The Haunted Hoard: Sea Salt (Xbox One)
In most stories featuring Lovecraftian monsters and the Cthulhu mythos, the knowledge and worship of cosmic horrors known as Old Gods is often kept to underground cults and secret societies. However, in the world of Sea Salt, the undersea deity Dagon is not only worshiped out in the open, but his church is the largest in the land. People show no compunction after sacrificing their crops, livestock, and children to appease this Old God, a grand cathedral and a history of devout apostles showing this is truly the entrenched religion of this land.
There are some who oppose the will of Dagon, some just being mercenary families who care more about coin than religion. However, while the seaside community is certainly dreary, the true trouble this community faces occurs when Dagon finally demands the Archbishop as a sacrifice. The Archbishop, happy with his life of wealth and power as the figurehead of Dagon’s church and the only one the Old God speaks directly to, refuses to hand himself over and starts allying with unscrupulous types to protect himself from the deity’s wrath. Dagon decides to take matters into his own hands, sending creatures from deep beneath the waves onto land to tear apart anything that stands in the way of claiming what Dagon is owed.
In Sea Salt, the player actually assumes the role of Dagon, but the god of the Deep Ones doesn’t actually go on land at all. Instead, the player commands a group of faithful minions around with a cursor that moves freely across the top down environment in real time. Whether you want them to move to a location, break barriers, or tear apart the humans who stand against you, all you need to do is move the cursor towards the intended destination and they’ll charge in. For the most part this works fairly well, different minion types knowing if they’re more effective hanging back and creatures usually knowing to avoid fire unless its being actively used against them. However, one big mental hurdle that the player will need to get over is the fact that minions will die in battle no matter how well you command them. You can’t instruct individual unit types to move in alone or ever split apart the horde you’re commanding, but the game has many ways for you to call in more minions.
When you start a level, you will be asked to pick an apostle to determine your starting forces. The game only gives you Aghra De Pesca to start, his opener being 25 members of the Swarm species who are essentially all about using incredible numbers to make up for being fairly weak and simple attackers. You can unlock other apostles by performing special tasks, but the special effects and starting troops of other apostles are more situational and gimmicky so they’re more likely there for either the wave survival mode or to make playing through the game a second time feel different. To summon in new minions outside of your starting batch, you need to either find an altar or gather gold by defeating enemies. Both of these happen regularly enough that you’re not often left scrambling for troops, and if you do find your minions are wiped out to the point they’re barely able to hold their own in the fight, you can reset the current subarea and try it again without penalty.
What makes Sea Salt so interesting though are the minions you find yourself commanding. As you progress through the game you gradually collect minion cards, the options changing based on what levels you play. While there are some guaranteed areas you’ll need to push through in your quest to reach the Archbishop, there are a few points in the plot where you pick which of two levels you’ll be moving through. Besides obvious differences like stage layout, enemy types, and the boss battle at the end of the level, you also get different minion cards based on your path. When in a level, the player is able to pick one card per altar usage or every time the gold threshold is reached. These can provide varying amounts of the creature chosen, the many minion types working together to make an army where you’re constantly trying to evaluate where your numbers need shoring up and what choices might benefit you based on the enemies you have been encountering in the level.
Their different stats means even basic minions might have different perks, creatures like The Crab packing tougher armor and fire resistance while The Fishman has a high horror stat and can send foes running who would have otherwise fought back. The Cultist and The Spitter both rely on projectile attacks so you can position your group in clever spots where these minions can safely attack foes from afar, and there are plenty of minions with completely unique concepts like The Maggots who will reproduce rapidly if they have corpses to eat or The Drogher which will explode into a group of smaller creatures when its finally taken down. Some of the concepts are niche to the point of near uselessness admittedly, The Toad in particular standing out since it moves into a battle and blows itself up so its hard to justify picking a single explosive minion over something with staying power, but if you’re in a boss fight or area filled with mercenaries and just need some instant damage output, it can be a good way to spend a sudden gold influx. The only minion who seemed to have any major issues was The Black Cat, the little felines pouncing the moment you indicate an enemy and sometimes getting stuck in place after the fight so they can’t help with any of the other battles until you move onto the next screen.
