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SR2-ReaverMeter-Full

A Full Reaver Bar

"I could now summon the blade at will, regardless of my strength, but once summoned the blade's ravenous appetite could not be contained.
It devoured the souls of its victims and if I allowed it to become over-aroused, the Reaver will now turn its hunger on me."
―Raziel — Listen (file info)[src]

The Reaver Bar, also known as the Reaver Meter, was an element of the heads-up display and gameplay mechanic appearing in Soul Reaver 2. Encircling Raziel's Health coil, the meter filled as Raziel struck enemies with the Wraith Blade, becoming more powerful with each strike until it completely filled at which point it drained Raziel's health.

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The Reaver bar was only seen in Soul Reaver 2, but was not initially part of the gameplay. In "A Reaver in Time" as Raziel moved through the Sarafan Stronghold armed with the Wraith Blade he came across the physical Soul Reaver positioned in the chapel of William the Just within the Sanctuary Cathedral. The resulting Reaver convergence awakened the largely dormant spirit within the blade, arousing its ravenous hunger for Souls and manifesting the Reaver meter in the heads-up display.[Soul Reaver 2][Soul Reaver 2/1][Soul Reaver 2 manual][Soul Reaver 2 strategy guide (Prima)]

When used in combat the Reaver bar would fill up, appearing as a circular meter around Raziel's health coil. The meter would rise briefly with each strike or shot from the blade and would rise quickly from damage and deaths of enemies, visibly consuming souls as it did and rising through green, yellow, orange and red colored grades until it encircled the health coil.[Soul Reaver 2][Soul Reaver 2 manual][Soul Reaver 2 strategy guide (Prima)]

The mechanics of the bar were both a blessing and a curse - with each strike the blade would become more powerful, allowing Raziel to cause greater damage to enemies and dispatch them quickly; however Raziel would be unable to feed on the consumed souls and if the meter was fully completed it would totally encircle the health coil and quickly drain it for a short period. After draining Raziel's health, the bar would subsequently slowly drop to its previous position. Raziel could avoid the loss of souls by changing weapons for the fatal blow, but this would deplete the soul energy available from the kill. [Soul Reaver 2][Soul Reaver 2 manual][Soul Reaver 2 strategy guide (Prima)]

Despite being a constant balance in the course of Soul Reaver 2, the Reaver bar was not seen in further games and quite different mechanics for Feeding the Reaver were seen in Legacy of Kain: Defiance.[Soul Reaver 2][Defiance]

Behind the scenes[]

The meter and its associated gameplay mechanics can be toggled on or off under Debug menus, where it is labelled as an ability named "SR2 Health". The mechanic itself appears in early versions of Soul Reaver 2 and can be seen in several of the later pre-release screenshots including in both the US and European versions of the Air Forge demo, however its coloring is slightly different to the retail version and it fills noticeably quicker in the US version and noticeably slower in the European version when compared to the retail version. The setting in the debug menu for the ability does not appear in the US version of the Air Forge demo but is present in the later European one, suggesting it was only added as a distinct ability between May and July 2001, with the balance of health, damage and feeding consequently effected.[1][2][3][4]

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  1. Icon Soul Reaver 2 Soul Reaver 2 Air Forge demo (US version)
  2. Icon Soul Reaver 2 Soul Reaver 2 Air Forge demo (European version)
  3. Icon The Lost Worlds The Air Forge Demo at The Lost Worlds (by Ben Lincoln)
  4. Icon The Lost Worlds The Debug Menu at The Lost Worlds (by Ben Lincoln)
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