I don’t usually enjoy Soulslikes, but this one is winning me over

digitaltrends.com:

I have a love-hate relationship with Soulslike games. Well, more hate than love.

I’ve played almost all of FromSoftware’s Souls games, from Demon’s Souls to Elden Ring, but have bounced off them hard. Outside of those games, I occasionally find one I enjoy on the indie scene, like Another Crab’s Treasure, but even then, those both had downsides that prevented me from saying I’ve ever truly loved a Soulslike. That’s finally changing with Void Sols, a self-prescribed “minimalist Soulslike.”

We’re entering a minimalist moment for some well-trodden video game genres. Earlier this year, SoulGame Studios’ Minishoot’ Adventures combined twin-stick shooters with The Legend of Zelda’s formula to create something special. Now, Finite Reflection Studios and Modern Wolf have done the same, but with the Soulslike genre. By removing a lot of the noise that can surround Souslikes, boiling down the genre to its basics, and including some helpful gameplay-modifying options, Void Sols has become one of my favorite Soulslike games.

Going minimalist

Void Sols begins with me breaking out of their prison cell. I fight my way out of that and then through the surrounding forest, village, mountain, mine, and more. Combat is stamina-based, so methodically dodging enemy attacks before striking with a flurry of my own is critical to staying alive. I obtain “Sols” after killing enemies but drop them when I die. I’ll lose them forever if I die before getting them back and redeeming them for a level-up at a Light Spark, Void Sols’ version of a campfire.

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If you’ve played a Soulslike before, that will all sound incredibly familiar to you. The twist with Void Sols is that there’s barely any story or lore, the player and enemy are simple geometric shapes, and the whole thing is played from a top-down perspective like Asteroids. As long as I make sure the triangle I’m playing as isn’t