Saros Earns 88 Metacritic Score Pre-PS5 Launch

Housemarque's Saros, a PlayStation 5 exclusive third-person roguelite shooter, has earned widespread critical acclaim ahead of its April 30, 2026, launch, positioning it among the year's top-rated games with a Metacritic score of 88.

The game serves as a spiritual successor to the studio's 2021 hit Returnal, tasking players with controlling Arjun Devraj, a Soltari enforcer dispatched to the alien planet Carcosa to probe the disappearance of prior expeditions amid solar eclipses that induce madness. Unlike its predecessor, Saros introduces permanent progression via a skill tree, allowing upgrades to health, shields, and weapons that persist across runs, alongside fast travel between biomes and a suspend-save feature for shorter sessions of 15 to 30 minutes.

Combat emphasizes a "bullet ballet" of fluid movement, including dashes, grapples, sprints, and a shield that absorbs blue projectiles to fuel power weapons, while red attacks demand parries and yellow ones during eclipses apply corrupting damage. Weapons feature adaptive DualSense triggers for alternate firing modes, enhancing immersion with haptic feedback. Players select balanced modifiers before runs to tweak difficulty,...