Welcome to never forget the part of my channel where I pay tribute to my Absolute favorite games and try to explain what makes them so special to me today? I don't want to talk about a single game But an entire series the legacy of kain the legacy of kain franchise consists of five games that were released between 1996 and 2003 in order fuli's we have blood Amon Soul Reaver Soul Reaver - Blood omen - and Finally the legacy of kain defiance the reason why I can't talk about any of these games on their own is because what this franchise excels at is storytelling and the legacy of kain narrative spends all five games to the point where it's incredibly hard to evaluate one without the others with all of them combined however this series has by far my Favorite storyline in all of gaming, so let's start our perspective and get into all of these titles one by one don't worry I will take a detailed look at all the important parts gameplay story presentation and so on but I will try to keep this video as spoiler free as possible because I do want to give everyone the Chance to check out the series for yourself It certainly deserves your time and it all begins with blood omen 1 the first legacy of kain game came out in 1996 made by a company called Silicon Knights blood Ulman 1 covers the origin of the titular character Came a young noble that is assassinated at the start of the game and then resurrected by a mysterious Necromancer as a vampire allowing him to take revenge on whomever killed in the search for his murderer a necromancer leads came to the so-called pillars of Nosgoth which will soon become the focal point of this entire franchise Nosgoth is the world legacy of kain takes place in and the pillars represent all of Na scoffs Elements as well as their delicate balance which keeps the world intact the so called Circle 9 mortal Guardians each responsible for protecting one of the pillars have gone mad and through their symbiotic link to the pillars Corrupted them damming the entire world of Nosgoth to a slow Never-ending decay Kane is then tasked by the ghost of one of the Guardians to kill The entire circle in order to purify the pillars let them choose new Guardians and restore balance at this very moment in blood almond we already get to see what makes cane such an enticing Character and extremely different from most other video game characters back in 1996. He is a pure Antihero arrogant vengeful and sarcastic out of my way peasant the stench of the fields hangs over you like a pall He'll be in mourning for his kingdom soon And he'll mourn for you even sooner if you don't get out of my way He is even unwilling to save the world Until the ghost brings out that this task will also cure him from his vampirism curse you must restore balance You must write the pillars of noir scoffs. I care. Not for the fate of this world then for yourself, okay? Until that is achieved however Kane has to live with his lust for blood throughout the game He almost starts reveling in the slaughter. He can unleash I would call him downright edgy. Honestly trait He shares with a lot of other characters in the game too this No-holds-barred edginess is actually an important trick used by the riders of blood almond and inspiration taken right from Shakespeare back in his time Shakespeare wrote his plays for two different audiences trying to keep them both happy He made sure to entertain the peasants in the front rows with vulgar jokes for all his acts but also Included subtle cerebrum metaphors for his more intellectual aristocracy viewers the creators of blood almond applied the same Principle Silicon Knights made sure that players who just want to turn off their brain can enjoy the dark world feisty remarks and Over-the-top gore effects take blood omens intro cinematic for example and which woried another important vampire and the legacy of kain universe it takes part of the Circle and murders them in cold blood while they are screaming for the warrior melech to save them. I vividly remember Watching this back when I was a kid And I'm pretty sure it was one of the most brutal starts to a game I had ever seen honestly this intro still kicks ass this same way the legacy of kain franchise as a whole still kicks ass fantastic effects amazing sound design and Top-notch voice acting delivering so many great lines that are forever etched into my mind But beneath this edgy surface lies a narrative that is far more advanced than what most video games offered back in 1996 next to the outstanding voice performances the dialogue and blood ameen is incredibly Eloquent and poetic cane is strung along on a complex tale with great twists and even Time-travel elements in which she ultimately has to question the agenda of everyone surrounding him and not only that during his journey Kane also Starts reflecting on the very nature of his vampirism is it actually a curse or maybe a blessing in disguise Should he reject these powers of the undead is his? Humanity really worth holding on to or has he maybe become something greater this mature Storyline is ultimately what made blood omen 1 a cult classic back when it came out and defined the rest of the series which would Later take up these and many other themes and turn them into the narrative I fell in love with the reason Kain reflects on his condition. Is that vampires in this world while they aren't just your run-of-the-mill Vampires the very first ability you receive as a fledgling bloodsucker is to turn into a fucking Werewolf, which ok is somewhat common in vampire mythology but nevertheless Amazing and it only gets crazier from there. You learn to throw lightning if people get swarmed and eaten by maggots takeover Minds cast protection bubbles turn into mist and so on Vampires in Nosgoth don't even have to bite other people's necks they literally force a stream of blood out of an Incapacitated body directly into their mouths the creators of the legacy of kain games made it a point to stay on top of all contemporary Vampire law to come up with something unique and damn did they ever Succeed from the gameplay footage so far you have probably already realized that blonde omen one is basically a grimdark 2d Zelda it has a pretty large map that you unlock by gathering new items and powers with a ton of Optional small side areas to explore in between the great irony of the entire legacy of kain Franchise however and the reason why this video is going to contain a lot more negativity Then my other neverforget videos is that the actual gameplay? Has always been this series is weak spot you have five games all of them with more or less different gameplay But none of them is it ever actually you know good glad omen. One is the only isometric 2d game the rest I'm 3d with very mechanics However out of all of them blood almond 1s as far as I'm concerned by far the strongest gameplay in the entire series so in that aspect We are peaking early and only going downhill from here, which again is also not to say that blood all-men's gameplay Isn't without issues and that makes the position I want to take in this video so much more difficult because what I would recommend the legacy of kain series on Atmosphere and story alone it comes with a caveat that you have to go through five games of it best Decent gameplay quality still worth it but probably a test of patience for anyone who isn't already a fan anyway I think blood omen 1 has two big problems Mainly it's that hitboxes and damage indicators in this game are simply fucked. It is never really clear How many more hits enemies can take before they die and the area of effect of your weapon swings seems to only vaguely? correspond