Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver
Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver is an action-adventure video game developed by Crystal Dynamics and published by Eidos Interactive. It was released for the PlayStation and Microsoft Windows in 1999 and for the Dreamcast in 2000. As the second game in the Legacy of Kain series, Soul Reaver is the sequel to Blood Omen: Legacy of Kain. Soul Reaver was followed by three games, one of which, Soul Reaver 2, is a direct sequel.
Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver
An early version of the Glyph menu during development
Legacy of Kain is a series of dark fantasy action-adventure video games primarily developed by Crystal Dynamics and formerly published by Eidos Interactive. The first title, Blood Omen: Legacy of Kain, was created by Silicon Knights in association with Crystal Dynamics, but, after a legal battle, Crystal Dynamics retained the rights to the game's intellectual property, and continued its story with four sequels. To date, five games comprise the series, all initially developed for video game consoles and later ported to Microsoft Windows. Focusing on the eponymous character of Kain, a vampire antihero, each title features action, exploration and puzzle-solving, with some role-playing game elements.
Series director Amy Hennig described the Pillars of Nosgoth (above: in concept art, center: in Blood Omen, below: in Defiance) as "the mythological and geographical hub" of the five games.
Raziel (left) and Kain (right) as they appear in Legacy of Kain: Defiance. Both are armed with the Soul Reaver sword.
Vampire mythology was a central source behind the production of the series, as were gnosticism, ancient literature and Joseph Campbell's works.