go get "Salt and Sanctuary" on steam/PS4 and you'll see exactly what that baby would look like
SIMILARITIES TO DS:
- killing bad guys earns you salt (souls) and gold
- salt is a currency that can buy you level-ups and along with rare finds can be exchanged for weapon/armor upgrades
- if you die due to falling or traps, your salt becomes a creature that you can kill to regain your salt - and if an enemy kills you, you have to slay it to get your salt back. if you die again before reclaiming your salt, it's gone forever.
- it's fuckin hard and sometimes makes me wanna snap my controller in half (oh yeah, def play with a controller)
- inventory - several armor slots, some rings, and a hotkey belt
- combat - you can sword-and-board or go 2h and trade speed for power, but either way you're better off not getting hit than trying to block everything
- well-timed parries open up enemies to powerful counterattack
- weight - lower equipment-to-max ratio means faster running/rolling
- massive map with unlockable shortcuts to make travel easier
- items - bell of return (homeward bone), consumables that add poison/fire/holy to your weapon
- enormous bosses
- plenty of moments like this:
- health flasks (idk if they can be upgraded, but you can definitely increase your supply
- bronze knights (black knights) that are tough kills and drop sweet gear and do not respawn
- you can change faiths mid-game and receive brands on your body to unlock abilities (covenants)
- leave/receive messages in a "jurney bottle" (orange soapstone) for other players, see other players' phantoms reenact their deaths
SIMILARITIES TO CV:
- fuckin platforms everywhere
- you can explore as far as you want if you have the tools and/or fighting skills
- everything's creepy as shit
- secret passageways up the yin yang
- flying critters can really ruin your day if you're doing a lot of tight platform travel
- lots of backtracking as you get new abilities
OTHER STUFF:
- there's a skill map kinda like path of exile or FFX. each level up gets you one black pearl (and they can be found rarely in the wild) and unlocking a stat point boost (str/end/dex/wis/mag) typically costs one BP. other nodes that unlock the ability to equip certain types/levels of weapons/armor typically cost more than 1 BP, but you do get a decent stat boost along with it.
- although the level design and the monster design (especially the bosses, holy shit) are super creepy, the design of living characters is mildly cartoony. i don't mind this, but some might.
- at each sanctuary, you can make up to four different offerings of little statuettes that you collect here and there. these will summon NPCs to live in the sanctuary and provide useful interactions. so far i've found merchant, leader (turn in enemy tokens for special unlocks), sellsword (allows couch co-op!), cleric (teaches prayers), mage (???), guide (facilitates travel between sanctuaries), and blacksmith (sell/upgrade weapons and armor). however as stated you can only have up to four different villagers at each sanctuary
- some sanctuaries are vacant and you can claim them for your faith (healing lady, justice triumvirate, or atheistic iron worship). other sanctuaries are already claimed for other faiths you can't select at the beginning (so far i've found the woodwraiths). you can't make offerings to summon villagers to a sanctuary of a different faith, but you can still save there, level up, and refill your flasks. you can also renounce your faith and take an oath at preoccupied sanctuaries - that will allow you to make offerings, but idk how that will affect sanctuaries you already claimed for your previous faith. i didn't have the guts to take the woodwraiths oath.
now, purists might read about all these DS similarities and get all butthurt about it, but while i can't deny there's some direct appropriation going on i think it's faithfully and respectfully executed and captures the intense feeling of "i am definitely somewhere i'm not supposed to be" that i felt so strongly with DS. it's fairly affordable too - i think it's still on sale for $10 but even regular price is like $15 or maybe $20. you'll get your money's worth too; i've played about 8-10 hours so far and according to the wiki page i've only visited 4 of the 22 different areas
enough jibba jabba though. here, have a trailer:
