Trivia / Legacy of Kain

• Acting for Two:
  • Michael Bell, Raziel's voice actor, also played Melchiah and various antagonists. This also happens when Raziel confronts his past self.
  • Blood Omen might as well be called, "Everyone is voiced by Tony Jay, everyone who isn't is voiced by either Simon Templeman or Neil Ross. Except for Moebius (Richard Doyle) and Vorador (Paul Lukather)"
• Cowboy BeBop at His Computer: IGN had a hilariously bad case of this whenever they wrote previews of Soul Reaver, referring to Raziel as Kain, the Soul Reaver as a Laser Blade, series producer Amy Hennig as Amy Bennig, etc.
• Channel Hop: Sorta... Crystal Dynamics published the first game, but after they fell out with developer Silicon Knights, they took over development for the rest of the series, with Eidos Interactive (and later Square Enix) taking over publishing duties. Sadly, as detailed under Screwed by the Lawyers, this created problems down the line with re-releases for the first Blood Omen.
• Dummied Out: So, so much in Soul Reaver. A quick guide here. Essentially Soul Reaver and Soul Reaver 2 were going to be one game, but there wasn't enough time, money, or data for that, so they split it into two, hence Soul Reaver's cliffhanger ending and a lot of the cut elements for that game appearing in Soul Reaver 2 and Defiance.
• Follow the Leader:
  • Defiance's combat system is obviously inspired from Devil May Cry, which had come out 2 years prior. When you think about it, it was actually one of its first followers, before God of War and Ninja Gaiden made everyone forget about it.
  • Based on the leaked gameplay footage shown, the cancelled Legacy of Kain: Dead Sun took more inspiration from games like Assassin's Creed and the Batman: Arkham Series, especially in regards to the combat, which was faster and more streamlined, similar to the Arkham games' "freeflow combat". This is cited as a reason as to why the game was cancelled, as Ubisoft and Rocksteady had hundreds of employees working on their games each time, while Climax Studios, the developer helming Dead Sun was much smaller in comparison.
• Franchise Killer: After the first three games did very strong, Blood Omen 2 got average reviews, and to fans of the series its story and design aesthetic were a complete departure from the rest of the franchise. The series stumbled on to Defiance, which got a bit better reception on both fronts, but it wasn't enough to save the series.
• Keep Circulating the Tapes: While averted by the PC versions, the console releases of these games scarcely if ever got any kind of digital rerelease, with only Blood Omen receiving a PS Classics port for PS3/PSP/PS Vita.
• Orphaned Reference: The three visions of the future shown towards the end of Soul Reaver were intended to foreshadow the original planned ending of the game. The first vision shows Raziel and Kain having their final battle at Kain's Mountain Retreat, a location not present in the released game. The second shows Ariel's soul being absorbed to create a Sword of Plot Advancement needed to defeat Kain. The third vision shows Raziel wielding a reaver further augmented by devouring Kain's soul, preparing to travel back to the Silenced Cathedral to activate its Lost Superweapon. The events of later games would go on to re-contextualize each vision, retroactively justifying the foreshadowing.
• The Other Darrin: Mortanius was initially voiced by Tony Jay in Blood Omen, leading to some Wild Mass Guessing regarding the Elder God's identity when Jay went on to voice that character instead. His actor was changed in Defiance, to avoid confusion.
• Referenced by...: Tomb Raider: Legend, also developed by Crystal Dynamics, has Kain in a painting on Croft Manor, his emblem in the unlockable Goth costume, and the Soul Reaver itself is an unlockable weapon.
• Screwed by the Lawyers: For a long time, the PC version of Blood Omen I was denied any sort of rerelease on GOG.com or any other service, due to a spectacular case of Executive Meddling-induced legal bridge-burning between Silicon Knights and Crystal Dynamics (with Activision as an involved sideline third party), which is best left explained in details by NeoGAF user Mama Robotnik. Only its rerelease on PS3 as an emulation of the Playstation port managed to make it through. This eventually ended in late September 2021, when said issues were cleared up in the wake of Silicon Knights' collapse, and Blood Omen saw a rerelease on GOG.com, although only on that storefront, leaving Steam without the complete series.
• Serendipity Writes the Plot: Turel was supposed to be included in Soul Reaver, Dummied Out locations and dialogue make it clear that Raziel would have eventually gone after him, at least on the way to Kain's mountain retreat. However, the team was out of time so Turel was cut without mention, and later games made his absence from Soul Reaver a plot point. He was eventually dealt with in Defiance.
