Salt and Sacrifice and his review comes as a direct follow-up to the "old" Salt and Sanctuary, an independent title released in 2016 (of which, we remind you, there is a version for PC). We have often wondered if the second chapter would have lived up to, at least minimal, the first: well, immediately removing the sad thought, this was not the case. Unfortunately this second encounter / clash with the monsters of the game did not surprise us (at least, not as much as the first) and we made an immense effort to swallow the toad. But let's go in order and let's go on this adventure.
Salt and magic
In the unspecified world of Salt and Sacrifice we will be called to playing a penitent, that is, a person who has committed a horrible crime. Different from time to time, and which you will choose while creating the character, this crime can be fished from a decidedly crowded fan: there is a bit of everything, from murder to rape, from theft to the contempt of a corpse (not it's a game for weak stomachs, know it! ed). Once you have chosen the sin committed, it will be proposed to you the death (and here, the credits and end of the game will scroll, congratulations!) or the possibility to undergo a forbidden ritual, able to make you immune to death but condemned to an endless hunt. The goal of your research is the wizards who "went beyond" or those people who have spasmodically sought magic for too long and have become real monsters. The world is in a panic as the wizards control different territories with magic and the undead, and the aim of the victim will be to face all the monsters and restore (if possible) peace. Plot that must be discovered, as usual, through the actions and of dialogues, almost never explicitly revealed to the player (long live the news ed).
Salt and spirit
Initially you will find yourself surrounded by classic undead between skeletons and zombies, and then be attacked by much more interesting monsters, at least aesthetically, even if a sense of inadequacy remains: the graphic sector makes water from all sides transforming, in the best of cases, stick men with "drawings pasted on" which are then the weaponry and armature that you will take with you. Even your enemies will look like an ugly elementary school collage, and weapon feedback will almost never match up to the blow.
Another problem is that, although the zones are in the style of Demon's Souls, that is with a central hub that leads us from time to time to the desired instance, a map does not appear for the player, and this is undoubtedly the height of frustration in what is an exploration to metroidvania. It all comes down toenter an area, find that there are doors not accessible, impassable areas in which we will have to return, identify the boss and kill him, to then return to the neutral zone: certainly not the top of fun or inventiveness. Add to all this that, once you find the boss, he moves around the map and you will be forced to chase him to reapproach him and try to continue your work. In Salt and Sacrifice you live one constant feeling of inadequacy and inhospitality.
Salt and pains
We have reached the final part of the Salt and Sacrifice review. Find a niceObelisco (the equivalent of a Bonfire if you are a fan of the Souls) and you want to go back to the previous one, because maybe now you have an object or an ability unlocked by the spherography in Final Fantasy X sauce that you did not have before, and you are sure you can overcome an obstacle that previously blocked you: there sorry, but there is no teleportation between one obelisk and another and you will have to retrace your steps ... on foot, without a map, and relying on memory. Frustrated? It does not end here: the game's checkpoints are placed in a "random" order in the sense that it seems as if in the programming phase they forgot to insert them and someone put them randomly on the map, result? Some tremendously close to each other, others as distant as an Odyssey.
Although there is an interesting mechanic, namely the one that the enemies who at first wanted your head, at the sight of the Wizard (or the boss) ignore the protagonist and throw themselves headlong in pursuit of the Wizard, this is not enough to make the game a small masterpiece as the first chapter. Yes, they can get powerful items, legendary equipment and so on, but even this is not enough to alleviate the frustration and the inadequacy in which the experience is lived.
There is multiplayer mode, which is lived as a Soulsian experience, and this adds "salt" to the whole, which however is basically dramatically dull and tasteless. The title is undoubtedly addressed to that hard core of fans who loved the first chapter, to all the others I recommend, quoting Virgil, “don't care about them but look and pass”.
Review- Salt and Sacrifice (Tested on PS5) 6 Final Vote
Salt and Sacrifice is a title aimed at the public who loved the first chapter, as it is difficult, rough at the level of level design and dramatically inadequate: the game leaves the player with a feeling of hostility, not welcoming and little inspiration (almost always stealing elements than other much larger games). It seems like a cauldron of beautiful ideas almost recast in a context that is not so explicit. We are far from the quality of the first chapter.
