4/5 ★ – AvatarAang's review of Nine Sols.

Some great sci-fi and philosophy wrapped up in a solid Souls-like from start to finish. The game posits many moral conundrums, such as whether slavery is justified if it solves global famine. Most of these concepts are ultimately rejected, and by the blade of your sword you are tasked with slaying the noble elitist who had the gall to make such a bold and disgusting statement. It's very delightful and investing to be given so many dark ideas to ponder, while rightfully concluding that they are wrong and should be dismissed, and every boss in the game poses a new question to think about, a new concept to say "That's so messed up!" My personal favorite was a very unique and surprising take on the Experience Machine thought experiment. Something that I loved about the game and continually remarked on was its Story Mode. The game features two difficulty settings: Standard and Story. The two settings have identical difficulty, but Story Mode allows you to customize the amount of damage that you deal and the amount of damage that you take. As an adult with a child, this was a godsend and really allowed me to get into the game and its gameplay loop much more than I typically can for a Souls-like. What I love about it is that I was able to play with 100% attack and 100% damage during typical exploration--so the same as Standard Mode, which was fine because I am a core gamer of 25 years and am quite skilled at platformers in particular. But I only can play for 30-40 minute play sessions at a time, so the expectation of a Souls-like to spend hours fighting a boss over and over again to learn their attack patterns through trial and error is a non-starter for me. I just don't have that time. Nine Sols respects my time and allows me to either reduce the damage that I take so that I can actually learn a fight without having to sit through countless load screens and transitions, OR I can increase the damage I deal to speed up a fight without having to sit through a damage sponge boss. This was FANTASTIC. Something that I appreciated was that Nine Sols is balanced so well that even at 25% damage and 180% attack power (which I had to do for the final boss), the bosses are STILL tough as nails! There is no way around it, you HAVE to learn the bosses' attack patterns and they still deal crippling amounts of damage as punishment if you fail. But some of these bosses would easily have taken me hours to figure out and the fact that I was able to still challenge myself but beat a boss within 30 minutes to an hour and move on with the game was honestly incredible. It completely sets the standard for a Souls-like in my opinion. This should be a feature in every Souls-like designed for an adult audience. On the note of the bosses, they are almost all excellent (even though I weep for the dedicated folks willing to do this on Standard Mode). The platforming in-between bosses is standard and nothing you haven't seen in something like Hollow Knight but fun and engaging. I think the game is a little mislabeled as a "Metroidvania;" it gives you the freedom to explore that a Metroidvania gives you, but there is pretty much zero required backtracking and abilities are unlocked based on linear plot progression rather than finding them in a labyrinth. I am a video game music enthusiast and there were several songs that caught my ear. Unfortunately, the overworld music can be a weakness--some areas such as the agricultural area are fantastic, while others are completely unmemorable. The boss music goes all out as you may expect, and there are many spectacular fight themes. A word of warning for those looking to purchase the soundtrack--like Hollow Knight, the soundtrack combines the exploration and battle music for each zone, so every time you want to hear the cool ambient vibes of an area it gets interrupted by generic fight music. Yuck! Overall, a great game and probably this year's sleeper hit! I would recommend it to anybody who loves games that blend Souls-like and Metroidvania mechanics, especially anybody who enjoyed Hollow Knight.