I recently got a chance to sit down and play the newest game in the Souls series. What’s that you say? I played Bloodborne? No, I finished up Bloodborne early this year so, what game did I play? Why it’s only the worst Souls game out there and shameless money grab, Slashy Souls.

A few weeks ago, From Software announced that they made a game, in partnership with Gamestop, called Slashy Souls. Even just hearing the name filled me with dread. Then a short trailer was released showing some gameplay of a generic knight running to the right in a crappy take on the common pixelated art style that’s very popular. Well a few days later the game released and there really is no way to describe just how bad this is.

If you look at the Souls games in general there are several things in common. They are intense, action and movement oriented RPGs that have a stylistic flair for Tolkien-esque fantasy. The only exception to the rule is Bloodborne, which substitutes the Tolkien fantasy for Lovecraftian inspired gothic streets. However the intense focus on movement and careful control is still there and is still just as important.

Slashy Souls controls extremely poorly. For one, its 2D instead of the 3D that every other Souls game has used so effectively. Secondly, your character is constantly moving to the right. You can slow him down but you can’t stop him. Thirdly, the game constantly mixes up your controls, you can slash up to jump or tap to hit and the game constantly mixes up the two.

‘Is there at least a good story?’ you ask. All the rest of the games have interesting and elaborate stories that help drive you through the sheer difficulty of the game. So what’s the story for the game? There is none. Pure and simple, several bosses from the original dark souls show up at complete random but that’s it.

All in all, Slashy Souls is a poorly conceived cash grab that tries to piggyback on a game whose community is used to picking apart a carefully designed world. Slashy Souls is bad. Do not play Slashy Souls.

This writer can be reached via Twitter: @EthanNathe26.

For more from this blog, read Checkpoint: Exploration of Nintendo.