Review #259: Saint Seiya - Soldiers' Soul

 Burn, my Cosmo!

 It's no secret that I'm not fond of Saint Seiya. The story is dumb and, most of the time, makes no sense. But I can respect the concept behind it, teenagers fighting in colorful and shiny armors, with unique signature attacks and all that jazz. So that's the beauty behind the videogame: You get the concept, without the story.

 Soldiers' Souls is, basically, what Brave Soldiers should have been. Gameplay has been polished, and it's much tighter this time around, more characters and in-game unlockables and more modes. Let's start with the characters; the previous game's roster was made up of mostly clones... that hasn't changed. The new characters are Asgard's God Warriors and Hilda, for a total of 8 new characters... mostly, Bud and Syd play almost exactly the same, they are even more cloney than Saga and Kannon. Then there's the new 12 Gold Saints wearing the God Cloths.... which play exactly like their normal counterparts, except that they are 'broken.' These 12 characters build up their cosmo gauge extremely fast, and their 'Big Bang Attacks'(Ultras) have no startup whatsoever, basically, if you are not playing as any of these 12 characters, you are handicapping yourself. Ikki, Shun, Hyoga and Shiryu get their God Cloths as well, but not the enhanced cosmo gain. As a matter of fact, you can now change which Big Bang attack you want to use at the character select screen, but the Big Bang Attacks haven't been touched up at all, so they still get almost uncomboable start up times.

 All the modes and VS variations from the previous game return, alongside a new 'Battle of Gold' mode and a revised Story Mode. The new Story Mode is much more detailed, and while the cutscenes reek of a short budget, they are serviceable. That said, the mode itself is a drag, each 'chapter' is made up of two fights against the SAME enemy, and there's so much exposition with little more than flapping mouths. What's worse is that this is the only way to unlock characters, and you only start with 5 Saints at the start of the game. If you played the previous game, you are mostly unlocking what you already unlocked the last time around! As for Battle of Gold, the what if scenarios are moderately amusing, but for whatever reason they decided that you needed to buy 'torches' in order to proceed. Not only is it annoying, since costumes are expensive, but if you run out of torches you just can't buy them at the chapter select, oh no, you have to go all the way back to the main menu, then collection, then the store. On the other hand, all the DLC costumes from the previous game can be bought for in-game currency, and the game has no DLC, major props for that!

 But what really matters, Gameplay, has seen major improvements. Firstly, cosmo is much harder to gain, so combos are no longer worthless! Controls have been reworked, so no awkward fingers gymnastics to pull off the different special moves, just hold R2 and then Square, Triangle or Circle. All characters now have access to a new move, 'Photon', which is basically a weak projectile, although there's about 4 or 5 different types of Photons shared among the cast. Lastly, and this pertains the PS3 port only, the game has a few framerate issues during Big Bang Attack cutscenes and when Hypnos or Thanatos use their normal moves, but they are tolerable.

 Saint Seiya Soldiers' Souls is a decent time waster for the uninterested in the franchise, and a more than decent game for fans. I dare say that the game has more depth than your average licensed fighter, but don't expect to see it played competitively any time soon.
 6.0 out of 10