BLOOD OMEN: LEGACY OF KAIN - another classic videogame

I've been acquainted with the Legacy of Kain games since the demo of Soul Reaver for PS1 came out in 1999 or so. Ironically, the first one I played from start to finish was Soul Reaver 2, I think maybe around 2005-ish, when a friend from school sold it to me with other three games for the whopping amount of 20€. I didn't understand it at all. Then my interest waned until mid-2009, when I picked it up again and the actual passion for this series ignited. I think that after that I played Blood Omen, and only after that Soul Reaver. And then, Defiance. I've never played Blood Omen 2 (my brother did and was not pleased if I recall correctly). Along the years, I may have played Soul Reaver, Soul Reaver 2 and Defiance maybe one more time each. I've never managed to play Blood Omen again. Which is odd, given the fact that is a great game, even if a bit dated.

The reason is soon explained: Blood Omen, for many years, has been a de-facto abandonware, due to a lawsuit between the studio developing it and its distributor. Now this is apparently resolved, as it is sold on GOG (for a minimal sum of money, definitely worth a grab), but I remember clearly that it wasn't easy to run it (a 1997 game) on modern PCs. Now, you could be asking yourselves "why do you not buy the GOG version?". Good question. I have two laptops, none of which is able to run Windows anymore, due to poor hardware. Trying to emulate the PlayStation version with the glorious ePSXe emulator was doable, but the settings to make it run correctly were truly a trial and error process. Original PS1 copies were out of my reach for monetary reasons and my consoles were not modded to run pirated games. Also, it was available on the PS3 digital store. Too bad I didn't have a PS3.

So yes, it wasn't impossible, it was just hard.

The main character, Kain, is not in this loading screen. The final boss is, though.

And believe me, up to three months ago I still tried to run it on PC. Well, on linux. With a controller. It kinda works, but only in a tiny windowed mode, or else it crashes. Thank you Wine for being mysterious in your ways. I just want to add that Soul Reaver, emulated on linux through Steam's inner windows emulator, works fine. I've even adjusted the joypad controls so it pans the camera with the right stick (you had to do it with L2 and R2 buttons, totally awful for nowadays standards).

An interesting (only to me) effort of mine was to recreate Kain in Elden Ring. I've had a blast with this, trying to use only the weapons and spells that were featured in Blood Omen. I also find the two games having a lot in common, in terms of plot and ideas.

Now I finally own a PS1 original copy of the game. Disc, front cover and manual (no explanations as to why the seller had no more the case and the back cover). And I have it in english. Because you see, there is a ton of Blood Omen discs on ebay, but almost all of them are dubbed in french or german. This was the only one in english that, because of its lack of case and back cover, didn't cost a kidney. I actually paid slightly more in shipping and import taxes than the actual thing, believe me or not.

Something that those who played only emulated or GOG version of the game don't know, are the loadings. Everytime you enter a menu, a building, a wilderness area, etc, the game has to load. For a bunch of seconds (usually around 5-10) which doesn't sound much, but it actually is. And did I mention that sometimes it actually slows down? On PS2, nonetheless.

Credit to @fonald3d161 on YouTube

Is it worth playing Blood Omen in 2022? Videogames have changed quite a bit, but it is still an interesting 2D hack and slash game, with some bullet hell elements. Pretty dark in themes for its times (1996), maybe too colorful in its palette for today. The story still holds it though, and there are some crafty gameplay concepts here and there. The world presented is grim and doomed, very fascinating and inspiring. If I was to point out a singular feature that makes Blood Omen still relevant, that would be dialogues and voice acting. Way ahead of time, still a masterpiece today.

The main (and convoluted) story of the Legacy of Kain is quite daunting. It is based upon time travel and paradoxes (history abhors a paradox) and shows clear signs of retcons, rewrites, cut content and reused ideas. It also still lacks a finale. But it's fascinating and does some neat tricks in storytelling and fooling the player (especially in Defiance). It's a frail castle of cards, but it manages to not crumble down and maybe that's why it is still so influential and well regarded: in the end, it does actually make sense.

Very recently, Crystal Dynamics has showed interest in revamping this series. Everyone's wondering: what are they going to do? Remakes? New games? Both?

I have thought a lot about this situation and I've come up with these plausible scenarios:

1 - remakes

This is risky, but also a great opportunity to better polish these old titles. On average, the already published titles take from 10 to 15 hours to complete. Again, on average those are 60 hours. Why not shrink them? Shrink the two Blood Omens together (or better, remake Blood Omen and then use the idea of Blood Omen 2 to make a DLC or something), shrink the two Soul Reavers together (as it was the original plan). Then, leave Defiance standalone (but espand it a bit, like explaining why is Vorador still alive in BO2).

2 - a sequel to Defiance

Now it's been almost 20 years since the release of Defiance. We deserve a finale. But just one game would just be risky. Maybe two?

3 - remakes and a sequel to Defiance

This would make the most sense, but it's a long and risky journey. If they use the same engine for all the games, as well as the same assets, they should be able to cut costs and give the series more organic visuals.

4 - Dead Sun...again?

There was a cancelled Legacy of Kain game post-Defiance. It was called Dead Sun and had not much to do with the rest of the saga. I'm not saying they should make this, but the chances that they would like to start fresh with a new protagonist isn't slim.

We'll have to wait and see what Crystal Dynamics will do. In the meantime, vae victis.