Housemarque released Saros: Zenith, the first major update to its PlayStation 5 shooter Saros, on October 19. The studio said on the PlayStation Blog that the update is available to all Saros owners at no additional charge.
We had two main goals for this update: add replayability for existing players who had already plumbed the depth of Carcosa, and make the game more accessible so Saros even more people can discover the addictive, explosive, exhilarating bullet ballet gameplay that made Saros one of the highest rated action games of 2026.
Overlord Rush and Eclipse Layers
The headline addition for returning players is Overlord Rush, a training-simulation boss rush accessed through the Primary unit in the Passage hub and attached to global leaderboards. Housemarque divided it into sets: Incursion and Ascension each hold three Overlords and can be cleared in around ten minutes, while the final set, Totality, lines up all eight Overlords from across Carcosa in one continuous gauntlet.
Zenith also adds a New Game Plus mode built around Eclipse Layers. Clearing the game adds new nodes to the Armor Matrix in the Passage, which players use to pass into the next Eclipse Layer under tougher rules and against deadlier enemies. In those layers the protagonist, Arjun, wears a golden crown and glowing armour that grows more elaborate as more trials are active, and the crown unlocks story and lore entries called Visions.
The update expands the Carcosan Modifier system with 10 new Protection Modifiers, which make the game more forgiving, and 10 new Trial Modifiers, which raise the challenge. Housemarque highlighted Corruption Melee Enhancement, which turns accumulated Corruption - normally a drain on maximum Integrity - into a single heavy melee hit. Among the Trial Modifiers is Hostile Regeneration, which lets players stun larger enemies but requires a finishing melee strike before they recover.
New accessibility settings
On the accessibility side, Zenith introduces Slow Game Speed, which slows the game so players have longer to read and respond to enemy attacks. Housemarque said players control how much the game slows and can set it to engage automatically in combat or toggle it manually. An Auto-fire setting fires the weapon whenever it is aimed at a hostile; Tinari said it does not automate reloading, and a perfect reload still requires a well-timed press. Motion Sensor Aiming joins the game's existing button remapping options.
Saros is a PlayStation 5 exclusive. Polygon reported, citing Alinea Analytics, that the game sold 300,000 copies in its first two weeks, and that Housemarque co-founder and managing director Ilari Kuittinen retired from the company shortly after release.
