Housemarque just raised the bar again
By Paul Hunter
Returnal was one of the best things to happen to PS5. Saros, Housemarque's follow-up, takes everything great about that game and builds something bigger and better in every imaginable. You're Arjun Devraj, an Enforcer dropped onto Carcosa, a hostile alien world shaped by recurring solar eclipses that transform the planet every time they occur. The signature third-person bullet hell action is back, as is the roguelite framework, and both are more generous and more rewarding than before. The story is better too, and that's saying something considering how much Returnal drew me in. So, is Carcosa worth dying for again and again? Let's find out!
Rahul Kohli voices and does the motion capture for Arjun, and the performance is one of the best in any Sony title I've experienced this gen. Kohli gives Arjun a grounded mix of toughness and vulnerability that makes you invested in his fate from early on.
The Passage, the hub where Arjun returns between runs, is where much of the story's human moments happen. The rest of the Echelon IV crew voices their perspectives on Carcosa and Soltari's agenda, and their collective grip on sanity loosens in fascinating ways as the game progresses. I looked forward to visiting them between runs to genuinely check on their welfare and to see if they're still okay.
Similar to Returnal, Saros serves up its story in multiple ways. Periodic cutscenes, randomly located audio and text logs, optional crew dialogue at The Passage, contact with survivors further out on the planet, and flashback sequences all work together to build a deep and fascinating story. The details come slowly, and that restraint pays off the further you get in.
Saros is, of course, a third-person bullet hell shooter, and precise movement along with proper timing of your abilities is crucial to suvival. Your most used defensive move is the power dash, which phases Arjun briefly out of the physical world and grants invincibility frames to slip through the dense enemy fire filling each combat arena. Mastering that timing is one of the most satisfying parts of the early game.
You'll soon learn that the Soltari Shield is another crucial ability, especially during intense boss encounters. Holding R1 absorbs blue projectiles and converts them into Power for your Power Weapon, your most devastating attack move. You can also absorb yellow projectiles, but doing so increases your corruption, which in turn decreases your maximum health. Tapping the R1 button unleashes melee strikes and later in the game it'll parry red projectiles, which before that point you'll need to outright avoid. Mastering the colour coding is central to Saros' gameplay, as you need to react to each colour differently and quickly.
Every weapon in the game carries an alt-fire with a partial L2 press and switches to your Power Weapon when pressing L2 fully down. [Pro tip: You can remap buttons in the menu, and it's possible to separate alt-fire and Power Weapon to two separate buttons.] Weapon types range from assault rifles, shotguns, crossbows, and pistols and each have their own variations with different properties or alt-fires. The game also employs an active reload system that rewards well-timed button with quicker reloads.
Saros uses the tagline 'Come back stronger' and this plays out through the armour matrix at The Passage that handles permanent progression. It's a skill tree of permanent upgrades funded by Lucenite, covering armour integrity, Power Weapon capacity, number of artefact slots, frequency of health drops, and more between runs. Halcyons, rare purple items found during runs, unlock specific matrix nodes that you can't with standard Lucenite. Alpha enemies, a tough elite tier between standard mobs and bosses, typically drop Halcyons after defeating them.
Carcosan Modifiers are also available at The Passage and they let you customise the challenge level before each run. You can apply modifiers buffs like inflicting more damage, but the catch is you need to add debuffs to make the world 'balance out', although there is an option in the menu that lets you ignore adding debuffs if you prefer a lighter challenge.
Each biome has Nightmare Strands offering optional high-difficulty battle zones for anyone looking for a challenge with high rewards. Defeating bosses progressively unlocks traversal tools including a grappling hook, jump pads and eclipse strands that open up new paths in earlier zones in true Metroidvania fashion, and most of these optional areas have valuable items or audio logs to discover. Back at The Passage you'll also gain access to the World Dial for fast-travel to any biome you've already reached to quickly get back into action.
When the signature eclipse activates, Carcosa's visual shift is immediate and dramatic. Reddish orange light floods the environment, tentacles emerge from the ground, and the combination of increased enemy projectile density and greater number of thrm being deadlier yellow and red versions transformation the world around you into a harsh and threatening sight. A massive sky-dominating black sun ringed with fire tops off the metamorphosis and is an eye-catching visual that's impossible to ignore even mid-fight.
