Developer: Jaleco, CP Brain, Ratalaika Games
Publisher: Jaleco, Ratalaika Games, DotEmu, Hamster Corporation
Platform: Switch, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S
Tested on: PS5
Avenging Spirit – Review
There’s no denying that retro games are popular again. We see many different developers and publishers either recreate a retro gaming experience or remaster (or rerelease) an old classic title to be enjoyed by a new generation. Avenging Spirit is one of the latter, where the old-school 1991 game is now available for young and old on our current-day gaming platforms. We put this old-school body-snatching action platformer to the test, and we mostly enjoyed our time with this bite-sized retro game.
Story
Avenging Spirit does have a small backstory, but we reckon most players will just dive into the gameplay. Nonetheless, the game is about a man who gets brutally murdered but his will is still so strong that he’s going after his abducted girlfriend as a spirit. Depending on how you do in the game, you’ll get a different short ending when beating the game.
Graphics
Graphically you’re getting a nice-looking retro game that utilizes a lot of different character sprites. By today’s standards, this wouldn’t be extremely impressive, but even so, Avenging Spirit looks quite good. The game has six different stages to play through, and all of these have different themes. That being said, even though the character sprites look spiffy, we did find that they didn’t always match the environment they were in. At times the game feels as if it’s a lot of random items thrown together. It looks flashy, but the overall setup is not always coherent.
Sound
The sound design is fairly typical for when this game was originally released. You’ll get upbeat chiptune-like music, which gets the adrenaline flowing. The different stages have their own dedicated track, and this works quite well. The sound effects are pretty simplistic, but this is also quite common for a title that came out in 1991. While a new modern soundtrack would have been cool, the current retro soundtrack has withstood the test of time.
Gameplay
Avenging Spirit is actually a very simplistic action platformer. In the game, you, as a spirit, can take over the bodies of your attackers. When doing so, you’ll be able to fight off more enemies, and you can progress through the six stages of this game. You’ll have a varied cast of enemies which you can possess, and this allows for several different playing styles. Some characters have ranged attacks, while others prefer to fight close range. Of course, if you’re thinking of floating around until you find a fun host body, you will find yourself moving on to the next world a lot quicker than you imagined. You have energy, and this depletes when taking hits, but also when you’re not inside a host body. The host body also has its own health meter, so you’ll have to be careful if you wish to use a certain character for longer periods of time.
The game itself is fairly fun to play through, and you have different difficulty settings making sure the experience is accessible for newcomers and veterans alike. We did enjoy the overall gameplay loop, but there is not that much content to explore. Of course, given the current price point of the game, there is little to complain about. We did, however, sometimes struggle with the overall menu controls, as these often proved to be unclear. Just figuring out how the second player can ‘join’ is a chore that took us quite some time. You can choose to play the original version, Phantasm, but you’ll basically get the same experience when doing so.
Conclusion
Avenging Spirit is an old-school title that deserves a new lease on life. The game is a case of what you see is what you get, and that is actually quite appealing. That being said, the game is extremely short if you tinker with the difficulty settings and the menus aren’t all that user-friendly. Nonetheless, if you’re a fan of retro games such as this, you will probably enjoy the overall experience.
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