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0 Sancticide is an early access third-person action game with souls-like combat and roguelite systems. Red Square Games (SlavicPunk: Oldtimer) and Sylen Studio (The Sin Collector: Repentless) are both developing and publishing the game. Explore the dark world of an apocalypse of biblical proportions today only on Steam.
The Apocalypse is a Dark, Brutal Place…
Reading up on a game description can really only gets you so far. I really am not sure what I was expecting going into Sancticide. What I found was definitely not it. Have you ever run into this before? Where the content within the game isn’t what you were expecting? I mean I had an idea but check out my thoughts in the preview below.
Gameplay
Sancticide is a third-person action game based in the midst of the biblical apocalypse. You play as Ezechiel, a Sin Collector on a mission given to him by Them at The Top (aka God or God’s direct reports). As you travel through the very dark, brutal, and gruesome world you encounter various side quests, NPCs, and enemies with variable levels of “Kosherness”.
Kosher has become the law of the land and all things are either categorized as Kosher, which are acceptable to Those at The Top, or non-Kosher, which are not. Collecting non-Kosher items appears to lead to paths of upgrading gear and equipment. It also appears that eliminating certain NPCs provides an amount of experience commensurate with their un-Kosherness. Collecting these items and experience are key to the roguelite features that persist after inevitable death. Just don’t expect to get any of your loot back and prepare to be back at level 1 too.
I am the chosen sinner
The game blends souls-like melee and ranged combat with a handful of divine powers and skills. Sancticide refers to these powers as being powered by “Purple” and there are several that are available at the game start to choose from. I personally found myself using the slow time ability most frequently, because frankly, I suck at souls-like combat. I am not the biggest fan of the choice to include firearms but they are available (sparingly from what I’ve seen thus far). It just seems out of place despite that they would actually be around. The pistol I was carrying also felt too powerful to take down a creature I didn’t want to close in on. Speaking of out of place, there where a few moments that took me by surprise such as the endless swearing, voice acting and some random memes.
Hello darkness my old friend
I mention the darkness in Sancticide a few times above. I keep saying this because despite there being a lot of dark games available in the wild, in both theme and setting, this one hits a bit differently. It may have to do with the biblical theme hanging over everything. Or maybe it’s because one of the first side quests is to hand out tablets to those considering “Self-Execution”. Regardless, please prepare yourself or look elsewhere if religious extremism to a grotesque level is not your cup of tea.
Graphics & Audio
Speaking of the dark, gory world of Sancticide, the developers have done well with their portrayal of just what a biblical apocalypse could look like. Everything carries either a bloody, dirty, or contorted appearance. It provides an atmosphere of a place I really, really would not want to end up in. The only place where light is even shining is at the central hub area, the Citadel, which is of course built as close as possible to the high heavens and for some reason Roman in design. With the exception of a few graphical glitches, the game played smoothly for me in its current version of early access.
The only thing that stood out to me in Sancticide’s audio was the dialogue. The developers have a notice on the Steam store page that parts of AI-generated voice overs are used, which come from sample recordings of the devs working on the game. However, this leads to some odd inflections and tone that are off-putting. Some things came across as jokes, that I wasn’t sure were actually meant to be. I also wasn’t sure at times if certain dialogue was being fully voice-acted or not. My personal preference is that if you’re not going to use full voiceovers, either do just the first couple sentences or nothing at all. Don’t use AI to fill in the gaps for you in this area.
Longevity
Sancticide primarily has the ground work laid out. The developers expect it to be in Early Access for approximately five to ten months. At this time I cannot speak to the longevity of the game due to a combination of failing at it and it not being fully complete. I also haven’t seen a specific indication of what happens when you conclude the main story, so can’t speak to whether repeat playthroughs will be viable or if there’s a different end game.
Final Thoughts
Sancticide has the potential to be a quality game. It reminds me a lot of when I took a look at Kristala. The basic mechanics felt ok to me, but I know this is something the devs have said they are working on. It will be interesting to see where exactly they go from early access. Hopefully with less AI audio and old memes. That being said, Sancticide is a game I will probably return to. Once they’ve ironed out some issues.
Disclaimer: A code was received in order to write this preview.
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