Salt And Sanctuary Review

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• Salt and Sanctuary is an action RPG game with brutal combat and boss fights. It is often described as a 2D version of Dark Souls. Released prior on the PS4, Salt and Sanctuary made its way to PC last week.

  Dota Sentinel Agility Heroes - Side by Side Comparison in Warcraft 3 Reforged In-game Preview WC3R Before & After Sentinel Strength https://youtu.be/WTv51zID. The Radiant is one of the Nemesis Stones, a force diametrically opposed to the Dire. The Radiant is known to Zet as Radinthul. He originally kept the Dire and Radiant in check. Radiant ore can be found in Radiant lands. It is a glowing, bluish mineral with benevolent magical properties. DotA\'s Sentinel Heroes is born! For those who don\'t already know, DotA stands for Defense of the Ancients, a Warcraft III: Frozen Throne map that changes the RTS arena. With over 80 different characters (40 or more per side) and with constant upgrading by its maker, IceFrog, it\'s no wonder that DotA is such a popular game! Strength Agility Intelligence Rexxar the Beastmaster Kardel Sharpeye the Dwarven Sniper Aiushtha/ Enchantress Bradwarden the Centaur Warchief Yurnero the Juggernaut Puck the Faerie Dragon Raigor Stonehoof the Earthshaker Syllabear the Lone Druid Chen the Holy Knight Purist Thunderwrath the Omniknight Luna Moonfang the Moon Rider Ezalor the Keeper of the Light Mangix the Pandaren Brewmaster The. Dota sentinel heroes. This page was last edited on 6 July 2019, at 19:33. Content is available under CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 unless otherwise noted. Game content and materials are trademarks and copyrights of their respective publisher and its licensors.

  

  Editors Note: Salt and Sanctuary originally released in 2016 for PS4, Vita, and PC. With the release of the Switch version, we decided to dive back into the sanctuary and update our review for Nintendo\'s hybrid console.Forget about mages and warriors—in an RPG with a name like Salt and Sanctuary, I figured it was only appropriate to save the world as a chef.

  It\'s one of the eight starting classes, after all, and thus, clad in apron and armed with a three-foot iron pot and a handful of potatoes, I left the sanctuary of my galley to slay the pirates stealing our princess from our ship and murdering my crewmen. Larry never brained Curly with such vigor. Gordon Ramsay never unleashed such spite. At last I made it to the deck, where I faced off with what looked like Cthulhu himself.

  I tossed a potato at him. He killed me in two hits. At last, I awoke on a far shore. Sound a little like Dark Souls?

  It\'s no accident. Salt and Sanctuary pulls liberally from From Software\'s series for this 2D adventure. In less capable hands, it might have devolved into parody, but instead Salt and Sanctuary establishes itself as a lovingly crafted reimagining that usually succeeds in capturing the spirit of From Software\'s adventures in a format that initially seems incompatible with it.

  It\'s not without its own identity, even if that, too, rides on the shoulders of other giants. It establishes much of it with a rough-brushed art style, which greatly resembles that used by developer Ska Studios\' own Dishwasher series. Inspired by comic strips and angry marginal doodles in high school notebooks, the aesthetic allows for spectacles of blood splatters and gore that might otherwise be disturbing if paired with a style more inclined toward realism.

  The color palette may be wider than what we find in The Dishwasher, but it’s nevertheless dull and earthy, thus punctuating the idea of the menace of its world even if the circly heads and strangely drawn beards do not. Beyond that, Salt and Sanctuary brilliantly recalls the earliest Castlevanias, right down to the zigzaggy side-on stairs and the bats who swoop down and try to knock my Chef Belmont down into the abyss. If I were to choose an old-school sidescroller to base this kind of experiment on, I could think of no better source.The Apprentice or The Master?But otherwise this is very much Dark Souls in 2D form. It\'s what Terraria is to Minecraft and with similar success. Name almost any feature common to Hidetaka Miyazaki\'s punishing games, and it almost certainly asserts itself here in some form or another. There are, for instance, the souls themselves, which drop from enemies and serve as currency for leveling and weapon and armor upgrades. The difference?