with Cain's actual sprite which often turns combat into a game of Exploit the enemy at your maximum range before he exploits you at his the second issue our loading times I myself am a very patient man, and I have gotten use to them by now But in the PlayStation 1 version of blood almond short loading screens even pop up when you try to go into the menu and in a game that requires so much item and spell switching that can become incredibly obnoxious Especially considering that due to the game's age the PlayStation 1 version is the easiest one to get working Currently I still think this game has the best gameplay in the series. However it is worth your time He is why blood almond one manages to use many of its mechanics to service its storytelling in ways that especially for game from 1996 I would almost call unparallel as I already described Kane learns to wield a huge arsenal of abilities And if he used the right spell and items at the right times most normal enemies do not stand a chance Against you which especially because of the great sound effects feels really cathartic Nosgoth however also manages to be an incredibly dangerous place even love may be specifically for a vampire Everything is out to kill you not only living beings but the elements themselves as an undead Kane takes damage from rain from snow from walking through water and swamps he can poison Himself if he drinks the blood of corrupted creatures and at some point even has to avoid fire coming from the sky all of this hammers home just how much of an importance of nature Cain has become the world had changed my eyes I Had not expected such cruelty from the light for in the embrace of the Sun I could find no comfort only Malice this would change in time for the worse along with other things additionally over the course of its story blood omen smartly raises its Difficulty curve by giving you fewer humans and more demons to fight not only because demons are more powerful Humans are the only Enemies you can actually drain blood from which is your main way of healing yourself in the beginning hours of the game you come through? Sleepy cities and villagers, and there are more helpless people around for you to feast on than possibly needed I particularly like the little overflow Animation on Kane's life bar when he drinks despite being already at full health making it very clear that he is literally wasting blood at this point you as the player and as a Moral human being can decide to just leave all these peasants be and avoid unnecessary Bloodshed thus implying there might still be some humanity left in Cain as well later in the game However as humans become more rare and otherworldly creatures stand in your way You suddenly begin to feel the pressure you start jumping at every single foot soldier and peasant you can find eagerly drain Every little bit of feeling blood out of them But oh no, you are still only at half elf you need to find more You need to kill more so as your journey becomes more difficult the player slowly is turned from this benevolent Demigod who lets the little villagers live in peace into a desperate Bloodthirsty predator murdering the innocent for sustenance every chance he gets mirroring Cain's slow Capitulation to the vampiric hunger it is wonderful how? seamlessly blood almond manages to make you feel like an Engine of death in one moment and as if the world is bent on destroying you in the next it connects player and player avatar and deepens the exploration of Kane's condition as a vampire which is what this title is ultimately about so while the gameplay itself might be Clunky blood omen one is still an amazing game with some Surprisingly well realized themes and the story that Blows most other titles of its time out of the water as the starting point of one of my favorite gaming franchises It is and always will be a classic This brings us to the second game in the franchise the legacy of kain Soul Reaver for this one Crystal Dynamics Took over development from Silicon Knights and Amy Hennig who had already worked on the first game became the director Sol Riva is a pretty unique sequel And how it continues the story of blood omen instead of following up directly so we were commits to a massive time skip taking place 1500 years after the original game and instead of playing Cain again We are introduced to a completely new protagonist rez yell I want to keep this retrospective spoiler free, but there's one bit of blood almond story I'll have to give away because it's basically the cornerstone of the rest of the series and can't be avoided Don't worry Even knowing what I'm about to tell you doesn't change the fact that blood omen is Absolutely worth a playthrough at the end of the first game Cain has a decision to make it is revealed that ever since his birth He was the tenth guardian the guardian of balance after killing all the other Guardians that corrupted the pillars of Nosgoth he was destined to offer his own life and fully restore their purity the player then gets choice Cain either Sacrifices himself and restores the pillar saving the land or he refuses and embraces his vampirism Leaving them corrupted so Riva treats the second option as the canonical ending of blood omen and thus Establishes a future where Cain becomes Supreme Lord of a vampiric Empire while the pillars stay Corrupted now here in the intro of Soul Reaver. We meet Raja one of Cain's five lieutenants It is explained that vampires in Nosgoth have one more power on top of all the crazy abilities They already had they constantly evolve Raziel and his clan the Razzie limb were the first among the vampires to sprout wings even before their master Cain who as it? Turns out is not happy about this at all for my transgression I've earned a new kind of reward He throws Raziel into the so-called abyss presumably killing him Razia however after being horribly burned and disfigured is snatched out and saved by a giant creature called the elder God who claims to be Nosgoth ruler over life and death the other God tells Raziel that Cain and his vampires need to be stopped because in their underthe vampires are unable to truly die which is Obstructing the natural circle of death and rebirth that souls in this world are going through under the other gods watch he then makes Raziel his agent his soul reaver and gives him a chance to take revenge on cain and Save the world from the vampire scourge that betrayed him the starts the game Soul Reaver as an entry in the Legacy of Kain series serves a few purposes in the timeless abyss Rahzel was thrown into the 1500 years I mentioned earlier have passed and he finds himself Exploring an Oscar that suffered a never ending decay Kane's decision to not restore the pillars has brought upon it they are soulless mutated undead and crumbling structures everywhere and the human race has been driven back into a few remaining cities by the vampires this instills the motivation in player and protagonist alike to find a way to restore the pillars the goal that ultimately becomes the series centerpiece also with Raziel it obviously Introduces the second most important character to the franchise and reveal some twists about his origin But what I think deserves special mention is that we finally have our magical trio installed Simon temple - Kain stole the show last time and now we have Michael bell Voicing Raziel as well as Tony Jay may he rest in peace as the elder god to confront him these three characters and their unparalleled voice acting our drives everything any scene with either of them in this and any game to come is a masterpiece of poetic dialogue witty exchanges and ever developing