The first new mode is Overlord Rush and, true to its name, you’ll be taking on the game’s bosses one after another. If that wasn’t enough, you’re graded based on performance with a leaderboard to compete against other players worldwide. Then there’s New Game Plus, known as Eclipse Layers. Available after finishing the story, you can access new Carcosan Modifiers and other progression options. Housemarque is also teasing new Trophies and “secrets.”

If that wasn’t enough, new accessibility options, including gyro aiming, the option to slow the game’s speed, and High Contrast visuals for better visibility. There’s likely even more that players could look forward to, so stay tuned for more information, including a release date, in the coming months.

Saros is available exclusively for PS5 and serves as a spiritual successor to Returnal. Check out our review, where we scored it 9 out of 10. Despite strong critical acclaim, sales have reportedly been less than impressive, though Housemarque is looking to the future (and its next game).

“Starting out in 1993 with Terramarque, and then joining forces with Harri to establish Housemarque in 1995, we had a passion for games but no real blueprint for building a business. Looking back, I feel immensely fortunate. We had the luck of being in the right place at the right time during three decades of incredible industry growth, allowing us to stay fiercely independent for 26 years before finding a home within the PlayStation Studios family.”

Kuittinen also spoke about some of the major things he, and by extension the studio, had accomplished during his tenure. This includes boosting Finnish game development at a global stage, creating a variety of titles that would form the identity of Housemarque, achieving AAA success with Returnal and Saros, and evolving into a AAA developer while maintaining “our unique creative identity.”

“Beyond the walls of Housemarque and PlayStation, this journey would have been impossible without the broader games community. To the many friends, fellow founders, mentors, and industry peers across the world who have offered invaluable advice, a listening ear, or steady support over the last three decades: thank you.”

“This industry is defined not just by the games we create, but by the remarkable, generous people who make up its global community.”

As for what’s next for Housemarque, Kuittinen said that the studio had been working behind the scenes to ensure a smooth leadership transition. This led to Sami Hakala taking over the managing director role as of July 1st, and he will lead the studio’s strategy and creative vision going forward. Kuittinen himself is taking a break from any sort of work from September onwards. He does, however, plan to return to the industry at some point.

“You certainly haven’t seen the last of me. I look forward to staying connected with the industry, attending trade shows, cheering from the crowd at award shows, and down the road, doing some mentoring or consulting.”

The last title to be released under Kuittinen’s stewardship is Saros, which came to PS5 back in April. Following this release, the studio has continued supporting the roguelite shooter, while also starting work on its next project. However, details about the next game haven’t yet been revealed, aside from Kuittinen noting that it might not be of the same scale as Saros. He also acknowledged that there was still plenty of work left to be done on its latest release.

“This is just the start of the discussion and conversation with the gaming community. If you have played Saros, you know that there are a lot of things that we can do and tweak and add. We hope that we can keep on doing that for a while.”

For more details about Saros, take a look at our review. Also check out its 2.5-hour demo for PS Plus subscribers.

While the two noted that Housemarque didn’t quite have the same ambitions as FromSoftware, much like the Japanese studio, the Saros developer also wanted to educate players more about the kinds of games it makes.

“FromSoftware have been doing a similar genre for a very long time and built up their fan base [over that period],” said Kuittinen. “We have two unique games out. Returnal, Saros. It’s kind of a new thing that you need to educate the market about, so that people say, ‘Hey, these flow states are really cool.’”

“FromSoftware’s journey from King’s Field to what they are today… We’re not presuming that we would be anywhere close to that,” he continued. “But [like them] we will keep our core, keep educating the market that these are the coolest game you can play. That’s our goal.”

“We will get there step by step,” added Haveri.

Haveri also spoke about how, even though Saros may not have sold many titles so far since its April release, the game still represents “the start of the discussion and conversation with the gaming community.” He went on to say, “If you’ve played Saros, you know that there are a lot of things we can do and tweak and add. We hope that we can keep on doing that for a while.”

