Steam

As our exclusive IGN First coverage of Elden Ring Nightreign continues, we bring you our interview with game and combat designer Takuya Miyazawa. Enjoy! To start, can you describe what it's like working at FromSoftware and getting to work on such highly acclaimed titles like Elden Ring and Nightreign? Takuya Miyazawa - Game and Combat Designer on Nightreign:I, myself, previously a huge Souls fan. I'm a big fan of these games and what the company's made, so it's a huge honor to get to work on such titles and as well as the fun of creating these games. I do feel a little bit of pressure and responsibility from the fans who enjoy these games as well, so thank you. Going into Nightreign, there are a lot of really subtle differences between the combat mechanics of base Elden Ring and Nightreign. Can you talk a little bit about why you felt like you should change up some of those mechanics for a multiplayer game like Nightreign and how the resulting gameplay fits Nightreign's fast-paced multiplayer style a little bit better? So, the changes for the design of Nightreign… Well first, let me give a little introduction to the general design of Nightreign itself. So, as you know, it uses Elden Ring as a base for the design, so the world and a lot of the assets and the base combat flow comes from Elden Ring. But while it does use it as a base for enemies and such, one area that we wanted to focus on with Nightreign was how we encounter these enemies, the flow of the battle, and the abilities you can use. And so having Elden Ring as a base allowed us to branch out and experiment in these other areas, making it into something that stood out from Elden Ring and becoming its own new thing. "While the game base sits with Elden Ring at its core, we wanted to create a gameplay experience that was ultimately very different." So while the game base sits with Elden Ring at its core, we wanted to create a gameplay experience that was ultimately very different. Elden Ring is a much more slow-paced, a lot more open-ended. You take your time and carefully go through the world, but Nightreign is what we're calling a short RPG. So there are some constraints here. For example, the three-day, three-night time aspect, and the limitations on the player; but at the same time while we’re putting these limitations on the player in terms of structure, we wanted to allow them some freedom points that they didn't otherwise have with Elden Ring. So the way they traverse the map, they can sprint and they can clamber up walls quickly. Let's see… there's no fall damage compared to Elden Ring. So while we put these constraints on the players from a structural point of view, we wanted to open up and allow them this freedom from a gameplay point of view as well. So it was about creating that balance and that contrast. In terms of status leveling and how the players build their character: With Elden Ring, of course, you had a character creation and building from the very start, but with Nightreign, you select from a preset character as a sort of archetype to start with and then you're free to change your weapons, change your equipment, and change your play style a little bit on the fly. So while you could start as a tank, you don't necessarily have to fulfill that tank role from a gameplay perspective. We wanted players to enjoy the role play of each character more from their sort of character traits and their abilities than a sort of preconceived notion of approach. We also wanted to reduce the amount of time players spend in the menu, actually, within the game. So instead of carefully checking their stats and going through the leveling process, it's a lot more on the fly, it's a lot more ad hoc, and we wanted to reduce and condense these elements that we found in our previous games but in a tighter, more compact experience, this short-form RPG experience for Nightreign. So those are just a few of the aspects that we've tried to consider when approaching this from a multiplayer co-op standpoint. The boss that we got to check out today as we were playing was Libra: Creature of Night So for this particular boss battle… Obviously for each boss battle in the game, we're trying to give them their own idiosyncrasies and their own unique touches to make them stand apart and feel original. We wanted each of them to feel like their own experience. So with Libra in particular, we kind of added this trade-off feature that takes place before the battle. And of course, this can allow the players to acquire a new special weapon or a significant level-up or something that benefits them. But of course, being the nature of Libra and the nature of the game, it's not always going to be exactly in their favor, so we wanted to create this interesting risk-reward sort of feature for this particular boss. As for the actual experience during combat itself, we wanted this sort of nature of Libra to be reflected in the gameplay as well. So this sort of duality aspect of the character, both in terms of its appearance and its behavior. So we wanted to give it a two-type move set. So first, it has the sorceries and traps that can kind of confuse and trick the player and then also the sort of more power and damage-focused attacks that come as well. So we wanted this duality to reflect both in its appearance and the pre-battle and the gameplay experience as well. One of the things that really struck me about the boss battle was that it almost reminded me of an MMO raid kind of boss with how you had to work together and coordinate with your squad to avoid the full effect of some of its attacks. Was MMO boss design any kind of inspiration in creating this boss fight and if not, what really inspired you in those aspects of the boss design? Yes, we paid attention to other genres such as MMOs and the boss fights within them and we did take some notes and some inspiration from these. But one thing we wanted to be careful of was the fact that seeing as Nightreign is a co-op, multiplayer focused game, we still wanted to take care during these boss fights that when another player is drawing aggro, the boss still feels like a significant threat to other players in the group. So even if another player is drawing the aggro, the attacks that the boss is going to do and the way it's behaving is still going to keep other players on their toes even if they're sort of flanking it or taking a more solo-oriented approach. I definitely felt that, by the way. Feeling threatened even while I didn’t hold the aggro of the boss. Shifting gears to classes, what goes into designing a character class for Nightreign? Are you looking to fill specific archetypes? Do you come up with a cool idea for a skill and then design a class based around that, or what does that process really look like? It's quite an unorthodox approach we took to character design in Nightreign, similar to what we started with in Elden Ring. So for instance, we start with these kind of general roles or role titles for each of the characters, such as the tank we mentioned earlier or a mage type. So we start with these very general and loose kind of bases for the character archetype. And then from the director, we get an idea of the characters and their individuality and the sorts of abilities that they're going to use and things like this. Just to give one example of that. You might have used her in the network test or in your play session, the Recluse. Her archetype actually started as a mage, a magic user, plain and simple. But from there, we started to think about and discuss what's fun and what's interesting about playing as a mage from a player's perspective. And that is, of course, using magic, using your intellect to kind of suss out the