Soundfall Review

The rhythm action game is a difficult one to cross over into other genres. It has had lots of different visual and audio representations, the ultra cartoon look of Parappa the Rapper hip-hop to the more guitar directed Rock Band. However, outside of games like Rez and Crypt of the Necrodancer there hasn’t been many successes beyond the ‘Simon Says’ gameplay of matching a button press with a cue. The attention required to be successful at a rhythm game often involves blocking everything else out so there isn’t a lot of space to pay attention to ancillary items.  

This makes Soundfall an interesting proposition – a looter/twin-stick shooter, where the player is expected to shoot and dodge in time with the beat of different songs. The question is: does Soundfall manage to find the magic sauce that helps the player to pay attention to the beat as well as dodge enemies and shoot without detracting from either element? The answer – kind of.

The premise of the game is that the protagonist Melody is transferred to a magical world called Symphonia. All of its magic is music-based and unsurprisingly, Symphonia requires saving. This is done by Melody engaging in bite-sized levels, unlocking new playable characters, weapons and gear that will clear the scourge.

The game is played as a top down, twin-stick shooter but in the center at the bottom of the screen there is an ever-pulsing indicator of the rhythm that the player should attune themselves to. Timing shots and dodges on the pulse will result in a more powerful effect, missing that timing however will produce a weak shot or fudged dodge. The rhythm is not limited to player actions – all enemies move and attack in time with the beat and this helps reinforce better play – this means that the player will never be expected to dodge a shot off the beat. Soundfall is also mindful of different skill levels and accessibility. On top of the usual difficulty sliders and tools to adjust for input delay, there is a metronome option if the player can’t properly hear the beat, and the controller vibrates in time for those that are hearing impaired.

Soundfall smartly keeps each level short – all can be beaten in the duration of a song – and drops new loot at the end of them. The quality of the loot is impacted by the player’s performance, keep a combo running for a whole level, never get hit, finishing before the song ends, all of these help to get better weapons, armour etc.

In local co-op it is a little chaotic as it is easy to lose track, I found it too distracting to have someone in the same room as me to be able to focus. This is ameliorated by online, and the connectivity capabilities of the game are rock solid, something that is essential for a timing-based game.

All of it works and for anyone that is reading this and anticipates a ‘but’, here they are: in an attempt to make its two styles blend Soundfall compromises both of them. I found myself, no matter what was happening, having to keep an eye on the beat indicator to make sure I wasn’t missing too many shots. The game seems to know this is something most players will have to do and the action, as a result, never feels particularly challenging. Likewise, the developers seem to know that the highest ranks of the game are only going to be hit by the most dedicated. This means that basic loot is still very useful, and that flattening of loot quality meant that I never felt that dopamine hit of satisfaction that is known from these types of games when I got a new weapon.  

This is conjecture but I imagine that to make all the information onscreen readable, more wild guns and effects had to be sacrificed. That need to keep to the beat and to be mindful of it naturally means keeping things clean.

Soundfall makes sense as a series of design choices and what is here is solid, but it does not crack rhythm-action crossover problem.

Conclusion

Soundfall can be fun and certainly offers a fresh look on rhythm action games. It doesn’t manage to find the compelling magic though.