chemistry Or if you prefer avenge yourself Settle your dispute with kale Destroy him and your brethren free their souls and let them feel the fate churn again use your hatred to Ask any legacy of kain fan what he likes about this franchise And I have no doubts that voice performances are going to be in the top three reasons every single time And it's not only that particular triangle of characters you have equally amazing portrayals of other recurring side characters like Vora door and mobius the time streamer and Janna zadran the mightiest vampire to ever exist voiced by none other than odo from Star Trek Deep Space nine What in short the Legacy of Kain has some of the highest quality voice acting you can find in? Gaming and together with a world billing and dialogue influenced by classical plays and theater it very much Defines the unique feeling of this entire series, which soul Weaver one is a prime example of have I said enough phrase at this point because here's the thing I? Don't actually like the First's or even know it kind of despised it in fact It's hard for me to even say that how can I despise the Legacy of Kain? Game so reverse an essential part of this narrative And the world that I hold so dear and when it comes to the story of voice acting and music this game is absolutely fantastic But the gameplay here is the bane of my fucking existence Sol Riva is a 3d Action-adventure, and that means in this game you either fight shit you do platforming Or you solve puzzles and all three parts are equally as terrible platforming is an easy one to hate here I mean it's a PlayStation 1 3d platformer with extremely stiff animations and a camera that you have to constantly wrestle into submission I almost expect nothing else although some of these platforming segments and how far back a failed jump Will throw you is truly ridiculous even for this particular era the combat however is where this game really starts Aggravating me because no matter how I look at it combat in this game is never ever Worth it the only reason to fight is if you have to kill everything in the room to proceed which Admittedly happens quite often my problem with Soul Reaver. Is that you can't just you know kill shit Oh, no trying to finish off an enemy has to be a fucking Audia most enemies. Don't actually die from attacks They only ever get stunned and recover quickly once stunned you have to then pick them up And I've impale them with a pole weapon or throw them into spikes water fire or intense sunlight Only then will their bodies actually dissolve and you can consume their souls you have no idea how? Fucking annoying this gets and how many issues you will encounter yeah? Not every room gives you a proper weapon to impale your monsters worth for example rezian's pick up and carry Animations are also incredibly slow And you're constantly getting interrupted by other enemies aiming to throw someone at a specific Deadly spot is also tricky and on and all this entire system is just such a hassle when all you want to do is your? Educate your opponents and quickly move on now to be fair There is another way to finish someone off and that would be the Soul Reaver weapon you acquire Fairly early into the game the kicker however is that you can only? Sustain that bladed for health meaning if you enter combat and get hit once you just lost your one Convenient way to finish the fight fans of the game will probably tell me the combat isn't bad. Just don't get hit you scrub It's not that hard But my reply to that is the following the only thing I get out of combat is absorbing souls Absorbing souls heals me and gets me back to full life If combat needs me to stay at full life the whole time But it's also the only thing where I will really lose health and my only reward From it is getting that health I lost back then how would I just ignore this shit entirely because clearly there's no point to it especially when combat itself is Unnecessarily arduous anyway see I would just say fuck the Soul Reaver and carry around a spiel with me at all times But one of results trademark powers is to switch between the physical and the spectra To change the properties of objects surrounding him he has to use this Constantly to progress, which by itself is a really cool feature But whenever he does this he loses whatever weapon he was holding as you cannot physically interact with things from the spectrum so just carrying around a spear isn't a Consistent combat method either, and that is what really grinds my gears with Soul Reaver It makes you go through so many hoops to do the simplest stuff you have to constantly wait for animations to finish heal up in one realm to get your soul reaver back in another which Specter the physical realm to open doors as You go back and forth because there's so much backtracking and expiration And it's just so tedious and don't get me started on the puzzles I mean the one type of puzzle and soul reaver the fucking blocked pushing challenges So it seemed to be just about everywhere and not only get more complex in every dungeon But increasingly annoying to deal with too because results block pushing animation is so Slow and clunky it makes me want to stick a goddamn knife in my throat seesaw Weaver's considered one of the true gems of the ps1 and Dreamcast era and to an extent I guess I understand it in many ways this game was mind-blowing back then the typical legacy of kain Storytelling being only one of the obvious reasons the game does feel like it has a truly epic open-world that begs the player to explore it might also be one of the first games to feature a dynamic soundtrack that Changes the intensity of the music based on what's currently happening and of course the implementation of dual worlds gameplay in which res y'all can Switch between the planes almost whenever he wants to to reach new places was really innovative back then but man I can't stand actually playing Soul Reaver I can't even say it's an age Problem because the following legacy of kain games came out within the next few years and are much more enjoyable to pick up Not to mention blood almond 1 released in fucking 1996 even from a story perspective this game isn't that important in terms of actual plot progression There's very little happening in cerebro the beginning the scene in the crypt and the ending relevant of a series as a whole But the remaining 90% about Brazil hunting down and killing his traitorous Brothers that threw him into the abyss on Caine's orders, which by itself makes sense But results brothers are the least impactful sight characters in this entire franchise so despite so River one being the most popular legacy of kain game despite it being seen by many as the poster child of the series it effects the storyline this franchise is so well known for much less than the other games my love for the first Soul Reaver is limited to two things the understanding of how influential in all inspiring it was back in the day and its introduction of Raziel one of my Favorite video game characters of all time is third I accept it as part of the legacy of kain family However having played it for a third time now for this video. I do not want to touch it ever again moving on Let's go straight to Soul Reaver - which released in 2001 just two years after the first game unlike the transition from the dormant Soul Reaver this time We don't go through a time scale Soul Reaver - picks up the story exactly where Soul Reaver one left it off except Raziel got entangled and time Jeffersonians at the end of the last game So sorry if a - despite continuing the storyline also takes place many many years before sorry for