  They\'re called salt here, and in a nod to Bloodborne, you have to kill the enemy who killed you to get them back if you lose them. Here, too, is the minimalist story, imparted only by sparse NPCs who seem more interested in being cryptic than being helpful. Death, particularly on bosses, comes swift and easily. The main—and huge—spot where the comparisons falls short is in the absence of PVP combat, although you can leave bottles for other players with messages composed from a limited set of words.

  (A little hilariously, \'Praise the Salt!\' Is a common one.) It does, however, feature a workable couch co-op option that can make boss battles much breezier. Name almost any feature common to Hidetaka Miyazaki\'s punishing games, and it almost certainly asserts itself here in some form or another.Remarkably, this kinship extends to the combat as well.

  Though the action has shifted to profile view, the core abilities remain the same, although mapped a little differently by default when played with a gamepad. Light attacks and strong attacks, blocks and rolls, charged attacks and shifts to hold a one-handed weapon in two hands—all share time in the spotlight here. The brawling itself is never quite as demanding as it is in the games that inspired it, but neither does it ever devolve into mindless hacking and slashing.I initially saw it all come together in the first boss fight, where a hulking chump called the Sodden Knight waits atop a rickety tower. When he charged, I\'d roll past him. When he slammed lightning on the ground, I\'d jump over it. The fight demonstrates Salt and Sanctuary\'s commitment to Mega Man-style memorization, but it also highlights the volatility of its approach. Just when I thought I\'d learned his rhythm, he shook it up by attacking more swiftly and ferociously.

  He eventually fell to my iron pot of doom, but not before I\'d had to adjust to Salt and Sanctuary\'s little idiosyncrasies, such as how attacks make my salty chef pause for a second in midair. I never really got used to it.That\'s a common theme. Whenever Salt and Sanctuary elects to let go of Miyazaki\'s hand, it runs the danger of losing its way. When the time finally came for me to put aside my pot and apron and become the greatsword-swinging warrior I suppose I was born to be, for instance, the transition wasn\'t quite as fluid as it might have been in Dark Souls on account of a sprawling skill tree in the style of Path of Exile and Final Fantasy 10. Its interconnected paths offer a great deal of choice as to whether I want to specialize in weapons like spears or axes, sure, but it\'s not quite the same thing as freedom.

  

  Even its massive, Castlevania-style labyrinth filled with castles, swamps, and inky black dungeons can get a little out of hand, as I eventually found myself struggling to find my way after unlocking multiple shortcuts and combing ever further into the depths.A Soul of its OwnSalt and Sanctuary\'s stabs at originality do hit the mark in the titular sanctuaries, even if they, too, are essentially riffs on Dark Souls\' bonfires. These are the places where you\'ll refill your flasks and regain health (and reset enemies, naturally), but they\'re also instanced hideouts where you can drop off totems that conjure NPCs like blacksmiths and the mercenary that serves as as the avatar for your couch co-op buddy. It\'s a smart system that captures Souls\' emphasis on risk and reward, as you\'ll need to think about where to place these guys so you\'re not continually running to an inconvenient spot to find the artisan who can craft the sword you want. Whenever Salt and Sanctuary elects to let go of Miyazaki\'s hand, it runs the danger of losing its way.These specific sanctuaries are controlled by \'creeds\' with specific bonuses and craftable goodies, which—c\'mon, you can probably guess at this point—stand in for the covenants of that other series. You can only be a member of one, though, so \'defiling\' one of your existing sanctuaries with another one\'s idol renders all of its adherents enemies.

  All of this isn\'t explained as well as it could be in-game, though, so it\'s worth it (but not essential) to partake in that grand Souls tradition of checking wikis for more information if you\'re embarking on a serious playthrough.Salt and Sanctuary clings so laughably much to the Dark Souls template that I joked to myself that this review probably would have been better off as a two-columned comparison checklist. But in truth, this ranks among my favorite games I\'ve played in the last few months.

  Salt and Sanctuary\'s mimicry is born out of love, and it pulls it off with a flair that could come only from a team who drinks and breathes Dark Souls in their after hours. All in all, it\'s worth its salt.