“It’s funny, Returnal, when we shipped, it started gaining traction a bit later,” he explained. “A lot of the community got to unlock it a little bit more, and then that tends to trickle down, and people get more interested in it.”

Discussing the growth of Housemarque from its humble days of being 40-50-employees strong during the development of Nex Machina to now having nearly 120 staff members, Kuittinen spoke about how the developer has had to learn how to make bigger experiences, and the organizational challenges this involves.

“It’s quite different jumping into this scale of doing one game at a time with this amount of people. That’s been a big change in the studio to learn how to make these bigger experiences, and how to organize that,” he said. “We attract people who understand our design sensibilities and the things that we are trying to accomplish.”

Saros was released on PS5 earlier this year. For more details, take a look at our review. As for how much players might be enjoying it, check out the stats released by Housemarque, which confirm that, as of the end of May, the game had seen more than 13 million player deaths and 3.08 million boss deaths. The studio also confirmed that the Smart Rifle was the most popular weapon in the game.

As for how it holds up against Returnal, check out the studio’s thoughts about how Saros is meant to be more approachable.

Brand director Mikael Haveri is optimistic, though he didn’t reveal any concrete figures. Speaking to The Game Business, he noted, “It’s funny, Returnal, when we shipped, it started gaining traction a bit later. A lot of the community got to unlock it a little bit more, and then that tends to trickle down, and people get more interested in it.”

Of course, studio head and co-founder Ilari Kuittinen admits that there’s still work to be done on Saros. “This is just the start of the discussion and conversation with the gaming community. If you have played Saros, you know that there are a lot of things that we can do and tweak and add. We hope that we can keep on doing that for a while.”

Which is interesting because the studio now has nearly 120 staff, compared to 40-50 in 2017, when it released Nex Machina. “It’s quite different jumping into this scale of doing one game at a time with this amount of people. That’s been a big change in the studio to learn how to make these bigger experiences, and how to organize that,” said Kuittinen. “We attract people who understand our design sensibilities and the things that we are trying to accomplish.”

For now, the studio is focused on Saros and “discussing with the community” on how it should move forward. But it’s also looking towards the future. “There are interesting opportunities we’d like to look at that might not be at the scale of Saros. There are so many things that we want to explore, and we will find out whether it’s possible or not.”

Of course, with all the reports about Xbox studios at risk, including Ninja Theory, Double Fine, Arkane, and Compulsion Games, it’s hard not to feel concerned about Housemarque. Alinea Analytics estimated that Saros sold about 406,000 copies, apparently generating $30 million in revenue. How long it will continue to receive support remains to be seen, especially if Sony wants the studio to move on to something less costly, but time will tell.

In the meantime, check out our review for Saros here. We rated it a nine out of ten, praising the combat, rogue-lite elements, presentation, and more.

It looks like Carcosa has managed to remain as challenging as it has been entertaining, with 13.13 million recorded player deaths versus 3.08 million boss deaths showing that the meanest ones in Arjun’s quest pack quite a punch. Of course, the grunts that stand between you and those terrors aren’t as fortunate, with 863 million of them felled for being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

The Smart Rifle seems to have been a part of a lot of those victories, as it’s declared the most popular weapon in the game.

The numbers are huge, but we’re only mildly surprised as Saros has been quite an entertainer, building on its predecessor in all the right ways to let it score very high in our review. The fact that it’s meant to be more approachable than Returnal without sacrificing the challenge probably has something to do with its numbers, too.

While Krueger hasn’t revealed too many details about what the first project by Cosmic Division will be, he has confirmed that it will be a brand new IP that will focus on single-player gameplay and will come to PC and consoles. The title is slated to be “unapologetically gameplay first,” and its story will offer “strong emotional resonance”.