one I'm glad we cleared that up on the hunt for Kane Raziel and us the stream of time and travels back into a long gone era of Nosgoth past here he sees the world at a different time that he never experienced himself 1 before the Corruption after finding out in the last game who and what he was before Kane raised him to be a vampire he is now determined to pursue Kane and Finally get his revenge as the third game in the series so river 2 is Thankfully a much better game than the previous one It applies some key changes to the formula making it easier to deal with Overall I usually am the kind of person that argues against Streamlining and dumbing down when you go from a game to its sequel considering that almost everything about survival one's gameplay was Dreadful to me though Simplification seems like just the right idea no longer Do you have to hold a weapon or pick up enemies and throw them into? Hazards to actually finish them off You can now hack anyone into pieces with your class alone weapons still drop and give you different move sets but they aren't mandatory for anything most importantly however early on in this game Raziel learns to summon the Soul Reaver It will it is no longer exclusive to him being at full health in order to balance this out the Soul Reaver now comes with a Different drawback whenever you kill someone while the detective the Riva itself will consume the souls of your Enemies preventing you from eating them and healing yourself Additionally every soul it consumes arouses the reeva and charges it up the higher the arousal the more damage It will deal, but if it eats too much It will overcharge and start earning its hunger and Raziel draining his knife instead I think these changes are fantastic. They are actually well explained within the law of the game They build up the river as a separate entity or even a spirit only Interested in consuming souls that Raziel has to share his body with this is incredibly important for the plot and one of my favorite aspects Of the entire legacy of kain storyline and in terms of gameplay these changes at a nice little dynamic to combat that requires Limiting your river usage ideally you want to keep the blade at high arousal without it ever hitting the maximum charge Which is quite difficult to balance and at the same time you have to be careful to avoid taking damage Since the river will eat up all the souls in your state when you use it and fights go on for much longer When you don't none of these improvements however fail to mask the fact that combat is still pretty clunky And what's worse still utterly pointless because again? The only reward of combat is swords souls only heal you and the only reason why you'd need healing is because you got hit in Combat so it has all and all much more prudent to run past any enemy you see to be fair There are still a lot of rooms where you are locked in and forced to fight and the river Improvements are certainly welcomed for those sections But that makes combat still feel more like an obligation than something you tensional II seek out for fun in terms of area design so river 2 changes a few things as well and here I can see why some people would prefer the first one gun of the sprawling areas that allow of exploration, sorry but who has become Entirely linear there are no more secret powers to find no more extra health upgrades to collect the world serves only to guide you from Cutscene to combat section to cutscene to puzzle room given that I enjoy this series for the storytelling in particular I really don't mind it but for people who like open worlds. I can see this feeling pretty prohibitive What also feels a bit cheap is the fact that it consists of? relatively few areas overall you just go through them multiple times in different time periods See sorry the two tries to hide its linear nature Over time you unlock new elemental Reva powers that can activate certain switches scattered throughout the levels which will then unlock access to new areas So early on in your journey you will for example come across this hole in the ground that can only be activated by the air Either way later in the game, which of course you don't know at that point, but it doesn't matter You don't have to worry about this Hole until you actually have the area and at that point the game will have made it abundantly clear what area switches look like so even if you didn't know that this is where you have to backtrack to next if you just stumbled back and forth on the linear path this game exists off You will eventually notice the obvious switch and continue on there is no critical thinking involved here No exploration not even a slight danger of getting lost you will get the powers when you need them And you don't have to worry about them until you got them in terms of area design so River 2 is Definitely the weakest in the series you can tell from interviews that the Riva Enhancements were supposed to have a much bigger impact on gameplay They were supposed to have relevant properties Which have combat a lot for finding cigarettes and all that but seemingly just like the previous game so River 2 had to be rushed And suffered a lot of cuts for the final release It's a shame at least the puzzle dungeon still managed to be a decent challenge these forges where you imbue your evil with the elements are the only parts of the game word actually sheds its linear nature and gives the Player an entire complex to explore making him work with both Spatial and mechanical awareness gameplay wise these are the best parts by far But no matter what this game does or does not provide in terms of interactivity the reason why it still works is it's always The storytelling behind all this you might complain that so River too uses so many areas But Raziel attracts through these multiple times because his journey takes him through multiple eras of Nosgoth and each time the new historical context he finds himself in changes his perspective on things he gets to know the various actors surrounding the pillars And how they shaped Nosgoth over the centuries he learns about multiple sides of the conflict and ultimately has to Question everyone around him just as Cain had to do in blood Amon One it probably didn't sound like it so far But I actually fucking love saw River - it might just be my favorite in the entire Series and the main reasons that it bears the brunt of this serious storyline the complex nature of this plot is finally revealed at its core the legacy of Cain is a story about time travel and Changing your own destiny which by itself isn't anything new But these games succeed at something that a lot of other time travel plots fail it and that is consistency look for example It's Star Trek easily one of the greatest Frenchy's of all time But whenever an episode tries its hand a time-travel it is almost unavoidable that it ends up with a myriad of plot holes Characters from the present of make assertions and manipulate events in order to create a specific outcome in the past or the future And whenever they do it seems impossible that they'd be aware of all the possible ramifications Take deep space 9 s past tense where commander Sisko accidentally goes back in time and an important Revolutionary leader that shaped Earth's past dies because of him Cisco's goal in this double episode is of course to preserve the original Timeline he takes on the role of that leader and plays his part to stage the events that need to happen in order to keep The present he knows intact But this never made sense to me just by existing in another time just by talking to or even just there being seen by other People he introduces