Salt and Sacrifice Is Not Fun | Lets Talk About It

I went into this game extremely excited, because I loved Salt and Sanctuary. Been eagerly awaiting this game for years, so you can guess my reaction when I realize that its just bad. Its not fun, its "cheap" at times, tedious, and annoying to play. I have never so thoroughly been deflated...
I'm sorry I really wanted to like it, but I just cant...
BGM: "Theme of Prontera" - Ragnarok Online
"Birdie Explain" - Chibi Robo Zip Lash
/ phemeto
mhgh.info/
Twitter - @Phemeto

[@rcd338]

I really miss the feeling of entering a shrine or a sanctuary just to heal up and rest from the chaos outside. It's one of those little charms the last game had.

[@beri4138]

The game had atmosphere. From the gloomy artstyle to the ambient music. The sequel has no atmosphere.

[@Chromeskull90]

the change in the music as you activate it

[@kingkongmalunggay]

i missed that feeling so much throughout the game. Pardoner's Vale doesn't give the same feeling because the overall music of the game is bland.

[@lordcasper3357]

@@beri4138 yeah the most appealing part of the first game was the atmosphere for me, sadly the sequel does not have it :(

[@IxodesPersulcatus]

This game feels like Devil May Cry but with you as the combo fodder.

[@BloodyAshes]

lmao true

[@cesarhernandez6861]

The time has come and so do I.

[@skinnyboss25]

i’ll laugh last cause you came to die

[@MILDMONSTER1234]

its funny cause these devs made a 2d DMC game basically

[@SolironBrightwoode]

Constantly found myself thinking "I know right?!" With every point made. Went back to Sanctuary to see if maybe I just remembered it with rose colored glasses... Not the case. It's a minor detail but the monsters will actually have "patterns" rather than just relentlessly attack. Sacrifice feels like a knock off in comparison.

[@beri4138]

It's not a minor detail, it's literally what makes the combat work lmao.

[@FunkelMcStump]

Also the lighting in this game feels to…. “Happy-go-lucky”

[@Coliflowerz]

For anyone watching now, they released a balance patch that helps with some of the stuff here, particularly the juggling. Its still pretty frustrating but not as much

[@Dukkha-Bhavana]

There's another patch today (Dec 9 2023) with many changes, including reduced damage received from being juggled.

[@Raidon484]

Excuse me was it just insta kill before the patches? Because if this isn't "so bad", I don't wanna know what so bad looks like

[@svenbernhagen6320]

I play this at the Moment and every second attack still let you bounce like you are made of rubber

[@toolittletoolate3917]

It’s actually quite comforting to discover that other players disliked the game, and for exactly the same reasons. I really enjoyed Sanctuary and was baffled by the design of the new game. I may just replay Sanctuary now - it’s a much more appealing experience.

[@lives4summits]

I’m in the same boat. I loathe this game after 3 days. I’m done with it. Going back to the original.

[@cesarhernandez6861]

It's nice knowing that I'm not the only one to wish this was like the last game!

[@lucasmonteiro600]

Me too. Its not that the sequel is bad ,is just that sanctuary gave the player more freedom, variety, better weapon balancing and enemy diversity.

[@cesarhernandez6861]

@@lucasmonteiro600 you hit the motherload.

[@ibarhimmz2813]

@@lucasmonteiro600 sanctuary had better weapon balance??

[@GrippeeTV]

It seems like this game was designed with far more Monster Hunter World inspiration than Souls as opposed to Sanctuary, which imo, works against it. Monster Hunter are MASSIVE games. You get 300+ hours out of each title, dozens of unique boss fights, 14 weapon types that all make the game feel completely different, a far more robust and thought out loot system that’s been tested and refined over a dozen titles, and with World, HUGE open levels that served as battlefields for your boss fights. All of that worked beautifully in Monster Hunter - it doesn’t work here in a narrow scope 2D side scrolling platformer with souls inspired gameplay mechanics. Dark Souls translated beautifully to Sanctuary’s souls inspired metroidvania, with a huge interconnected map that you were free to explore and backtrack through and find your own progress. Monster Hunter has translated HORRIBLY to Sacrifice. Grinding for berries to create your flasks(ALA honey for mega potions), chasing mages through levels full of enemies which just makes the level feel frustrating and annoying rather than an enjoyable level you have to fight your way through to get to the next bonfire, mages even fighting each other just like the monster encounters from World - And even the length. Sacrifice took me 17 hours to beat, Sanctuary took me 70. I had an alright time with Sacrifice, but it doesn’t even compare to Sanctuary for me. Sanctuary is probably in my top 20 games of all time, but I’ll forget Sacrifice in a week. Which is a damn shame because this game DID take some big positive steps, such as the multiplayer being so seamless(take notes, From Soft)and the animations being totally redone. But it just falls flat compared to Sanctuary for me.

[@legendredux1291]

Fiver spotted

[@phiavir5594]

Which is bizarre because I follow the dev to a degree and have never ever seen him talk about MH once. This feels like someone shoving in new game mechanics they don't care that much about or understand

[@malazan6004]

Why though? The devs already knew the recipe for success lol

[@GrippeeTV]

@@malazan6004 maybe yeah, but I think the devs said they didn’t want to get caught in a loop making the same kind of games. They didn’t want to just make another Salt and Sanctuary with some new bosses and locations.

[@footthumb]

This is exactly how I felt about the game, the only difference is I couldn't make it through it. I tried with 3 different classes and every time I made it to the second area, beat the Terramancer and just had enough. That's how long it took for all the things you mentioned to just really grind down my enthusiasm. Loved Sanctuary (which is why I kept trying to get into it) but they really dropped the ball with Sacrifice. I keep seeing messages about 'big patches' but the problem isn't just the non-stop juggling deaths, the repetitive mage hunting, and the constant consumable farming it's the very core of this game that I'm bouncing off of. Shame to see them just toss aside the Salt & Sanctuary franchise for this new direction, but the original one is always there to play.

[@LilyMaeBlossom]

That Terramancer was a monster. I'm very neutral on this, been enjoying the game so far, still do. But the Terramancer was the first unarguable bad design for me. His pathing always takes him to at least one other mage that's spawned in (for me it was actually 2), and his arena, instead of leading to a rest like you'd think, leads to *another* boss. I was not happy. No pillar for several enemies into that bugger, then the next thing I'm greeted with 2 seconds later is another boss, forcing me to defeat it or forfeit 20k salt.

[@poopandawa9593]

I think the game has its ups and downs, all mages summon which is kinda less unique, but ive never had to grind consumes, nor do I have most of rhe issues you or others have.

[@mhfuwindowbird]

Have you started your fourth yet?

[@OgreMascarin]

@@poopandawa9593 same

[@jahredharrison4069]

Well if we're having Dark Souls 2 problems and the Devs have learned the wrong lessons I'm personally looking forward to SaltBorne where they're gonna take a breath of fresh air from the series, and then the third entry of the main series: Salt and Sarsaparilla, the epic victory lap that makes great use of both the old and the new.

[@NickJoeBeg]

Bloodborne blew nuts compared to ds2

[@phiavir5594]

Yeah but this is kinda a one man Dev team now who didn't even listen to all of the valid criticisms regarding Sanctuary. Didn't add a map. Didn't expand crafting and weapons. Didn't fix weapon balance. I seriously doubt he'll even make a follow up in this genre after the criticism. He made millions with Sanctuary, and epic probably paid him good for this too. It's time for him to try something new, or retire and enjoy life.

[@darkprincesnuffleupagus1006]

removing the spell system was a huge letdown for me

[@technodude458]

same my usual class is a battle mage with a huge weapon

[@mhfuwindowbird]

Yes sanctuary had an extremely interesting magic system with imbalance

[@brunocourcy4692]

I bought sanctuary on all platforms, played it through 20+ times and loved it every time. I have deleted this game after the first 2 worlds, I just can’t.