“I’m incredibly grateful to Housemarque for our shared journey, which has shaped the foundations for our new studio,” said the studio’s founder and CEO. “We’re proud of what we’ve achieved, but we’re not standing still. At Cosmic Division, we’re building on our strengths while finding a new edge through fresh themes, ideas and talent. We believe there is always room for games built on timeless values that trust the player and leave a lasting impact.”

This emphasis on offering a gameplay-first experience falls in line with many of the projects that Kreuger has worked on in the past. While some of Housemarque’s earlier projects, like Resogun, didn’t quite focus much on narrative, the developer found its groove in mixing up story and strong gameplay with its more recent outings like Returnal and Saros.

Interestingly, while Kreuger had left Housemarque in 2023, he managed to help shape the ultimate direction of this year’s Saros before his departure.

“We’re excited to push further into the experiences we love creating: intoxicating gameplay loops, audiovisual spectacle, and impactful stories that linger with players long after the credits have rolled,” Krueger continued. “We have our feet on the ground and solid foundations beneath us. Now our journey of cosmic wonder begins, as we venture towards the stars… and beyond.”

The last project Krueger shipped during his tenure at Housemarque was Returnal, which blended the studio’s penchant for bullet hell-style gameplay with the structure of a 3D roguelike shooter, as well as a mysterious story that seemingly revolved around protagonist Selene Vassos being stuck in a strange time loop.

Since Kreuger has a strong history of working on projects that focus quite a bit on throwing hundreds of projectiles towards the player that have to be dodged, along with excellent visuals that emphasize particle effects, it wouldn’t be too surprising to see Cosmic Division’s first project bearing more than a striking similarity to Returnal.

In the meantime, Housemarque released Saros just last month exclusively on PS5. The title stars Rahul Kohli in the role of protagonist Arjun Devraj, and offers several refinements over the gameplay introduced by Returnal. In our review, we gave Saros a score of 9 out of 10 thanks to its aesthetics, addictive gameplay, world-building, and the design of its boss fights. Our only complaints were the fact that its ending left us wanting more, and that Carcosa Modifiers could have used more depth.

“I had to catch a flight, and Housemarque wouldn’t have access to me for six months,” he explains. “And they needed the trailer. And in order for me to make my flight, I had to record on the other side of town in LA crazy early. And I’m stuck in traffic. And I was so worked up and angry at seven, eight in the morning. We recorded the teaser trailer. And that voice that came out was angrier, more intense than anything we’d done or explored previously. And Greg and I were immediately like… ‘wait, that’s him. That’s who we’ve been looking for’… being angry and not being good enough to hide it… that was where Arjun was really born.”

Director of the Finding Carcosa documentary series that chronicles the development of Saros, Paul J. Vogel, adds his own opinion on the unpredictable nature of storytelling. He noted that moments like these tended to add more to Kohli’s work despite being “completely unglamorous.”

“Rahul’s anecdote about finding the true voice of Arjun is the perfect summary of how sometimes the creative nature of storytelling can be unpredictable,” said Vogel. “It’s funny because it is so completely unglamorous. Stuck in traffic, already late for a recording session, and up against the clock for a departing flight. It shows how a character can come alive from research, rehearsal, and collaboration with your director… but sometimes all it really takes is one very bad commute.”

Providing more details on his first day in for performance capture work, Kohli noted that “I hated it.” He went on to talk about the experience of wearing the motion capture suit and how it made him wish that he’d “gone to the gym.”

“It takes an hour or two before you stop feeling silly. That’s the strange thing,” he continued. “It starts tech-heavy – calibrating your fingers. And then once you’ve done that, it felt like an empty stage with actors and a director, and a script. Most actors are comfortable with doing a lot with very little. From day one in a rehearsal space, you are working without props, without stage furniture. Everything else, [the tech], has just gone.”

Ultimately, advice from fellow voice actor Troy Baker helped Kohli out in this regard. “He said it was the purest form of acting you’ll ever do. And he was right. I’m not playing to the camera… it’s about me and [the other actors].”