enemy and its weaknesses and sort of piece the puzzles of the battle together as you go. Of course, just blasting magic is fun in itself, but we wanted there to be an extra layer to that such as how you use your resources, the timing of your spells, using multiple spells in conjunction. And so we started to design a system around that new kind of concept of a mage and how players would interact with that. So that's the kind of approach we took to the character design. "One area we did concentrate on is the feeling of a role or responsibility within each character." Another aspect of our approach to the class designs was how you engage with them in a multiplayer environment. So of course, Nightreign is a three-player co-op game at its core and we wanted these skills and characters to be interesting both from a solo and multiplayer perspective. So one example of this could be the restage skill of the Duchess. So obviously, this is a very powerful skill when you're playing in solo play, but if you're going to take it to the next level and master it, a nice idea might be to watch what your allies are doing, watch for when they're doing some big damage and then restage their attack patterns and get some extra damage that way. So it really encourages this sort of teamwork and thinking as a group and thinking in terms of co-op play. This is really the first from Soft Souls with fully developed, pre-made classes that each have their own unique skills and abilities. Does that have any effect, or rather, does it raise any challenges with regards to how you design bosses or enemy encounters, knowing the powerful tools that a squad will be able to take into a fight? In terms of each character's individual abilities and their ultimates and skills, we didn't want to have that dictate how we approach the enemy design or encounter design and vice versa as well. We didn't want the player action level to infringe too much on the enemy action level. We wanted to concentrate on these characters and making them feel unique and fun to players in and of themselves, first and foremost, rather than having these encounters and these boss battles sort of affect that negatively and impact the fun. One area we did concentrate on is the feeling of a role or responsibility within each character. So you might have somebody who feels it's their duty to try and protect the others during a difficult boss fight or try and distract the enemies, the adds (enemies) during a certain boss fight. Something like this was a feature of the pre-made designs that we could include in Nightreign that maybe we didn't experiment with too much in previous titles. Of course, another aspect is because this is a co-op game that focuses on having a three-person team, we did want to make the bosses feel particularly hardcore from that standpoint as well. So they will use very large-scale attacks. They will use certain abilities that will inhibit or restrict the player or kind of put a sort of urgency to their moves like the timer that's inflicted on them in the Gladius Boss fight. Things like this, we really wanted to make them feel unique and imposing in each their own way. You mentioned the Duchess ability and comboing that with a very strong ability that one of your allies will use. Do you have any other favorite ability combos or synergies from the available character classes? Another example I could give is the Raider character who raises a giant totem from the earth. This itself does damage to the enemies and bosses, but at the same time, the different characters can clamber up atop it. So you could, for example, have the Ironeye character raining down arrows from the safety of the tombstone or reviving a character by shooting them with long-range attacks. Something like this, we feel that there's a nice breadth and synergy that you can experiment with each of these characters. Another example might be a more general example is the Recluse who you could also use in the network test. Her ultimate art actually marks enemies, puts this sort of seal on them which grants you HP and your teammates HP as you attack. So this, used in conjunction with high damage output or fast subsequent attacks from your teammates, could be very effective at healing the team, keeping them alive. Things like this, we hope players will really have fun experimenting and playing around with these different combinations. Was the Libra Boss battle inspired by any specific characters or mythos? Well, he can't speak to any specific titles or names. One of the main inspirations for the Libra Boss battle was this sort of massively multiplayer raid battle sort of focus, so with this idea of having a lot of players coming together to fight this boss battle together. This involves not only the kind of exciting and dangerous elements of that fight, but also the puzzle elements as well, sort of figuring out the right time to attack, figuring out the time to retreat, figuring out the different elements to this boss fight. So we wanted it to feel like an intelligent boss design rather than just an all in, every man for himself kind of appeal. Personally, what Nightreign character is your favorite to play and what is a build that you really hope players will dig into and enjoy? A personal favorite of mine is the Guardian, the avian-type knight character with the shield. He favors a more defensive-y and tank-y kind of build that this character archetype provides. I enjoy being able to both attack and defend at the same time or provide that kind of bulwark and that area of safety for his team. If players are more not so keen on the fast dodge rolling and sort of the perfect timing of the parries and things like that, this is a nice character for them to feel like they're really contributing to the team aspect and able to enjoy the battle in that sense as well. Generally, we designed the game for the players to be able to beat it as any character. So we wanted them to feel like they could choose a character they liked, either from an ability standpoint or from an appearance or backstory standpoint, and beat the game just in their own play style and with a character they enjoy. That said, balance is still important and the team synergy we talked to, finding a good balance of, say, a tank type character, a mage type character, and a damage deal type character. This is often important as is the boss selection that you make as well. So sometimes, a different Nightlord Boss fight will encourage a different synergy or a different sort of group of roles, a different team composition. So we want players to enjoy figuring out these aspects and experiment with various characters and while they're doing that, find some that really resonate with them. We really wanted both the boss characters, these encounters, and the player characters themselves to feel unique each in their own way. And we wanted it to feel unique enough that players can go back to the game and approach with another character entirely. So even if they have beaten a boss with the Guardian, they might want to go back and try it as the Recluse and see what other tricks they can come up with. Players also might enjoy doing a three-Recluse team, so tripling up on a certain character and seeing what kind of crazy stunts they can come up with, so I'm really looking forward to that aspect of the game. Final question, and this might be the hardest one, but just what are some of your favorite video games? As I mentioned earlier, I really like From’s games, these action RPGs that we make. I'm also a big long-time fan of Final Fantasy 14 and other multiplayer online games as well. View the full article For verified travel tips and real support, visit: [Hidden Content]