[@ramrodbldm9876]

wtf is that thing in your pf? Wow wanna talk about (I cant) shtttttt I (definitely couldn't) that thing is hidi us

[@eidolon3850]

I loved salt and sanctuary and I was looking forward to this game but I'm very disappointed too, the enemies are always attacking, sometime it feels like you cant do anything to retaliate, they can combo us in the air until death and there's no way out, re-mapping the map in all directions to chase the mages becomes boring very quickly.

[@IxodesPersulcatus]

And that's not even exaggeration - they are *always* attacking. Just pulled a finisher on the enemy, knocking it back? It's already half way towards you in a thrust dash, better perfect block again.

[@rpgrsta]

Thank you for making this. This game is pointlessly tedious and in every way worse than the original Salt and Sanctuary. It feels like every design direction they chose to go in was the wrong one.

[@lives4summits]

I wish I could upvote this comment 1000 times

[@ChuckFinelyForever]

And I don’t think any amount of updates can fix it

[@Checkyourmail]

Dude, come on, I can see the meme of copying Monster Hunter for a sequel, but why on earth did they think removing so many basic core components was in any way a good idea? It's baffling, it's like they wanted to make fans of the first NOT buy this.

[@mathewhosier9739]

The original salt and sanctuary??? The original is the only, salt and sacrifice IS NOT a sequal to that overrated Grey bland crap

[@mathewhosier9739]

​@@Checkyourmailit's almost as if salt and sanctuary had poor sales numbers so Ska wanted to do something different since sanctuary didn't sell very well

[@loranriser2989]

Salt and Sanctuary is my favorite game, and that's not hyperbole. So that said, I hate that I hate Salt and Sacrifice -- I really hate that I hate it. I went into "Sacrifice" meeting it more that halfway and it's still disappointed me. Dark Souls II didn't disappoint me as much as Salt and Sacrifice -- and that's not hyperbole, either. Combat is a complete downgrade from the first game, the consumable system is idiotic, farming is tedious, enemies are miserable, inventory management is mind-numbing, weapons and magic are hyper-simplified making character creation and experimentation frustrating linear, and any sense of exploration and atmosphere is completely absent. I love Sanctuary so much I keep forcing myself to return to Sacrifice, but I just can't stand it. At all.

[@Exel3nce]

If the coop is good...

[@UltimateOutcast]

I don’t know why dark souls 2 dissapointed you but that’s a masterpiece. This game is garbage coming from a leftist pronoun pansy dev.

[@happymoomoocow]

On today’s episode of Redditors taking things way more seriously than they should and being extremely dramatic in KZbin comments:

[@AzureShrike]

@@happymoomoocow Ah yes because if there's anywhere you shouldn't state your opinions on things its KZbin comments. It's not like that's their entire purpose or anything.

[@danielenos8082]

Salt a Sanctuary is my favorite game also. I agree with 100 percent of what you just said. So sad.

[@ArktosBears]

It was like the worst parts of monster hunter mixed with the worst parts of salt & sanctuary grindy, monsters all felt the same, infinite stun lock, and I died to fall damage & knockback more than enemies.

[@AbyssalPlague]

Those damn stunlocks killing annoyed me. Getting hit and not have Stam and not getting any back was basically just a death sentence.

[@techlover231]

The co-op multi player is when I really started enjoying the game, You gather salt and resources faster when playing co-op. Use the Pale Candle to help others, and a Golden Candle for others to help you.

[@jaydmaster8824]

Such a pure message in this sea of hate XD. Don't ever go hollow friend!

[@turntapeover5749]

@@jaydmaster8824 You didn't need coop to enjoy the first one though because it was just...you know. Good. As opposed to whatever this sequel is.

[@LaCazaLP]

Yeah. but if i wanna help other people...i play Dark Souls. Its not a good sign when your majorly Singleplayer game is now only Fun if you play it Online. Also THIS is not what the Fans wanted when they said Online Multiplayer. Said it once and say it again. If i want to play Dark Souls i play Dark Souls not Sacrifice. If you had fun with it. Hey nice for you. But most people from what i heard and seen really really REALLY didnt like this game.

[@dandan3045]

Yeah, but you shouldn’t need coop to enjoy the game.

[@twilightsparkle75]

*players without internet*

[@CriticalBill-eh2fm]

You hit everything right on the head. The design choices the devs made in this one is mind blowing. It seemed like a new group made it and didn't even playtest it let alone play the first one. It speaks volumes about the design when you're wearing the same armor set throughout the whole game. At least you went light/dex and had more options to you. As a heavy/strength build I was pissed almost every time I defeated a new mage unlocking more crap I couldn't use.

[@xgrimmdisasterx3935]

Devs? Pretty sure it was made by one or two people tops. I really don’t see what’s so horrible about this game. Is it as good as the first? No, it’s not. But people are shitting all over it and I just don’t understand.

[@kaulenfuhs1630]

​@@xgrimmdisasterx3935 you're in luck! The video you're commenting on pretty thoroughly explains exactly why people are really not enjoying it.

[@xgrimmdisasterx3935]

@@kaulenfuhs1630 yeah I watched the video troll. I don’t agree that it’s a bad game. It’s a mediocre 2D souls like that scratches that itch for me.

[@Koop784]

@@xgrimmdisasterx3935 My complaint is that the difficulty comes from it being relentless, and nothing else. In almost any other Souls-Like, if you died, it's because you didn't know enough. You didn't know how the boss attacked, you didn't know where the enemies were or what they did, you didn't know the terrain. But you try again, you learn the tells, you maybe prepare a little tiny bit to get your stats up if you just need a little more power to eke out a win. If you learn what the bosses can do and where the enemies are placed, then your victory is at hand. If you fail, it's your fault. That's not the case in Sacrifice. If you die in Sacrifice, 80% of the time it's not because you played badly or didn't know what to do - it's because you got fucked by random bullshit and bad balancing. Enemies will just attack relentlessly, with the Mage-spawn appearing in random areas that you can't prepare for, and even with heavy armor they'll usually kill you in 3 or 4 hits from their combos, leaving you no time to block, dodge, or heal.

[@xgrimmdisasterx3935]

@@Koop784 yeah I understand that completely… It does get tiresome dying over and over to just a cluttered group of enemies that keep respawning lol. But some of the bosses I really enjoyed fighting, and some of the areas don’t seem all that awful. To me the random mage system was just executed poorly. I personally would’ve rather worked my way through and entire area. Fight the mage boss of that area and be done with it. The hunts are the major issue with the game to me. But like I said. I still don’t think it’s horrible. It’s just not a good game. It’s ok. Worth 20$ as far as I’m concerned

[@eddiet.4979]

What they need to add is air recovery. Getting combo to death in the air and can’t do nothing is TRASH

[@bassgx1459]

I don't like how most of the bosses are just dudes in robe or just humanoid in general. First game didn't suffer from this issue.

[@tasor1186]

Yeah dont know why the tutorial boss wasnt a real boss it wasa the coolest looking boss imo shit game

[@malpheus4299]

@@tasor1186 I think it is a real boss, similar to the kraeken in sanctuary, but you're just not expected to ever defeat it and you don't get a rematch.

[@yewtewbstew547]

@@malpheus4299 You kinda get a rematch this time, there are two of them in the game's 5th area that serve as mini-bosses and both drop a top tier upgrade material (ashpyr brick and voidpyr brick iirc). The reward for killing the tutorial one is pretty crap though, just 15k worth of salt items. Unspeakable Deep from Sanctuary was maybe a bit less impressive a boss fight by comparison but at least you actually got a worthwhile reward for killing him in the form of a drowned tome, which you can only obtain 1 of per playthrough otherwise.

[@LotusKai1992]

I'm about 15 hours into the game and I've been enjoying myself (for the most part.) I do have to say that the stunlock is BS, and that blocking/stamina loss seemed way easier to manage in the first game. I REALLY hate when the boss has a sliver of health left and then hits me with a bunch of moves in a row, stunlocking me into a certain death. Also the fact enemies can hit you will your character is climbing up a ledge or hoping off the zip line is COMPLETE crap!!!

