If you shine a light on Dark Souls, the shadow it cast would be Salt and Sacrifice. The newest 2D souls-like coming to the Epic Game Store has its own rich history, dating back to 2016’s Salt and Sanctuary. The latest game is darker and harder, but a less lonely place. Salt and Sacrifice has been built with multiplayer in mind.

As a Marked Inquisitor, the player is a condemned criminal serving out their sentence in a battle against Mages. These seething, giant, elemental creatures are multi-stage bosses that require planning and patience to defeat. But before you delve so deep, you have to choose who to play as. There are a number of archetypes to choose from. I went with a Fighter, but you could be an Assassin, Cleric, Ranger, or more. Crime pays, too. You select what you were guilty of, and the relevant items land in your inventory. Casting myself as an arsonist gave me a few firebombs.

The town of Pardoner’s Vale sits between you and the game world. It’s a place where you tend to your character, upgrading your swords and gathering supplies for the hunt ahead. Even better, there’s a cat that you can pet. A small comfort in comparison to what’s ahead in Ashbourne Vale.

Salt and Sacrifice is a game of careful combat. There’s no rushing, not when the weakest slash you have leaves you vulnerable to countering. Down in the Vale, even the most meager of damned souls are capable of perfectly piercing an over-extended slash, pushing you to obliteration in a matter of seconds. You have to have the patience to pick your moment, and the skill to know when a dodge will give you time to recover. You have to balance your stamina, which feeds into blocking, dodging, and attacking. And that’s just dealing with the small creatures picking at the corpses around the level.

Larger bosses roam the world. There were two I encountered. The first, the knight-like “Uryks Necklace-of-Ears”, locked me into a small arena and started to swing his giant sword. After a few deaths, his pattern emerged. He’d leave a gap while attacking for me to dodge past and slash. Any slight delay in the dodging or slashing would result in a fairly brutal beat down. Blocking worked, but I couldn’t work that into a coherent strategy. I died a lot before getting the rhythm down. Dodge-slash-dodge, dodge-slash-dodge. Victory was sweet.

Mage battles are almost a game in themselves. After following a few clues and explicitly starting the hunt, you’ll come across a towering, cloaked behemoth, wreathed in spells. Whatever grim thing the mage conjures in battle will aggro everything around it, including the creatures you battle. It’s worth waiting for the AI to wear each other down, letting the mage kill them off before teleporting to another part of the world.

I confess, I never did work out how to deal with the mage. He spawns creatures and blasts fire. I could never quite work out a long-term plan in the chaos and constant dying. What would have helped is a friend. Salt and Sacrifice’s multiplayer is multifaceted. At its most basic, you can beg for help from a friend or stranger, welcomed into your game by you to explore and battle.

But if you feel adventurous, you can set your game up for invasion. Salt and Sacrifice has factions that will turn your game into a battlefield. People who align with the Dawnlight Order can join your game to help you out, and to earn faction tokens. Players from the Shroud Alliance are invaders, and will use matchmaking to attack the host, earning faction tokens for doing so. That’s not all, though. Another faction, Oathbound Watchers, can follow Shroud Alliance players into a game in order to defend the host from attack.

Blueheart Runners can invade the host’s game in order to spawn and fight other creatures in there. They can perform rituals that’ll summon wraiths to attack the host. They can be countered by Sheriff Inquisitors, whose role is to hunt these invaders down.

Finally, there’s the Chaos Eaters. The name is fitting, as this faction can choose to help or hinder the host, give gifts that can be good or curses, and even fight or aid any other invaders. They’re wild cards.

Is it worth it? I think so. The mages are so big, so complicated, so tiring to fight, that I’d probably take my chances and leave my game open for someone, anyone, to come along for the ride.