• Trolling Creator: When questioned about the seemingly-Dummied Out HMCS Bitter found in Blood Omen via hacking, Denis Dyack said that there is a legitimate way to reach the ship, seemingly involving four invisible switches scattered around Nosgoth, but refused to elaborate further. A decade later, players found he was legitimately serious — there are four invisible switches around Nosgoth that activate a secret teleport pad to the ship.
• Vaporware: The Dark Prophecy, a straight sequel in the style of Defiance, which was in development for the PlayStation 2 and would have presumably tied up all the loose ends in the franchise... but was never finished, most likely because of Amy Hennig, the head writer of the series after Blood Omen, leaving Crystal Dynamics for Naughty Dog, as well as the death of Tony Jay, the voice of the Elder God. Not to mention the fact that Defiance didn't sell too well.
• What Could Have Been: The development process of the series is infamous among its fans.
  • The very first game was originally a Sega Saturn exclusive before moving to the PS1. According to previews, the Saturn version seemed to run more smoothly.
  • Blood Omen originally contained a chess match between Kain and Vorador, played with living pieces, right before their first meeting, where Kain would have to either cheat using Control Mind to checkmate Vorador, or lose/forfeit and fight the pieces to reach him. It was completed to a playable state, but a serious bug was found in it just prior to release, so the entire sequence was cut at the last minute so as not to delay the game.
  • The game was originally titled Pillars of Nosgoth due to their importance in the story. For that matter, Moebius was originally "Bridenal" and Vorador, for a time, was caleld "Infernum" before being renamed back to Vorador.
  • In Soul Reaver, the Glyphs were supposed to give various elemental properties to the Soul Reaver. They were cut and the concept worked in Soul Reaver 2 and Defiance as the Elemental Reavers. And for that matter, Defiance recycled some axed concepts intended for Soul Reaver 2. Locations that were likely to play host to these abilities can be found in both games; for instance, the lake in Soul Reaver 2 obviously contains a ruined temple that was a prototype Spirit Forge.
  • Also from Soul Reaver, there was to be an expanded area of the Human Citadel where Raziel found the lair of the vampire worshippers and killed their Priestess, gaining the ability to possess others similar to Kain's Mind Control spell from the previous game. May possibly have been recycled into the "Charm" Dark Gift for Blood Omen 2.
  • As covered above, Turel was supposed to be in Soul Reaver with his own territory, but it was axed for time.
  • Soul Reaver originally had a different ending that had Raziel kill Kain and reave his soul, granting him the ability to shift between dimensions at will. This would let him access the highest areas of the Silenced Cathedral and activate it, blasting a deadly hymn that would kill all vampires in Nosgoth.
  • The mystery of Vorador's resurrection in Blood Omen 2 was intended to be solved in Defiance.
  • A human Umah was to appear in Defiance, revealing that she was a priestess before being turned into a vampire. In fact, she was supposed to aid Raziel in recovering Vorador's severed head and returning it to his body so he could be revived, in return for which Vorador would make her into a vampire.
  • A return to the Soul Reaver era was intended in Defiance, presumed to be intended as a Playable Epilogue where Kain saves Nosgoth and permanently destroys the Elder God. This chapter however was scrapped, seemingly due to budget limitations.
  • A sixth game, "The Dark Prophecy," was planned after Defiance but didn't go very far. What little is known about it is that it would have similarly revolved around two protagonists and would shift viewpoints between them, but this time, it would be two versions of Kain in two different time periods.
  • A project called Legacy of Kain: Dead Sun would've focused on the future of Nosgoth resulting from the end of Defiance, starring a human whose soul (through some freak accident) winds up in control of the vampire that kills him. It was first delayed because the PlayStation 3 couldn't handle it technically, but unfortunately, Square Enix cancelled it in 2012. When it was almost complete. Nosgoth is actually based on what should have been Dead Sun's multiplayer mode. And then Nosgoth was also cancelled, when it was already in beta.
  • And, of course, there's no telling how the series would have gone if Silicon Knights had gotten the rights to the series after Blood Omen instead of Crystal Dynamics.
  • All of the above, and even more, can be found on Legacy of Kain: The Lost Worlds, a site dedicated to cut and altered content for the entire series.