[@mars188]

think i will wait for a deep price drop like 6 bucks. now it is 17.99

[@poopandawa9593]

I hate Sanctuary Bosses more than Sacrifice, I get spammed to death on Sanctuary compared to Sacrifice, but preference for each people

[@mars188]

@@poopandawa9593 i took a pass on this game happy i did

[@skinnyboss25]

@@poopandawa9593 Witch of the Lake flashbacks

[@BigKevSexyMan]

I'm still enjoying the game, but it just doesn't compare to the original. It's not even close. One thing you didn't mention that really bothers me is the amount of backtracking in the game. The game regularly puts the named mages at the end of a zone and makes you backtrack to fight them. THEN you have to go through the entire area again just to get back to where you were. Also because of the mage doors, the game is actually pretty linear. So we have a linear game WITH a ton of backtracking.

[@KakihoV]

I really feel like salt and sanctuary has a more sole put into it, than a sequel. In second game it feels like just a bunch of mechanics from popular souls series, mixed together without really any effort. Should i mention the awesome soundtrack from first game and just some kind of humming that present in the second. Now we only have: you are an inquisitor go kill bad mages

[@meestersecure9060]

The first game was just random souls mechanics too lol. This game feels like they tried making a unique experience and I think they did a good job as I enjoy the sort of monster hunter style hunts system. This game dev is severely underrated imo

[@ucpham9910]

@@meestersecure9060 sure if u like running aroung the map trying to kill a mage which teleport every fking 5s. fun if its the first time not the whole game based around that tedious mechanic

[@svenbernhagen6320]

Amen

[@MonTueWedThuFri]

Man, I hate to agree as I liked the first a lot but this sequel has been rough. I spent three days trying to force myself to like but can't find a reason to try and finish. Gripes - Confusing level design (just give us a map), lame combat, endless juggling, no dual dagger options for first three mages, no parry (perfect blocks animation is too long), finite everything, stamina management is a chore, skilltrree seems random, and painful platforming. The art is neat tho 🤷

[@OgreMascarin]

lol salty saltboy

[@tobi_versace]

The boss attacks don't bother me but the stun lock and extreme speed at which you lose your stamina sucks bad.

[@Chromeskull90]

try fight the sanguinomancer high tier version. he would not stop attacking until you are done

[@Arclor]

I thought this was going to be just salty rant, but you went into detail on specific game mechanics you found issue with. Much respect and love dude, good stuff

[@odinonion4619]

It's hard to find an honest review these days. They either just hate the game or hype for nothing.

[@unioneye1087]

Still a salty rant doe

[@pockystyx4087]

enjoying the game so far; but there are things (most of what you mentioned) that could be tweaked to be better. Perfect Blocking should have added i-frames, small enemies need to do less poise damage, and knockback needs to be toned down on mage adds. We really should unlock fast travel after say; killing at least two mages in an area.

[@tobi_versace]

I'm really surprised you didn't mention how ridiculous the amount of stamina it costs to do literally anything

[@LilyMaeBlossom]

The cost is around the same as Dark Souls 3, which many people say baby's players with it's stamina - 6 rolls, 7 attacks, with no level in paladin? That's a lot. It's not the cost, it's the regen. *Everything* stops regen for some reason or other.

[@Glopatronicals]

I beat this game with a full highest poise possible set (water mages armour) and still could barely poise through 1 of a bosses smaller attacks with the next hit guarantied to launch me away into a floor bounce combo of some kind. But hey, at least with all that defense and 30 vitality i could survive 4 hits instead of 2. Edit: Just wanted to say, There does appear to be a parry of sorts. When perfect blocking you get a blue particle effect, reducing stamina drain, but i have gotten a Purple particle effect that negates all stamina drain and, i can only assume, does increased stamina damage to the enemy. The issues are, if you dont perfect block, it drains ~50-60 stamina from you, but if you do perfect block the recoil animation is long enough that if you drop the block to try and perfect block a follow up attack, you just get hit in-between the block animations.

[@doromizu.]

4:18 is the worst offender in this game. Enemies jumping at you from off screen in the middle of a boss fight. Can't believe why the dev never thought of this

[@odinonion4619]

They knew, and they don't care.

[@tastesalty2984]

LOL. When FROM do it, it's challenging and legendary battle but it's dungpile while it happens in other game?

[@doromizu.]

@@tastesalty2984 No it also sucks, I never said that

[@doromizu.]

@@tastesalty2984 Elden ring's commander Niall for example, mobs can sometimes enter his fog gate and I HATE it whenever it happens

[@cxllsignbishop]

imagine being this guy at a fight angry because a third person throw a punch

[@tabbylost8267]

As a high strength and vitality player, I can guarantee you can survive most falls and tank damage most of the time. Never even used runic arts or arrows, just strength scaled throwing axe. The only problem is that high damage bosses forces you to roll as a heavy armoured fat roller.

[@Poneglyph]

Relying on randomly generated enemies wandering through the map was a massive, _massive_ , mistake. The game environment was not made to support this kind of thing. Bosses can pile together. Several enemies with launch attacks can spawn in tiny platforms and camp ladders. Bosses can body-block you from reaching their arena after you hook jumped towards it, resulting in a guarateed lethal fall. Drowned mage is just 100% rng: if he spams bubble rain and force field minion you are done for. Overall, this decision overwrites map and encounter designs completely, in a non fixable way, because you can no longer carefully craft the challenges for the player. It's also crystal clear the game wasn't playtested seeing as there are so many bugs and design flaws that assault you from the very beginning of the game, like being locked out of boss arena by fog wall, foreground elements hiding visibility in a boss fight etc.

[@odinonion4619]

Totally agree, it's sad that the kids can't tell the differences from trash to masterpiece.

[@Checkyourmail]

@@odinonion4619 It's even worse because they already did all of this 100x better and with much more variety...

[@bladechild2449]

Overall, the main issue is that the Mage fights are trash, and that element is the key part of the game. Had they made the fights fun, like the normal bosses, this game would've had legs. But they're not. The whole thing seems like it would be a neat idea had it been made by a dev team that could talk to each other and figure their shit out. Instead, this was made by one guy and another guy who coded the multiplayer. Clearly his wife (I think they split likely midway through Sacrifice's production), who was part of Ska when they released Sanctuary, was more key than I thought when it came to QA testing and reigning in the bullshit. Still no map. Still no sense of balance and worth in weapon progression and leveling. Still really basic combat. Not that I expected each weapon to play different, like Souls, but you are literally left kiting enemies with melee, because dodging and stamina conservation is ass. Still zero info given to the player, either in text or by intuitive desgin. The amount of shit you pick up that means nothing to you, but could be super useful is annoying. It's also a chore if you're dilligent, because the UI is fucking awful.

[@odinonion4619]

Mate, you speak true words.

[@tasor1186]

Agreed the mage hunts are soo annoying like I just beat this dogshit I dont want to go back again

[@theemeghost2323]

Big downgrade from the first game unfortunately the first game was pretty fucking good

[@Omega77232]

If they sacrifice the whole multiplayer component and just focus on single player aspect I'm sure the outcome will be different.

[@retierashia]

I really enjoy it. My complaints revolve around the stun locks, enemy placements, and that some enemies just do too much damage or have too much health. Also, silver is completely useless. Enemies can be infuriating. Still, I think it’s well worth $20. Plus, it’s early in it’s life, devs are willing to update the game. The new music is awesome, I enjoy mage hunts, online is good, combat is still fun, gear looks good, atmosphere is fantastic, the game looks great, and I love that ranged weapons are sub weapons. Sure it’s less Souls traditional and more Monster Hunter like, others might dislike that, but I don’t. Imo for what it’s worth, I enjoy it more than most $60 games.

[@madengineerkyouma]

Well, the stunlock problem was somewhat reduced with today's patch (on PC)

[@darkdaysahead01]

I agree. I’m having a blast with this game.

[@Ock_mantis]

agreed

[@redduskironsky1058]

@@LineThree garbage game regardless

[@jacksonboyd8630]

@@LineThree the hell is your problem lmao

[@JasonDolson]

I was really trying to like this game, but I just couldn't take the unfair nature of the gameplay. It just seems to be designed to be intentionally inconvenient. I am really not sure why the dev's made the choices they did with this game.

