Salt and Sanctuary will launch on Xbox One on February 6

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On January 16, 2019, it was announced that Ska Studios’ Salt and Sanctuary would come to Xbox One on February 6. The game is a 2D adventure that mixes metroidvania structure with the heavy, punishing combat inspired by Dark Souls, and the port to Microsoft’s console was handled by BlitWorks, the same studio that had brought the game to the Nintendo Switch in August 2018.

What stands out in Salt and Sanctuary is the hand-drawn art. The scenery and characters have a dark, slightly grotesque line that matches the cursed island where the story takes place, and the animation gives weight to every sword or axe swing. A nice detail: behind that look there is a very deep character system, with around 600 items, different move sets for each weapon type, magic, ranged attacks and a huge skill tree that allows hundreds of attribute combinations. There is also local multiplayer and messages left by other players, another wink to FromSoftware’s series.

When the Xbox version was announced, the game already had a solid track record. It came out first on PS4, on March 15, 2016, and then on PC in May that year, also going through Mac, Linux, PS Vita and Switch. Critics liked it a lot: Metacritic recorded 84 on the PS4 and PC versions, and Polygon gave it a 9, praising how the game borrowed mechanics from another series without getting lost in imitation.

What came next

The Xbox One version came out on the promised date, February 6, 2019, and averaged 80 on Metacritic. Ska Studios returned to the same universe with Salt and Sacrifice, released in 2022, the game’s sequel.