Developer – Jukai Studio

Publisher – Versus Evil

Platforms – PC, Xbox Series S|X, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5 (reviewed)

Review copy given by publisher

I’m a huge survival horror fan, and always on the lookout for indie gems that might do the genre justice. My interest was piqued when Jukai Studio’s debut project Stray Souls was announced back in November 2021, as it seemed to take inspiration from my favorite titles, Resident Evil and Silent Hill. This third person psychological horror game is finally releasing now just in time for spooky season 2023, but I can’t help but feel it needed a lot longer in the oven before releasing.

Stray Souls starts off with a bang with a cutscene of a naked man in piss-stained boxers pulling out a shotgun and killing his family only to find out it was just a hallucination. The game then has you take on the role of a young man named Daniel who has just inherited a large house from his late grandmother. Not everything is as it seems, and Daniel soon finds out his family’s darkest secrets as he descends into a nightmare. The narrative is mediocre at best, and follows the cliche story of some cult trying to perform some demented ritual. It doesn’t help that the voice acting is terrible, as the main character doesn’t seem to be the least bit bothered by the messed up events unfolding around him.

The game doesn’t know what it wants to be and it shows. One portion has you exploring a haunted house solving puzzles and pretty much being a walking simulator. The puzzles make no sense most of the time and you have to guess and check what the right answer might be. In the rest of this section, you type text messages that are impossible to read on your computer, pick up laundry off the floor, and pet your dog, among other mundane tasks. You can also pick up notes and learn more about the overall backstory and lore. Is this a horror game or a life sim?

The next portion puts you, equipped with a bright gold desert eagle, in a random forest cemetery against hundreds of dog-hand creatures. Conveniently placed ammo boxes and health packs are scattered throughout for you to replenish your supplies. It’s nonsensical at best, because every monster is a bullet sponge and has you pumping at least 10 bullets in them before they magically disappear. Since none of these monsters drop anything, you don’t even have to kill them. I found that if you simply sprint past them, they automatically die for some reason. You’ll hear a blood splatter behind you and they’ll be gone if you turn around. You do visit some interesting locales later on, including a police station and a town called Aspen Falls. 

Stray Souls attempts to be a survival horror experience, and has all the parts to be one, but fails to meld the pieces together to create something worthwhile. For starters, you only have your 1 pistol throughout the entire playthrough. It can be upgraded but all the upgrades feel menial. Bullets feel as if they have no impact on the monsters, and every five steps you take there will be another ammo crate for you. You have a dodge ability but it’s pretty useless and the timing of i-frames is off half the time. There’s never a sense of dread or urgency anywhere you go. Running and shooting is pretty much all you’ll be doing in this game. Level design is equally atrocious, with certain ones having you run mindlessly for 10-15 minutes straight.

I’m not sure what it is with indie developers biting off more than they can chew when it comes to Unreal Engine 5. Maybe it’s just for marketing buzz because the end product looks absolutely heinous. The term MetaHuman technology is even used on the official Steam page as a description of the game, with advanced facial animations! The only word I would use to describe the characters in this game is uncanny. Daniel’s hands are disturbingly large and his expressions are unnatural and stiff. Voice-overs don’t match with the lip syncing and overall character movements feel off. There are some cool monster designs later on, but the evil grandma just looks goofy as hell. At least I got a good laugh out of it.

What makes everything worse is the god awful camera angles. The camera is jittery and headache inducing if you are too close to a wall or other object. It will start glitching and move back and forth uncontrollably. In the more open areas, you can actually clip and fall through the map if you do a dodge roll. Even when you don’t fall through the map, the camera angle sifts underneath it when you do roll. I’m not sure if this was a bug or intended but there were several times where Daniel was dragged to the floor by the grandma only for her not to show up. He would also have no reaction as to what happened and just go about his day. Sometimes you’ll see animations of Daniel floating above the ground too! Maybe Daniel is on the same side as evil granny.

Given how awful the overall game is, I was actually quite surprised to see how technically smooth Stray Souls is, for the most part. The load times are quite fast and the frame rates are smooth on PlayStation 5. There are no graphical or performance modes, nor are there any accessibility settings or DualSense features used. Subtitles are offered, but they are incredibly small and illegible to the point where it’s better to just turn them off. The overall volume is incredibly unbalanced, with environmental screeching sounds being insanely loud, while dialogue between characters is almost inaudible. I did run into some softlock bugs that forced me to reload at a checkpoint several times. Combine this with the inability to skip cutscenes and you got yourself an even more frustrating experience. 

This game is being sold for $29.99 and will run you around 3-4 hours to complete, depending on your skill level and how many game breaking bugs you encounter. Not sure why the developers thought it would be a good idea to implement no manual save either, as the game only saves at specific checkpoints. Sure it’s not triple A price but it’s almost highway robbery to charge something of this quality for that amount. There are several different endings to achieve but given the state that this game is in, I’d be surprised if you even finish the game once!

There are hundreds of games out there that are more worth your time than Stray Souls is. This bizarre, disappointing, and messy experience takes inspiration from but ultimately disrespects all the survival horror greats. I wouldn’t recommend this title even after several patches and a heavily discounted price tag.