These days, I don’t usually slam games that much (except Diablo III recently), and personally I felt I am getting more receptive about bad quality stuff. But when a game is marketed and developed as a full action side-scroller, the 1 important things which must at least be good, is of course the combat. Soul Slasher managed to somehow go over my level of tolerance for incompetency.
Announced last year by China’s no.2 online gaming company, NetEase, Soul Slasher was categorized as a “Fighting MMO”, which is definitely not true at all. Trying out 1 of 3 available classes currently, the combat is clunky, unresponsive and mediocre at best. Try moving around with the WASD keys, and normal attack with the “J” key. What is worse, going through quest dialogues allows continuation using the space-bar key, yet when choosing a decision, the mouse has got to be used. And there are no options to edit the keys!
More about the combat. Characters can’t move and attack. If you are moving forward and press the attack key, you will stop moving and attack. What?! Having a fast, smooth and responsive combat is a 100% “must” in any action MMO, and even if Soul Slasher has tons of other features coming up, it will never help solve the root problem. Do you know Soul Slasher is apparently going on consoles in the future, with demos available at ChinaJoy? Talk about priorities.
Blue Tears is still the best action side-scroller I tried for the past few months, it is a pity the game is showing no signs of an English release. Trust me, Blue Tears is da bomb. For NetEase, I will just wait for the much anticipated Dragon Sword, and stay away from its other new games for the time being.
