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You Died: Ranking The Dark Souls Games And Their Imitators

It's incredible, really, that in seven short years the devilish Dark Souls series has spun five games from its web. Each entry is brilliant in its own distinct way but when you're treated to so much effortless quality, it's easy to take them for granted. The temptation is to nitpick, to square them off against one another, to single out subjective preferences.

3) Salt And Sanctuary

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Release date: 2016

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If you’re anything like me, you’ve spent a lifetime turning your nose up at indie platform fare that eschews big-budget frills for simple gameplay. And then Salt and Sanctuary comes along and you realize you have been a fool the entire time. Man, what a surprise: this is Dark Souls in 2D, and it should be played by anyone who holds the series dear.

So, how does the Dark Souls formula hold up in two dimensions? Amazingly well, actually.

True, it hews so close to the Soulsformula FromSoftware could conceivably sue for copyright infringement; Salt are souls, sanctuaries are bonfires and the focus is on punishing difficulty. Yet, at the same time, the new 2D perspective makes it utterly different. You’ve got jumping puzzles, two-dimensional boss fights and a rich variety of locales.

What Salt and Sanctuary truly perfects is the world. All those beautiful shortcuts that you start opening reveal a map that’s truly interconnected. Few games in the FromSoftware stable do it this well.

In the end, it’s as tough as nails and rewarding as hell, and that’s just about the biggest compliment you can pay a Souls imitator. It’s one of the best games I’ve played all year, and the best attempt by a third-party at recreating that elusive Souls magic.

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