While the cutscenes set a high standard for character facial animations, the in-game conversations with Echelon IV crewmates are a step below, and a couple of stronger narrative moments are slightly weaker because of it. The visual presentation is generally excellent across the board though.
Turning our attention to audio, Sam Slater's soundtrack shifts between tense exploration music and aggressive, driving combat tracks the moment enemies appear. The contrast is handled well enough that after dozens of hours the sudden transition still put me in high alert mode. The audio keeps each biome run feeling alive and fresh from start to finish.
The DualSense implementation is some of the best on PS5. Adaptive triggers vary resistance for alt-fire on a partial L2 press versus the Power Weapon on full press, and haptic feedback sends Arjun's dashes and attacks directly through the controller, right down to the proximity of nearby enemies.
Performance-wise, I played Saros on PS5 Pro where it runs at a buttery smooth 60fps at 4K resolution. It also features PSSR 2 upscaling for more detailed particle effects and a locked frame rate across every biome and every encounter.
Final Score: 9.5/10 - Amazing
Developer: Housemarque
Publisher: Sony Interactive Entertainment
Genre: Action, Roguelite
Modes: Single-player
By Paul Hunter
Returnal was one of the best things to happen to PS5. Saros, Housemarque's follow-up, takes everything great about that game and builds something bigger and better in every imaginable. You're Arjun Devraj, an Enforcer dropped onto Carcosa, a hostile alien world shaped by recurring solar eclipses that transform the planet every time they occur. The signature third-person bullet hell action is back, as is the roguelite framework, and both are more generous and more rewarding than before. The story is better too, and that's saying something considering how much Returnal drew me in. So, is Carcosa worth dying for again and again? Let's find out!
Story and Narrative
Arjun Devraj is sent to Carcosa with a mission, but he's also secretly there for personal reasons. The Soltari corporation dispatched three separate echelons of colonists to the planet to mine Lucenite, a compound with enormous energy potential. However, all three echelons lost contact after arriving. Echelon IV, the emergency rescue team Arjun is part of, arrives to find a planet surrounded by mystery, and by the time you take control the crew has crashed and is stranded. Arjun is one of two remaining Enforcers, Soltari's armed agents aboard the mission, and he's determined to find out what happened to Echelon 1, which he has a connection to. That connection directs his actions in ways that go well beyond following a corporate brief.Rahul Kohli voices and does the motion capture for Arjun, and the performance is one of the best in any Sony title I've experienced this gen. Kohli gives Arjun a grounded mix of toughness and vulnerability that makes you invested in his fate from early on.
The Passage, the hub where Arjun returns between runs, is where much of the story's human moments happen. The rest of the Echelon IV crew voices their perspectives on Carcosa and Soltari's agenda, and their collective grip on sanity loosens in fascinating ways as the game progresses. I looked forward to visiting them between runs to genuinely check on their welfare and to see if they're still okay.
Similar to Returnal, Saros serves up its story in multiple ways. Periodic cutscenes, randomly located audio and text logs, optional crew dialogue at The Passage, contact with survivors further out on the planet, and flashback sequences all work together to build a deep and fascinating story. The details come slowly, and that restraint pays off the further you get in.
Gameplay and Mechanics
The eclipse is the mechanism that makes Saros feel unlike anything else in the roguelite space. Triggered at set points during each biome run by interacting with a specific environmental structure, it transforms enemy attacks into more dangerous versions, floods the environment with yellow corruption, adds a debuff to every artefact (items that provide stat boosts or perks), but also increases the Lucenite currency dropped by defeated enemies.Saros is, of course, a third-person bullet hell shooter, and precise movement along with proper timing of your abilities is crucial to suvival. Your most used defensive move is the power dash, which phases Arjun briefly out of the physical world and grants invincibility frames to slip through the dense enemy fire filling each combat arena. Mastering that timing is one of the most satisfying parts of the early game.
You'll soon learn that the Soltari Shield is another crucial ability, especially during intense boss encounters. Holding R1 absorbs blue projectiles and converts them into Power for your Power Weapon, your most devastating attack move. You can also absorb yellow projectiles, but doing so increases your corruption, which in turn decreases your maximum health. Tapping the R1 button unleashes melee strikes and later in the game it'll parry red projectiles, which before that point you'll need to outright avoid. Mastering the colour coding is central to Saros' gameplay, as you need to react to each colour differently and quickly.