Saros is available on PS5 and has seen an incredibly positive reception. For more, check out our review. Also, take a look at why Housemarque made the title more approachable than its previous outing, Returnal.

Well, the developers have just dropped a new patch for the game, with some balancing changes and other noteworthy additions. You’re going to see a reduction in the amount of juice the Power Generator perk puts out, while damage scaling on the Powered Dash Artifact is sure to improve its utility. There’s also more accuracy on bouncing bullets, while the UI is getting a few tweaks and toggles to make it more readable and intuitive. There are also a few minor performance fixes – check out the full list below if you want to see more, although it’s shorter than you would think.

Saros might be the more approachable title among Housemarque’s lineup of titles. However, its niche nature has us questioning whether it can lead to long-term security for the studio. You can check out our thoughts on that here. In the meantime, stay tuned for more patches and further improvements that will hopefully help Saros inch ever closer to perfection than it already is.

Patch 01.004.000

Gameplay & Balance

• Improved the accuracy of bullet bounces
• Lowered the amount of Power gained from the Power Generator weapon trait
• Added damage scaling to the Powered Dash artifact and updated the visuals

World & Level Design

• Fixed collision and geometry issues in multiple biomes

Audio

• General minor bug fixes and improvements

UI / Accessibility

• Colour settings:
  – New colour categories
  – Added preview images
  – Settings for HUD Power Indicator
  – Added colour matching for Armor Integrity Gauge Corruption
• Fixed issues regarding ammo, weapon charge bar and boss invulnerability indicator
• Fixed Second Chance visibility when using Carcosan Modifiers

Technical & Performance

Optimization

• Adjusted reflection quality

Cinematics

• Prologue and Eclipse Device sequence improvements
• Optimizations to Depth of Field

This SAROS guide is everything you need to know about getting the best ending to the game.

Initial Story Completion

You will have to complete the game just once, with no other requirements with regards to Cycle completion or perfection. Simply wrap up the final biome, Yellow Shore, and its final enemy, and watch the ending followed by the credits.

Post-Ending Continuation

Once you find yourself back in the Passage, you will be explicitly directed to various objectives and watch multiple cutscenes. Next, proceed to make your way through the Yellow Shore to face the enemy yet again.

Battle the enemy right up until you have to strike the deathblow.

At this point, you will be presented with the choice of taking him down outright or letting him live. The former option just rehashes the first ending all over again.

Instead, ignore the enemy and walk into the portal in order to see the second, or true ending to the game.

That is everything there is to know about unlocking the alternate ending to SAROS.

Not to belabor a point after doing just that, but after playing Saros, I do. Housemarque’s latest game is a bullet-hell third-person shooter with excessive cosmic horror-inspired sights and sounds. Third-highest rated game of the year on Opencritic – you’ve probably heard of it. I’ve gone back to it several times, even after finishing my review, to gather more information for our tips and tricks, and every time, I’m still left astounded by the controls, responsiveness, gunplay, and the sheer number of new sections that keep popping up during new runs.

Which is funny because I had those exact thoughts with Returnal back in 2021. You know what else I thought at the time? There’s no way this gets a sequel, and that was without knowing any sales numbers (and keep in mind that it was also one of the more highly rated games of that year). Ironic as it sounds, here we are almost five years later, and it indeed got a sequel – one that’s bigger, better, and more intense in all the right ways. And yet, there’s concern over the future.

Back in December 2023, that unfortunate Insomniac Games ransomware leak revealed some rather interesting figures about PlayStation’s many IPs. It pretty much confirmed that Bloodborne sold millions, and there was no excuse not to remake or remaster it (and boy, does that come full circle later on). It also proved that Ratchet and Clank: Rift Apart was profitable, but nowhere near the same vicinity as the Marvel’s Spider-Man series – who could have guessed? And then, for those who bothered checking, was the little detail that Returnal had shipped over a million units as of February 2022 and sold through about 866,000 units.