  Switch Port UpdateReleasing back in 2016, Salt and Sanctuary helped set the standard for the “Souls-like” sub-genre of games that derive their core mechanics from From Software’s Souls series.The same holds true for the Switch version. While it is a straight port with no new features added, it makes the jump to Switch without any sacrifices; running at a smooth 60 FPS, with only slight and infrequent dips in certain spots. Salt and Sanctuary on Switch provides the same brutal, yet satisfying challenge that helped make it one of the best indie games released in 2016.One relatively minor complaint about the Switch port is the fact that the game is naturally very dark, with many enemies that blend in with the backgrounds. While playing in handheld mode with less than ideal lighting, enemies can often end up being harder to see than they were initially designed to be.It’s a small price to pay though for the ability to play on the go, and Salt and Sanctuary on the Switch remains every bit as good as it is on other platforms.- Mitchell Saltzman Pros.

  Huge, sprawling map. Excellent Souls homage. Grim, attractive art style.

  Fun combatCons. Poor explanation of some mechanicsThe VerdictYou could call Salt and Sanctuary a 2D mashup of Dark Souls and Castlevania, and you\'d be right. But such a simple pronouncement would be a disservice to the tremendous amount of thought that\'s gone into Salt and Sanctuary, whether it\'s in the graphic style that evokes horror through the style of comic strips or in the intricate web of dungeons and castles serves as it map.

  Salt and Sanctuary is a derivative Dark Souls clone - but it\'s a shockingly good one.

  Lots of games compare themselves to Dark Souls these days. Why wouldn\'t they? From Software\'s instant classic began as a niche import with Demon\'s Souls before taking the world by storm and spreading its influence everywhere. \'It\'s like Dark Souls with zombies\' Ubisoft would say about Zombi U. \'It\'s like Dark Souls with cars\' people have said of Dirt Rally. So when you hear that The Dishwasher: Vampire Smile developer Ska Studios\' non-linear action platformer Salt and Sanctuary was going to be \'like Dark Souls\', it\'s easy to write it off as another buzzword attempted to raise interest in the umpteenth metroidvania on the digital market. But good lord, this is a lot like Dark Souls.

  Salt and Sanctuary

  • Publisher: Ska Studios
  • Developer: Ska Studios
  • Platform: Reviewed on PS4
  • Availability: Out now on PS4. Coming soon to PC and Vita.

  Ska Studios doesn\'t try to hide that fact. Salt and Sanctuary is so beholden to Dark Souls\' template that it\'s a little shocking the two-person Seattle studio hasn\'t been sued. Not only does Salt and Sanctuary crib the Souls series\' unique respawn mechanic - in which you need to reclaim your lost experience by retracing your steps - it copies Souls\' entire combat system and RPG structure wholesale. You fight by managing your stamina meter that temporarily depletes with every strike, block, and roll. You equip various pieces of armour, weapons, and rings with a weight system that influences your mobility based on how much gear you\'re currently wearing. There\'s even stats for Strength and Dexterity that scale your weapons\' damage output on an E through S ranking system. The list goes on and on.

  This borderline plagiarism should be repulsive - and on some level it is - yet Salt and Sanctuary survives this obvious intellectual thievery based on two conditions: it creatively adapts From Software\'s template to a 2D plane, and it\'s a damn fine imitation.

  Let\'s focus on that first point for a moment. This new perspective gives Salt and Sanctuary\'s exploration and combat a sense of deja vu with a different series: Castlevania. Koji Igarashi and co. were letting us explore a non-linear gothic landscape long before From Software entered the fray, though it\'s been several years since Konami issued a 2D outing in the famous franchise. Amusingly, these two series already seemed to be colliding with From Software\'s most recent outing Bloodborne feeling like Dark Souls in Castlevania\'s clothing. By the same token, Salt and Sanctuary feels like Castlevania donning Souls\' whole wardrobe, and in a weird way Ska\'s obvious cribbing has resulted in a novel missing link between these two fabled franchises.

  One interesting discovery upon merging these two inspirations is how different navigation feels in a 2D world without a map. While non-linear platforming adventures like Symphony of the Night and Metroid provided players with maps so that they wouldn\'t get lost, Dark Souls wanted players to feel lost and made memorising its labyrinthine layouts part of the puzzle. That sort of freeform navigation worked well in a 3D environment, when players had more peripheral vision and could see off into the distance. In 2D, however, it\'s a somewhat greater struggle to navigate. This isn\'t necessarily a bad thing, though, as it ends up giving Salt and Sanctuary a unique feel, even if it\'s seemingly assembled out of spare parts.