[@FelisImpurrator]

This is what happens when people think the difficulty is the point of soulslikes. No, the point is to make challenge feel fair and rewarding to overcome. Souls games want you to want to beat them. That's the point of them being challenging, not "they're hard because it's funny when the players get mad at the sadistic game". Another victim of confusing Souls for Kaizo, I guess. Unless they fix it.

[@fukunaga-kane]

You should try ender lilies, it’s a fun game with good boss design

[@Reefzeedvietnam]

They mix sekiro & monsters hunter. BAMM. Now we have this

[@jiggly821]

@@fukunaga-kane +2

[@Exel3nce]

@@FelisImpurrator say that to elden ring

[@hannahrg]

I love salt and sanctuary so much i wish they kept the same world format 😭 i keep telling myself sacrifice is ok but i kind of hate it

[@ducreat]

Due to the hype a lot of fanboys would "love" this game. Give them a few years and better games to play then they would forget it even exist.

[@Dukkha-Bhavana]

Another big update today, Dec 9 2023. Improvements so far that address this vid's complaints: --Now more than 5 main areas to get to from mirrorgates in Pardoner's Vale (up to 7 so far). --Souls now left where you fell from, not where you land (& remember you can often save yourself with a grapplehook). --Reduced enemy ledgecamping. --Buffed blocking for all weapons, especially Vanguards/shields. --Farming materials for consumables no longer necessary. --Enemy juggle damage halved, and i've never been juggled anyway. LOTS of other changes since launch. I say is good, though maybe not the same wowness as Sanctuary.

[@Fallen-Asura]

I'm extremely easy to please with souls genre games - I loved Dark Souls 2 just as much as any other in the genre. I did not like this game. Salt and Sanctuary is one of my favorite games ever and this game just wasn't that. After a few hours I just wanted it to be over so I could never play it again. Such a huge letdown. I have been a fan of Ska studios since Dishwasher Dead Samurai and loved every game they have made but this was just so far from the original recipe.

[@nowayhosay50]

It definitely feels like a passionless rush-job compared to the first.

[@meestersecure9060]

Honestly that's how I would've felt if they just made it the same as sanctuary and slapped a 2 in the title.

[@tristanward9937]

@@meestersecure9060 if they did that I would have actually purchased it. I really enjoyed the first all they had to do was improve it not re haul it.

[@colinclement2752]

Salt and Sacrifice was my 2nd most anticipated game of 22... Needless to say I'm very disappointed

[@darkdaysahead01]

Did you play it? It's fun. Phemeto just had a horrible time with this game, but others, like FightingCowboy have been having a lot of fun with this game. Don't let this bitter review turn you off.

[@redduskironsky1058]

@@darkdaysahead01 its just not this one guy so its not just "this one bitter review". You should still try it if you want but dont make it seem like almost everyone but this guy and a few others didnt like it. Just look at comments.

[@darkdaysahead01]

@@redduskironsky1058 I've played it and had a lot of fun. Several other more reputable reviewers (FightingCowboy, Fextralife) also enjoy the game quite a bit. If you can watch this review in which he spoils the final area bitching the whole time like a child, and can't see why this is a bitter review, I'm not sure what to tell you.

[@Nevecus]

@@darkdaysahead01 I've played Salt and Sanctuary to death -- Salt and Sacrifice is doing everything it can to make me hate it. From excruciatingly annoying enemy designs, their attacks, their positioning, their damage numbers; traps that range between invisible to being put in such malicious places that only perfect timing will get past them, lest you end up stunlocked by the trap and killed; mages that need to be chased across the whole level and will merrily reset to square one if you happen to die to an air juggle. Blocking eating practically all your stamina and parries being made into razor thin perfect blocks. Platforms that end sooner than the actual graphic suggests. Stamina not recovering while you're being hit, making blocking even more risky without any reward and rolling out of a bad situation sometimes impossible. Pointless material farming for healing items and ammunition, both of which have nodes practically next to obselisks, further making me question the point of them. It needs some big adjustments to not be an experience in frustration and tedium. I can even stand the mages not being all that unique or special, I just want to be able to play without feeling like I'm wasting time, rather than investing time. What I do appreciate is the aesthetic, the Runic Arts (even though they force a bigger split in your skill trees), and the variety in elemental gear. The multiplayer is a big mixed bag, as people will always default to the cheesiest methods to reduce it to "who can hit the Runic Art first."

[@BloodyAshes]

@@darkdaysahead01 so far I've seen roughly fifty people in these comments, there are about 300 total comments, complain about poor decisions, and I've only read about 50 comments... take that ad you will, but maybe FCB, and Fextra, as terrible of a company as it is, are some of the outliers, instead of the other way around. But if you, cowboy, or whoever orchestrated that fextra review, are enjoying the game, all the power to you. But I have seen a lot of other people complain about the game, so don't just be disrespectful to this player who doesn't like the game, because their opinion differs from the norm.

[@odinonion4619]

100% agree with this video, in salt & sanctuary, every corner is mystery and you don't know what would eat your face alive. In salt & sacrifice, mages are everywhere and they respawn forever even you devour them. The horror is gone and it's boring.

[@shadowslayer759]

I've played the game for about 8 hours, I'm stilling having fun. However I plan on beating this game regardless on my feelings. I agree with what the video creator said about boss design I don't feel reiterating that. HOWEVER I take massive issue with mage design. There is a reason why I'm setting mages aside from bosses. Bosses do not respawn they are one piece spectacles that are supposed to challenge you or teach you an aspect of a game. Mages however are respawning annoyances. I can only really say anything about mages I have seen and dealt with and I get the feeling Nameless mage hunts are supposed to be upgraded variants with "some new" attacks. At least that was the feeling I got from the nameless pyromancer (Stacking tick damage without some kind of indicator is a dick move). I'm going over each one I have so far encountered in the game... Why? because I have nothing better to do but to bitch about mages. So the first two you hunt Pyro and Cryo are alright, I don't feel that their unfair but some attacks could use polishing and readjustment. However I do take issue with Cryo mage's tick damage. You need to understand what attacks do to you. If tick damage is applied to you an indicator of some kind NEEDS TO BE ON SCREAN THAT YOU ARE AFFLICTED WITH SOMETHING. They did it with venom they can do it for other sources! Next up was bubble boy, I didn't really struggle with him but I am still confused as to how his bubbles work. I just don't understand how far the range on the bubbles are. Especially the one that tracks you. My verdict on bubble boy is, he clunky and a pushover. Aeromancer, the epiphany of how juggling can get you killed, my worst experiance with him was he a summoned a tornado towards himself, I get hit I go up he takes a swing as I go down I am dead. Electromancer, my experience jump up and poke with a stick, dead. I will admit though that his call down lighting attack can juggle you and kill. While I feel that the telegraph of the attack is fair, it comes out too fast. Terramancer... OOH BOI I have a lot to say so I'm going to sum it up in perfect little sentence. Terramancer is an unfair piece of shit, moving on!. Necromancer, I actually like her, while I feel her tracking skulls are one too many, her weird bone attack that comes from both sides is straight up BS though. Overall all though most of her attacks are well telegraphed. Venomancer, honestly a push over I only remembered because of the poison gimmick. Thank you coming to my TED talk about mages I've encountered.

[@bboy458]

no i-frames on stagger is kinda BS

[@Maxb0-__-]

It’s the most annoying shit and the way they can stun lock you pisses me off to no end

[@woolgum]

I have it. The controls are awful. Ridiculously slow healing. Always getting knocked down. No button memory so you really have to make sure animations are finished before pressing a new command. I’m so mad I just want to delete it.