a variable in the past that potentially influences hundreds or thousands of lives Someone just stopping in the street and having a random thought when seeing Sisko could make that person forget to do something Important that day which in turn could lead to someone else not getting a call and then someone else not leaving his house in time And all of that potentially branches out to so many alterations that all of his We could be changed and it's not only Star Trek on today life a strange style Time-traveling scenario where I leave my house to drive to work at the same time Every day and one of those days I get into a car crash that killed me Assuming someone else wanted to go back in time to try and save me all he needed to do would be to delay my departure From home for maybe a few minutes and the car that would normally kill me would be long gone When I reached the spot where I would have normally crashed so the notion that characters in Star Trek and many other fictional universes can strategically Recreate a time line that they approve off is pretty absurd and stories like that have always bothered me the point I'm trying to get it with all these examples is that legacy of kain smartly gets around this problem And there is one of my favorite Aspects of its writing the L ok universe treats the stream of time the chain of events that is supposed to happen as almost unchangeable and that is explained by a river metaphor mentioned in snow river to Drop a stone into a rushing river the current simply courses around it and flows on as if the obstruction were never there You and I are pebbles Raziel and have even less hope of disrupting the time stream The continuum of history is simply too strong too resilient It is difficult to alter events in this universe as time keeps Rearranging itself to accommodate how things are supposed to occur unless there is very specific criteria are met which by themselves Become part of the larger plotline then we have the guardian of time mobius one of the most Important side characters who also make sure that timelines won't be altered in ways He doesn't approve of and despite all of it the rigidity of time the special rules for constant interference of all these characters soar Eva - and by extension the entire series manages to create some of the most engaging And well-thought-out time-travel plot twists I have ever seen without spoiling anything things are revealed in this game that put even scenes from blood omen 1 into a brilliant new perspective And there is a remarkable consistency across what at the end of the franchise amounts to fall separates lines that Canid Raziel keep jumping back and forth in it is just Masterfully written incredibly hard to understand of course One of those stories where you have to read 10 pages of summary to make sense of all the details But once you're familiar with it and all the important parts come together You can see how carefully everything in here was set up and paid off throughout the five games together with the high quality Dialogue and voice acting this is the main reason why I hold the storytelling in these games in such high regard And so Eva 2 is arguably the game in the series where all of these qualities are shown at therapy which at least for me makes it one of the Best and most important out of all of them With that said let's move on to the strangest title of the franchise blood omen - blood omen - is the one that most people Dislike it's considered the black sheep of the series mostly because it doesn't continue the existing storyline or at least that's what it seemed like back when this game came out after two games to Thor as well as the Protagonists this time we're back to playing K Not however the quote-unquote real Cain the one we've been following in the previous three titles this series deals with time travel So naturally there are Multiple timelines in this universe blood omen - not only creates a new one giving us an entirely new came to play but also Jumps back into a period between black omen 1 and Soul Reaver 1 where Kane is still relatively young and his vampiric Empire is Currently at war with a human race in the original timeline of the first two games can of course wins this fight Which is why in Soul Reaver 1 Raziel sees humanity? Mostly obliterated driven back into a few remote cities in blood or mintues timeline however things play out Differently this time this so-called Seraphin a recurring order of vampire hunting nights are led by a mysterious Individual only known as the Seraphin Lord who in a decisive battle manages to beat Cain Seemingly killing him blood omen - then begins with Cain waking up with a mild case of amnesia years later He finds himself in a world that after he lost the war is now reversed dominated by the humans were the vampires reduced to a few woefully outmatched resistance groups the resistance pursue a came to help them and so he sets out to discover who the Seraphin Lord is to kill him and to rebuild his empire the Problem right off the bat ears that all of this feels more like a spin-off game than a full-fledged entry into the legacy of kain Franchise blood almond 2 released just one year after Soul Reaver 2 which itself ended on a massive Cliffhanger and here we are going through some weird alternate timeline with a different cane and no ratio There are some characters that come back but in 2002 it was entirely unclear how this game even fit into the main Storyline as a matter of fact It needed the next game Legacy of Kain Defiance to retroactively Lee explain how the events in La Roman two were even connected in fear of spoilers I can't elaborate further on that But rest assured that despite one or two plot holes this game does eventually become part of the broader story Gameplay wise blood omen 2 is comparable to these Soul Reaver games But with much less emphasis on platforming instead focusing more on combat the premise of this timeline is that? Vampires lost the war making them the vulnerable unlocks this time and blood almond 2 Incorporates this in multiple ways for one thing. This is the first and only legacy of kain game They're her stealth in certain areas Cain can turn into his mist form and instantly execute enemies from behind Which lets you thin their ranks before taking on the rest directly Thematically a lot of the missions also reflect the guerrilla style tactics commonly used by Resistance groups you travel through a lot of dark alleys and slums often taking secure route through sewers over rooftops and even taking a detour through barely populated canyons later on multiple times you also have to seek out human turncoats that work as Informants for the vampires and rely on them which is quite a subtle tonal shift from previous games wladim And who also does a great job of actually making the enemy forces feel? Intimidating nicely ramping up their skills and damage as you go along and making sure you only fight a few enemies at a time Reflecting the stealth in nature of your objectives the combat itself however does have some issues. It's fairly clunky and even for game That's 15 years old now has a lot of awkward Animations that like punch firing as fairly slow and methodical Built around a rather simplistic approach or for waiting to block then Pecking and sometimes grabbing enemies when they've exhausted themselves Some enemies make you block three times in rows some five some have occasional unblockable the techs you need to dodge but every single enemy in the game whether it's a night or Specter or Spider is essentially just about dealing with a mixture of these patterns Probably the most important feature is that