Saros PS5 Review: Eclipsing the Competition

The roguelite genre has a very dedicated following, very akin to the Soulsborne genre. These games are not for everyone, and you need to have a certain tolerance for failure, difficulty spikes, and very little hand-holding. Despite these factors, these two genres have garnered a lot of fanfare. Elden Ring is proof that the Soulsborne genre can attract mainstream gamers as well. For developer Housemarque, Returnal was the first try at reaching out to a broader audience with a roguelite game. The challenge with Returnal was that it was a punishingly difficult game and had limited permanent progression, leaving a lot of players wanting more. The good thing about Returnal was that it had very exciting gameplay; the core loop was a lot of fun.

I am happy to say that Saros is Returnal 2.0 with two big changes: 1. Permanent progression for the character, and 2. The ability to jump directly to the new biome you’ve unlocked, with the option to replay the older ones once you’ve unlocked new traversal abilities. This makes the game much more accessible to those who want to try the roguelite genre but were initially put off by the difficulty. That’s the short review. For the detailed review, read on.

Table of Contents

Carcosa Dreaming: A Fragmented Tale

Let’s break down the story as simply as I can. You don the role of Arjun Devraj, played by the ever-charismatic Rahul Kohli, a Sultari enforcer stranded on the hostile, shape-shifting planet Carcosa.

As always, there is a resource-extraction mission gone wrong, and Arjun must survive the day by navigating a dangerous, shifting landscape filled with a lost civilisation and mechanical foes, all while dealing with his own deteriorating sanity and the demands of his employer. It sounds like a lot, but the story is sparsely paced for the first half of the game. You have a central hub where you respawn after every death, or can teleport to after completing a biome successfully. After every few deaths, you get a mysterious cutscene of a bedroom and some more flashes, which all connect at the end (which I won’t spoil here).

However, note that the story isn’t the strongest suit of the game. I really liked the story and ending of Returnal, but my true appreciation for its nuances came after consuming a bunch of story analysis videos on YouTube, and I’m sure the same will be the case with Saros. It’s also worth noting that the developers have heavily scattered lore drops and datalogs throughout the environment, rewarding players who take the time to scan and piece together the backstory themselves.

Total Eclipse of the Screen

But the gameplay is where the game really shines. It is Returnal dialled up to 11, and that’s not a bad thing. The movement is pretty much the same, tight, third-person action. You have a melee attack to disarm enemies with a shield, and your primary weapon can be a pistol, shotgun, machine gun, or so on. You also have a secondary weapon, which charges when you absorb the enemy’s fire. So, hold up your shield, absorb the blue and yellow orbs, and fire a charged shot to deal massive damage. There are a bunch of secondary weapons as well that I won’t spoil here. You have the same fast-paced action as Returnal, and you can dash through incoming projectiles. Movement is the name of the game, and there are times when the screen is so full of enemies and their projectiles that I wondered how my base PS5 from 2020 was pulling off these amazing visuals.

The biggest twist to the gameplay is the Eclipse. At a specific point in each level, you must trigger an eclipse. This changes a few things in the level: enemies become tougher, and the “pickup upgrades” adopt a risk-reward system. Before the eclipse, you can pick up upgrades for your weapon. These include things like an upgrade to the clip size, an increase in damage, etc. But once the eclipse happens, grabbing an upgrade means you must also take a debuff, like taking fall damage or doing reduced damage when shooting from a stationary position. Mind you, you don’t have to pick up each upgrade option, so choose wisely.

There is also a skill tree that basically gives you more health, a second revival chance, faster adrenaline buildup, etc., making you that much stronger for your next run.
Overall, the core gameplay loop is a lot of fun, and runs can last as little as 15 minutes and go up to 45 minutes. Living in India, my biggest complaint with Returnal was that when a power cut happened, my entire run was lost, and I had to start from scratch. Here, you can close the game in the middle of a run, and you will start from just before the current battle room, which is super nice. As I mentioned above, the ability to jump to the latest biome from the beginning is also a welcome change, although I do recommend returning to old biomes once you get new traversal abilities to retrieve audio logs and explore new areas.

Sights and Sounds of a Ruined World

Returnal was a stunning game when it launched, and Saros has managed to enhance that experience considerably. It has a warmer colour palette, with some areas looking like futuristic underground industrial mining facilities. The opening biome is an open area that looks like it once housed grand architecture, which is now left in ruin. With each run, you have a different combination of areas from a biome, keeping the look of the run unique each time.

The game runs at a smooth 60fps, and while we will wait for the overlords at Digital Foundry to give an accurate pixel count, I can tell you that despite the chaos on screen, the game looked stunning on my base launch PS5.

The same experience translates to the sound of the game. Each gun has its own grunt, giving you an auditory kick with each shot. The swishes of your movement and the background score that kicks in to jumpstart a boss fight just add that hint of immersion to the game. I highly recommend playing with headphones, as the game has very good 3D sound design to help you know the positions of enemies, especially when you are surrounded. Furthermore, the DualSense controller integration is spectacular; from the subtle haptic pitter-patter of environmental weather to the heavy adaptive trigger resistance when aiming your secondary fire, it feels incredibly tactile.

Rahul Kohli has also done a good job with the voice acting, but this isn’t Uncharted or God of War, so don’t expect it to be littered with conversations throughout the game.

The Final Verdict

Saros takes the brilliant, adrenaline-pumping foundation laid down by games like Returnal and successfully sands off the frustrating edges. By implementing permanent progression, mid-run saves, and biome-skipping, it respects the player’s time while maintaining the bullet-hell chaos that makes the genre so addictive. While the narrative takes a backseat to the action and might require some outside reading to fully grasp, the sheer joy of the combat loop, backed by stunning visuals and phenomenal audio design, makes Saros a must-play. It is the perfect entry point for roguelite newcomers.

Editor’s Rating: 8.5 / 10

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