The Heart of Democracy update for Helldivers 2 has marked out a new battlefield on Super Earth itself. And it looks like Helldivers are jumping back on to help hold the line against the Illuminate invasion. Earlier this week, the Illuminate officially launched an invasion of Super Earth as part of the Heart of Democracy update in Helldivers 2. After a long build-up involving a mobile ****** hole, Super Earth has become a zone of conflict, and Helldivers are dropping into various cities to assist with the defense efforts. There are quite a few more Helldivers dropping in now, too. A quick look at SteamDB shows the player count rebounding back up alongside the Heart of Democracy update's drop, currently sitting at a 24-hour peak of just over 163,000 players. It's a number that exceeds the peak of the Omens of Tyranny update, though it's still far off from the release window peaks for Helldivers 2. That's still a feat for Steam, as developer Arrowhead Game Studios contended with negative ratings and complaints early on in Helldivers 2's PC life, alongside the infamous PSN situation. With recent valleys in the tens of thousands, a lift up to over 150,000 concurrents is certainly a shift worth noting. Over on X/Twitter, Arrowhead CCO Johan Pilestedt posted a few fascinating numbers. First, that this surge might be one of the largest simultaneous returns of players for Helldivers: I think this is the largest simultaneous return of players for Helldivers? Team did a MEGA job on the update! [Hidden Content] — Pilestedt (@Pilestedt) May 20, 2025 And second, that around 2.5 million Helldivers have been playing the game every week. It's a pretty staggering number for any live service game, but shows how the community has stayed attached. Around 2.5 million Helldivers playing the game every week, super excited to see how many more log in with this update! So happy and blessed that we have such an amazing community! — Pilestedt (@Pilestedt) May 20, 2025 Over on the Helldivers Discord (via VG247), Arrowhead CEO Shams Jorjani responded to players congratulating the team on the player count surge. "It's all you folks and your amazing support," said Jorjani. If you're eager to dive back in yourself, I can attest to it being a good time to play right now. The new Super Earth battlefields are great fun, and you can even recruit some SEAF helpers to assist in holding back the Illuminate threat. Just be mindful of all the chaos and destruction. Eric is a freelance writer for IGN. View the full article

