Legacy of Kain: Defiance Remastered is a welcome addition after the Soul Reaver games received the treatment. Though fans may wait for Blood Omen to have its moment, having this 2003 with a suite of upgrades could make it palatable for newcomers to be drawn into the Legacy.
Playing Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver 1-2 Remastered back in the winter of 2024, I was able to finally tick one game off the abyss that is my backlog.
When a developer brings back a beloved but long-forgotten series to the modern era, there’s always risks to consider. Preserving what made the original so applauded by fans and/or critics is important. Lose that spirit and you’ve lost any justification for a remaster or a remake to exist. Just port the damn game in a barebones effort and ride the base appreciation that it’s available on modern consoles and PC if you’re not going to put your all into it.
But what if you screw it up? What if a full-fledged remake changes things too much or goes too far? What if a remaster tries to clean up those muddy polygons and wonky or non-existent camera but it doesn’t replicate the spirit and intent of a bygone era?
Because I had no frame of reference for the Soul Reaver games outside of a demo I played over 20 years ago, the changes in the Remastered version didn’t taint an original experience that had been crystallized by nostalgia. Since I was able to instantly switch back and forth between the original visuals and the updated version, I could see the changes made to take a PlayStation 1-era game and make it look sharper for HD displays. That being said, some interpretation and artistic license was taken that did seem to stray from the original vision.
With Legacy of Kain: Defiance Remastered, I find myself in a similar position. The PlayStation 2/Xbox game from 2003 was never touched by my hands. At the time, I was spending most of my time on a GameCube in high school and sinking a bunch of time into Final Fantasy X. Ultimately, I have no nostalgia for the game outside of the legacy it has created for itself and the lack of meaningful sequels that would serve to continue the complex world and lore built by the previous games.
Defiance picks up after Soul Reaver 2 and features a dual-protagonist narrative where players switch back and forth between the vampire Kain and the scorned wraith Raziel. Time travel is the sticking point here as the two characters explore the vast history of Nosgoth, tackling eternal gods, the creation of vampires, and the question of fate itself.
Crystal Dynamics’ work on the Legacy of Kain series feels almost prophetic for the kinds of narratives that would eventually come to consoles. Though PC players were often treated to complex stories and intricate character fantasies, action games were usually just that. Considering Amy Hennig who would one day work on the Uncharted games was the director behind the Soul Reaver titles and Dead Space‘s Glen Schofield worked on Defiance, Legacy of Kain oozes the kind of depth that would take a whole generation to fully evolve. The addition of excellent voice acting and moody music–thankfully remastered here–elevates the entire package.
Defiance Remastered has an entrenched history for a number of players who adored the Legacy of Kain series in the past, or grew to love it over time. And I can’t help but think that most of the people who will initially be drawn to this work are those veterans. They will be the ones to notice the changes and appreciate the improvements that have been made to a decades-old game.
Personally, I can’t imagine playing Defiance without the third-person controllable camera. The original game featured a fixed camera angle that was meant to frame all the action in the way intended by developers. Don’t get me wrong, I’m very much used to this approach across countless games of my younger days. There are many cinematic moments meant to surprise and tantalize the player based on how the on-screen action was directed. But Defiance can be a bit confusing when trying to figure out where to go in combat, platforming, and puzzles.
Legibility is sometimes an issue with scalable walls being an uncertainty due to placement or visual texture. Thankfully, the camera makes combat more engaging because the player can adjust the angle of a fight if they get in tight spaces. Like the Soul Reaver remasters, the graphical upgrades done here are meant to sharpen up Defiance and provide a clearer idea of what Crystal Dynamics’ intentions were back then. Crisp, high-definition graphics offer new detail and give the world more personality. But I think there are a few instances where the original look has more style and personality, where the remaster changes it a bit too much. Graphics can be switched from old to new with the press of a button or stick and that is one of my favorite features in any game like this. Even the new camera can be swapped with the old.
Additionally, players can use a new tool called Foresight Navigation to point the player directly to where they should go next, a helpful thing in these older games, especially if you’ve never touched them before. Other meaningful inclusions come in the form of archival material like behind the scenes footage, lost levels that never made the cut, concept art, skins for Kain and Raziel, an in-game map that isn’t really practical, and a demo for The Dark Prophecy. The Dark Prophecy would have been the next Legacy of Kain game but development was halted in 2004. This is a nice addition–albeit short–simply because it’s an attempt to encapsulate as much of the series as possible.
Outside of Defiance Remastered‘s improvements and additions, this is still very much a game of the early-2000s, warts and all. Crystal Dynamics had an engaging combat system and a complex narrative. But there’s still a tendency for fights to become repetitive, especially when Kain and Raziel aren’t vastly different from each other mechanically. The story might still bounce around in frustrating or confusing ways. Levels may go on for longer than you wish. But it is still very much a piece of gaming history that many hope will eventually see a resurgence. And, of course, we can always hope that the two Blood Omen games get a similar treatment one day or that the Legacy of Kain games continue with a full-blown sequel in the future.
Legacy of Kain: Defiance Remastered is a welcome addition after the Soul Reaver games received the treatment. Though fans may wait for Blood Omen to have its moment, having this 2003 with a suite of upgrades could make it palatable for newcomers to be drawn into the Legacy.