[@J-Dizzle95]

I’m loving this game. I have been playing it coop with a friend, just like I did the first game. I feel the game is designed to be played this way. It’s been a lot of fun together but I played for like 20 minutes by myself and it was frustrating as all hell. My biggest issues with the game are: 1. No map. Why tf is there no map?? You open up all of these convoluted paths and shortcuts and the game just expects you to remember every single one??!!! Didn’t the first game have a map, or am I misremembering?? This game DESPERATELY needs a map. 2. Absolutely no fast travel whatsoever. You can’t even choose what obelisk to travel to from the camp with the available ones you have already unlocked. Like….. why?? When I started getting farther into the game, it became almost impossible to remember every single place I need to go or revisit or even how to get to any of them again in the first place. It leads to plenty of running around aimlessly, looking for that one path you found four hours ago that you decided not to take and now it’s the only option you have left to explore. It makes you feel like you are missing tons of stuff, but at the same time, it’s too much of a chore to be bothered with running blindly all over the map trying to find all of the secrets. It’s maddening. 3. The bouncing on receiving attacks. Almost EVERYTHING sends you flying in this game. And I’m wearing FULL heavy armor with the charm and ring that increases poise!!! This is like a best case scenario and yet I feel that 90% of my deaths are caused by being bounced around like a damn beach ball between enemy attacks and there’s nothing you can do about it. It’s extremely rare that an attack DOESN’T bounce you off the ground in this game. 4. The enemy aggression levels. The enemies in this game are FAR too aggressive. They attack CONSTANTLY with almost no breaks in between. This is not an exaggeration. Most boss fights devolve into rolling the bosses attack, hitting him once from behind so your stamina can recharge a bit to give you enough to roll and hit again, roll through the bosses attack, hit him once, rinse and repeat. I wouldn’t say it’s not fun, but it is a bit tedious and just feels unbalanced/wrong. 5. I hate that they did away with the “sanctuary” aspect of the game. I know they literally took that part of the name out of the title, but this was one of the coolest things about Salt and Sanctuary. This also seems like such an extremely odd decision in this game when it’s alllllllllllll about joining different factions/covenants and stuff like that. You had all these different rooms throughout the game with different groups you could join and you could level them all up and utilize them for different reasons. They had different NPC’s and themes and they were just amazing. They were useful in so many ways with providing fast travel and vendors, among other things. Also, I absolutely was completely in LOVE with the music that played in these areas and would always always jam to it. This also allowed you to level up and do all of your stuff WITHOUT traveling back to some pointless hub area. Why do they force you to do this when it was already solved in the first game?? It’s so strange because it totally reminds me of the choices made in Dark Souls 2 after Dark Souls 1. It’s just baffling. And the hub itself is like reason 5.5. The hub area is such a pain in the ass/annoying to navigate. It gets better later with shortcuts between the NPC’s but it still doesn’t feel very good in a sequel to a game where this was literally NEVER a problem. Oh and the skill tree lost lots of interesting weapons and choices for leveling up and I absolutely HATE how the game forces you Demon’s Souls style to farm for crafting materials for HEALING CONSUMABLES and AMMO. Like WHAT??!!?? It makes ZERO sense. My friend wanted to do a ranged build and he just can’t because he runs out of ammo so quickly. And my other friend wanted to do a mage build but he can’t because he runs out of mana. It’s so stupid!!! WHHHYYYY. I also do not understand why they completely took magic out of the game. I didn’t use it much in the first game but it seems like a weird decision to just basically completely remove it. You feel like you’re missing out on weapon arts for a melee build, or you have to level up weapon modes on the skill tree just to use magic or a mage build. You actually expect me to level up a whole new weapon tree just to use a spell I might like??? Or respec my weapon options every time I find a new spell I want to try out??? I just literally do not even begin to understand some of the choices made when designing this game. They had such a great thing going with the first one. Everybody just wanted more!!!! It also drives me crazy that the game doesn’t really have any sort of linear structure to begin with. You can literally go anywhere/everywhere and the only way the game blocks your progression is through these doors that require you to kill a certain number of mages before they can be opened, which leads to you, again, having to remember all of these random obscure places everywhere through the maps to backtrack to so you can actually progress with the game. There is no structure to speak of. Physically in terms of these places not making any logical sense in terms of locations and also literally in terms of letting you go anywhere. Pretty much every time I load into a map, and am completely lost as to where I’m supposed to go next or what areas I haven’t visited. I load in on the same obelisk every single time and I’m immediately overwhelmed with where I have and haven’t been and where I need to be going. It’s hard and unfulfilling to explore the maps. The original game was pretty linear in its design and it allowed you to feel like you are actually progressing through the game by getting further and accessing new areas. It was also never that hard to figure out where to go unless you were trying to find a secret. The new areas also usually contained a lot of loot and stuff which is now basically restricted to the mage fights so there is a lot less of a reason to explore because you’re finding a lot less cool stuff everywhere. All in all, I do really like this game and I am really enjoying it. But I think it’s only because I am playing it coop. The game seems to have a heavy emphasis on the “covenant” system and teaming up with other people to hunt mages and engage in PvP.

[@CATaclysmOg]

The first game didn't have a map either, but it still was better overall

[@TheRealDys]

@@CATaclysmOg true I think the new one supports more co op It feels better on co op

[@bladechild2449]

It seems like the only people who enjoyed the game mostly seem to have played co-op

[@odinonion4619]

@@bladechild2449 If a game is fun with friends, it means you have good friends. It doesn't mean the game is good.

[@loled123]

First game didn't have a map, but areas transitioned pretty well from each type. As a result, you always had a good idea on where you where in a zone. In this, each area seem like a large zone, but outside of interior vs exterior transition there isn't any form of transition between the environment types, so its easy to get lost.

[@malpheus4299]

Ok yeah, this looks like a massive step down from salt and sanc

[@omensoffate]

It’s not really

[@Reefzeedvietnam]

Like darksouls 1 & darksouls 2 🥲. Not good like the first but still play, just not excited anymore. Hope next salt like ds3 is very good

[@TheDungeonDive]

That’s the narrative everyone is jumping on, but it’s totally false.

[@MSculls19]

Its a step AWAY from Salt and Sanctuary, that was a souls game, this is a monster hunter game

[@odinonion4619]

@@MSculls19 Yep, this is more monster hunter than a salt game. If they call it a new title, people won't hate it that much.

[@161patox]

I haven't played Salt and Sanctuary since it came out in 2016 and I remember loving the game but when I played this one it just fell off. EVERYTHING is needlessly annoying, the berries for the healing flask, the iron for the ammo, the other shit for the focus points, granted I had like 200+ at all times so it wasn't even a factor really, which begs the question of why it's in the game if all it does is make me press C whenever I walk across a bush. The teleport to zones instead of a whole world is... different, I like it less but I can't say it's strictly worse design wise. Enemies attacks feel, as you said, relentless or completely random, specially which attacks made enemies turn around and which didn't, the knockback was crazy and something you didn't mention but I thought was annoying as hell, the insane amount of "homing projectile" type attacks, specially the ones that wrap around corners like it's fucking Tokyo Drift. Overall I think it's an average game, not a terrible one, hell, played it for like 30 hours so I definitely didn't hate it but found myself sighing and saying "why am I playing this?" more than you probably should while playing. Going to revisit Sanctuary now to see if it's all rose tinted goggles.

[@Gato._.Cristo]

Got off work today excited to give the game another shot and make my way through the final area but by 11:00pm I just shut it off and had an empty feeling, progressed a pretty decent amount into the area but it felt like I was just beating my head against a brick wall to break it down only to find another brick wall. In any other soulslike I might be beating my head against a wall but before I reach the next one there’s a well earned reward and a hint, whether it be a contextual clue or something directly telling me which way I should break the next wall down. Every weapon felt bland and it felt like no matter how much I built my character in a specific archetype, the game would just shit on me with some shitstorm of uninspired attacks from a mage and four other basic enemies or a mix of enemies and platforming. Don’t get me wrong the platforming was a lot of fun when there wasn’t an enemy sitting there waiting to knock me off only for me to get back up, roll through the attack, and fall off because the platform is just long enough to make dodging impossible. Overall the small amount of co-op with my cousin in the first two areas was the only joy I found in it, mostly because we got to watch eachother get destroyed over and over again in some horrendous comedic way. Watching him get launched off a cliff by some summon while I’m fighting a mage and then hearing him panic as he spectates me getting juggled around by the most vile moveset we’ve ever seen was as good as it got. I know this is just a bunch of incoherent run-on sentences but if you’re going to play this game, make sure it’s with a friend who can find humor in suffering, otherwise it just feels like a complete waste of time compared to salt and sanctuary.