  As to my other point: Ska Studios handles this unlicensed conversion remarkably well. Combat is thick and crunchy, with each boss and enemy type having its own strengths and weaknesses, making experimentation with different equipment layouts and strategies is important. As was the case in Dark Souls, figuring out when it\'s best to block, dodge, and whether to go in with heavy armour or light can tip the scales drastically in your favour. Sorting your own path to victory in Salt and Sanctuary\'s deep combat system is a pleasure. It may be built upon someone else\'s foundation, but it\'s been captured so authentically in a 2D side-scrolling perspective it feels like an incredible achievement.

  It\'s not just the combat Ska gets right, as the level design cunningly apes Dark Souls as well. Looping corridors and surprising shortcuts are a mainstay in these sorts of games, but it\'s not until later on that you realise just how intricate the level design is. Each area of the map is littered with obscure secrets and hidden loot providing ample incentive to retrace your steps later with new gear. Towards the endgame you\'ll even come across whole areas and bosses that are entirely missable. The fact that these large pockets of content are shrouded off the beaten path only makes discovering them feel that much more like an actually discovery. It\'s a risky prospect for developers to spend that much time on optional, hidden features, but Ska understands just how rewarding unearthing this clandestine content can be.

  There\'s even room for a few original ideas from Ska, even if they\'re relatively modest in practice. The way death works has been slightly tweaked from Dark Souls in that gold and experience points are different currencies and only one is recoverable upon death. Your gold - used to buy items - is gone for good, adding a more menacing edge to each game over. Enemies also liberally drop gold when slain, and constantly collecting shiny loot drops is one of those tiny platformer pleasures that\'s lost in the proper Souls series. There\'s also a neat system where you use limited items to summon shopkeepers and blacksmiths to your sanctuaries, adding a sense of anxiety about where to lay down roots in this ever-expanding adventure.

  There are a few places where Ska\'s ambition exceeds its reach. The studio\'s cartoon goth visual sensibilities aren\'t the best fit here. The angsty-teenager-doodling-in-their-margin aesthetic worked well enough for Ska\'s modest-sized beat-\'em-up The Dishwasher series, but in a game as sprawling as Salt and Sanctuary the art direction is neither as varied nor majestic as the game\'s obvious inspirations. The dialogue also captures some of From\'s penchant for elliptical prose, but none of its darkly romantic allure. Fourth wall-breaking referential gags, like a message riffing on Dark Souls\' most familiar mantra (\'Praise the salt!\'), are similarly unwelcome. [Editor\'s note: The developer has informed us that this was a user-generated message. Apologies for the error.] These blemishes scream \'low-budget fan tribute\', coating Salt and Sanctuary with an icky envious amateur vibe that contrasts greatly with the Souls series\' solemn gravitas.

  Salt and Sanctuary feels like the work of a teenager who really wants to make a Dark Souls game - if that teenager was also really, really good at game design. It isn\'t quite as good as a proper Souls or Castlevania game, but that it gets as close as it does to capturing the thrill of such storied series is a remarkable achievement for such a tiny team. The most frustrating thing about Salt and Sanctuary is how very close it is to a masterpiece. What if Ska had joined forces with From Software to make a licensed 2D Souls game with the original developer\'s art department and writers? If only a larger team had worked on it to provide extra polish in the spots outside Ska\'s limitations. Imagine if it had the visual fidelity and creative spark of something like Ori and the Blind Forest or Cave Story.

  With just a little more spit, polish and imagination, Salt and Sanctuary could have been a timeless classic. As is, it\'s very obviously a fan-made tribute act, but what a tribute act it is. Given that Dark Souls 3 may signal the end of that franchise and Koji Igarashi\'s Castlevania successor Bloodstained is still a long way off, Salt and Sanctuary provides a thoroughly enjoyable imitation in the interim. Worth one\'s salt, then.

