Salt and Sanctuary

This tribute to Souls series is built on the proven mechanics, but it extends them beyond the "original" universe. Thanks to jumping segments, it offers a tougher challenge, yet it is fair and fun as hell. [Issue#263]

The biggest developers out there would be hesitant to try and take on such a task as emulating one of the most distinctive approaches to game design, and to do something different with it, to boot. That Salt & Sanctuary mostly succeeds at that goal is just so incredibly impressive.

A bi-dimensional Souls-like, bestowed with an original and compelling combat system. Waiting for the next Souls, this might be the perfect choice.

Imitation is the greatest form of flattery, but Salt and Sanctuary is truly inspired.

Salt and Sanctuary is wholly engrossing from every angle, from its happy marriage of combat and exploration to its ominously gripping art direction.

Do not underestimate Salt and Sanctuary: it'll chew you up and spit you back out, drawing from From Software's modern action RPG blueprints and translating the hard-as-nails gameplay to two dimensions. It demands your attention, never holds your hand, and rewards your patience and skill. Some players will find the lack of information too obtuse and difficulty too harsh, and a few cheap enemies and well-hidden traps will certainly frustrate. For those willing to go the distance, however, this is an intricate and fulfilling game just waiting to be conquered. As far as Souls wannabes go, this is one that's certainly worth its salt.

Salt & Sanctuary can be brilliant, but it's held back by undersized visual design, both in UI and open play, making playing it from distance a pain. [June 2016, p.122]

Masochistic. The only side scrolling rpg you will ever want. Do yourself a favor and go to their website to support them more by buying a T-shirt and signed poster.

While there is still a lot of fun in playing this game together via couch-coop with a friend, it seems obvious to me that there was a low budget and little menpower in terms of capacity when creating this game. I mean, you cannot even really properly compare the stats between the items (in a souls-like!) as the interface lacks so much information and overview. Especially the inventory-UI is a mess, having a lot of useless but lacking ton of useful information. There is a lot of chaos and inconvenience in the game in general. For singleplayer, there are better games. For local coop, it still does a good job.

For some reason Metacritic has stopped accepting my full reviews but will accept these few words.

Competently made exploration based platformer with everything else ripped off wholesale from the Souls series of games. The lengths at which they went to pilfer and the lengths they didn't go to to mask it or give it some sort of original twist is frankly shocking. The only differences are that it's 2D, that character designs look like something out of a cheap, dingy flash video from the early 2000's (like they were designed by a focus group analyst instead of an actual designer) and that most of the bosses look about as interesting as old bread. Coupled with the at-the-time imminent release of Dark Souls III makes me hate this game on a deep, personal level. Obviously the only reason I'm writing this now after the release of DSIII and the subsequent abandonment of this shameless **** **** is out of spite.

didnt like the graphic style(looks like an amateurs work, but many low price games have that problem..) and one boss towards the end of the game (witch of the lake) is ridiculously out of balance and hard to beat which kinda ruined the experience for me. gameplay wise its quite a nice low budget oldschool 2D platformer game with rpg elements