[@xelthos2051]

It's really a disgrace how backwards they took the quality of this game compared to Sanctuary. Sanctuary was one of the best souls likes out there, honestly better than most of the Souls games. Then we got this mess.

[@TheDungeonDive]

This game is great.

[@odinonion4619]

Agree, it's a poor game.

[@MSculls19]

This isn't a souls game, its a monster hunter game. But i cant fault ya for expecting a souls game

[@2265Hello]

While I may be biased take this as someone who initially didn’t like the game but it later grew on them. From what I’ve found, when you boil it all down the major reasons most people give for hating this game, outside of some mage fights needing some tune ups, it’s that they really expected it to be Salt and Sanc clone especially at its core. In the end of the day the game is different and in some ways combat is improved. This time around I can’t just simply roll behind 80% of the bosses and basically avoid their move set. I have to actually time my dodges better, utilize block, and manage my stamina. This game isn’t perfect but it’s fun (at least for me).

[@tasor1186]

@@MSculls19 Not even monster hunter. In MH the fights are fun in this they are either easy asf or just stupid getting thrown around. Poor attempt at what could have been an amazing game.

[@Ocean5ix]

They got Dark Souls so well in the first game but completely missed the point on Monster Hunter in the second one..

[@richardwhite3521]

Same. This game triggers me so much. I want to keep playing. But I find myself screaming at it more than I find myself enjoying it. At all.

[@paydoncarmon5480]

I love this game and after the early patches it's quite easy to complete now.

[@helvetic86-29]

Usually I am really into such games, so I just bought it without hesitation. It was very dull and then I got a mage that permanently juggled me. When I finally beat him, the game crashed. That was the final kick in the nuts I needed, uninstalled it.

[@moonraven6145]

I got to the end out of spite tbh, I enjoyed the idea of hunting mages, but that soon became an annoyance when most of them were essentially the same teleporting damage sponge that just spammed you with enemies and had really annoying attacks that just multi-hit you, funny enough the non Mage fights were probably the best designed ones, although again some of them were basically copy and pasted from Sanctuary with maybe a few new moves. Strangely though you never gain the air dash you got in Sanctuary, something that would've REALLY helped in this game with the amount of AOE spam.

[@mikeincanada_]

I can't agree more about Salt and Sanctuary. It was really fun. Something felt off with Salt and Sacrifice. This nailed how I feel and I didn't even realize I felt it until I watched this. I was going to try another playthrough with a different build until 4:47 hit. So many of the bosses were like that. I don't think a different build will redeem this title for me. My first character had 40 VIT and class 5 Hallowed Armor set... and I was still getting rocked

[@Replica2901]

The best thing in this game for me is the aesthetic and the concept, but one of the main new mechanics (hunting mages all over the map) is so annoying, it loses all sense of exploration because of this.

[@shadow12860]

the staminia recovery needs to be fixed asap it would fix alot of the problems with getting cheesed.

[@beri4138]

It's unbelievable how badly they fucked this game up. Bad platforming, bosses are boring and annoying, unfair encounters, forces you into the repetitive mage hunting minigame. This game feels like a chore to play. The difficulty all comes from being annoying and frustrating rather than tight and complex. Every boss summons enemies. The mage that endlessly summons bees can waste your time for as long as he wants. The game is a test of patience rather than skill. I get absolutely zero enjoyment out of it.

[@Fredgilb29]

Sad to say that I feel the same. I finished it in 26 hours, and my brain don't want to go through that bullshit again. I have near 500 hours in Salt and Sanctuary and still play from time to time. Not gonna play Sacrifice again unless they do some major changes. Hell, killing the Sodden Knight felt more rewarding than any bosses in Sacrifice. I just don't care about platinum at this point.

[@ducreat]

I played 10 hours and I'm not sure I'll finish the game.

[@Exel3nce]

Play coop

[@jimbe4mxl410]

The dev of this game seems nice and cool, was listening to him on Lobos Jr stream while he was playing salt and sanctuary, so lets hope he works on the game to improve it. Everything is in place already, no need to add anything new, just rebalance stuff, some things need tweaking, maybe remove some stuff etc. Hollow Knight, Bloodstained, Salt and Sanctuary were like my top 3 2d games in the past years, was really hyped for this, think im gonna wait for some patches/updates.

[@2265Hello]

They already have two patches out

[@davidalvarez5659]

It took me literally the first 20 minutes to see this just wasn't the sequel Salt and Sanctuary deserved. I don't know how to explain it, something about the whole thing just didn't hit the same...

[@brandtmiles2373]

I'm actually waiting to see if there's a patch coming to fix some issues before I invest more time but....one thing nobody else has mentioned is the weapon hit boxes. Is it just me or are they extremely tiny? I have to basically be pushing up against an enemy (mages in particular) to actually make weapon contact. It's bizarre.

[@ianbevan40]

It's most likely the weapon you have. I'm cooping with a friend. My stave feels like a butter knife for range other than casts; his HALFspear reaches like a vaulting pole.

[@ianbevan40]

Or wait since you mention it, mages hit boxes may be the wonky part. I do have to hug their legs to proc hits

[@poisonrain87]

"Don't worry about spoilers, don't play this game" Savage lol

[@jaydmaster8824]

As a note perfect blocking does act as a "perry in a way. Each enemy you fight has a poise counter that takes a hit when you attack or perfect block them. Yes this counts for bosses as well If an attack from a boss is hitting you with a melee weapon it will digrade their poise counter leaving them open for the grapple strike. When it comes down to exploration each zone you go to has more than enough shortcuts that connect back to the start of the area or one that chains to it that going back to a spot doesn't always feel like a sludge through the mud. I does really suck when you loose your stuff and you haven't found a checkpoint or shortcut in a while but I'd also add that the game makes you make the choice to keep exploring or stop, rest and come back from the start. Having it this way made it so id go back through an area and rember about that one door that I forgot about or take a path I might have missed (Happend alot). Also the bestiary tells you what each enemy is strong against and how many items they drop. Being a very helpful tool when fighting a large number of enemies over the course of the game. To close, I find this game less a souls like and more a true Metroidvania whith its focuse on exploration and returning to past areas while removing the magic system you would normally see. obviosly still having some souls like elements as thats what the series started out as.

[@meekaboo_]

I've never played either of these games but have always kinda been interested in them. But wow, that opening sequence and the footage in the background just reminds me of playing some mods or "fan expansions" etc for the first dark souls. I feel like it misses the point of the game being challenging but encouraging exploration and instead just puts a dude ready to kick you down at the top of every ladder or backstabbing enemy around every corner because game hard, yeah? After watching this tho, I might check out the first game, been a long time fan of the momodora games and the gameplay seems kinda similar! Thanks for the vid, don't know if I'd have gone back to check it out without seeing this!

[@eduardooee74]

I would have prefered a salt and sanctuary 2. And i beat salt and sacrifice with only throwables. I feel like after my 20 hours i realised that the first one is better

[@Kara_Pabuc]

I have feeling that they sacrificed this game to its multiplayer component.

[@beaucameron8025]

Salt and santuary is such a good game and with salt and sacrifice they ruined what could have been an even better game. Its sad 😢

[@nibnoc6]

Thanks, you pretty much covered it for me. I bought the game but the constant knock backs and jumping platform screw overs really killed my enjoyment of the game.

[@danielnolan8848]

It's alot like the most annoying parts of the early megaman zero games, alot of dumb newplayer traps

[@yash19842]

I absolutely love the game even though i agree to most of the points but its not a bad game tbh but yeah Runic arts idea is so cool but needing Divine or forbidden glyphs to activate it means that you anyway have to go magic route and then it defeats the purpose the melee build altogether since i may well be using staff then. Also the dex weapons have been balanced considering Runic buffs in mind and if you don't use it , it means handicapping yourself in DPS .