  ...'>Salt And Sanctuary Review(08.04.2020)

• Salt and Sanctuary is an action RPG game with brutal combat and boss fights. It is often described as a 2D version of Dark Souls. Released prior on the PS4, Salt and Sanctuary made its way to PC last week.

  Dota Sentinel Agility Heroes - Side by Side Comparison in Warcraft 3 Reforged In-game Preview WC3R Before & After Sentinel Strength https://youtu.be/WTv51zID. The Radiant is one of the Nemesis Stones, a force diametrically opposed to the Dire. The Radiant is known to Zet as Radinthul. He originally kept the Dire and Radiant in check. Radiant ore can be found in Radiant lands. It is a glowing, bluish mineral with benevolent magical properties. DotA\'s Sentinel Heroes is born! For those who don\'t already know, DotA stands for Defense of the Ancients, a Warcraft III: Frozen Throne map that changes the RTS arena. With over 80 different characters (40 or more per side) and with constant upgrading by its maker, IceFrog, it\'s no wonder that DotA is such a popular game! Strength Agility Intelligence Rexxar the Beastmaster Kardel Sharpeye the Dwarven Sniper Aiushtha/ Enchantress Bradwarden the Centaur Warchief Yurnero the Juggernaut Puck the Faerie Dragon Raigor Stonehoof the Earthshaker Syllabear the Lone Druid Chen the Holy Knight Purist Thunderwrath the Omniknight Luna Moonfang the Moon Rider Ezalor the Keeper of the Light Mangix the Pandaren Brewmaster The. Dota sentinel heroes. This page was last edited on 6 July 2019, at 19:33. Content is available under CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 unless otherwise noted. Game content and materials are trademarks and copyrights of their respective publisher and its licensors.

  

  Editors Note: Salt and Sanctuary originally released in 2016 for PS4, Vita, and PC. With the release of the Switch version, we decided to dive back into the sanctuary and update our review for Nintendo\'s hybrid console.Forget about mages and warriors—in an RPG with a name like Salt and Sanctuary, I figured it was only appropriate to save the world as a chef.

  It\'s one of the eight starting classes, after all, and thus, clad in apron and armed with a three-foot iron pot and a handful of potatoes, I left the sanctuary of my galley to slay the pirates stealing our princess from our ship and murdering my crewmen. Larry never brained Curly with such vigor. Gordon Ramsay never unleashed such spite. At last I made it to the deck, where I faced off with what looked like Cthulhu himself.

  I tossed a potato at him. He killed me in two hits. At last, I awoke on a far shore. Sound a little like Dark Souls?

  It\'s no accident. Salt and Sanctuary pulls liberally from From Software\'s series for this 2D adventure. In less capable hands, it might have devolved into parody, but instead Salt and Sanctuary establishes itself as a lovingly crafted reimagining that usually succeeds in capturing the spirit of From Software\'s adventures in a format that initially seems incompatible with it.

  It\'s not without its own identity, even if that, too, rides on the shoulders of other giants. It establishes much of it with a rough-brushed art style, which greatly resembles that used by developer Ska Studios\' own Dishwasher series. Inspired by comic strips and angry marginal doodles in high school notebooks, the aesthetic allows for spectacles of blood splatters and gore that might otherwise be disturbing if paired with a style more inclined toward realism.

  The color palette may be wider than what we find in The Dishwasher, but it’s nevertheless dull and earthy, thus punctuating the idea of the menace of its world even if the circly heads and strangely drawn beards do not. Beyond that, Salt and Sanctuary brilliantly recalls the earliest Castlevanias, right down to the zigzaggy side-on stairs and the bats who swoop down and try to knock my Chef Belmont down into the abyss. If I were to choose an old-school sidescroller to base this kind of experiment on, I could think of no better source.The Apprentice or The Master?But otherwise this is very much Dark Souls in 2D form. It\'s what Terraria is to Minecraft and with similar success. Name almost any feature common to Hidetaka Miyazaki\'s punishing games, and it almost certainly asserts itself here in some form or another. There are, for instance, the souls themselves, which drop from enemies and serve as currency for leveling and weapon and armor upgrades. The difference?

