I don’t really like roguelites. At least I always thought. The only one I really tried was the Binding of Isaac. I never progressed far, I never really got the hang of it and had a lot of unsuccessful runs. I finally gave up on it. So I went for years without trying new ones. Until Hades. I played it quite a lot and had a lot of successful runs, but never fully beat the game.
I returned to it with the recent launch of Hades II into Early Access and finished (except a few achievements) my save. The gameplay and difficulty is very well-balanced for my skill level and it managed to motivate for several weeks. Overall I put over 100h into it and the pull was so strong, I got Hades II right away. I know not very patient of me. Another 40h later and I finished the content that is available so far. I can see myself diving back in for the 1.0 release or a big update.
Afterwards I looked for other well-received roguelites and picked up Dead Cells and all the DLC in a sale. Similar story here. 80h in, I made it to 2 BC and unlocked a most weapons and quite a big chunk of the outfits. My playstyle is rather slow and deliberate, but I enjoy the challenge a lot. 2 BC is kicking my ass a bit and I’m thinking about moving on again.
I’m currently thinking about what comes next. With the steam sale going on, I am considering Hollow Knight, even though I have very little experience mit Metroidvanias. Also Sekiro is a possibility. I never played a From Software game or our souls-like before. (Mostly) fighting human-sized enemies and a focus on parrying suits my preferences well.
If anyone has recommendations for other roguelites or games to jump to, please leave a comment.
I’m glad I tried a genre I had written off before. It resulted in a lot of fun playing hours. I recommend stepping out of your gaming comfort zone once in a while.
People have mentioned almost all the good options. You’ll find gems within these. I’ve absolutely loved Curse of the Dead Gods, Balatro, FTL, Blazing Beaks, Slay the Spire. I haven’t liked some really well loved recommendations like Children of Morta and Moonlighter.
Roguelites have been great for me because of a number of factors. Handhelds like the Switch and Steam Deck have really helped. When I had kids, I needed something I could pause when interrupted, and then get straight back into. With little bits of fragmented time, a roguelite is great for getting some progress and experiencing a power curve and good progress (whereas in long story driven single player games, there wouldn’t be much progress to be had in half an hour). Roguelites have been underrated, and I feel like we’ve really had a golden era of roguelites over the past decade.
Y’all, Metroidvanias are not Rouguelikes. Randomly generated levels are an essential element for a game to be a Rouguelike, and fixed levels you can memorize are an equally essential feature of a Metroidvania.
So I feel like Spelunky needs to be mentioned here. I haven’t played it in ages and need to give it more of a chance, but a lot of people love that one.
both Hades and Dead Cells have randomly generated levels
I was thinking about how Hollow Knight got included in this post. It’s fantastic but not even a little bit Roguelike.
Ok, sticking to roguelites, here’s some other options:
Deckbuilding Style: Slay the Spire, Monster Train, Griftlands, Balatro
Survivor/Bullet-Heaven Style: Vampire Survivors, Brotato, Deep Rock Galactic Survivor
Realtime Combat (I’d put Hades/Dead Cells here): Hand of Fate 1/2, Zero Sievert, Wall World, Rogue Legacy 1/2, Risk of Rain 1/2, Heroes of Hammerwatch
FPS: Gunfire Reborn, Roboquest
Turn-based/Pausable: FTL, The Last Spell, Loop Hero, Dungeons of Dredmor, Darkest Dungeon 1/2, Backpack Hero, Into the Breach, XCOM: Enemy Unknown, XCOM 2
Sure I missed some other good stuff.
Not a roguelite/roguelike but if you liked the combat style of Hades, check out Bastion.
Roboquest is one of the most enjoyable games I have played in years, And the devs seem to really care, every update has made the game significantly more enjoyable and they seem to be actually listening to player suggestions and feedback. Highly recommended if you want a fast paced FPS Roguelite.
If you’ve played Gunfire reborn and are expecting more of the same your going to be disappointed though.
Gunfire Reborn is Roguelite first, FPS second Roboquest is FPS first, Roguelite second.
Same concepta executed and implemented very differently.
Noita is probably my favorite game of all time, and it’s an excellent rougelike.
I really liked enter the gungeon. It was one of the first roguelites I played. It’s fairly basic in terms of mechanics compared to some newer entries in the genre. But it’s just good arcadey fun. Bonus is that it runs on a lot of systems. It’s still one of my go to’s for plane trips or other offline scenarios
