Please login to submit a screenshot

Title Sword of Sodan
Game Type General Action
Players 1
Compatibility All (degrade for AGA)
Company Discovery
HD Installable Patch available
Submission Chris Vella cvella@specdata.com Profiled Reviewer

Review
I remember seeing a demo of this game in the software store and being
amazed. At the time I only had the C64 and seeing this demo made me want to
buy an Amiga, but that was 10 years ago. 10 years ago this game was ahead of
its time but, it has very much dated.

The game is a slash/hack'em up where you control either a man or woman
warrior who must kill all the enemies that you come across. The sprites in the
game are huge, probably the biggest even now for an Amiga game. The screen
scrolls as you move from left to right and jerkily at that. The graphics are
very nice and the sound effects are very good, there is even sampled speech.
There is some gore to the game, blood squirts out of enemies and you can even
behead a certain enemy. When you kill an enemy they may drop either a shield
or a zapper. You can collect these and use them when your shield gets low or
if you need help with a particularly tough opponent. The game plays slow and
there are not a lot of enemies but some are tough to kill and will take quite a
few hacks from your sword.

In conclusion, there is not much to say about the game. It's standard hack n
slash but with nice big graphics. 10 years ago you would drooling if you saw
this game but now it has severely dated. If you can get this for a cheap price
do it, and relive history a little, but don't go out of your way to get it. If
you like this kind of genre get the fabulous game Lionheart instead.

"Decent side-scrolling beat 'em up with quite possibly the largest sprites ever."

Ask somebody if they remember an Amiga game, chances are Sword of Sodan will be one of the first on every list. Renowned mostly for its fantastic graphics rather than its fairly difficult, mediocre hack 'em up gameplay, Sodan was a pinnacle in the development of the Amiga itself as not only a gaming platform but for its intense display capabilities as well (this game was released circa 1990. At that time, IBM was experimenting with 16 colors. Not 16-bit colors, 16 COLORS. Period).

As it goes, Sodan's storyline is fairly 'medieval,' as these things tend to go. Two twin children born to a kindly king (son Brodan, daughter Shardan, father Lordan...sensing a connection with these names here?) are taken away to safety shortly after the evil Zoras (you can tell he's evil, because 'dan' appears nowhere in his name) decides he wants to rule. He kills Lordan, sets up in your family's castle, and rules with evil and such over the land.

Brodan and Shardan grow up learning the ways of warriors and some forms of simple magic, mostly protective stuff. Finally, it comes time to for one these two to wield the mighty Sword of Sodan (no family relation) and smite it across Zoras' jewel-imbedded forehead. Trouble is, it will be a long and arduous journey, and who will go to fulfill the destiny of the kingdom and bring peace to the land?

Yep, that's right. In a bold and momentous move that brought about a...er, slightly new age in computer gaming, you can play as either Con...er, Brodan, or his sister Red Son...er, Shardan. What was interesting about this was that both go through the exact same game with the exact same puzzles and monsters, with neither strengths nor weaknesses over the other. The choice of who to pick resides entirely on who you'd rather stare at for the next hour and a half of gameplay. Quite possibly the first game to let you choose genders of equal ability.

Anyway, from the moment you select which twin will lay siege upon the castle, the game goes to a side-scrolling layout. By holding the fire button and choosing one of five major directions (down, up left, and up right don't do much), your character will either slash forward, duck and slash, or perform an overhead slice. Each move helps in different circumstances. Your character can also move and jump, both of which come in handy more often than you'd think. Anyway, you hack through many, many, MANY different creatures (each new area is host to at least one or two new monstrosities, with few repeated in a later level) until you reach the final confrontation with Zoras. Fallen enemies drop power-ups in the forms of weapon strength upgrades, magic spells (invulnerability shields and screen clearing bombs, of which you can carry a maximum of four total at once), and health potions (exceedingly rare). You'll need these just as much as your physical skills if you want to make it all the way through. Also, your mind will be required at certain times to avoid dying in clever and rather devastating traps, including a bridge of spikes, pit floors, and even a tricky water puzzle that had me stuck for quite some time. You get five lives, but be prepared to go through those (and quite a few more) before you reach the end.

GRAPHICS: 10
At the time, these graphics were pretty astounding. Although not as fluid as the earlier graphics of Shadow of the Beast (and, in fact, quite a few Psygnosis games), the sprites are HUGE. Your player character takes up a good 1/2 of the screen height-wise, as do many of the enemies. Heck, one nearly fills the entire screen. The coloring was also heads above the stuff being done at the time, and while we have billions of colors available today, the 4096 that this game takes advantage of really does look pretty stunning. A warning to younger players and parents, though: some of the monsters die in rather disgusting ways, including a beheading.

MUSIC & SOUND: 9
To my knowledge, there's only one piece of music in the whole game, a rather forgettable piece played during the intro. However, the sound effects more than make up for this. Digitized speech samples, sword thwacks, the hiss of deadly scorpion like creatures, zombie moans, magical explosions...this game has them all, and they sound great (I still think the built-in Amiga sound generator is one of the best built-in sound chips of all time. PCs today still don't have good built in sound chips, just fantastic add-in cards).

CONTROL: 8
Your jump is a little on the awkward side, but this game's control scheme is easy to pick up and not complicated at all. Duck, slash, slice, jump, walk...that's all you need to get to your objective. Magic items are handily placed on the function keys, meaning that a simple key press activates a spell instantly. So simple, it's almost perfect.

OVERALL: 8
Great sound, great graphics, good control...this game's pretty solid all around. No level is too long to get overly boring, meaning you often get to see new enemies and areas at a good, constant pace. No level takes much longer than 5 minutes to clear, which may make the game too short in some eyes. However, the game is wickedly difficult at times, extending the gameplay longer than it might appear at first glance. For a game that is now looked back on by many to be rather worthless and dated looking, it was built on a solid gaming core.

All in all, if hacking, slashing, and swords'n'sorcery are your thing, try Sodan. It's sometimes available on ebay, where a Genesis version is also sold (although considering this game's real strength is its graphics, I wouldn't recommend that version, though I've never seen it to be truthful). It's a lot of fun.

And besides, with the new Amiga systems coming out right around the corner, it might be worth to pick up some Amiga software. Never know what the future might bring.


Reviewer's Score: 8/10 | Originally Posted: 09/21/01, Updated 09/21/01