  They\'re called salt here, and in a nod to Bloodborne, you have to kill the enemy who killed you to get them back if you lose them. Here, too, is the minimalist story, imparted only by sparse NPCs who seem more interested in being cryptic than being helpful. Death, particularly on bosses, comes swift and easily. The main—and huge—spot where the comparisons falls short is in the absence of PVP combat, although you can leave bottles for other players with messages composed from a limited set of words.

  (A little hilariously, \'Praise the Salt!\' Is a common one.) It does, however, feature a workable couch co-op option that can make boss battles much breezier. Name almost any feature common to Hidetaka Miyazaki\'s punishing games, and it almost certainly asserts itself here in some form or another.Remarkably, this kinship extends to the combat as well.

  Though the action has shifted to profile view, the core abilities remain the same, although mapped a little differently by default when played with a gamepad. Light attacks and strong attacks, blocks and rolls, charged attacks and shifts to hold a one-handed weapon in two hands—all share time in the spotlight here. The brawling itself is never quite as demanding as it is in the games that inspired it, but neither does it ever devolve into mindless hacking and slashing.I initially saw it all come together in the first boss fight, where a hulking chump called the Sodden Knight waits atop a rickety tower. When he charged, I\'d roll past him. When he slammed lightning on the ground, I\'d jump over it. The fight demonstrates Salt and Sanctuary\'s commitment to Mega Man-style memorization, but it also highlights the volatility of its approach. Just when I thought I\'d learned his rhythm, he shook it up by attacking more swiftly and ferociously.

  He eventually fell to my iron pot of doom, but not before I\'d had to adjust to Salt and Sanctuary\'s little idiosyncrasies, such as how attacks make my salty chef pause for a second in midair. I never really got used to it.That\'s a common theme. Whenever Salt and Sanctuary elects to let go of Miyazaki\'s hand, it runs the danger of losing its way. When the time finally came for me to put aside my pot and apron and become the greatsword-swinging warrior I suppose I was born to be, for instance, the transition wasn\'t quite as fluid as it might have been in Dark Souls on account of a sprawling skill tree in the style of Path of Exile and Final Fantasy 10. Its interconnected paths offer a great deal of choice as to whether I want to specialize in weapons like spears or axes, sure, but it\'s not quite the same thing as freedom.

  

  Even its massive, Castlevania-style labyrinth filled with castles, swamps, and inky black dungeons can get a little out of hand, as I eventually found myself struggling to find my way after unlocking multiple shortcuts and combing ever further into the depths.A Soul of its OwnSalt and Sanctuary\'s stabs at originality do hit the mark in the titular sanctuaries, even if they, too, are essentially riffs on Dark Souls\' bonfires. These are the places where you\'ll refill your flasks and regain health (and reset enemies, naturally), but they\'re also instanced hideouts where you can drop off totems that conjure NPCs like blacksmiths and the mercenary that serves as as the avatar for your couch co-op buddy. It\'s a smart system that captures Souls\' emphasis on risk and reward, as you\'ll need to think about where to place these guys so you\'re not continually running to an inconvenient spot to find the artisan who can craft the sword you want. Whenever Salt and Sanctuary elects to let go of Miyazaki\'s hand, it runs the danger of losing its way.These specific sanctuaries are controlled by \'creeds\' with specific bonuses and craftable goodies, which—c\'mon, you can probably guess at this point—stand in for the covenants of that other series. You can only be a member of one, though, so \'defiling\' one of your existing sanctuaries with another one\'s idol renders all of its adherents enemies.

  All of this isn\'t explained as well as it could be in-game, though, so it\'s worth it (but not essential) to partake in that grand Souls tradition of checking wikis for more information if you\'re embarking on a serious playthrough.Salt and Sanctuary clings so laughably much to the Dark Souls template that I joked to myself that this review probably would have been better off as a two-columned comparison checklist. But in truth, this ranks among my favorite games I\'ve played in the last few months.

  Salt and Sanctuary\'s mimicry is born out of love, and it pulls it off with a flair that could come only from a team who drinks and breathes Dark Souls in their after hours. All in all, it\'s worth its salt.

