An unlikely combination of Metroidvania and monster-taming will soon come in the form of adventure role-playing game Monster Sanctuary. The game comes from developer Moi Rai Games (known for their work on the Might and Magic and Tropico franchises) and publisher Team17 Digital (the publisher behind Overcooked, The Escapists, Worms, Blasphemous and Yooka-Laylee and the Impossible Lair).
Monster Sanctuary is a game about the player character’s journey to follow in their ancestor’s footsteps and become a Monster Keeper and save the titular Monster Sanctuary. With the humans and monsters’ relationship is filled with tensions, it will be your task to uncover the mystery that threatens the peace between these two species.
Inspired by a combination of role-playing games, monster-taming titles, and platforming classics (Pokemon, Metroid, Castlevania, Hollow Knight, Dead Cells, Terraria, Starbound, Digimon, Tem Tem), Monster Sanctuary’s gameplay revolves around exploring a Metroidvania world that is open to either travel on foot or with the help of your monsters. Its monster and role-playing game inspirations come in the form of the collection and training of monsters from across the world, each with their own unique powers and skill trees that you can customize depending on your approach and playstyle. Once you’re done choosing from your monsters, you can assemble your team and engage in tactical and strategy based 3v3 combat. By stacking your own attacks with your monsters’, you can create devastating combos which may earn you the rarest monster eggs.
Team17 Digital’s repertoire in publishing quality and hit indie games has already been proven, which is a good sign for fans of Metroidvania games and whose interest is piqued by Monster Sanctuary’s twist on the genre. However, for those who are still wary about dipping their toes in an early access title, a free PC demo is currently available for download on its Steam Page, so check it out if you want to find out how it plays.
The pixel styled adventure role-playing game will be making its way to PC via Steam’s Early Access on August 28.
