Salt and Sanctuary

 Switch
Metascore
82

Generally favorable reviews - based on 22 Critic Reviews

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 19 out of 22
  2. Mixed: 3 out of 22
  3. Negative: 0 out of 22
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  1. Wccftech
    Aug 24, 2018
    70
    As someone that loves Dark Souls, I can say I enjoyed aspects of Salt and Sanctuary, but comparing the two games side by side seems incredibly unfair. Similarly to the Souls games, Salt and Sanctuary requires time and patience for players to reap its true rewards. While that may be attractive to some, it doesn’t quite have the same level of depth and finesse that would warrant it as a worthy substitute for one of the greatest RPGs ever created.
  2. Digitally Downloaded
    Aug 7, 2018
    70
    Salt and Sanctuary is a solid homage to its blatant source of inspiration. It doesn't supplant its predecessors, but it does an admirable job nonetheless, and offers players a moody, intricate, and fundamentally enjoyable dark fantasy experience.
  3. Nintendo Life
    Aug 2, 2018
    60
    Salt and Sanctuary does an admirable job of hitting all the right beats that it needs to provide a challenging and fun action adventure that will no doubt provide a solid bang for your buck, but it doesn’t do a whole lot to stand on its own two legs; this is a game that can only thrive on the scraps generated by the overwhelming popularity of a much better game series. We’d give this one a recommendation to any Dark Souls fans - this is a decent way of capturing that game’s spirit - but those who’ve never been interested won’t find much new here to entice them.

Awards & Rankings

64
#64 Best Switch Game of 2018
100
#100 Most Discussed Switch Game of 2018

User Reviews

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User Score
7.9

Generally favorable reviews- based on 63 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 47 out of 63
  2. Mixed: 6 out of 63
  3. Negative: 10 out of 63
  1. ivmD4XHwulve
    Aug 3, 2018
    0
    From the first moments it becomes obvious that the developers just tried to make their own DS-like game and they were not really worried aboutFrom the first moments it becomes obvious that the developers just tried to make their own DS-like game and they were not really worried about quality or how good gameplay mechanics work in the game. The gamedesign of the game is just terrible. It's obvious that 2D space is just too limited for this genre. Surprisingly, the devs did not even try to workaround the issues caused by 2D. The graphics is a nightmare, it seems that the devs tried to develop their own style but it looks more like drawings of a 12-year-old kid. The sound design of the game is at the same level as the graphics. The storytelling and the script both sound more like a joke. It's a great pity that Nintendo doesn't want to provide refunds.… Full Review »
  2. Relyst
    Aug 2, 2018
    9
    Huge Dark Souls fan, impatiently waiting for literally any news about the switch release. In the meantime, 2D Dark Souls will have to suffice.Huge Dark Souls fan, impatiently waiting for literally any news about the switch release. In the meantime, 2D Dark Souls will have to suffice. I want to say I'm maybe a third of the way through the game and I've quite enjoyed myself. Pro-tip: parry is god… Full Review »
  3. nusco
    Aug 13, 2019
    3
    [Edited: I fixed a typo in this review, and that edit reset its votes. I didn't realize that would happen. My apologies to the raters. It[Edited: I fixed a typo in this review, and that edit reset its votes. I didn't realize that would happen. My apologies to the raters. It won't happen again]

    Salt and Sanctuary is a Dark Souls-inspired 2D metroidvania, and one of the worst gaming experiences I ever had. I don't even know why I finished this game. Maybe it was the misguided idea that I payed for it, so I should beat it. Maybe it was a sense of resentment so deep, that it could only be amended by the cathartic "Eat this!" of beating the final boss. In any case, I felt relieved when I reached the credits and knew that I'll never play this game again.

    Mind you, Salt and Sanctuary isn't an extremely though game. It's actually on the easy side compared to the similarly inspired Hollow Knight, that I enjoyed immensely. Instead of being hard, however, Salt and Sanctuary choses to be insanely frustrating. It's marred by a number of regretful design decisions that add up to a laundry list of how *not* to design a game. Here are a selected few:

    - S&S involves a huge amount of stats, skills, weapons, and items. In theory, that should allow you to tackle the game in many different styles. In practice, some combinations just don't work, and lure you into a dead end. After ~7 hours, I had to abandon my first playthrough, because I'd chosen a setup that made it impossible to pass a mandatory room. Short of getting info from the Internet, I had no way of knowing that beforehand. I just had to bite the bullet and start from scratch with a different setup–that made the “unpassable” room ridiculously easy. I heard other players who got into same exact situation, where the game punishes you for trusting its systems.
    - Like in many games, falling from a height does zero damage until a certain height–above that, you get incremental damage. In S&S, however, that damage scales so fast, that you go from “not even a scratch” to “ah, ah, you're dead” across a tiny range. Should you jump down from that platform? Do you feel lucky?
    - Most of your character's attack/defense/heal animations cannot be interrupted, and some last for *seconds*. I died hundreds of time while waiting for my input to register. The game has an encumbrance system that makes your character more responsive if you go around naked. I ended up fighting all the late bosses in my underwear, without any kind of armor, shield, or large weapon, just to shave some lag off the horribly unresponsive controls. Some people call that kind of high-latency control “deliberate”. I call it “crap”.
    - The game's idea of a challenge involves littering the map with traps that are made invisible by the muddy graphics and extreme darkness of some areas. In some cases, those traps are placed on purpose to drop you from a height and instakill you. Ah, ah, you're dead again. Ah.
    - Some levels demand precise platforming, and then make that impossible with confusing graphics that smear the edges of platforms. So you fell and died *again* while aligning a hard jump? Back to the spawn point for you.
    - There is a very common scenario where you get hitstunned by a small enemy, and then slowly die through a series of uninterruptible hitstuns. You can only watch in impotent pain as your full health bar slowly gets sipped to zero. Just watch and suffer. I mean, you got hit once, you deserve to die.
    - Some bosses, and *even regular enemies*, one-hit kill you. Sometimes. When they want to.
    - One late-game boss is the worst designed boss I ever fought in a game. (Yes, I'm talking about *that* boss). One of its techniques has been called the “decide to win” attack: it flies off screen, where you cannot follow her or track her tells, and one-shot kills you from there. Many players pass it by trying dozens of times, until they get a lucky fight where it doesn't use those cheap attacks.

    I could go on. And on.

    The sad part is that I wanted to like this game. It's clearly a labour of love. I respect the tiny indie team that developed it, and I liked their earlier work. I also love the hand-drawn graphics, even though it's often hard to parse. Some of the boss fights are good, and some are even very good. Because of all those factors, I don't feel like giving Salt and Sanctuary anything less than 3. If I had to judge on how pleasant it was as a gaming experience, however, it'd probably be a 1. Negative.

    To make things worse, I saw people posting for hints on this game's Reddit and getting abused by pedantic “git gud” types. If there's anything more annoying than hitstuns it's these guys. That comically stuffy attitude is not the game's fault, but it does make the game harder to recommend. Enemies one-hit kills you? “Git gud, learn not to get close”. You keep dying by falling off a platform? “Git gud, don't drop off platforms”. You die? "Git gud, don't die".

    I have better advice for you: git gud, don't play Salt and Sanctuary.    … Full Review »
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