On April 6, the Oddworld: Soulstorm adventure game from the Oddworld Inhabitants studio was released. The game is available on PC, PS4 and PS5. In the latter case, you can try it with a PS Plus subscription.

An unprepared person has a question: what is this Oddworld yet? Those of our readers who at one time had the first PlayStation are most likely familiar with such strange words as mudokons, sligs, glucons and RuptureFarms. For those who have no idea what this is about, I will try to tell everything in this review on Oddworld: Soulstorm.

Who are the mudokons, Abe, and what’s going on here?

To begin with, a little excursion. The first part of Oddworld was released in 1997 and was called Oddworld: Abe’s Oddysee. In 2014, they released a remake of it for modern systems.

The story of Oddworld tells about an intelligent race with the funny name Mudokona or Madakona. How it is right there, I do not know for certain. So, the main character named Abe is a janitor at a meat factory, which is not doing well. The leadership exterminated several species of animals, after which they had the question of what to further make their products from.

Here the main antagonist, Director Molluk, enters the scene. This insidious type of the glukon race, without hesitation, decides to start producing new products from factory slaves, those same mudokons. Abe accidentally overhears the conversation of the management, he is noticed by the guards, and he goes on the run. This is where our long journey through the Oddworld universe begins, which includes several games and re-releases.

The sequel, Oddworld: Abe’s Exoddus, came out a year after the release of the first part. Then a couple more games in the universe followed – Oddworld: Munch’s Oddysee (2001) and Oddworld: Stranger’s Wrath (2005), which differed in style and moved from 2D to 3D perspective. They were subsequently re-released on PlayStation XNUMX, Playstation Vita, Windows, iOS and Android, so if you’re interested, there is an opportunity to review.

If we describe Oddworld very briefly, then the main games of the series are an adventure platformer where we need to run, jump, hide from enemies and save our relatives from certain death. The main character has several abilities – for example, he can speak, meditate and control not only a group of mudokons, but also take control of the minds of enemies, and also sneak on tiptoe and somersault, and the player must combine all this arsenal so as to successfully move around the game world. 

The main task is to survive and save as many representatives of their race as possible (the ending of the game depends on the number of saved: good or bad), sometimes using them for their own purposes, and then sending them to a safe place through the so-called bird portal. At the same time, if the main character catches the eye of the guard, it almost always means death both for him and for the whole group, which is why you have to carefully think over your actions. 

As for the hero of today’s review, Oddworld: Soulstorm, this is something like an extended remake of the second part – Oddworld: Abe’s Exoddus. Here’s how the project was described by the creator of the franchise, Lorne Lanning:

In fact, after the events of the first game, another story unfolded, much darker and darker. We never talked about it, but Soulstorm will allow us to add more detail to a famous plot and tell about familiar events from a different point of view.

In general, the new game begins with a video in which a couple of dumbfounded mudokons are going in an unknown direction on a train. Sligs (local enemies) are chasing them, and Abe sits like a zombie and stares at a luminous contraption of unknown purpose. Then the game rewinds the events 12 hours ago to show us the plot. 

So Abe escaped from the RuptureFarms factory, taking a crowd of his brothers with him. The guy became a hero among his own, everyone loves and revered him as a deity. Mudokons live relatively quietly in the cave, their potion is swollen, and the local shaman tells Abe about its purpose. Suddenly, the shelter is attacked, a commotion begins, a fire breaks out in the cave, everything burns and collapses, and here we are given control.

Run, jump and save the mudokons

Oddworld: Soulstorm is made, as the developers themselves call it, in 2,9D format. To put it simply, the outwardly game is a traditional platformer with a perspective familiar to this genre. At the same time, the characters and backdrops are three-dimensional, and the camera sometimes tries to show everything that happens from the most interesting angle, which makes the game more cinematic.

The first level is training. The player is given a task – to get out of the burning cave, and at the same time they are immediately introduced to the basic mechanics that should be known to everyone who has played Oddworld at least once. 