  Switch Port UpdateReleasing back in 2016, Salt and Sanctuary helped set the standard for the “Souls-like” sub-genre of games that derive their core mechanics from From Software’s Souls series.The same holds true for the Switch version. While it is a straight port with no new features added, it makes the jump to Switch without any sacrifices; running at a smooth 60 FPS, with only slight and infrequent dips in certain spots. Salt and Sanctuary on Switch provides the same brutal, yet satisfying challenge that helped make it one of the best indie games released in 2016.One relatively minor complaint about the Switch port is the fact that the game is naturally very dark, with many enemies that blend in with the backgrounds. While playing in handheld mode with less than ideal lighting, enemies can often end up being harder to see than they were initially designed to be.It’s a small price to pay though for the ability to play on the go, and Salt and Sanctuary on the Switch remains every bit as good as it is on other platforms.- Mitchell Saltzman Pros.

  Huge, sprawling map. Excellent Souls homage. Grim, attractive art style.

  Fun combatCons. Poor explanation of some mechanicsThe VerdictYou could call Salt and Sanctuary a 2D mashup of Dark Souls and Castlevania, and you\'d be right. But such a simple pronouncement would be a disservice to the tremendous amount of thought that\'s gone into Salt and Sanctuary, whether it\'s in the graphic style that evokes horror through the style of comic strips or in the intricate web of dungeons and castles serves as it map.

  Salt and Sanctuary is a derivative Dark Souls clone - but it\'s a shockingly good one.

  Lots of games compare themselves to Dark Souls these days. Why wouldn\'t they? From Software\'s instant classic began as a niche import with Demon\'s Souls before taking the world by storm and spreading its influence everywhere. \'It\'s like Dark Souls with zombies\' Ubisoft would say about Zombi U. \'It\'s like Dark Souls with cars\' people have said of Dirt Rally. So when you hear that The Dishwasher: Vampire Smile developer Ska Studios\' non-linear action platformer Salt and Sanctuary was going to be \'like Dark Souls\', it\'s easy to write it off as another buzzword attempted to raise interest in the umpteenth metroidvania on the digital market. But good lord, this is a lot like Dark Souls.

  Salt and Sanctuary

  • Publisher: Ska Studios
  • Developer: Ska Studios
  • Platform: Reviewed on PS4
  • Availability: Out now on PS4. Coming soon to PC and Vita.

  Ska Studios doesn\'t try to hide that fact. Salt and Sanctuary is so beholden to Dark Souls\' template that it\'s a little shocking the two-person Seattle studio hasn\'t been sued. Not only does Salt and Sanctuary crib the Souls series\' unique respawn mechanic - in which you need to reclaim your lost experience by retracing your steps - it copies Souls\' entire combat system and RPG structure wholesale. You fight by managing your stamina meter that temporarily depletes with every strike, block, and roll. You equip various pieces of armour, weapons, and rings with a weight system that influences your mobility based on how much gear you\'re currently wearing. There\'s even stats for Strength and Dexterity that scale your weapons\' damage output on an E through S ranking system. The list goes on and on.

  This borderline plagiarism should be repulsive - and on some level it is - yet Salt and Sanctuary survives this obvious intellectual thievery based on two conditions: it creatively adapts From Software\'s template to a 2D plane, and it\'s a damn fine imitation.

  Let\'s focus on that first point for a moment. This new perspective gives Salt and Sanctuary\'s exploration and combat a sense of deja vu with a different series: Castlevania. Koji Igarashi and co. were letting us explore a non-linear gothic landscape long before From Software entered the fray, though it\'s been several years since Konami issued a 2D outing in the famous franchise. Amusingly, these two series already seemed to be colliding with From Software\'s most recent outing Bloodborne feeling like Dark Souls in Castlevania\'s clothing. By the same token, Salt and Sanctuary feels like Castlevania donning Souls\' whole wardrobe, and in a weird way Ska\'s obvious cribbing has resulted in a novel missing link between these two fabled franchises.

  One interesting discovery upon merging these two inspirations is how different navigation feels in a 2D world without a map. While non-linear platforming adventures like Symphony of the Night and Metroid provided players with maps so that they wouldn\'t get lost, Dark Souls wanted players to feel lost and made memorising its labyrinthine layouts part of the puzzle. That sort of freeform navigation worked well in a 3D environment, when players had more peripheral vision and could see off into the distance. In 2D, however, it\'s a somewhat greater struggle to navigate. This isn\'t necessarily a bad thing, though, as it ends up giving Salt and Sanctuary a unique feel, even if it\'s seemingly assembled out of spare parts.