with every successful block Cain fills up an extra meter spent on unblockable special attacks when you build enough bar this essentially gives you access to an unavoidable boost of damage you can distribute among all opponents Which by itself could lead to a cool bit of resource management the problem is that blood almond 2 is a game that? Rewards defense way more than offense Which makes you? overly reliant on these moves fights tend to drag on when you don't use your special skills all the time as it is difficult to Damage enemies consistently with your normal strikes whether opponents will end up blocking in a tag or not often feels random and unpredictable already but if they do Actually end up guarding on the first hit then you can spare me a basic attack as much as you want you are not getting Through that defense so the cleanest way to kill anyone is to just wait it out and block fill your meter And then use your guaranteed unblockable attacks over and over it Definitely gets boring after a while a nice change that blood almond 2 brings to the series is the addition of a rudimentary? Xpm sucking blood or in the case of Raziel Souls was so far only ever used for healing in blood almond to every fully trained enemy Also, fills up a small part of an extra bar, which once it is maxed out resets it increases your maximum HP Additionally all throughout the levels you can find vampire artifacts that give you a ton of XP at once so Consistently building up your maximum life in this game outright Requires you to a kill and suck blood from every single enemy you meet which is thematically appropriate For character like Cain and B to actually explore the corners of every level in search for artifacts which is good design An approach that the Soul Reaver games Royally fail that sore evil one wasn't difficult enough to warrant looking for all the secrets violent 2 there Weren't even any and in both games combat was never worth it because there was no asting reward blood woman to correct Spotify's well at least in theory because in practice There's one thing. I majorly take issue with it just takes too Fucking long to draw blood from dead enemies. No seriously There is my biggest problem with blood Armand - it takes too long to drain just a single enemy in a game. Where you fight Hundreds of them and that's not even mentioning all the countless Communists that you can hunt down in most levels you want to kill everyone just for that extra bit of XP But it gets so so tedious after the first few levels I've honestly never seen a case where such a trivial and mundane mechanic manages to outright kill the entire Pacing of a game really I don't think me just talking about it can accurately convey how annoying this gets okay? So far it might have sounded like I'm overly shitting on blood. Oh man - but to be perfectly clear I do actually like this game and in my opinion most legacy of kain fans Don't give it enough credit because despite those pacing issues and some minor timeline Inconsistencies there are multiple things here that I feel it does really well the series Trademark high level of atmosphere voice acting and dialogue is a strong and blood omen - as ever Caine is the usual arrogant prick that you've come to love but taking on the role of the underdog in this game leads to a Series of neat personal conflict since he and the event pyre resistance group work towards the same goal But don't necessarily trust one another level variety is also at an absolute high point for the franchise Half of the game's missions show you the massive city of Meridian from many different and well realized sites whether it's slum stocks Villages or industrial quarters all of them build a dark and believable Steampunk era within the legacy of kain timeline the second half of the game meanwhile goes completely off the rails, but in a good way The legacy of kain franchise never did areas like the eternal prison of a Hilton City before or after this game They are strange and alien places, but for franchise. That is so intentionally Unpredictable it fits extremely well in my mind all of these areas managed to create the wonderful feeling that throughout its entire Playtime blotto and to will always have something cool and surprising and store for you next and it keeps you going Probably the highlights of this game However are the boss fights And they are arguably better in this than any other Title of the series because their actual boss fights every single one of these encounters has multiple phases alternating between combat sections and little puzzle esque Scenarios in which you have to figure out a way to harm the boss using Kane's various abilities Every boss battle feels like you're actually up against an intelligent creature that will adapt to you over the course of the fight let's look at an example the boss you meet in the industrial quarter starts with a one-on-one combat phase in which you have to Continuously burn him by keeping him in range of seething steam coming into the room once that is over He will try to run along the walls and a tech cane with a fast jumping kick that is unstoppable Unless you manage to position a beam of energy in the middle of the room between the bus and you when he's about to strike all the while avoiding the unerring steam after that when he realizes his efforts if I have been fruitless the boss attempts to overload the machine in the room and destroy the artifact that you came to collect in the first place at this point he will actively avoid fighting you and stay out of range as a Counter you then have to mind controlling nearby worker use him to activate the burning gases again and force the boss to confront you on An elevated platform, which finally makes it possible to care It is incredibly satisfying to overcome such an elaborate encounter and every single boss fight in the game manages to come up with multiple unique faces the bosses also have a personal connection to Cain's past before he was defeated by the Seraphin lord and after killing them and taking their So it unlocks a new ability Mirroring a power that these bosses were just using Against Kay all of that makes these fights very memorable and for a series that generally struggles in the gameplay Department the boss fights and a doorman to are genuinely my favorite bit of interactive design throughout all of these games so despite it being the black sheep of the Franchise despite its connection to the main storyline being hard to figure out despite not featuring Raziel the other got a mobile slot on to still has positive qualities that it brings to the legacy of kain franchise and for that I Admire it moving on Finally we are the last game of this series the legacy of kain Defiance and this one comes with pretty big changes so far we had four legacy of kain games - blood almonds in which we played cane and two soul rivers in which we Played rosio in defiance the storylines finally truly converge and now we play both Alternating between them from chapter to chapter the combat has also been massively changed turning wood used to be a 3d adventure Into a more combo focused character action game with a fixed camera Perspective in every room now after blood almond to goofed off with alternate timelines Defiance picks up the original plot again and acts like a true Sequel beginning shortly after the end of Soul Reaver - in terms of story structure most of defiance is spent in one of two ways Raziel and Kane will either explore and gin vampire ruins discovering the backstory of their race or they will travel to and meet up with side characters well-known from the previous games Defiance introduces very