Review by: Brian Pipa

“Free your soul from the boredom of ordinary 3D games and escape to a world where intelligence, skill and agility are your most powerful weapons. Prepare to face your greatest fears as Soultrap takes you into a deadly nightmare world of intense terror and lethal surroundings. Some features of the game: 360 Degrees of freedom, First person view, plus a variety of third person camera angles, 11 heart pounding levels, numerous weapons including: axes, ray gun, dynamite, boomerang gun.”

The storyline is that you, Malcom West, are plagued by bad dreams and must enter your dream world, confront your fears, destroy your enemies, and finally get a good night of sleep. When Soultrap first starts, it looks like a 3D platform-type game where you can jump from platform to platform picking up items and weapons and shooting enemies. Basically that’s what Soultrap is, but it’s not very well done. The default controls are so complicated that I could not figure out how to play the game without looking at the settings (and changing them). There are so many keys used that it is very confusing. I wish I could have used the other 2 buttons on my joystick or used the hat on my Logitech Wingman Warrior Extreme. As it is, I had to use an awkward combination of joystick and mouse.

The object of the game is to complete each of 12 levels by destroying all the enemies on each level and then finding the way out (sound familiar?). Along the way you find MANY different weapons – I counted over 20 listed in the manual. You don’t just run or walk around – you are standing on what’s called a jetboard and all actions are accomplished while riding this. I really didn’t see the point of the jetboard – I think the game would have been the same without it.

The gameplay is very difficult. It’s a chore just to jump from platform to platform. Throw in some enemies shooting
at you and you trying to shoot back, and you get one hard game. Too hard in my opinion.