Lost Soul Aside has been stuck in development for a long time. It’s understandable given it started life from a solo developer until Sony stepped in and assisted with it finally seeing the light of day. On the surface, the shiny visuals and fancy trailers make it look like an almost carbon copy of Final Fantasy XV. The brooding Kaser, the ancient evil, the evil empire: it all checks out. But while it does feeling too familiar at times, it is the combat that stands out as its best feature. Just don’t expect an engaging story or a particularly smooth presentation.
There are some glaring issues with Lost Soul Aside. While fighting enemies almost always feels fun, the platforming elements are frustrating. Jumping feels floaty and unbalanced. Moving between platforms never feels like you’re going to make it safely. It’s almost like you’re in a space suit on the moon. There are also janky transitions between cutscenes, and whenever you have to interact with someone, it does that thing when it moves you into the correct position before anyone speaks. It lacks a smoothness that would have been greatly appreciated.
As Kaser, you are part of a resistance group known as Glimmer. While the empire you fight against seems like the main threat, things go from bad to worse when the world is invaded by the Voidrax. It starts off strong, introducing you to a bleak world when these interdimensional creatures begin to destroy everything, not caring about the Empire, Glimmer, or anyone else. They steal souls to fuel their race, and when your sister Louisa gets taken, things start to pick up. The story is as bombastic as you’d expect, even though it feels like you’ve seen it all before.
The pacing of Lost Soul Aside is slow to start with. It takes a long time until things start to pick up as far as the action goes, but when it does, it’s invigorating. While fighting against enemies can really open up when you gain new abilities with your companion Arena (the floaty crystalline being you’ll see in trailers) along with new weapons, there’s little to do outside of the main story. Side missions or extra tasks would help to break up Kaser’s journey. While the story has some good moments, it’s familiarity holds it back from doing anything particularly exciting, so having other things to do would have helped.
So then, the combat. Kaser has light and heavy attacks that allow you to build combos. You can dodge and parry, leading to some twitch-heavy moments where battles feel strategic as well as intense. When you get new abilities, everything blends into something greater. Arena is always on offer to help in battle, with AoE attacks like lightning strikes and huge energy orbs that deal damage. It can also heal you during battle and strengthen the damage Kaser deals, making it a worthy addition to the already impressive arsenal.
As fast as fights can feel, you always feel in control regardless of how many enemies you’re staring down at once. New weapons like the Greatsword can break defences with ease, and the Poleblade is superb at distance. There’s also an ability that can be activated by pressing the trigger buttons together, called Fusion Merge, helping to empower your attacks for a short duration. When mastered, the combat is superb. There’s such freedom to fight against the enemy, all soaked in beautiful visuals.
This is highlighted by the boss battles in Lost Soul Aside. There’s plenty of diversity in these encounters, and almost all of them give you opportunity after opportunity to flex your muscles and utilise every trick in the combat handbook. If only everything worked as well as the fighting, we’d be talking very differently about Ultizero Games’ debut. As long as it has been in development, it still needed more time. Regardless, it’s still impressive the journey this game has been on to give us something that can still be enjoyed.
Lost Soul Aside has a copy and paste Final Fantasy story with some questionable voice acting. The score, as good as it is, never quite hits the highs of similar RPG action titles. Traversal is clunky and slow, and there’s a lack of polish to various elements from dialogue interactions to cutscenes. Yet, despite these issues, the world is gorgeous and the combat is superb. If you can look past the pacing issues and its other various problems, there’s a lot of enjoyment to be had from its deep battle mechanics and stunning art style.