Through generously scattered prompts, we are told that this is how to run, jump (there is also a double jump, which greatly simplifies life), roll over and interact with the environment, but these are the boxes and trash cans, which contain bottles of water and a local tonic. Water can be used to extinguish the fire in order to go further along the level, and the potion, on the contrary, is useful to set someone or something on fire. A little later, we will be told how to use meditation to open locks, scout the area and take control of sligs.

In principle, at first, the gameplay will seem painfully familiar to all platformer lovers and will not cause any particular problems for most of the players. We run through the level, collect items, jump over the abyss, read the tips along the way, delving into the gameplay, and do our best not to die. However, do not rush to conclusions, you will have to die very often in this game.

The player is immediately given to understand that it would be nice to be more attentive and pay close attention to the nooks and crannies at the level (attentiveness and sniffer skills will still be useful to us in the future, when we need to look for mudokons in the corners), where you can find additional resources and various interesting plops like “ royal jelly “, which increases the maximum health. 

For digging in trash cans and boxes, for finding secret areas and saving mudokons, they give out badges. There are several of them in the game, including “Explorer”, “Scavenger”, “Hidden Help” and “Savior”. Badges are different – you can knock out bronze, silver, gold or platinum. For example, I climbed 50 trash cans, got gold, climbed only 20 of the available ones, I’m sorry, here’s a bronze for you, and so on. This moment is more likely made for those players who will not be able to sleep well if they do not knock out the next achievement.

After passing each level, the player can see his statistics, which includes the passage time, how many mudokons were saved, the number of enemies killed, and those very icons. Completion scores can be uploaded to the leaderboard to compare with other Soulstorm players.

A new indicator for the series is karma or kvarma, as it is called here. It depends on the player’s actions, namely on how many enemies we killed during the passage and the number of rescued relatives: the followers saved, killed and forgotten at the level are taken into account. 

The ending subsequently depends on karma: there is “bad” and “good”. To open the latter, you need to save at least 80% of the mudokons on at least 12 of 15 levels. The “good ending” includes two additional levels, bringing the total number of levels to 17. During the entire game, a gamer can save about 1400 mudokons. At the same time, we can completely score on the salvation of relatives, using them when necessary, for our own purposes, and then simply leaving them to their fate. The game will still be able to pass.

By the way, the developers told how to get this or that ending:

• If you save at least 80% of the mudokons at a maximum of six levels, then you will experience the worst ending. 
• If you achieve this at levels 7-11, you will unlock a bad ending with an explosive ending cutscene. 
• If you save 80% at least at levels 12-15, you will open a good ending, which includes another cutscene, as well as 16th and 17th levels. 
• If you manage to save 80% in each of the 17 levels, you will unlock a bonus ending (which includes a newspaper cut-scene). 

I confess, I got option two, because sometimes I couldn’t even figure out where to find the mudokons. It so happens that they are in the most unexpected places, and you need to purposefully look for them, keep this in mind. At one of the levels, I managed to miss 15 guys, and it was very disappointing. The levels, of course, can be replayed in a new way, there is such an opportunity here – this will come in handy if you really want to see a “good” ending. Regarding saves, checkpoints are generously placed on the levels, but you can only load from the latter. If you missed something along the way, and at the same time want to explore everything 100% and find the missed mudokons, you will have to start the stage anew and replay it entirely. If they died, and this happens here quite often, the game starts not a meter from the place of the character’s death, but, again, from the last checkpoint. 

Mudokons are divided, so to speak, into two types: almost at the very beginning, we come across sick guys who will have to be soldered with a potion, for which we will first need to find the ingredients, and then make the slurry out of them. Yes, there is craft in the game – the player is introduced to it gradually. Interestingly, we are not given the opportunity to transfer the accumulated trash to a new level. Each new stage will have to start with empty pockets.

It’s not worth worrying about, since resources can be found without problems and they are almost always abundant.

Crafting is made extremely simple: we collect the necessary trash and by pressing one button in a special menu we do what we need at a particular stage – mines that can be thrown at unlucky enemies at their feet, smoke pipes that will help to pass motion sensors or snipers, and so on … The game also features vending machines where you can exchange surplus resources for cash or buy other items. The arsenal is not that very large, new types of useful things that can be crafted will appear as the game progresses.