Cultivating your little army of varied minion types is where a lot of the enjoyment comes from, the player needing to identify the best mix of creatures to handle the battles ahead. Making adjustments based on what you’ve lost, pushing an advantage by building up the numbers for the really strong troops, and other strategies all find footing in the gameplay, and while having a huge army can completely undermine a boss fight, getting your forces there in great numbers is no easy task and the ease of the battle is practically the reward for playing so cautiously elsewhere. The variety in your enemies plays a huge role in how you’ll need to adjust your tactics on the fly, and one of the clearest points of reinforcement for accepting some of your minions will have to die is the fact some foes fire guns at you from afar and you can’t possibly avoid every bullet. Your minions come with different levels of health and resistances so you’re not always losing troops the moment a battle starts, but the mercenaries and other forces you face bring different weapons to the table that can tear through your army with a few good hits.
Dogs are surprisingly dangerous creatures, the animal pouncing forward and able to kill anything in its direct path if you don’t move your minions in time and strike when the dog is tired. Men wielding large axes can slam the ground around them to kill anything attacking them, but their windup means you have time to get your minions away. Some foes just rely on strength in numbers like archers who pester your group while you’re fighting men who prefer to move in close, but at other times the opposition uses level geometry to their advantage like men arming huge ballistas who nestle their weapons in corners and can carve through your ranks with one surprise bolt shot. You quickly learn that you need to progress cautiously to avoid drawing too much attention or you could end up throwing yourself into a losing battle. Splitting up enemies or knowing when to get aggressive becomes key to consistent success. Your forces never get so big that you can truly play carelessly, but for the most part the enemies you’re up against are on an even playing field where their stronger weapons and group tactics can hold their own against your group of minions. One exception exists in the mercenaries with fire weapons. While you can avoid explosives that are tossed into your midst, the flamethrower men take a lot of damage to put down and your minions won’t avoid his specific flames since they’re being used as an attack. There are counters, but this is the point where it feels like the minions should at least know not to charge into fire if the game isn’t going to allow you to only send in the types that can handle it.
Bosses come with their selection of unique attack types such as an anchor throwing dockworker and a horseman whose balista backup and raising of the dead combine into strong area denial tactics. These tougher battles are definitely the best when it comes to the game communicating an enemy’s intention before executing an attack that can eliminate some of your minions, this being the point where you’re most actively encouraged to pick your moments based on your ability to get in safely and deal damage. Transferring that mindset to the regular minions is the true key to success, and as you get closer to the Archbishop, enemies become more capable and come in groupings that start to demand good strategy to overcome. The smart balance of your strength versus what you’re up against is what keeps Sea Salt engaging to the end, but make sure to stick around after the end credits as eventually the option to play an extra bit will appear so long as you don’t head to the main menu too soon.
THE VERDICT: Sea Salt’s minion commanding gameplay may not give you the level of control you’d desire over such an army, but the game is built around the idea of sending the servants of Dagon into the fray as a swarm. The different capabilities of your troops is still the key to overcoming the opposition and how you build up your forces as you progress through a level has a clear impact on how well you’ll handle what lies ahead. Some enemies like the men with flamethrowers can strain the all or nothing command system in play, but the need to balance your minion picks and how you move them around to overcome the different strategies enemies employ is what makes Sea Salt such an engaging reverse horror game.
And so, I give Sea Salt for Xbox One…
A GOOD rating. Sea Salt is clearly trying to keep commanding your forces accessible, the real time pacing meaning that too much micromanagement in the heat of battle wouldn’t be possible. For the most part, pointing your forces at the enemy properly is the key to victory and learning to adjust to the inevitable losses when it comes to selecting reinforcements means you’re still thinking about how your army takes shape and how they should move into a situation. The power balance between you and the opposition isn’t always perfect, but the game does manage its spacing on altars and gold well to ensure you can gather a formidable army for whatever trials lie ahead. Improving a few ideas like how fire works in general would remove the moments that still can frustrate even once you’ve grown accustomed to how commanding your minions will play out, and it’s a shame that two playthroughs of the game are needed to see everything when one longer story could have allowed you to get more cards and really mix and match minion types even more, but the most important part of Sea Salt is it did its core gameplay concept well and designed its levels and combat to mostly complement that system.
Commanding the horrific minions of an Old God turns out to be a surprisingly accessible yet strategic way to play Sea Salt. While it could have been interesting to see more of this world where a cosmic horror is openly worshiped and the Book of Dagon on the main menu touches on its lore a little, the main idea of commanding an army of creatures and cultists is what brings together this reverse horror game nicely. While it had a few ideas that weren’t thought out perfectly, it’s still satisfying to create and command a horrific little army of your own.