Naturally, we don’t know the latest figures, and the likelihood of Sony sharing them is about as high as Fairgame$ not getting cancelled. But it reinforces, without a shadow of a doubt, that as beloved as Returnal was, it’s a niche game by triple-A standards.

Snap back to the present day with Saros, which is far more triple-A facing by comparison. There’s a heavier story focus with more cinematic cutscenes. Quality of life features like suspending a run or fast traveling back to The Passage after clearing a biome offered more freedom for how long you wanted to keep playing. Even the difficulty, a major aspect of Returnal that many considered an obstacle to a wider audience, was much more freeform.

Now, you could easily decide whether you wanted to deal loads more damage, make it so that enemies barely tickled you, negate any of the Corruption or bad effects from Artifacts – heck, for all its horror, Saros felt like a day at the spa compared to Returnal tossing you into the deep end. And while having this kind of customizable difficulty is great, especially for bullet hell fiends like me who want something far more challenging, it’s hard not to think that this was done because of how niche Returnal ended up being.

You don’t have to take my word for it, though. Creative director Gregory Louden and associate design director Matti Häkli told Polygon in a recent interview that they wanted to “enable more people to enjoy these games.” It’s not seeking to reduce the challenge or introduce arbitrary difficulty modes that players may not fully agree on. You set the challenge, you dictate the difficulty, and you decide whether to sink or swim. And I can appreciate that.

The question is: Will that translate to sales? If we assume the current reports that Returnal ultimately sold two million copies are correct, then all in all, it’s not a bad milestone, especially since the shooter retailed for $70. A new IP that’s as niche as can be, that too with a difficulty level which automatically limits its potential audience – all in all, pretty good for an independent developer.

But in 2026, Housemarque is in a different boat altogether. Saros is a far bigger game with more biomes and more money spent on a larger cast, not to mention those shiny cinematics. Assuming it’s been in the works since 2022, a year after Returnal’s launch, that’s a pretty significant amount of development costs. Unfortunately, it’s not a question about breaking even or turning a profit, but whether this will appease the executives at Sony, especially since they own the studio. The same PlayStation Studios which saw numerous layoffs and cancellations in recent years, mostly for its live service initiative, but still. If it can get rid of a prestige studio like Bluepoint, then who’s to say it won’t turn to Housemarque next?

Of course, one shouldn’t assume the worst immediately. We don’t know precisely how much Saros cost to make, how much it’s sold and, more importantly, what Sony’s expectations are. After backing away from its live service push and recommitting to high-profile single-player games, both to players and shareholders, having something like this that’s so acclaimed is a point in its favor. Not just for the current generation but for the future as well, as it builds up a marquee line-up of PlayStation console exclusives (especially if rumors about first-party single-player games no longer launching on PC end up true).

There’s also that whole discussion about how it couldn’t find any projects suitable for Bluepoint, thus leading to its closure, but I digress. It’s important that Sony had enough confidence in Saros to release it – and lend a decent amount of marketing, though nowhere near as much as its bigger titles – but that doesn’t guarantee any kind of security for the future.

And that’s really the crux of the matter and why it can be so frustrating to be a fan of any game these days. As good as something is, as beloved as it is, the industry is on such shaky ground that it may not be successful. And even if it is successful, there’s no guarantee that the studio will escape layoffs. And even if it isn’t shuttered, it could very well exist in limbo, trying its best to hang on and fruitlessly pitching projects that either aren’t approved or end up cancelled mid-development.

So while Saros is great, and there’s much cause for celebration, especially for PS5 players who desperately want something new to play, there are always going to be concerns about the future. Maybe time is a flat circle, and I’m just going through the same motions as with Returnal, only being proven wrong when the inevitable follow-up is announced, happy that Housemarque has another chance to showcase its single-player prowess. But if the games industry has proven anything in recent years, it’s that nothing is forever, and you only get so many chances before your luck inevitably runs out.

Note: The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of, and should not be attributed to, GamingBolt as an organization.