Titan Souls | a Review
originally published on 13/12/2024;
Hello everyone, I am the titan of gaming, G.E.M.Simov, a being so massive I take up four screens worth of space, and I’ve come to tell you about “Titan Souls“.
Simple review details - I rank games on an out of 10 basis, granting up to 3 points in 3 categories, as well as a last, single point from my own self, depending on my experience with it.
Gameplay
This game is a top-down boss-rush with one or two “puzzles” strewn about it. It is made to be challenging - so much so that it is barely beatable unless the Player figures out almost everything related to the bosses they are fighting, be it movement, timing - all those things.
The game can be played with a keyboard, but it strongly recommends that the Player use a gamepad (a controller). That is an understatement, for some fights are nearly impossible with the keyboard, and on the challenge modes - they are literally impossible on the keyboard. Thus, this game needs to be played with a controller.
There are four buttons that get used when playing Titan Souls - both joysticks for movement and aiming, the X button for rolling (to dodge) and the Square button for firing the Arrow. In addition to that, holding down the X button allows for sprinting, while holding down the Square button, after having fired the Arrow, makes it return to the Player Character (PC).
Now, I said both joysticks for movement and aiming, and that is partially true. The Right joystick makes the camera move around, thus supposedly allowing for better aiming. However, the crux here is that the aiming in this game sucks, so no matter how many means of providing a vantage point the game gives the Player, it will still be unreasonably challenging to aim wherever the Player wants to aim.
That’s mostly owed up to the Presentation of the game - no aiming reticle, everything is pixel-based so the Arrow point can’t point in all 360 possible directions, instead having like 36 possible positions or something along those lines, even though the game requires incredibly precise shots.
Not only that, but the fact that whatever it is that the Player needs to shoot at is, typically, not on top of the PC, which leads into the Player being unable to use the tip of the Arrow as it is being nocked to aim, thus generating great room for error. The fact that the Player needs to have faith in the controller’s joystick is already problematic enough, but giving the Player nearly no other means of actually aiming is even more troublesome.
Couple that with needing to aim down the sights and fire an Arrow within less than half a second, which is nearly impossible to manage for the average human, due to the fact that the game has another HORRIBLE design choice.
Whenever the Player taps the Square button - the one meant to fire the bow - nothing happens. This game features the ability to hold down the Square button to pull back the bowstring and thus fire the Arrow further. While holding down the Square button, the Arrow will not be fired, allowing for aiming. That’s all well and good, but when the game requires that the Player aims down the sights within less than half a second, and shoots within that same window, making it so the Player can not shoot an arrow by tapping the Square button, even if at the lowest applicable power and with lessened accuracy, is ridiculous.
On the one hand, it can be argued that due to the fact aiming is necessary, the Player needs to have a window of opportunity to aim down the sights - and that’s why holding down the button holds the Arrow and does not release it. But needing to hold the button down for at least a third of a second before being able to fire is, simply put, a bad design choice that only serves to impede the Player’s progress and lessen the overall enjoyment derived from the game.
Again, I need to reiterate that this game wants the Player to shoot very precisely at specific targets, which targets move constantly, within less than half of a second, whilst requiring that the Player spends half of that window unable to fire at the target. Simply ludicrous.
That issue aside, the game is challenging for one other reason - the bosses all kill the PC in one hit and fire off a large multitude of attacks that provide nearly no breathing room. Fortunately, most of the bosses also die in one hit, so the game is all about managing to avoid making mistakes (after making many mistakes in the process of memorizing the bosses’ attack patterns) and finding the opening to kill the boss.
The world is very barren, with the only thing to do in it being to kill bosses (and solve two very rudimentary puzzles). There are gates stopping the PC’s ability to pass through, requiring that a number of bosses be killed, with the tutorial gate requiring 4 bosses and the proper gate requiring 6, though those 6 can be any out of a larger number (as there are more than 6 bosses accessible around the proper gate).
That’s cool, though it’s also quite pointless. The bosses that are extra do not provide any bonuses for being killed, so they’re just there for the Player to fight and enjoy fighting them. However, with the issues previously discussed, fighting the bosses is not as fun as it could be and, due to the challenging nature of the game, it becomes tedious and unpleasant to fight them, because the Player figures out what the solution to the fight is and then spends 30 to 60 minutes trying to time their shot right, with the main reason for not succeeding being the bad design of the Arrow firing mechanic.
Regardless, the game features around twenty bosses and each of them is quite unique when compared to all the others, with the exceptions of the fourth and the second to last boss, which are very similar in both design and mechanics, though the latter has more of them and is harder.
Then, after beating the game, the Player unlocks three new modes of play - the challenge modes. One that requires the Player beat the game without dying, one that is simply Hard mode - essentially making the window of opportunity even smaller and just forcing the Player into a session of violent CBT - and a no-rolling mode. Fortunately, the game recognizes that Hard mode is literally impossible without rolling, and so the Player cannot combine Hard mode and the no-rolling mode, but every other set of combinations is available - no-rolling + no deaths or Hard mode + no deaths are perfectly legit.
On top of all of that, there are also many bosses that are simply impossible without rolling, but there are 12 of them that can be beaten without rolling, so the no-roll challenge is possible.
With that said, the game is not inherently bad, even if it makes a horrible decision that makes it more frustrating than fun. The bosses are all very well designed, featuring a plethora of interesting mechanics and a very obvious weak spot that should get hit by the Arrow.