few story aspects that are completely new it is instead more interested in tying already Existing elements together and after four games and so many open questions That is very much appreciated in many ways this as well as the fact that you play both Cain and Raphael makes it feel like a Best-of legacy of kain game however there is not meant as an insult Thanks to this time-travel aspect the story of the series has always been circular and self-referential by nature But without it ever feeling forced or self-congratulatory there definitely is a purpose to every single scene in here So let's talk about the gameplay in defines the legacy of kain sir once again Honors its proud tradition of taking one step forward and one step back Fixing a bunch of problems that the old games had while at the same time Inviting a whole set of different issues with a new approach. It really is a shame because on the surface I love this new action-oriented combat system Cain and Rossi are retained their normal abilities Lighter tech heavy attack telekinesis and so on but all the texts now have a lot more combo and juggle potential while all Animations are snappy and more impactful even blood and soul-sucking can now be done mid-fight with quick finishing moves making combat more stylized and Increasing the speed and fluidity of everything actually fits very well with his universe as Cain and Raphael have always been Incredibly powerful creatures in general defiance is the game to finally fix legacy of kain having clunky gameplay And boy was it about time Another addition is the inclusion? Of a special move that can be unleashed after charging up your sword unlike bad omen to the focus years on offense though not defense as your sword charges up with every successful strike the properties of a special move change depending on what element of the reverb lady currently got equipped and given that there are Multiple different elements for both characters this potentially adds a lot of possibilities to combat Unfortunately all of these end up being either uninspired or straight-up gimmicky 75% of special moves are just some form of big damage, AoE It really doesn't matter if I'm doing damage and also freezing Everyone around me or burning them or attacking anything on screen by turning into a ghost Most enemies will just die on the initial hit anyway Those are the uninspired ones the gimmicky moves meanwhile Don't even deal damage and instead lead to other effects that are way too Secured us for such a simple combat system like why would I ever use the charged up darkness River to turn invisible? During combat and formulate some kind of a tech strategy when it's much quicker to destroy everything on screen with a huge fuck of Explosion and here we touch on one of the bigger problems of defiance overall great animations Then flow cannot mask the fact that the combat is overly simple and becomes repetitive Quickly for one thing both Kane and Raziel have almost the same exact basic moveset same through head attack same launchers Our combo options so even though you're constantly Alternating between the two you're still going through the same kind of combat all throughout the game enemy variety is decent But enemies also do very little damage So there's rarely any strategy involved Defiance simply doesn't give you enough tools to keep things fresh for the amount of fighting you have to do and that is a shame Because again the general more action-oriented approach feels like the right one It just needed fleshing out the tedium of defines this gameplay also stems from the game's repetition of content What's really weird about this game? Is that it is extremely back loaded with multiple important boss fights that shake up both story and combat happening in the last 20% of the game one almost right after the other the first 80% meanwhile especially on Rajee outside lead him to ancient temples multiple times and they end up feeling very Same for one thing because all of them reused the same art assets and for another because at the end of every temple you fight One or two spirit Guardians that Raziel has to defeat in order to enhance this river with their elemental powers these spirits have extremely simplistic movesets and even with slight variations to these fights There is no justification for them to be repeated four times now. Don't get me wrong I'm not trying to imply all you do in this game is run through crumbling temples and do combat they're still puzzle solving and they're still Platforming although because of the awful fixed camera positions in some of these rooms the platforming aspect can also become incredibly frustrating at times But what I really like about defiance are the general level layouts every single area outside of the occasional Temple is large and complex often Teasing you with the exit of the level early on but making you explore to find a way in reach it most of these areas Have just the right size keeping the game storytelling linear But giving you a nice open space with multiple paths within each chapter Some of these levels really stand out in terms of complexity involved as mentioned for example Which you initially enter from the front yard you soon come across a well that needs to be activated with multiple artifacts scattered Throughout the villa so you start going through the basement so if some puzzles search the backyard end of the house again at some point Even make it back outside to the front yard But this I'm on a balcony level where you need to change between realms to make certain jumps across pillars and roofs possible And it's just such a satisfying area to figure out where blood who has my favorite levels Phonetically defines us definitely my favorite in terms of actual level design So there are some ups and downs in this game some things are really good some parts are like luster ultimately I'd still only call Defiance's gameplay decent however, and I know I've said this about all of these games now But there's also kind of a point of this entire retrospective when it comes to the most relevant aspects of the legacy of kain series the story and atmosphere it is as Magnificent as ever with defines the story being so self referential and most important characters showing up at some point you really get the entire package of voice acting talent in this game Must have blood bring me blood Of your God you Yours yes, it will strengthen me, okay For the plot meanwhile there are many details that I can still have ouch because at this point just about anything would be a spoiler But in defiance this series again manages to recontextualize Multiple events from previous games even some from the original blood almond and works them into new Twists and turns it is just wonderful No matter what gameplay issues that possibly had the story music and cutscenes alone compelled me to play through this game Yet another time I was always looking forward to the next bit of dialogue - every single sentence every little back and forth between these characters and their struggles I really don't think I've sufficiently made clear how much I love the Legacy of Kain dialogue How I who's played these games multiple times would often watch a cutscene And then enderbury watching it in my recorded footage because every exchange just felt so rich with Information and this franchise is so infinitely Quotable - there are countless great lines here that I simply can't get out of my mind anymore like Kane's infamous coin toss and energy Symbolizing his continuous fight against the odds you said it yourself game There are only two sides to your coin apparently so But suppose you throw a coin