Rating: 4.5 stars

When the fighting elements of Secret of Mana meet Roguelike elements of Rogue Legacy, the result is Wayward Souls.

There isn’t much to base the story off of. Each character has their own individual narrative, but they’re all somewhat generic, stop-the-bad-guy type of plot. Where the storytelling shines is how it’s presented. For the most part, things aren’t outright stated. By finding journals throughout different areas, players can piece together what exactly happened before the events of the game.

Played from a bird’s-eye view, players control their character by tapping or swiping the screen. It’s an easy-to-learn control scheme and helps players get comfortable quickly for the potentially long road ahead.

Wayward Souls is hard. It doesn’t hold hands and it pulls no punches. Death is permanent. If a character loses all of their health, then that’s it. It’s back to the beginning for them. Smart play and spacial awareness is key.

There are some advantages a player can gain. By visiting Emberforges, players can upgrade a piece of their character’s equipment, be it their weapons or armor. For example, the mage has an upgrade where her attacks become short-ranged and go through multiple enemies. But these upgrades are lost upon death.

What isn’t lost, however, are character attribute bonuses. By spending gold earned by breaking objects and defeating enemies, players are able to upgrade characters permanently. These can range from more health to a higher chance of inflicting double damage to an opponent, some of the only stable enhancements in the game.

No two playthroughs of Wayward Souls are the same. Every single time the Emberforge upgrades, items found and even the layout of the floors will be different. This makes for near infinite replay value.

The presentation is also well done. Graphics are reminiscent of the SNES era, making for an easy-on-the-eyes experience. Characters are animated smoothly and the game never slows down, even though there are often times where literally more than 100 enemies appear on the screen.

Wayward Souls’ soundtrack is atmospheric yet catchy. Songs tend to focus either on string instruments, like “Heart of the Dungeon,” or are more techno-based, like “Ashen Scars.” There are time when the two styles combine, such as in “The Only Way Out-Reprise.”

With fun yet challenging game play combined with an intriguing story and great presentation leads to an overall great game that left me constantly saying “one more run.”