[@phiavir5594]

A lot of the arts requiring Rage are also fucking pointless. Like seriously, they're fucking useless for bosses once you've died. The decisions in this games mechanics are dreadful. I don't know how you code, make art and spend years of your life making something nearly there, to basically fumble at game design 101 concepts.

[@Omega77232]

It's objectively a bad game but you can still enjoy this.

[@yash19842]

@@Omega77232 i dont really think its bad game at all, actually the more i played the more i like it ...some design decisions and boss moves are questionable but that's about it.

[@EldritchErik94]

I am having a lot of fun. The game definitely has its faults, but I think it is a really good game. I do prefer Salt and Sanctuary to this.

[@tasor1186]

Nah this game sucks

[@typingcat9196]

I agree with most of things said in this video. Consumable is a chore to collect and near impossible to buy enough amount. Ledge camping is too annoying and with blocking being gutted and parry being deleted, only way to deal with them is ranged weapon which has very limited ammo. Because rolling on the platform will almost always guarantee you falling off from the platform. and in addition to that, the most disappointment comes from mages having no personality. In terms of personality, they are practically regular mob with extra step to kill. Named pyromancer is just as same as a nameless pyromancer, or fated pyromancer. They are all the same, and they don't have their own boss room, they just spawned out of nowhere and squat with the rest of regular mobs.

[@ZaephyrAltar]

The reason why I dropped the game was because of The Tireless Exalted. Jesus christ, what a ridiculous boss. I remember I had to farm a lot of ore to make arrows, because I found it impossible to melee attack him sometimes, either because of the ghosts that Insta Killed you if they stacked against you, or because of his quick high damage melee attacks, which came right after the ghosts, and if his melee hit you, you were just fucked because of the bounce and the ghosts chasing you. Which led normally to getting Insta Killed. And you know, he was probably the hardest thing that I fought in the game, not because he was designed in a good way to be hard, but in a very stupid way that just made you try to fight him over and over again. Eventually I did kill him, and proceeded to the next area, but at that point I just realised how some of the things of the game were unfair, or repetitive, and just dropped it after killing of the game main mages on the third area.

[@eldenstinker5310]

pretty insightful review, thank you. I played up to the third area and I have very mixed feelings on the game, sometimes I have a lot of fun with it, other times I face many of the issues you stated! I personally feel like waiting to see if there will be more patches, meanwhile I will play other games and indulge in other hobbies ahaha.

[@misterG2006]

I'm level 80 and defeated 11 mages but getting a little bored now. I've made a few bad choices in my skill tree which is annoying. A full respec option would be very useful.

[@SLCclimber]

Not sure if you've played Vigil: The Longest Night, but the entire time I've been playing this game I was wishing I was playing that one instead.

[@odinonion4619]

Vigil is better than this mage hunt simulator.

[@thebarbaryghostsf]

Vigil is an amazing game

[@stevevaii1094]

I played the game on Playstation to Platinum. I also farmed a lot of 20-21+ Mages in all levels. Of course, I have also dipped into NG+. On normal difficulty: Very stressful, very frustrating, the rage was real. On NG+: unreal. The last two levels in NG+ are extremely hard, so mages have to be dodged as much as possible - all projectiles, no matter the source, are onehit if you don't have max defense in the respective damage type. And even then you don't survive a second hit. It is also problematic that offensive and defensive power of the player hardly increases anymore. Most players will already have reached all diminishing returns in the first run towards the end, and will have equipment and weapons at maximum. For Achievement/Trophy hunters, it is strongly recommended to do everything on normal difficulty. NG+ is not worth it.

[@gatorr4life]

Yup. NG+ is trash. I got to the second area and it was absolutely insane. And I’m as leveled as it gets. Only paid $12 so I definitely got my money’s worth.

[@LittleMissGuillotine]

the worst thing about this game is I can so clearly see WHY every horrible design decision was made. Shields are weapon locked cause it doesnt fit gameplay fantasy to be just as effecitive with a massive 2 handed weapon and a shield as you would be with a more managable sword. the mages run around and spawn adds cause both aspects force the player to act more aggressively instead of just learning patterns and doing the boss the same way every time. The ammo and health consumables are linked to items to incentivize not simply giving up and smashing your head against a wall until it works when you run into something challenging. AND THEY ALL FAIL. it feels like this game is a great game in theory, but it needs more time and effort to become that.

[@Glopatronicals]

Thing about shields is, only about half have a 100% dmg block and most big weapons have 75%-90% dmg block and comparable stamina drain. The upside of using a Sword and shield over a two-hander or greatsword is less stamina cost on attack swings and you dont take that ~10% chip damage.

[@tastesalty2984]

Really ridiculous to see these guys. I agree there are many flaws in this game but people are all talking wrong things. Complaining about shields… other Mr stupidy talked about parry and now this guy is talking about shields. Lmao do you really played this game? I’m asking seriously. I bet this guy didn’t even tried blocks with various items.

[@mostafaal-ghurabi640]

This game is sucks as hell for reasons: first we miss that gloomy ambience, second the stamina thing is so stupid and annoying that you can't even block and attack or dodge, third the mage hunting thing is so boring that you have to chase the boss which is repeated many times with different names, fourth there is no sanctuaries to load your play but instead you have to back to the camp and return all the way back when you play again, and last thing is the stupid fight system and moves no heavy attacks but only swinging your sword, also it is almost impossible to farm in order to upgrade your skills! Definetly not going to continue with this one, sorry SKA studio but you messed up badly here

[@SkullkidProductions]

man I wish I saw this before I bought it. I knew something felt off like 3 hours into it. I loved Sanctuary.

[@fg09403]

yeah I have to say this game was a massive let down. Even setting aside their new found love for putting practically unavoidable traps and enemies that knock you off platforms, the exploration and gameplay loop is just total down grade.

[@ducreat]

This. It feels like the dev suck the fun out of salt series. In the other hand, elden ring is about making a fun game.

[@alicbezzina6680]

Thank you for sharing your more critical review of the game Phemento. I think you convinced me to to wait on this one and pick up Salt and Sanctuary again on PC instead and replay it with mods this time. Which mods did you use? And are their any in particular that you recommend?

[@darkdaysahead01]

The game is good. Did you check Nexus for mods? There's no mods available for this game.

[@BloodyAshes]

Spindle beasts only is a fun and enjoyable mod for salt 1.

[@alicbezzina6680]

@@BloodyAshes I am so glad I played enough already to know that's a trap. Nice try though.

[@Slumd0g]

can't agree with you more. this game is such a chore to play. I enjoyed salt and sanctuary a lot, but this game is a huge dissapointment as a sequel.

[@user-lo9tn1jj9s]

fun fact you can parry, your just mind numbingly slow, you press the block button as soon as the attack connects and some enemies get staggered most bosses get their "stamina" ticked down and if you do it enough they get stunned and you can do a grapple attack

[@user-lo9tn1jj9s]

oh wait your especially wrong, your perfect block is a parry that's the point bozo

[@mkv2718]

soo... this isn’t really a souls like game, not purely at least. it’s more a hybrid 2D monster hunter & souls like in a souls style fantasy world. and while i agree with some of the criticisms (there should at least be a way to get back to the last obelisk you used, if not just letting you choose which one from the hub like demons souls of bloodborne. the one starting location is pure old school monster hunter, and a change that helped World blow up. and health and ammo mats ARE too expensive.)many just seem to come from a complete misunderstanding of what they were going for. gathering for ammo and potions and the mage hunts- straight outta MH. also, there ARE shortcuts around the maps; doors to unlock back to the middle and ziplines. i dunno, seems to me like people went into this just expecting more of the the same thing and then when it wasn’t they complain about issues that were prevelant even in Sanctuary: stun lock and being bounced across the map and losing your salt in a place you’ve not unlocked? yup- both in salt and sanctuary. it just seems people have forgotten that cuz they got good🤷‍♂️ heck, that stuff honestly almost made me quit Sanctuary first time thru, but now that i know about i love the game. oh, and for the stamina management- you need to mix deflects and rolling, you can’t just roll spam like it’s ds3. deflect single attacks or slow attack strings, roll thru status attacks and fast combos. it’s not that hard, and once it clicked, the game became infinitely more fun (i was having the same frustrating experience until i figured this out) and i only run out of stamina when I panic roll. also the multiplayer is just a blast. just pure silliness on all levels. so i don’t think it’s a bad game at all, just one where people keep trying to play it as something that it is not. play the game you have, not the one you want to play. if you go into this thinking it’s just Sanctuary 2, you’re gonna have a bad time. if you ever wanted invade someone in monster hunter tho... maybe give it a shot. or at least check out some more positive reviews, maybe check out FightinCowboy’s take.. i dunno. probably gonna get hate for disagreeing, but hey, that’s the internet 🤷‍♂️

[@bladechild2449]

I went in expecting another Sanctuary like game. When I initially figured, hey, this is actually MH, but 2D with Metroidvania, I was even more excited. But the hours roll on by and you realize it just doesn't work. Monster Hunter only works because the fights are to fun to constantly replay and master. The Mage fights in this game are straight up trash, so the whole thing just falls on its ass from the basic requirement of a MH-like gameplay loop.

