Does anyone remember the classic 1990 SNES game ActRaiser? It was a combo-style game of both a side-scrolling action game, and an over-the-top strategy style castle defense. Using both of these created a unique style of gameplay and all of it combined made it an obscure cult classic. But Sega got together with ACE team, the minds behind Rock of Ages and Zeno Clash, as they didn’t forget about this small title, which had succeeded during its time and faded since then, when they developed the spiritual successor, SolSeraph.
In SolSeraph players take on the role of the Knight of Dawn, an angel for hire and the guardian of humanity named Helios. As Helios, your job is to help build the community for the village, their settlements, their defenses, and when times call for it, help protect these settlement and people. There won’t be staying in just one location, a there are many village and tribe to help in the adventure. Each tribe will have their own set of needs and requirements for how the settlement is to be built. And when you’re done with that, you can seek out the monsters and take care of them personally.
That’s where the second part of the game play comes in; the side-scrolling adventure. This is where players will be jumping, running, hitting a lot of things with your sword, or blocking with a shield, or using Helio’s magical archery to finish the level. A lot of the inspiration from ActRaiser can be seen here, mostly in the pseudo 3-d backgrounds which was popularized by the SNES Mode 7 graphics. Adding onto the spiritual successor, the original score write for ActRaiser, Yuzo Koshiro, is returning to do the title theme for SolSeraph. Joining Koshiro is acclaimed The Talos Principle writer, Jonas Kyrazes, bringing some of his work into SolSeraph‘s compelling narrative.
SolSeraph is set to come out on July 10, for PC, PS4, Xbox One, and Nintendo Switch for $14.99 USD. Help rebuild humanity, and beat up some monsters while you’re at it.