Cyberpunk 2077 meets Sekiro in this action-packed 2D platformer

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SHOULD I PLAY NINE SOLS?

Play it. In its current demo version, Nine Sols offers less than an hour of great storytelling and fun hack-and-slash gameplay, but it’s totally worth the experience. While a few balancing issues need to be addressed before the full release, Nine Sols has become one of my most anticipated games for next year.

TIME PLAYED

I played Nine Sols for forty minutes, which was enough time to complete the entire demo, including one boss fight. The demo took me through most of the first chapter of the story, and I’m eager to see how the plot opens up from here when the full game comes out.

WHAT’S AWESOME ABOUT NINE SOLS?

• A heroic story. Nine Sols dives into the world of New Kunlun where the awoken hero named Yi goes on a vengeful quest to take down nine rulers that did him wrong. I found the story compelling and engaging in its exploration of revenge and the mystical traditions of Taoism. It’s just a shame there wasn’t a lot of storytelling, because the bite I got a taste of in this demo was well-written and interesting. It only makes me more excited to play the full version.

• Eastern culture meets cyberpunk. The aesthetic of Nine Sols is heavily inspired by old Eastern civilizations and their cultural traditions. It mixes that inspiration with cyberpunk elements to create a world of fantasy and tradition with a modern touch. All of these styles are blended together beautifully through the game’s visuals and animations.

• Slicing up bad people. Beating up enemies and using abilities to deal massive damage felt exciting. While the parrying mechanic was a little hard to pull off because of how fast enemies attacked, I still enjoyed combat thoroughly. Even though I only got a small taste of the upgrade system, which allowed me to enhance my stats, abilities, and attacks, I can already see how much I’m going to love digging into that character progression more.

WHAT NEEDS IMPROVEMENT IN NINE SOLS?

• Blocking attacks. Parrying attacks to charge energy for abilities is a smart way to make combat more intense. But it’s a little difficult to consistently pull off blocks when the enemies in Nine Sols attack too quickly for me. If you’re really into games that focus on parrying, like Sekiro, then this may not be an issue for you, but if you’re hoping for something a little bit easier than a FromSoftware title, you might get frustrated. Hopefully the developers make the attacks a little slower in the full version, so I can keep up. Or maybe I just need to get good.

PLATFORM TESTED

PC via Steam