[@EXL72]

I do think that is an interesting opinion. However I don’t really think you can realistically think that this game is trying not to be a sanctuary 2. As you say, it can be reminiscent of MH. But, you wanna know the biggest difference between Souls and MH? MH does not make their small fry as a challenge to their big monsters. At best, they accomplish annoying the hunter, but I’ve never seen a hunter that plays regularly talk about small mobs kicking their ass. In souls and let alone adventure games, mobs are part of the journey. If this didn’t want to be considered part of Salt and Sanctuary, then its a little hard to believe with a lot of things returning, but also reworked for mostly worse for wear. The Skill tree, the flavors of Soulsvania genre. The Identity of the two are very closely linked with similar themes. For example, look at the title image, they match each other with a tee. They both haze you with a high difficulty tutorial boss. Playing the game for what you have and not what you want doesn’t really make sense. It tells someone to totally get rid of their expectations, which is impossible. Consumers usually buy and support stuff, because its more of what they would want and see. The core audience is Souls and Metroidvania. Even if you view it with a different outlook, this game is going to be subjected to critique. My opinion is that this is Sanctuary 2 because it has so much foundation from the game, but it needs a lot of tuning and qol updates. It has potential, but launch is super rocky, you can’t deny that. Multiplayer is super fluid, and actually quite giving as well. It’s actually super solid. However there is the problem when you and friend dies. Then you go recover salt, but either of you dies again, even if revived, salt goes bye bye. Because how the game processes it, that you die and your salt is dropped immediately. And alone, you would simply go back to obelisk. But in multi, you still drop salt when dead, but can be revived, and the salt will be picked up. But if you dropped salt already, then your body makes a new puddle, which forever erases your salt gained and making going back all for naught, if both of you died at least once while recovering. Which is probable because in coop, they have almost like doubled hp mobs. Me and my friend have lost probably about 15 levels because of this so far

[@tasor1186]

@@EXL72 Salt and Sacrifice is just not a good game.

[@EXL72]

@@tasor1186 Yeah, its not a great game, but decentish and not bad. Enough for a playthru. This one though needs a lot more balancing and polish. In sanctuary, the most infamous is the witch. Its like they took what they know about the witch and built it from there.

[@turntapeover5749]

No, he's pretty right. It's annoying, tedious, boring, unbalanced and janky. The bosses are mindnumbingly boring, the levels are tedious to explore and the glyph system is padding of the worst kind that forces you to go through the level over and over again. There were point where i had 3 mages in front of a ledge where i needed to hookshot to continue on the critical path with a Mage standing right on the ledge leading me to bounce on its body with 0 possibility to even be able to grab on said legde and falling off the cliff over and over and taking half my health bar worth of damage. This game is a classic example of feature creep. I did see fighting cowbow, and I can tell you he's gonna move on very quickly and go back to elden ring and never comeback to it again. And he also does express some of the same frustration as every one in his playthrough. Maybe you decided to cherry pick what you heard from fightingcowboy. Salt and Sacrifice is ok at best, annoying and tedious at worse.

[@VaulickTheCrow]

The PvP is also hot garbage. It's somehow more broken than Elden Ring's PvP, but at least I can have fun in Elden Ring.

[@Benjamin-mj9pd]

This would be the dark souls 2 of the Salt series except DS2 had ENJOYABLE content in it.

[@Innes188]

Thank you so much for this! I've been so frustrated by this game. it feels like they didn't play test this game at all. Everything just sucks compared to the first game and other 2D soulslikes. Like this is a post Hollow Knight world. this game is just bad.

[@odinonion4619]

Totally agree! If we want a different game, there are other indie games. After so many years, we want a better game from the same dev.

[@JustAnotherAverageWeeb]

Phemeto, do yourself a favor and play death's gambit to cleanse your palate, Its a 2D souls metroidvania like salt and sanctuary with some really good pixel art style and 2d combat. Heck, going full range is viable in that game. Trust me you wont regret it.

[@ItsKevin183]

Yeah, especially since they completely renewed it. It's soooo good now!

[@malpheus4299]

Yeah, death's gambit is much better now compared to its original release.

[@bladechild2449]

I'm sorry, but DG it's absolutely awful.

[@ItsKevin183]

@@bladechild2449 How come?

[@JustAnotherAverageWeeb]

@@bladechild2449 To each their own opinion but i disagree.

[@alexrogers9051]

Yeah it’s unfortunate they didn’t just make a second version of the first game…I love salt and sanctuary.

[@FUBARGunpla]

God im happy im not alone, i LOVE ska, loved dishwasher, love salt and sacrifice, and it breaks me inside that this game is so fuckin rough. It just doesnt hit the mark at all

[@SavedPotato]

Hey, just beat the game today (got the platinum on ps4 as well thanks to backing up a save before the final boss). I enjoyed my time with the game but all of your points are valid. And I find it funny we both used the same daggers and flame knives independent of each other. I think it'd make the game a lot better if they: 1) let you fast travel between pillars you've already reached 2) made the mage weapons and armor actually worth getting by buffing the elemental damage and negation they did and showing you exactly which damage works best against each element type 3) just auto refill your ammo and flasks. you already have to gather items to buff them just let us be topped off without having to grid even more 4) get rid of chasing mages, or once you've chased them to a certain point just have them stick to an area and don't lock me out of going back to prepare for them. Why would you give me the materials to make fire resistance crap right before the fire boss and then punish me for wanting to go back and get said fire resistance stuff? At the very least make it like megaman where I get the fire boss' counter from the water boss But I'm not a game dev just a game enjoyer so what do I know right?

[@bulbstark7231]

I like sacrifice more than sanctuary tbh

[@saschahollauf]

You had me with the Prontera theme in the background

[@Dinendal01]

Man I just started playing this game and I was hoping for the mages to pick up later, but if they're the same? dang, that's disappointing, now I dont know If I will finish it.

[@tbone9474]

Personally will pick it up if it ever comes to steam. By then I hope things improve. Loved the first game

[@RyuDaBurninator]

I've finished every Ska studios game. This is the first one I will not complete. Kinda makes me sad tbh.

[@sebastiantirado3675]

I detest how when you hit negative stamina you get hit with reduced regen and no more movement speed

[@lunar_arcus]

Man... I loved Salt and Sanctuary so much. Was so disappointed with this game. I had been so hyped for it for so long too.

[@zkt95]

Just finished the game. Would not recommend it. I really don't understand how they took such a huge step backwards from sanctuary. Feels really bad.

[@Boiokgogi]

there is shortcut , you open door and unlock gate and faster travel rigs etc. so when you come back you can get there fast but yeah you need to remember a bit where to go. elemental damage is for build ( item that boost said element ) and enemy resist etc, the level sphere node are not dumb , its so you can get hybrid build or some off build node without using useless stats you dont need. the gameplay have improve over the first game and you get more mobility with the grapling and we get a proper multiplayer that work very well with coop and invasion. my only negative point is the ambiance/music of the game , the first one was more eerie and dreadful and dark, we could feel it ( just like dark souls 1 vs other dark souls ) they improve the gameplay but tone down that ambiance