enough times suppose one day It lands on its edge Some of them are straight-up memes now like Kain is deified And very Victor's and for some of them are even wonder if they haven't been inspiring games that came way later I have seen the future Kain You are not in it I have seen the future you're not in it now despite defines being the last legacy of kain game It doesn't actually bring full closure to the storyline it does finish up multiple character arcs and integrates the events of bad omen - and Who the overall plot? but Ultimately it does not end properly a quick bit of research and Google as well as you know common sense suggests that there was at Least one more game planned after this defiance however had failed to meet the publishers sales expectations Despite selling somewhere between half and 4 million of copies and after the game's release the series director Amy Hennig left, Crystal Dynamics Production and the sixth game was started, but three months into the project. It was cancelled and the series put on hold that was 2004 and that is where we still are today a few years ago some people at Crystal Dynamics Stated that there still is a chance that legacy of kain might be picked up again, though So I guess the question to be asked this should there be a new Legacy of Kain game And my answer is one of the biggest fans of the franchise who cares enough about it to make an entire Retrospective video is fuck know there are so many reasons in my mind Why a sixth game just wouldn't work anymore after almost 15 years of inactivity this series has become a cult classic That only appeals to a small hardcore fanbase and no one else just from a financial Standpoint it is questionable How many people would even be interested? In a new entry even if we were to assume that Square Enix would greenlight a new title and it was made by developers who Deeply care about the franchise. I don't think there's any possible way they could ride a Satisfying conclusion to this story while keeping all the elements intact that made this series So great what people love about the Legacy of Kain? What defines it? It's rich complex story telling and unrivaled voice acting the series director Amy Hennig has long been working on different projects So it's very unlikely She'd be getting involved again Which is it ain't on the writing front already? Meanwhile the voice of Raziel Michael Bell is almost 80 now and more importantly the voice of the elder god Tony Jay passed away back in 2006 you can't replace these Voices so they are the characters that the fans of this series love and honestly just look at the timeline shot does this look like Any writer would want to entangle it does it look like something that some executive would want to touch? 15 years later for the sake of her name recognition of course not which is why the only recent game that had any connection to the Legacy of Kain universe Nosgoth was a Free-to-play multiplayer game that didn't even make an attempt at picking up the story again the developers of Nosgoth Specifically set their game in some weird time period between blood omen 1 and soul river 1 and made up a bunch of nonsensical fanfiction bullshit to justify the existence of some of their classes In the game and since it was an unexplored period and the time line they could always fall back on the excuse of yeah well We simply don't know what happened at this time so offers might as well be true know the legacy of kain relies on a certain set of Brilliant ploy sectors and a certain set of brilliant writers working together And it is pretty much out of the question that something this unique could be faithfully recreated and if you can't with a franchise that is Defined by its narrative and its characters and that no one but hardcore fans even cares about anymore What could be the point of making another game the only thing you could do with this series is rebooted? And that would most likely mean turning it into some cynical modern edgeless generic triple a cash cow Something that has nothing to do with the original vision anymore And that fans like me would undoubtedly hate you want proof of that look no further than legacy of kain Dead son another terminated legacy of kain title that was worked on around 2011 and that had some gameplay footage leaked a few years ago, I don't want to go too into detail on this game But what we can see and piece together about death son is Exactly what I've been saying up until just now it seems to have almost nothing to do with the original games It looks nothing like them. It sounds nothing like them It's about entirely new people as well and where legacy of kain had poetic intelligent writing about characters Pondering the concept of free will dead son's footage shows Which hunters were fair tits hanging out who talked about limp dick kings and spouts swear words in every other sentence fuck you This is the sublime moment of our undoing Raziel fuck you I would choose Olivia over this existence fuck you It is heartening after all these years To hear my name spoken without content This is what legacy of kain was supposed to become this prepubescent nonsense that likes all the eloquence and wit of the original fuck that I'm Glad that legacy of kain ended when it did and quite frankly. I hope it stays that way I love this series for what it is I Wanted to remain this unique piece of gaming History that I get to admire for as long as I live and if you have been staying with me through this entire Retrospective then my hope is that you will try it out too and that you will join me in my love for the legacy of kain Bokan signing out Hey, this is where I want to make a little addendum as some of you might be aware Crystal Dynamics on their official Twitter account tweeted out an image and the quote of Raziel the other day and Since that is somewhat uncommon people started believing that maybe they are teasing some kind of new Legacy of Kain and that for me is of course very ironic considering what I said at the end of this video now I wrote the script and Did the voiceover for this video long before that tweet happened? But I just want to state that I stand behind everywhere I said I do not believe any kind of remake any kind of reboot Any kind of sequel would work out for the Legacy of Kain series? And if that is where they are going with this then I can only hope I'm gonna be proven wrong also, I am aware that Amy Hennig Star Wars game was recently put into the dirt and You know does that mean that she might be coming back to the series? I? Find it unlikely as I would have to assume that if that's what's happening right now They would have to do planning and pitching and pre-production Way before right now for them to be already teasing this on Twitter, so yeah It seems unlikely to me and the last bit of speculation I want indulgence that may be where this is going is some kind of legacy of kain collection you know all five games at a cheap price and working on current gen systems If that is where they are going then you know you could color me Pleasantly surprised because these games being so old They are definitely a bitch to get running currently so that would be pretty great Anyway, thanks so much for watching I hope you enjoyed this video if you did then please like and subscribe to my channel I have a bunch of other videos coming up Well soonish I don't want to make empty promises, but I'm definitely working on them You can find me on Twitter. I handles at Bokan Jima underscore I am super active on there, and you know you can shut me up about the legacy of kain anytime otherwise I hope to see you on my next video and until then bye bye
