Atlus' latest work " Soul Hacker 2" is released. This is a sequel that has been around for more than 20 years. The previous work "Devil Summoner: Soul Hacker" was first released on the Saturn platform of Sega in 1997. It is traced to the origin of " True Goddess Reincarnation ". However, the release of "Soul Hacker 2" does not include any prefix in the name, which is quite independent. The advantage of this is to completely remove the existing works and start a new job with confidence. So, what completely different gaming experience will a brand new attempt bring to players?
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New series, new settings and characters
Different from the apocalyptic background of the "Reincarnation of the True Goddess" series and the campus storm of " Persona ". The background setting of the "Soul Hacker" series has a strong light science fiction atmosphere. The previous work "Soul Hacker 1" described in a forward-looking way in the early stages of the development of the Japanese Internet, which is still in its prototype, and the exciting level of the "Soul Hacker 2" is not diminished at all. "Aion", one of the core settings of this work, is very conceptual. This is a form of advanced intelligence consciousness born in the "information ocean". It exists in pursuit of eternal evolution (sounds similar to the information integrated life form in "Haruhi Suzumiya"). In order to save the crisis in the human world, two women, Aion, Lin and Feige, have been physicalized and started to contact human society. I have to say that the concept of the mixing of technology, AI and soul in the game is really quite good for me.
The plot development of this work basically revolves around this thing: Lin Gong and Feige gathered their partners to investigate the five "covenants" closely related to the fate of mankind, and prevent them from falling into the hands of the villain "Iron-faced Man". This simple plot has filled the game's nearly 20 to 30 hours of process. The story has not brought many emotional turmoil or eye-catching developments along the way - the plot process is greatly diluted by the maze and the battle, and only two broadcasts are interspersed in the key boss battle before and after the battle. There is little content and the plot is a bit routine, which has led to my personal personal loss of expectations for the plot of the game in the later stage.
In addition, the character creation of this work did not meet my expectations. The heroine's character (Aion) sounds very profound, but her performance in the game is no different from that of ordinary girls. Even the attribute of "three nos" is not the case. The character's strength in the plot is also very limited, making people unable to feel the charm exuded by the character's personality.
It is commendable that the production team puts a large number of plots that shape team members in the maze map called "Soul Hub". We can dig deep into the hearts of each character and enhance the character's abilities. The whole process is very free. When we return to the main plot, we can concentrate on finding the "Iron-faced Man".
Scene shaping in the soul hub Shangke
Finish the plot, let’s talk about art. The first thing that made me interested in games was the heroine's outstanding look - her bright blue and yellow hair, her slender and exaggerated body proportions, and her typical Japanese awl face, with impeccable image and temperament. All this may be attributed to the character design of this work - cartoonist Shiro Milou. His neat lines and handsome and beautiful style contribute to us a group of cool second-dimensional handsome men and beautiful women. In addition, combined with the excellent and delicate modeling of the game, it is really pleasing to the eye. The modeling of this work, compared with the " Real Goddess Reincarnation 5" released last year, is more cartoonish and high-definition, with less heavy colors, but softer, making the monsters look even less terrifying. Perhaps this is also to adapt to the less desperate worldview of this work. Although the gameplay of "Soul Hacker 2" is still the one that Atlus is familiar with - Maze, Turn-Based and Zhongmo (previously, Persona 5" and "Reincarnation of the True Goddess 5", this work did not copy the advantages of both, but adopted a new idea.
The map of "Soul Hacker 2" has two main functions.
1. Provides various functional stores.For example, you can take on tasks at the entrustment office, buy equipment at the jewelry store, communicate with your peers at the bar counter, and get a buff when eating in the store street. With full functions, almost all common elements in JRPG can be found here.
2. Maze. The rest of the map content available for exploration in this game is a maze, and walking the maze accounts for most of the game process. This design style is truly Atlus' "original" masterpiece. However, this game's maze design is quite friendly. The design of Minglei on the enemy can help players avoid many unnecessary battles (unless you are here to level up), and you can also get a first-mover advantage by chopping down the enemy. But compared with the design of other Atlus games, the maze of this game seems a bit mediocre.
First of all, the mechanisms in the maze have not changed much. Just like the fog of war, you can basically find the exit by running around for a while. Of course, as the game process progresses, the maze also has more gameplay designs, such as the one-way channel design and teleportation design in the maze, but most of the time players are still on the way to run and kill monsters. A slightly boring process will be worn out even if you have a great patience. After staying in the maze for a long time, supply becomes a problem. My biggest feeling during the game is that the amount of blue is not enough, and when I am in the empty blue state, I have to run back to the teleportation point to go home to replenish supplies. When we arrived at the pure maze link of "soul hub", the structure and complexity of the maze have risen sharply. I almost refused every hour, but after rejecting, the strength of the characters may be a little unsatisfied, making it difficult to choose. In short, the experience of this part is really a bit disgusting.
This game has also made microinnovations on the classic weakness mechanism in JRPG, and has added a new "Magic Banquet" skill, which can cause AOE damage to the enemy before the end of our turn. The more times the enemy's weakness is hit, the higher the number of layers superimposed. You can also use relevant skills to further strengthen, such as increasing stacking efficiency (spread two layers at a time), and the skills will be accompanied by healing, defense reduction and other effects. Before
is launched, there is even an animation
. If you say that the mechanism is useful, it will really increase the damage. But in terms of significance, I really can't see much. Because not hitting a weak point in this game is basically equivalent to scraping, so finding weaknesses has become a natural thing. The biggest function of this skill may be to speed up a lot of combat rhythms. Compared with the game between the enemy and us in "Reincarnation of True Goddess 5", the "Demon Banquet" shows obvious shortcomings in terms of depth and fun.
Zhongmo is the most interesting and in-depth gameplay of this game, as the feature that Atlus has always adhered to. Zhongmo = player's attributes and skills = player's body. As many as 187 kinds of Zhongmo and various effects skill combinations, combined with complex synthesis rules, the team of four people has extremely high freedom to match. Players can also use Zhongmo to combine Zhongmo to retain powerful and useful skills, and to create the ultimate Zhongmo whose attributes and skills are invincible. Players can change Zhongmo at any time during the battle, which also makes the battle process more changeable. You need to prepare Zhongmo with different attributes to prevent temporary needs. Atlus once again verified the success of this system.
When we look closely at the Zhongmo system of this game, we will also find that Atlus has made many fine-tunings. First of all, the search is more convenient, and you can find out the magic you don’t have for synthesis. Secondly, some Zhongmo's exclusive skills are gone, such as the eight jumps of the Yuanyijing - I don't know why this change was made, but it is not a problem. At most, the old fans of sentiment may be a little sad. Finally, there is a reduction in the skill column, from the maximum of 8 slots in "True Goddess Reincarnation 5" to the maximum of 6 slots (there were only 4 slots at the beginning). Many useful skills have to be replaced during the upgrade process, which is equivalent to a strategy of combining Zhongmo's strength and skills, making people feel like a knife. In short, the system did not take steps forward based on previous success, and the actual effects achieved also made players even more uncomfortable.
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Conclusion
Looking at the game "Soul Hacker 2", if you screw it out, it is a pretty good work, but you can never ignore those pretty parts. After all, this work only has 70 points in the basic framework parts that have been verified by predecessors. The only highlights are not enough to watch compared to the previous excellent series. All of this makes this game a bit embarrassing, as if it was already standing on the shoulders of a giant, Atlus chose to jump backwards as unexpectedly as everyone could have.