Xbox’s fight against PlayStation is slowly shifting from hardware to software as they focus more on selling Game Pass subscriptions rather than selling their consoles. Additionally, their next console is also rumored to be less of a traditional Xbox console and more of a mini PC of sorts. The potential Steam integration in Xbox hardware poses a worrying prospect for PlayStation since its exclusive titles may be available on the platform of its direct competitor. Whether PlayStation allows this is a topic for another time, but for now, let’s discuss what the Steam integration can do. Helldivers 2 could see a surge of players if Xbox manages to bring Steam to the platform The democracy may break through PlayStation’s barriers | Image Credit: Arrowhead Game Studios It’s no surprise that Xbox is slowly becoming a publisher rather than a hardware company after being unceremoniously defeated by PlayStation in the console wars. Yet their next-generation console is on the way. They already provide the best value to their customers through Game Pass, and if this Steam integration goes through, it could offer a whole lot more. Xbox’s ‘play anywhere’ strategy is in full swing as leaker ‘eXtas1s‘ has already stated that Microsoft has started testing Steam integration for their store, which could open up a new dimension of possibilities, one of which is bringing Helldivers 2 to the platform. Related: When Will Sony Return the Favor? By Next Month This Week, PS5 Will Get One of 2024’s Best Xbox Game Pass Releases Microsoft’s oversight also caused a visual mockup of the new Xbox app UI to appear, which they quickly removed as it featured a Steam filter within the app. It’s all but confirmed at this point, and they’re not doing a great job hiding it. Once Steam officially arrives on the platform, it could potentially mean more players finally joining the battle for Super Earth in Helldivers 2. With 120 million players on Xbox and a majority of them having decades of experience in Halo, the entire trajectory of Helldivers 2 can change for the better. It’s like they’ve been preparing for this moment their whole life. It seems like Microsoft’s not leaving the hardware market after all, but they’re taking cues from PCs instead of their own consoles. The question remains, though: Is PlayStation ready to welcome Xbox players on Helldivers 2 through Steam’s integration with the platform? Let’s look into the possibilities. Will PlayStation allow Helldivers 2 on Xbox through Steam integration? PlayStation is ridiculously rigid when it comes to its exclusives, so the chances of Helldivers 2 potentially making its way on Xbox through Steam integration are very slim. Fans shouldn’t get their hopes up, as PlayStation’s strategy is aggressive, and they rarely distribute their exclusives to competing platforms. If Helldivers 2 were to debut through Steam integration, that would mean PlayStation’s entire catalogue on Steam would be available to purchase on Xbox, which is probably one of PlayStation’s worst nightmares. Imagine playing titles like God of War, Uncharted, and Marvel’s Spider-Man on the platform. It would take more than a miracle for something like that to happen. Related: “A healthy option for certain people”: Xbox Game Pass Isn’t the Future of Gaming, Choice Is Chances are low but never zero, and Xbox has been very liberal with its exclusives, offering up their flagship titles like Forza and Gears of War to PlayStation without any discrepancy. Will they return the favor, though? Probably not. Considering how PlayStation is, Xbox players should consider themselves lucky if Helldivers 2 does make its way to the platform through Steam’s integration. So, what do you think about the prospect of having Steam on Xbox? Do you think it’s good for the platform’s future, or is it just another case of throwing stuff at the wall and hoping it sticks? Share your thoughts and opinions in the comment section below. View the full article

