Is Saros Worth It? Honest Verdict After the Hype

Yes, Saros is worth it for most players who like a hard, good-looking roguelike — with one caveat: the story doesn't hit as hard as the combat does. Housemarque's follow-up to Returnal landed with an 88 on Metacritic and 92% on OpenCritic, numbers that put it among the best-reviewed games of 2026, and reviewers largely agree the combat earns that score. What's split is whether the cosmic-horror plot around it does the same.

Here's the honest version, past the review-aggregate headline.

Who it's for

Saros is for anyone who wants the Returnal formula with fewer bruises. It's still a bullet-hell-adjacent roguelike built on permadeath runs, but Housemarque added concessions — an easier opening stretch, more room to learn patterns — without stripping out the tough-as-nails combat that made Returnal worth it in the first place. GamesRadar called it a remix of Returnal for a broader audience, and that's the right way to think about who this is for: players who admired Returnal from a distance but never wanted to eat that much difficulty to see it.

It's also for players who want a genuinely striking world to die in repeatedly. Reviewers keep bringing up the world design and boss variety unprompted, which says something about how much attention went into the parts of the game you see between deaths.

Who should skip it

If your issue with Returnal wasn't the difficulty but the setting, tone, or the amount of story delivered through gameplay rather than cutscenes, Saros doesn't fix that — it's the same studio doing the same kind of storytelling, just with a gentler on-ramp. And if you're PC-only, there's nothing to decide yet: Saros is a PS5 exclusive with no PC version announced.

It's also not the move if you want the story to be the main event. Even the positive reviews flag the narrative as the weak link, calling it uninspired or disjointed against combat that reviewers describe as phenomenal.

The difficulty question

This is where most of the "is it worth it" hesitation comes from, and the honest answer is: easier than Returnal, still not easy. The early hours give you room to breathe that Returnal never did. Then the mid-game tightens up considerably, and by most accounts the difficulty actually eases again heading into the finale — an unusual curve, and one a couple of reviewers flagged as sanding down an edge or two more than the game needed to. If you wanted Returnal's total mercilessness, you'll notice the softer edges. If Returnal's difficulty was the wall that kept you out, this is the version built to let you in.

Is the price worth it

Saros launched at $69.99 for the standard edition, with a $79.99 Digital Deluxe adding 48-hour early access and three cosmetic suits referencing Returnal, Ghost of Yotei, and God of War — nice to have, skippable if you don't care about outfits. Early estimates put a first completion at roughly 20–25 hours for an average player, dropping to 15–18 hours if you already know Housemarque's rhythm from Returnal, with the secret ending adding a few hours more and full completion running 30–45 hours. Those numbers are still settling as more players finish the game, so treat them as a range rather than gospel. At full price, 20-plus hours of some of the best-reviewed combat of the year is a reasonable trade if the genre is for you. If you're on the fence, waiting for a sale removes the only real risk.

The story, honestly

This is the part of Saros that splits opinion. The combat and world design get near-universal praise; the plot doesn't. Eurogamer's summary — two steps forward, one step back — captures it well: the action is a clear improvement on Returnal, but the story interrupts the rhythm rather than building on it. If you finished Returnal mainly for its fragmented, strange sci-fi horror, go in expecting Saros to entertain you between fights rather than pull you through them.

The honest weaknesses

Beyond the story, the difficulty curve itself draws some criticism — a game that gets easier as it approaches its ending is an odd choice for a genre built on escalating pressure, and a few reviewers wanted Housemarque to hold the line longer. None of this tanks the recommendation. It just means the 88 on Metacritic reflects a game that's excellent at the thing it's best at and merely fine at the thing wrapped around it.

If a punishing loop with a stronger throughline between its powers and its world is more your speed, KUTO: The Lock of Time is worth a look. It's a time-bending Metroidvania, not a roguelike — you keep your five time abilities for good, and every one you unlock is one more lock off the thing ending the world, rather than a run-by-run unlock you can lose. For more of what Saros scratches, games like Saros rounds up the rest of the field. Wishlist KUTO on Steam if a slower-burn, permanent-power take on this kind of pressure sounds like your thing.