Smoke and Sacrifice
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Top Critic
An enjoyably distinctive survival game, in terms of gameplay, visuals, and an unusually affecting story.
Top Critic
A sometimes grotesque, always engrossing take on the survival game, woven together with a twisted tale, weird weapons, and giant, charging porcupine pigs.
Top Critic
A dark and twisted fantasy RPG which uses elements of survival games to great effect, Smoke & Sacrifice is a beautiful piece of indie software. Tonally and physically challenging, the artistry on display sets it apart from its peers, creating a foreboding world that's well worth being drawn into.
Top Critic
Smoke and Sacrifice is a beautiful handcrafted game with a solid game loop that fails to deliver an intense story filled with very similar and poorly designed quests.
Review in Spanish | Read full review
Top Critic
Smoke and Sacrifice is a dark and compelling adventure that deserves to be played
Top Critic
Smoke and Sacrifice tells a compelling tale of a mother searching for answers after being forced to give up her son. While the game's gorgeous art brings its grim world to life, its story is ultimately undercut by poor pacing and vague objectives. Smoke and Sacrifice shines in concept, but falters in execution.
Top Critic
Smoke and Sacrifice is a good addition to the survival genre, from its compelling storyline to its amazing design that engrosses you in a bleak world run over by monsters. The only thing Smoke and Sacrifice seems to falter in is its clunky and outdated combat and daunting crafting system. A beautiful aspect that distinguishes the game from other survival games is the narrative that focuses on motherhood. If you like titles such as Don't Starve, then this is a decent alternative.
Top Critic
A nicely designed Steampunk action adventure underpinned by an intriguing story line, Smoke and Sacrifice is hampered by repetitive world design, an excess of unnecessary crafting and a fighting mechanic which just isn't as much fun as it should be.
Top Critic
Smoke and Sacrifice get a lot of the things we love about this genre right, with the added bonus of playing a protagonist with clear goals and motivations. It also teaches players a lesson with every death.
Top Critic
If you're looking for an indie RPG that tugs at your heartstrings, Smoke and Sacrifice is that game. Sachi fights her way through the unknown, scavenging for tools and food. She pushes past the obstacles in her way driven to bring her lost child home. A mother's perseverance and strength give me those Kleenex commercial feels. It'll take about twenty hours to complete the story and side quests, which is a good length for an indie game of this scope. And those of us who get emotionally invested in games like these might want to have something comforting at hand. My go-to: a giant bag of M&Ms and some good Japanese whisky, neat.
Top Critic
Smoke and Sacrifice is an involving, vast and well crafted game that joins RPG elements to those of survival horror to create a world that is both beautiful and disturbing to explore, coupled with a long and compelling lifespan and an impressive degree of interactivity with the surroundings. One of the most original and significant games of this generation on the Nintendo Switch.
Review in Portuguese | Read full review
Top Critic
Smoke and Sacrifice is an attractive take on the survival genre with a diverting story examining our reliance on fossil fuels and class-dependent economies. Juggling your gear is more finicky than it should be, which is disappointing when inventory management is such a fundamental part of the game. However, if you're prepared to keep on top of things, and you have the fortitude to brave the oppressive smoke, there's plenty to enjoy in Sachi's quest and the core crafting loop.
Top Critic
Survival games were in need of a shakeup and Smoke and Sacrifice appears to be the game to do it. More than just a title of crafting and cooking, you'll find yourself rooting for Sachi while still appreciating the satisfaction that can come from a battle for survival. This is a game that's brimming with heart and emotion.
Top Critic
An amiable crafting game with an interesting story of parental devotion — let down by flawed combat and generic area design.
Top Critic
The story, mechanics, lore and aesthetic are all fantastic, but some simple tweaks, like improvements to the mission notes, would balance the crafting and survival aspects enough to make them less of an impediment to completion. That being said, whatever effort you put in to finish Smoke and Sacrifice will be worth it. It's flawed, but it's a step in the right direction for survival crafting games, and I hope to see others in its genre take the same initiative towards aesthetic and narrative in the future.
Top Critic
Smoke And Sacrifice is by no means terrible, but while its asking price may be lower than other known RPGs and its story is at its core interesting, its gameplay can at times also be just as fundamentally lacking.
Top Critic
Rote, uninteresting and devoid of narrative pathos, Smoke and Sacrifice never compels or engages enough to offer more than a few moments of potential.
Top Critic
Smoke and Sacrifice is an ambitious survival, but not enough. The chance to stand out with the adoption of a fascinating story is wasted in the repetitive quests that will lead us to the ending. Solar Sail production manages to propose astounding visuals, but fails in trying to entertain us with shallow survival mechanics and a disappointing combat system.
Review in Italian | Read full review
Top Critic
Overall, Smoke and Sacrifice ends up feeling like a little bit less than what it was advertising, but it's still a fun experience.
Top Critic
There are good ideas here, but I wouldn't say the game is worth playing. Even if you are a survival game nut or seriously invested in long, drawn out stories, I'd probably recommend against grabbing this one.