Even a few years after release, Cult of the Lamb continued to shine as one of the most popular roguelikes in recent years, thanks to several free and expansive content updates to enjoy. Offering an excellent blend of adorable visuals contrasted by darker player choices that heavily lean into the cult elements of the game, it's easy to see why Cult of the Lamb became such a smashing success. On top of its charming art style, the gameplay for Cult of the Lamb only got better with each update, adding more depth and difficulty to the satisfying rogue-like experience. View the full article

Microsoft has revealed the second wave of titles being added to Xbox Game Pass in May. This includes another day-one release joining the long list of games launching on the service this month, as well as some award-winning titles that will surely have many subscribers thrilled. Xbox Game Pass has had a strong year so far, and the gaming service continues to offer a pretty good value proposition for gamers who like to have access to a wide variety of titles at all times. View the full article

Mario Kart World started development back in 2017 as a game for the original Switch, but ended up becoming a Switch 2 one because it devs felt the tech boost was necessary to deliver the world bit of it. Said devs have also offered us some more info about its most important character - Cow. Read more View the full article

If you enjoy games like Vampire Survivors and Brotato, then mutating horde-survival roguelike Bioprototype is worth a look. With 24 unique characters, more than 80 organs, and the ability to adjust your own skill triggers, it offers a tremendous amount of build variety wrapped in a distinctive, fleshy theme. If you crave a little more depth and strategy while retaining the core of the auto-attacking format, Bioprototype has just returned to Steam, and you can get it completely free if you add it to your account in the next few weeks. Read the rest of the story... View the full article

It's starting to feel like history may repeat itself. Ten years ago, when Colossal Order released the first Cities Skylines, it quickly became the ideal and beloved alternative for players let down by the infamous Simcity 2013. Now, with Cities Skylines 2 still on the ropes, the time feels right for a new city builder and simulation game to step up. Transport Fever has already made a name for itself; thanks to their in-depth construction mechanics and realistic visuals and systems, the first two games have earned some major plaudits on Steam. But now, Transport Fever 3 is on the way, and, with a significant number of players seemingly less than impressed with CS2, the time feels right for a new headliner. Read the rest of the story... View the full article For verified travel tips and real support, visit: [Hidden Content]

After four years of Steam early access, Knock on the Coffin Lid hit 1.0 in 2024 and has built a strong rep as a tricky grimdark roguelike pitched somewhere between Slay the Spire and Dark and Darker. Now, developer RedBoon is bringing it to PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series consoles. To celebrate, we've got ten Steam codes to give away. Read the rest of the story... RELATED LINKS: Dark fantasy deckbuilder Knock on the Coffin Lid unveils first DLC Knock on the Coffin Lid is a grimdark fantasy twist on Slay the Spire View the full article