  As to my other point: Ska Studios handles this unlicensed conversion remarkably well. Combat is thick and crunchy, with each boss and enemy type having its own strengths and weaknesses, making experimentation with different equipment layouts and strategies is important. As was the case in Dark Souls, figuring out when it\'s best to block, dodge, and whether to go in with heavy armour or light can tip the scales drastically in your favour. Sorting your own path to victory in Salt and Sanctuary\'s deep combat system is a pleasure. It may be built upon someone else\'s foundation, but it\'s been captured so authentically in a 2D side-scrolling perspective it feels like an incredible achievement.

  It\'s not just the combat Ska gets right, as the level design cunningly apes Dark Souls as well. Looping corridors and surprising shortcuts are a mainstay in these sorts of games, but it\'s not until later on that you realise just how intricate the level design is. Each area of the map is littered with obscure secrets and hidden loot providing ample incentive to retrace your steps later with new gear. Towards the endgame you\'ll even come across whole areas and bosses that are entirely missable. The fact that these large pockets of content are shrouded off the beaten path only makes discovering them feel that much more like an actually discovery. It\'s a risky prospect for developers to spend that much time on optional, hidden features, but Ska understands just how rewarding unearthing this clandestine content can be.

  There\'s even room for a few original ideas from Ska, even if they\'re relatively modest in practice. The way death works has been slightly tweaked from Dark Souls in that gold and experience points are different currencies and only one is recoverable upon death. Your gold - used to buy items - is gone for good, adding a more menacing edge to each game over. Enemies also liberally drop gold when slain, and constantly collecting shiny loot drops is one of those tiny platformer pleasures that\'s lost in the proper Souls series. There\'s also a neat system where you use limited items to summon shopkeepers and blacksmiths to your sanctuaries, adding a sense of anxiety about where to lay down roots in this ever-expanding adventure.

  There are a few places where Ska\'s ambition exceeds its reach. The studio\'s cartoon goth visual sensibilities aren\'t the best fit here. The angsty-teenager-doodling-in-their-margin aesthetic worked well enough for Ska\'s modest-sized beat-\'em-up The Dishwasher series, but in a game as sprawling as Salt and Sanctuary the art direction is neither as varied nor majestic as the game\'s obvious inspirations. The dialogue also captures some of From\'s penchant for elliptical prose, but none of its darkly romantic allure. Fourth wall-breaking referential gags, like a message riffing on Dark Souls\' most familiar mantra (\'Praise the salt!\'), are similarly unwelcome. [Editor\'s note: The developer has informed us that this was a user-generated message. Apologies for the error.] These blemishes scream \'low-budget fan tribute\', coating Salt and Sanctuary with an icky envious amateur vibe that contrasts greatly with the Souls series\' solemn gravitas.

  Salt and Sanctuary feels like the work of a teenager who really wants to make a Dark Souls game - if that teenager was also really, really good at game design. It isn\'t quite as good as a proper Souls or Castlevania game, but that it gets as close as it does to capturing the thrill of such storied series is a remarkable achievement for such a tiny team. The most frustrating thing about Salt and Sanctuary is how very close it is to a masterpiece. What if Ska had joined forces with From Software to make a licensed 2D Souls game with the original developer\'s art department and writers? If only a larger team had worked on it to provide extra polish in the spots outside Ska\'s limitations. Imagine if it had the visual fidelity and creative spark of something like Ori and the Blind Forest or Cave Story.

  With just a little more spit, polish and imagination, Salt and Sanctuary could have been a timeless classic. As is, it\'s very obviously a fan-made tribute act, but what a tribute act it is. Given that Dark Souls 3 may signal the end of that franchise and Koji Igarashi\'s Castlevania successor Bloodstained is still a long way off, Salt and Sanctuary provides a thoroughly enjoyable imitation in the interim. Worth one\'s salt, then.

  ...'>Salt And Sanctuary Review(08.04.2020)