Every weapon in the game carries an alt-fire with a partial L2 press and switches to your Power Weapon when pressing L2 fully down. [Pro tip: You can remap buttons in the menu, and it's possible to separate alt-fire and Power Weapon to two separate buttons.] Weapon types range from assault rifles, shotguns, crossbows, and pistols and each have their own variations with different properties or alt-fires. The game also employs an active reload system that rewards well-timed button with quicker reloads.
Saros uses the tagline 'Come back stronger' and this plays out through the armour matrix at The Passage that handles permanent progression. It's a skill tree of permanent upgrades funded by Lucenite, covering armour integrity, Power Weapon capacity, number of artefact slots, frequency of health drops, and more between runs. Halcyons, rare purple items found during runs, unlock specific matrix nodes that you can't with standard Lucenite. Alpha enemies, a tough elite tier between standard mobs and bosses, typically drop Halcyons after defeating them.
Carcosan Modifiers are also available at The Passage and they let you customise the challenge level before each run. You can apply modifiers buffs like inflicting more damage, but the catch is you need to add debuffs to make the world 'balance out', although there is an option in the menu that lets you ignore adding debuffs if you prefer a lighter challenge.
Each biome has Nightmare Strands offering optional high-difficulty battle zones for anyone looking for a challenge with high rewards. Defeating bosses progressively unlocks traversal tools including a grappling hook, jump pads and eclipse strands that open up new paths in earlier zones in true Metroidvania fashion, and most of these optional areas have valuable items or audio logs to discover. Back at The Passage you'll also gain access to the World Dial for fast-travel to any biome you've already reached to quickly get back into action.
Presentation and Audio
Housemarque shifted from using Unreal Engine 4 for Returnal to UE5 for Saros, and the visual upgrade across each biome is immediately noticeable. You move through desolate ruins under a hostile sky, an industrial complex alive with fire and whirring machinery, decimated city streets where tight architecture closes in around every firefight, and swampland where the eclipse transforms the water into a toxic hazard. The randomised roguelite layouts mean the same environments appear in fresh configurations across dozens of runs.When the signature eclipse activates, Carcosa's visual shift is immediate and dramatic. Reddish orange light floods the environment, tentacles emerge from the ground, and the combination of increased enemy projectile density and greater number of thrm being deadlier yellow and red versions transformation the world around you into a harsh and threatening sight. A massive sky-dominating black sun ringed with fire tops off the metamorphosis and is an eye-catching visual that's impossible to ignore even mid-fight.
While the cutscenes set a high standard for character facial animations, the in-game conversations with Echelon IV crewmates are a step below, and a couple of stronger narrative moments are slightly weaker because of it. The visual presentation is generally excellent across the board though.
Turning our attention to audio, Sam Slater's soundtrack shifts between tense exploration music and aggressive, driving combat tracks the moment enemies appear. The contrast is handled well enough that after dozens of hours the sudden transition still put me in high alert mode. The audio keeps each biome run feeling alive and fresh from start to finish.
The DualSense implementation is some of the best on PS5. Adaptive triggers vary resistance for alt-fire on a partial L2 press versus the Power Weapon on full press, and haptic feedback sends Arjun's dashes and attacks directly through the controller, right down to the proximity of nearby enemies.
Performance-wise, I played Saros on PS5 Pro where it runs at a buttery smooth 60fps at 4K resolution. It also features PSSR 2 upscaling for more detailed particle effects and a locked frame rate across every biome and every encounter.
The Verdict
Saros takes everything great about Returnal and builds something more ambitious, more accessible, and more human around it. The bullet hell action is easily the best yet on PS5 and the permanent unlocks makes every run feel meaningful. The visuals, audio, and performance all hit the high standard you'd expect from a top-tier Sony PS5 exclusive. Saros is a must-play and one of the year's very best games. Carcosa is calling and you should answer.Final Score: 9.5/10 - Amazing
Saros details
Platform: PS5Developer: Housemarque
Publisher: Sony Interactive Entertainment
Genre: Action, Roguelite
Modes: Single-player