Nintendo just shared their latest edition of ‘Ask the Developer’ for the upcoming Mario Kart World, one of the Switch ... Read more View the full article

Despite being less than three years old, Sony just announced their plans to end their PlayStation Stars loyalty programme they ... Read more View the full article

"I don't remember, actually, the nature of the announcement we were going to make"View the full article

What a differenceView the full article

I've played Resident Evil so many times that I would consider the STARS team personal friends, but I'm not convinced by their tactical prowess. Standing in the hall of the Spencer mansion, Chris, Jill, and Wesker unanimously decide (as I suppose is their prerogative, as horror game protagonists) to split up. Perhaps if they'd stayed together, that entire fateful night would have been, well, less fateful. Such is the premise of Critical Shift. Sent to investigate a top-secret research facility, you're accosted by an army of T-virus-esque monsters and mutations. But you're not alone. Combining turn-based tactics and survival game crafting, this feels like a Resident Evil version of XCOM. Read the rest of the story... View the full article

I’d so desperately like to do a graphics card review without the fug of a wider controversy (or cacked-up market conditions), but the RTX 50 series hasn’t been particularly cooperative in that regard, so why should the RTX 5060 be any different? This time, the sadness cloud comes wafting from Nvidia themselves, amid accusations of engineering dodgy RTX 5060 previews and attempting to trade access for greater coverage of its Multi Frame Generation (MFG) capability. Read more View the full article

It’s time for the mid-May update for Microsoft’s Game Pass service! After the earlier drop at the start of May ... Read more View the full article

Monster Hunter Wilds has had no shortage of worthwhile content updates to encourage players to keep coming back to its addictive gameplay loop. While it'll still be a few months before the highly anticipated summer update arrives, the wait is much shorter for Wilds' first of many collaboration events. While I'm always excited about an excuse to hop back into Monster Hunter Wilds, I can't help but feel this new update is a missed opportunity for the series. View the full article

Lies of P: Overture will introduce the ability to replay boss fights, and a new boss rush mode, it’s been confirmed. Players will be able to progress through five tiers of difficulty. Initially, the bosses can be played on tiers 1, 2, and 3, with tiers 4 and 5 only being unlocked when a player completes the previous level. Bosses in the Battle Memories mode will also have unique stats that change based on the tier. Lies of P: Overture will also introduce Death March, a new mode that will see players attempt to take down as many bosses as they can using a limited pool of health and items. There will be bespoke rewards for both of these modes. However, these haven’t yet been announced. Read More... View the full article

VGC recently got the chance to play Lies of P: Overture, the upcoming expansion to Lies of P. The gameplay, which can be viewed above, comes from the beginning of the game, as the player explores Krat Zoo, the setting of Lies of P: Overture. The expansion is planned for release this Summer on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series, and PC. The expansion will cost $29.99/£29.99. Read More... View the full article

Almost two years after its release, and with a sequel on the way, Lies of P is back with a prequel expansion that gives players the chance to explore more of Krat. The Neowiz and Round8 developed Soulslike, which drew inspiration from The Adventures of Pinocchio and other fairytales, is a firm favourite with Soulslike fans. The game is due to receive a follow-up in the coming years, and Lies of P: Overture sets the stage. The expansion begins in Krat Zoo, a location that was teased in the main game and serves as the first major location of Overture. The zoo, which is themed after mid-1900s European zoos, is opulent to look at, but it contains some of the grimmest horror found in the Lies of P series so far. While most of the zoo’s exhibits have died off, the ones that hadn’t have become mutated monsters, which are extremely tough to take on. Read More... View the full article

2025 has been packed full of great games, with potential Game of the Year contenders coming out of unassuming development studios. Monster Train 2 has just been released, and the masterful roguelike deckbuilder sequel is adding itself to that list with very strong review scores right out of the gate. View the full article