I’ll tell you about local enemies. At the first levels, everything will be limited to basic foot sligs, then flying sligs, dog-like creatures that can most often be found in dark caves, security systems, robots and flying mines will be added. Sligs either patrol their area, or just sleep, snoring all over the area. 

With those guards who are active, we cannot closely interact in any way. That is, they can be killed, for example, set on fire by throwing a can of potion into the fire, or stunned with a mine. There is also the ability to take control of the enemy, which cannot be done if there is a sphere (Orbit) hanging in the air nearby, which prevents Abe from meditating by shaking him with electricity. Another working option is to just score on the enemies and try to sneak quietly, but this does not work in all places, sometimes you have to engage in battle. 

In the case when the enemy is under Abe’s control, there are several options for what will happen next: either we press the circle on the controller, and the poor fellow is torn to pieces, or we shoot other guards, if any, or the main character runs out of energy for meditation. and the adversary, taken under control, falls unconscious. 

Enemies who are sleeping or unconscious after contact with the power of the protagonist can be tied up, after which they will not be dangerous, and they can be searched. Sometimes in this way it will turn out to find the keys to the lockers and any trash you need for crafting. 

I have complaints about the behavior of sligs. As an example, after going through the plot a little, we will get the opportunity to hide in lockers, and if we climb there right in front of the enemy’s nose, then he sees it, as if he knows that we are there, for a while, it is aggroing, running back and forth, that’s all. Well, that is, he will not go into the box to check, he will not watch Abe near him, but will simply pretend that nothing happened.

Or another example, I throw a smoke box right under the guard’s nose, but he doesn’t react in any way, he doesn’t care, as if it should be so. At the same time, if you pull the lever next to the league, which opens the locked door (it emits a characteristic sound), then it will react to this rather quickly. It is clear that these are conventions, but I, for example, would like to deal with more lively opponents, and the game from this would be a little more interesting, as it seems to me.

Gradually, the levels become more difficult, varied and more interesting, and the number of enemies increases. At the end of the game, it starts to smell like hardcore at all. You will definitely not get bored. 

And if the first hour, maybe two, can still be called dull in every sense, not causing any particular difficulties in passing, then later we will find ourselves in more colorful places. For example, to the station “Zhyr”, and a little later, the player is waiting for a train rushing at full steam – in my opinion, this is one of the best levels in the game. 

The only thing – I would like a greater variety of adversaries, but even the set that is in the game will give you a light.

The ability to save mudokons will appear some time after the start of Oddworld: Soulstorm. Guys are very useful when you need to perform some kind of synchronous action, for example, simultaneously press seven buttons to open the door. 

Mudokons repeat all actions after Abe (sometimes they are stupid, not without it), no matter what he does: sneak on tiptoe, they too, run fast, and they keep up. It becomes quite interesting when a crowd of individuals at 10-15 need to be led through a bunch of enemies, traps and abysses. Here you have to turn on your ingenuity to the fullest, because you do not want to see any of the wards hurt.

By the way, for Mudokons, the meeting with the guards does not always end with death, sometimes the guards immobilize them with a rope, after which the player still has the opportunity to save them. If there is a bird portal, and it is found almost everywhere where you need to save mudokons, I recommend that you immediately send your brothers there, and not drag them along. In addition, the player will have the opportunity to equip his followers with objects and weapons created by him, and they can play the role of not only obedient and fearful dummies, but also give battle to enemies. 

The gameplay is capable of delivering a lot of troubles. This is definitely not a game where you can break through, scattering everyone in your path. There are no weapons as such, in some cases the player has the opportunity to kill enemies, but this is more the exception than the rule. Most of the time here you have to sneak on tiptoe, hide in the corners and deceive the guards. And it would be fine if Abe was alone, so you still need to drag a crowd of dummies behind you, who are striving to fall into the clutches of the enemy or run into another trap. The game makes you strain your minds, think over almost every step and use all available resources and abilities. 

One more thing – there are several plot situations in the game that seemed difficult to me, when you need to save a whole swarm of mudokons, a couple of hundred at once: the player opens the gate for them, and they run away. The difficulty lies in the fact that guards are shooting at them at this time, and I never managed to save everyone. While you are struggling to neutralize one foe, jumping on platforms, others shoot the poor fellows with impunity.

