Saturnalia Critic Reviews

Saturnalia should be on any horror fan’s radar this year. A twisted story combined with a superb art style, nerve-shredding gameplay and expertly crafted design will have you praising and cursing the creative genius to put roguelike mechanics into a horror game. This Italian town has a horrific history you’ll both love and hate to venture into, but you’ll be compelled to uncover it nonetheless.

Overall Saturnalia works and manages to excite until the end, thanks above all to its open structure, which makes the story replayable several times without ever appearing heavy or too repetitive.

Saturnalia is an atypical horror game, but engaging and extremely funny. Solid gameplay is accompanied by a great art direction.

Saturnalia is a smart survival horror title that offers plenty of freedom despite its claustrophobic and anxiety-inducing encounters.

Saturnalia is hard to call a must-play horror game, as it's likely to be polarizing both in terms of its presentation and its mechanics. A slower pace, somewhat minimalist gameplay, and mystery-laden narrative style will keep it from being everyone's cup of tea. Yet fans of exploration looking for a beautiful, atmospheric mystery (with just a handful of things that lurk in the dark) will find that Saturnalia is a wholly unique adventure that's well worth taking.

Each of the game’s characters come with an interesting, yet heavy backstory attached that’ll pique your curiosity and inspire you to dig deeper. At times, the narrative can get lost in the chaos of trying not to get all four characters killed, but when it’s present, such as in items and clues, it’s gripping and will haunt you long after you’ve beaten the game.

This disquieting, disorienting place leaves us as properly rattled as we've been by a videogame since Immortality.

Saturnalia is one of the best and most unique horror games of 2022 that not a single horror fan should miss.

An intriguing little game with a great setting and aesthetic, well worth experiencing blind.

A game that conveys in a very fascinating way the principles of magical thinking, folk horror and hauntology connected to the Italian rural tradition thanks to an awesome artistic work. Gameplaywise, though, Saturnalia struggles to offer solid survival horror mechanics and the roguelite elements are quite shallow, while the core of the narrative adventure is nonetheless gripping and interesting.

Saturnalia is one of a kind game, a roguelite survival horror that mixes Sardinian floklore with a commendable visual art style.

Saturnalia is an adventure that shows off its Italian roots by creating an intriguing story, although not too original, capable of exploiting Sardinian folklore and a credible setting within a highly inspired sensory frame. It works more on a conceptual and visual level than on a strictly playful one, but it is an imbalance that does not excessively affect the pleasure of the experience.

Saturnalia though? That's an experience you want to have. More and more I find myself skulking around the edges of the bell curve, looking for unusual things that provoke unusual feelings. Saturnalia is one. It's a pulse-raising, shiver-making, dark little whisper; a beautiful game. Sometimes tiny things go a little wrong in Saturnalia - dialogue triggering at slightly the wrong moment - but you'll hardly notice. It's a rare game that unsettles you enough to stop playing, but attracts you enough that you turn it back on almost immediately. A rare game that's so unapologetically specific, that doesn't seem to have diluted any part of itself. Rarest of all is a game that's truly unique, and makes you think "I haven't played anything like this before."