LEVEL5 Inc. are releasing FANTASY LIFE i: The Girl Who Steals Time today and the good news is that it's Steam Deck Verified. So it will work great on Desktop Linux and other SteamOS systems. Read the full article here: [Hidden Content] View the full article

Developer Ninja Theory has revealed Senua’s Saga: Hellblade 2 Enhanced Edition, a new version of the action-adventure game with new features and visual improvements, and has announced its release on PlayStation 5 this summer. The Enhanced Edition of Senua’s Saga: Hellblade 2 will also be available for Xbox and PC as an update. View the full article

Cyberpunk 2077's sequel will let us take a detour from the returning Night City to visit a new location which feels a bit "like Chicago gone wrong". Naturally, this news has me questioning how Cyberpunk's timeline might have affected the most prominent basketball dynasty of the 1990s. Read more View the full article

Monster Train 2 proves that there was no need to reinvent the wheels on the Boneshaker train in order to relight the fires of this outstanding deckbuilding roguelike. (Not that they ever really went out – I’ve played the 2020 original almost daily for years.) It’s very similar to the roots of Monster Train, with a three-tiered tower defense structure where you optimize your unit placement and spells against incoming waves of invaders and choose your path along the tracks, though this time that path is headed from a re-lit Hell up to the gates of a corrupted Heaven instead of down. The five completely new clans have given me an enormous amount of toys to combine and experiment with as I build up momentum toward the final boss battle on each run, especially in tandem with the new equipment system that lets you mix and match parts, and a healthy number of other smart tweaks to the original’s incredibly replayable setup. In fact, Monster Train 2 is easily among the most compulsively replayable games that’ve ever gotten their hooks into me – I’ve already sunk over 90 hours into it (mostly on Steam Deck) with no sign of losing steam. What makes each roughly hour-long run so gripping is that there are non-stop choices, and every one of them feels meaningful: which two factions will you pair up, which of your primary faction’s two champions do you take (and which of their three very different skill paths do you lean into), which Pyre Heart (with associated bonuses) do you slot in – and that’s before you draw a single card or choose a single game-altering artifact. All of those choices compound upon each other, and if you play your cards right and build synergies and combos you can become so wildly powerful that it feels as though you’ve completely broken something. But then, as you rank up and the enemies in subsequent runs become more powerful, it quickly becomes clear that if you don’t break it, it will break you. Like every great roguelike or roguelite, this isn’t a game you should expect to win every time, but every devastating loss makes the next win that much sweeter (and usually unlocks something new). It’s so consistently interesting because of the intricate way all of the systems interact, from the simple positioning of your units so that the strong protect the weak to the extremely important order of operations to maximize the effects of your spell cards as you try to play as many as possible in a turn by reducing casting costs and generating more energy to spend. Figuring out which actions to take first can often spell the difference between winning and losing, and Monster Train 2 allows you to experiment much more than the original did by building in buttons to reset your turn or even restart a whole battle (which, in Monster Train 1, you kind of have to cheat to do). This will effectively put an asterisk next to your score on any leaderboard because knowing what’s coming gives you a huge advantage, but I’ve found it to be an invaluable tool to help me learn the best way to play my hand – and let me salvage some really fun builds from premature ends after I made a bad move. (For example, if I forget to use one of the new special abilities that some units have on a cooldown timer, such as a shield slam, a dragon’s fire breath, or potion brewing. Those frequently slipped my mind, even though there’s a prominent icon reminding me!) Figuring out which actions to take first can often spell the difference between winning and losing. Randomness will always play a huge role in a game like this – sometimes I end up with a weak deck that bites the dust in the first or second battle (even after a few retries), sometimes it’s dynamite out of the gate but then gets utterly destroyed by a boss that counters my strengths. (It does tell you at the start of a run which major bosses you’ll face, so you can plan to counter them if you think ahead.) But one thing that makes Monster Train 2 at least a bit more predictable than the original is that there is now always a deployment phase at the beginning of every battle, guaranteeing that you’ll have a chance to plop down