Now, one other thing that was not mentioned earlier - the Arrow, when fired, remains wherever it wound up. It can be pulled back towards the PC by holding down the Square button (which requires that the PC stand in place, as with normally firing and aiming down the sights). While pulling back the Arrow, it can hit weak spots and kill bosses, but it needs to travel a bit of distance to speed up enough.
This mechanic is plagued by weird collision detection, meaning that it sometimes goes through solid objects (the Arrow) and then it cannot be pulled back from the position where it was fired, requiring that the Player change their approach so that they can get their Arrow and fire it again. Lastly, one other way of retrieving the Arrow is by walking over it, but that tends to require very precise movement.
In conclusion, this game is a very mixed bag when it comes to how fun it is to play it. On the one hand, it is very simple, yet those few mechanics that are present are strained to their very limits, displaying truly interesting and unique approaches to certain things. On the other hand, the challenge that the game presents feels artificial, due to the fact that the control scheme is lacking, and a number of things that should be easy to do are actually a lot more difficult.
The faults are overwhelming, but the amount of replayability and the feeling of catharsis provided by beating a boss, be it under ordinary circumstances or on one of the challenge modes, is very satisfying. 2/3
Presentation
Titan Souls makes use of pixel art to present itself to the Player. Pixel-based graphics are a fantastic approach to doing things, especially when it comes to making things look cute and endearing, which is what Titan Souls seems to want to do, drawing inspiration from films by Studio Ghibli and the game “Shadow of the Colossus”, which is also quite reminiscent of the filmography mentioned earlier.
The game looks very simple, as it does not clutter the screen with details, though what is present is well enough made that it works wonders. The environments are varied and interesting, and there are even some things in said environments that react to the Player’s actions. Now, I said it is pixel based, and at the very least it appears to be so, though all the bosses - or at least a decent number of them - look as though they are 3D models OR as though they are made out of polygons.
They don’t stick out like sore thumbs, though, instead fitting into the world perfectly, so that’s not actually a problem, though it would appear that the game only looks as though it is 2D and based on sprites, instead having a 3D space and 3 proper Dimensions (such as height). Achieving a 2D look while maintaining 3D does have its drawbacks, but more on that later.
What the main success of this game is is the User Interface, and the fact that there is none (excluding the menu used to access the game’s settings and to quit the game), which is fantastic. Diegetic design is fantastic, and Titan Souls is purely diegetic - everything is depicted in such a manner that it perfectly fits into the world itself. How much ammo the Player Character has is shown by the presence of an arrow on their back, how much progress and what the next task is can be gleaned from looking at the door or floor ornaments - overall, this game does diegetic User Interface immaculately.
Of course, the weak points of the bosses are presented fantastically, being a clearly different color and also being visually distinct from the rest of the boss, thus clearly communicating to the Player what the important thing (that needs to get dealt with) is.
The tutorial is strangely tautological, due to the fact that it features a sublime diegetic component, but then there’s text that shows up on screen to inform the Player which buttons do what, even though at that same time there are walls with paintings that depict the appropriate button and the action performed with it. That’s more odd than bad.
What is problematic, however, is the fact that whenever the Player’s Arrow is fired off somewhere, it can somewhat mix in with the ground - especially when that ground is blue or white, and even more so when that ground is obscured by bits of terrain created by the enemies, which is very unfortunate and can result in the Player Character’s death.
In addition to that, it is hard to tell where the Player’s Arrow is going to go whenever it is fired, whether it be because of the lack of aiming reticle or due to the fact that everything is pixelated and so the arrow does not have a means of portraying its direction (out of 360 possible ones), which further impedes the Player.
With that put aside, this game has an incredible quantity of musical scores that accompany not only the trips from boss to boss, but also each boss - all the bosses have a unique song associated with them, which song seems to react to the state of the fight, which is absolutely amazing. Couple with that the superb sound effects, and the result is an almost incredible visual treat! 2/3
Story
Titan Souls has a story, though it is presented in a manner very similar to what Dark Souls has become infamous for. It is there, but the Player needs to go out of their way to get to it, and even then there is no certainty that the story is properly discovered and understood.
The way the story is told is also quite curious, requiring that the Player beat the game once to be able to glean almost half, if not more, of the lore that is to be found in it. Even so, though, there is very little to be found, and the story is a very simple one.
The Player Character has split their soul in three pieces, putting one in their bow, one in an Arrow and one back in themselves, and has traveled to a mountain wherein dwell the Titans. The Player Character then fights and kills all the Titans, taking the souls that were within them to grow in power, until they reach themselves - or, rather, the Titan Soul’s Image - and then they fight it, too.
Having defeated the Image of the Titan Soul, and having consumed the Titan Soul, the Player Character fights Truth, destroys it and absorbs it, becoming one with it.
And that’s pretty much it. There’s a bit more to it, found in murals spread over the game world and requiring interpretation, there’s also some visual story-telling done with a few of the Bosses and a bunch of likely interactions or relationship between them, but everything is so vague and esoteric that it could be simply stuff that one comes up with as a means of explaining the world.
It’s neat, but it is nothing special. 1/3
Legendary Point
Does this game get the legendary point, so craved and wanted by all and none at the same time? No, as unfortunate as it is. Titan Souls had me thinking that I was going to give it the point, just from the videos and screenshots that are found on Steam and other platforms that accommodate those things, but playing it proved to be more of a chore than a fun time, as a result of which it does not get the Legendary Point. 0/1
Conclusion
5/10. Titan Souls is a very average game. It has its moments, but then it also has anything but moments, and also looks very nice. I’d recommend it to fans of difficult, challenging games, and not many others.
In the bag of mediocrity it goes, to gather dust and generate sighs of disappointment.