Solar Ash

+ Now the last of positives being the plot, lore and storytelling.

considering its cousin and soon to be niece, i dont think some of you ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ understand that this is not hyperlight in gameplay, hyperlight is swag, nice game, cool story, like that show dont tell aspect regarding our favorite little cancer ridden veteran, and hard as ♥♥♥♥, this is not that, you can play the most forgiving difficulty and still get both of the regular ending achievments, when hyperlight breaker comes out and mf's scream from their neon magenta tinged soap boxes clutching their chests and screaming out that its not brutally hard enough before falling over from a reference(heart attack), realize that this is both a different game, and a different medium to hyperlight.

regarding my love of the game i picked this sucker up some year ago, played it a bit and forgot it like so many other impulse buys that i didn't exactly want to return. i recently re-picked up the game, beating over the course of one night after starting a new save. i definitely got pissed at points but polished it out of my own volition, not for le funny internet points, or for bragging rights, but because i wanted to(nah i need that imaginary number on my profile to go up man). i like the colors, i like the flat but not lacking in detail textures, i like that my computer doesn't have an aneurysm trying to run the game like so many other unoptimized 3d singleplayer games, i like rei, even if she's blind to the nature of the void for lore reasons, cause like denial and ♥♥♥♥. i like that although the area's are pretty locked i can still openly explore and ♥♥♥♥ around skipping portions of areas by walking on the outside exterior of a structure because the boundings almost always accurately mimic the models. i like that the caches are never really ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ and even stand out, where you never need to use shenanigans to access one. i will say i wish the absolution skin wasn't accessible through saves, cause imma be real in saying i abused its presence to beat my hardcore save.

+ The whole OST and sound design is solid to say the least, but personally I loved it just as much as the visual side of things!

This game still runs verrrry poorly on the Steam Deck - which sucks, because I specifically asked for this game as a gift since I really like the IDEA of this game.

Solar Ash also deliver a really cool and fluid movement system and it play perfectly fine with mouse and keyboard despite the game clearly telling you it's best played with a controller.