Rei wakes up in the Ultravoid, dazed and confused. She is a voidrunner, which means she uses advanced technology to explore black holes. Unfortunately, the Ultravoid is an exceptionally massive black hole with Rice’s home planet trapped in its vacuum. Time is of the essence; Rei was sent into the void as part of a team to activate the Starseed, a device designed to collapse the black hole and save their planet. But their allies are gone, and the Ultravoid has native defenses in the form of ink-like monsters. With gloomy stakes and Ave Maria solutions, it is worth accompanying Reis solo mission in this impressive high-speed action platformer to its surprising end.
To activate the Starseed, six Remains must be killed, giant beasts that rule the handful of biomes in the ultra-galaxy. Awakening these titans is the first step that involves destroying giant eyeballs attached to them that are scattered across the landscapes. Fortunately, Rei is a nimble explorer. Solar Ash is all about the flow of movement, and it’s a wonderful rush to get around in the Ultravoid. Rice skating feels quick but controlled; I’ve never lost control if it wasn’t my fault, even in the most difficult of areas. Even better, it instantly regains speed when it needs to slow down. With relish I jumped over floating ruins, bubbling pools of lava and acidic waterfalls with calculated ruthlessness thanks to the professional placement of platforms and slide rails. No matter how far I jumped, my goal was always to land.
Lock-on grip points and a slow motion aiming mechanic work well and are perfectly woven into platform puzzles. I just wish the transition between the grind rails was faster. Given the speed of Reis Grinding and how far it can shoot, crossing Rails is easy because they are so close together.
I used to say “wow” every time I entered a new biome. Solar Ash is beautiful. Its distinctive color palette and an almost spherical world design give the experience a dreamlike quality. You can walk up and around this cosmic playground from seemingly impossible angles, and looking over inverted landscapes is always a trippy treat. Each area adds fun twists that take advantage of your movement, like wearing fast-fading mushroom spores to color-coordinated knots to sprout vines for grinding.
Everything in the game is there to keep you moving, and that extends to simple but satisfying hack-and-slash combat as well. Most enemies fall after just a few hits, which means you can easily kill them without stopping. Gracefully exterminating enemies while artfully dodging their attacks always feels cool. My favorite encounters are against the Remains. These towering monsters come in a variety of shapes and sizes, including a two-legged warrior or a flying bat-like creature. They essentially act as moving platform puzzles and are the final tests of your skills. Racing across their squirming forms to quickly shatter knots over their bodies is a reflex-focused white knuckle affair that made me hold my breath and pump my fist in triumph. It’s frustrating vaporizing for too long and vaporizing back on the ground, but that was usually due to a wrong choice in my platforming and was often fixed by a quick course correction.
I also appreciate the elegant, clean overall design of Solar Ash. I wasn’t burdened with complicated mechanics or even new skills for Rei. She maintains the same little skills throughout the experience, with suits providing useful passive buffs to collect, such as: B. Attacks to restore health or increased speed increases. Along the way, you will collect money in the form of plasma which will only be used to improve your health. Oddly, however, defeating each remnant triggers a sequence that removes a level of health. I’m not sure what’s the point of constantly dumping thousands of plasma to regain the same vanishing hit point, but I’m not a fan of that.
Another highlight is Solar Ash’s gripping story about despair and hope despite all adversities. I felt for Rei who is a novice who is accidentally burdened with the weight of her entire species. The story develops her almost stubborn optimism and sense of duty in an effective – and surprising – way that I will not spoil. I came to Solar Ash expecting to be indifferent to Rei, and I am pleasantly surprised to find the opposite.
Sprinting around the world is fun, but I was more than willing to slow down to absorb the fascinating story along the edges that flesh out the story of Ultravoid. Diary entries present fascinating survival stories from those trapped in the void. While these story beats are positioned as a sideline, it seems necessary to uncover the tragic arcs of Reis ‘allies and the few surviving NPCs as they feed into Reiss’ character development and the main story themes of loss, regret and isolation. An outstanding story is about a native of the void who grapples with his race’s tradition of sacrificing himself to sustain the cycle of life and death. The writing even does a great job of keeping you interested in CYD, your AI helper and loyal companion, as the loneliness of the Ultravoid will eventually raise its head.
Solar Ash let me race through its cloud-covered playgrounds in the early hours of the morning in search of the next fun platform segment. In the remaining hours I ran to see the end of his gripping story. Solar Ash exudes just as much substance as it does style and ensures an all-round entertaining play of space.