I completely forgot to tell you about the interface. In principle, it is quite simple, and here you can limit yourself to a couple of sentences. In the upper right corner, the level of anxiety of the guards is displayed, in the lower – Abe’s indicators: energy for meditation (regenerates itself), health, the character icon that displays his transition and wards to stealth mode, and the item that is in his hands right now. In the upper left corner are the tasks, in the lower – the number of mudokons. Here you can immediately see how many we saved, how many active and killed, as well as their total number at the level.

By pressing the triangle on the gamepad, the crafting menu opens, where you can also transfer some things to other mudokons. If you hold down the triangle, we will get into the inventory – it is displayed in the form of a wheel with items available for use.

About the plot, I can only say that it is in the game, it is gradually developing and is not even devoid of intrigue. Before us is a story about an oppressed people and injustice, and it is Abe who gets the chance to save his race from lack of will and complete destruction. The game has several characters around which the whole story revolves, and everything is flavored with cut scenes and cutscenes. 

Juicy picture, DualSense support and … where are my saves !?

In terms of visuals, Oddworld: Soulstorm does not raise any particular questions for me. I don’t know how the game looks and plays on PS4, but on the new PlayStation, for the most part, everything is fine with both the picture and the FPS, with the exception of very rare drawdowns near the bird portals. The backdrops, characters, and the levels as a whole are perfectly drawn, Oddworld has had its own style since the time of the first part. Lighting and special effects are up to date. Not “wow”, of course, there are more beautiful games, but we have what we have.

The animations and voices of Abe and the mudokons under his control are a separate song. They are very touching, especially when the main character and his charges sneak on tiptoe. And when Abe comes to the edge of the abyss, the player will not only see how the character is afraid to fall down, but he will also hear the corresponding exclamation from him. Mudokons, when you save them, shout something like: “Oh, cool, freedom!” If you tell them “stop”, they start to be nicely indignant, like: “I don’t understand why we stopped!”

The music, written by Josh Gabriel, plays somewhere in the background and perfectly conveys the atmosphere of the world and the events taking place on the screen.

Prior to the release of Soulstorm, the developers boasted of support for DualSense chips. They are used here in a very metered manner. For example, during meditation, the L2 button is pressed with noticeable force. The gamepad vibrates in a certain way when Abe digs through the trash cans, and the motors knock in time with the movement of the protagonist along the level. But I didn’t have enough tactile feedback that would convey what surface the protagonist is walking on, as it was implemented in Astro’s Playroom. By the way, the voice of Abe and the mudokons comes from the controller speaker. Both vibration and the speaker in the game can be turned off in the settings.

And now about the bad news. I had a strange story during the passage. I can’t say for sure, but this is most likely a bug. The thing is, the game stopped saving my progress. Now, when I go to the main menu and click “continue” or “start from checkpoint”, it would seem that I should get to the place where I left off last time. Instead, I am thrown to the beginning of the level right from the middle of the game. The only solution is to choose the stage that I need and start over. 

Imagine, you go through some slig barracks like this all evening, and this is a very difficult stage, it should be noted, and you decide to go to rest, turn off the game, and upon your return you find that all the progress has gone down the drain, be so kind to start the level from the very beginning and survive all my torment anew. At such a moment, you want to score and send Oddworld: Soulstorm to hell. 

Summing up

Oddworld: Soulstorm doesn’t really give fans anything really new. However, a worthy continuation of the series came out of the game: here you need to think, the gameplay will not get bored even after many hours, the picture is juicy, the levels are interesting, and the mudokons are funny. 

Except for the negative moment with my saves, I spent about 20 extremely exciting and intense hours here, saving mudokons from captivity, sincerely worrying about their fate and building strategies on how to make the wards die as little as possible. 

Yes, this is definitely a difficult (sometimes even very) game, it will not be an easy walk and is definitely not suitable for everyone. But, if you like interesting adventures, and at the same time are ready to endure all the challenges that Oddworld: Soulstorm has prepared, then it is definitely worth a try. For those who have never played Oddworld, a new project is the best opportunity. Well, fans of the series will be delighted at all, because Abe is back!