Find all of the caches, and you get a suit with a bonus effect. NPCs are hidden in these levels with story-driven side quests to solve, as well as audio logs and pieces of suits from the other void runners. In each, a boss reveals itself after you destroy all of its eyes scattered across each map. For the rest of the game, you must awaken and destroy massive legendary beasts, discover what happened to your companions, and start up the Starseed.

Your companions are missing and unresponsive.

Playing as one of the void runners, Rei, you wake to find yourself crash-landed near the Starseed. After inaction from planetary governments, the mystical void runners try a daring rescue plan by utilizing a tool known as the Starseed, located in a previously consumed world, they try to rid themselves of the Ultravoid threat. This time a massive black hole, known as the Ultravoid, is about to consume the whole planet. It begins with humanity, or rather, a human analog, on the familiar brink of destruction. In-game screenshot “Playing as one of the void runners, Rei, you wake to find yourself crash-landed near the Starseed.” Still, it does mash the two concepts together to produce an entertaining if shallower result, sprinkled with Heart Machine’s gorgeous neon pink and purple stylistic flourishes. Solar Ash does not reach the heights of either. Although I hate to compare games to other games outright in reviews, the influence of Shadow of the Colossus and Journey is impossible to ignore in Heart Machine’s sophomore effort.

Opencritic solar ash