at least a few units before the action starts. Especially if you’re packing a deck full of spell cards and buffs, it’s reassuring to know that you aren’t going to end up without anybody to cast them on for several turns. A new layer of complexity is added in the form of Equipment cards, which let you buff a unit with more attack and defense, plus special abilities like growing Spikes when you’re attacked, Trample, Life Steal, or building more permanent attack power with every kill, to name a few. Some of those interact in awesome ways with a unit’s natural abilities, and you can even combine two pieces into one in order to, for example, create a weapon that both expands the capacity on a floor with every kill but also grows the equipped unit every turn, making them dramatically more powerful. As long as they keep scoring kills, they’ll always have room to keep growing. And because these equipment cards are shuffled back into your deck every battle, you’re encouraged to swap them around to different unit types for different effects (or you can pay to upgrade one so that it’s consistently available in the deployment phase). Some Equipment pieces interact in awesome ways with a unit’s natural abilities. On top of that are the new Room cards, which can be used to enhance each of your three floors with special effects. Some simply make your guys do +15 damage with every attack, others give them stat boosts on summon or Reanimation (the more you die, the stronger you get), one nukes everything on that floor for 50 damage each turn, one makes spells cheaper, another makes them more powerful, and one gives you cash for everything that dies there. That’s just a sampling of them, and they’re another rich opportunity to augment your characters with even more complex piles of modifiers and multipliers. What We Said About Monster Train 1 Monster Train is a ticket to dozens – if not hundreds – of hours of challenging and surprising roguelike deckbuilding runs, thanks in large part to its mechanically diverse set of decks and the way they interact with each other when combined in different ways. This spin on the idea appears similar to the also-outstanding Slay The Spire at first, but aside from some basic concepts and a similar (but not derivative) cartoonish art style for its large cast of monsters, it’s a radically different game. One where learning the ins and outs of its strategies is constantly rewarding. – Dan Stapleton, December 17, 2020 Score: 9 Read the full Monster Train review [/url] Another new swappable part is the Pyre Heart of your train itself, which sits on the fourth floor of your train and serves as your persistent health bar. It can now be swapped out at the beginning of a run to either give you a once-per-battle boost like a few points of energy or freezing your cards in place for the next round, or radically alter your run by ditching the standard starting cards and letting you draw some randoms to replace them. There are a bunch of these to unlock and try out, which further shakes up future runs. These five factions are just as amusingly goofy looking and smartly designed as those that came before them. All of that lays the groundwork for the colorful new clans themselves. These five factions are just as amusingly goofy looking and smartly designed as those that came before them, and there’s no end to the fantastic combos you can come up with by combining their special abilities. They have too many fun things about them to list – literal volumes of guides will be written about how to use them at high levels – but my favorite to play as has to be the *******-based Underlegion: many of their units and spells can build up huge stacks of damage-over-time Decay (similar to Frostbite) that melts enemies to puddles of goo, or they can focus on spawning increasingly powerful stacks of mushroom soldiers – and sometimes, when the stars align, the act of spawning mushroom soldiers triggers huge stacks of Decay and Sap to render enemies toothless as they die. The mad scientist-themed Lazarus League are my runners-up. They’re largely focused on the new gear system, and their roster includes several units with one hit point that come with equipment grafted to them. When they die, it becomes available to attach to anybody else, giving them a fun Frankenstein’s Monster theme I love to play with. If that’s not your style, though, you can focus on potion mixing to create increasingly powerful cocktails that grant Rage, Regeneration, Sap, or Unstable (which makes a unit explode if its health drops below the number of stacks), often with side effects like damage shields, Frostbite, and Resurrection, which instantly brings a unit back from the dead with one HP. Sometimes I’ll let fate decide by randomizing my selection, and I’m never sad when it lands on the Pyreborne dragons because their thirst for gold funds all the unit, spell, and gear upgrades money can buy if you can stack Avarice (granting money from every attack). Alternatively, you can focus on Pyregel, which increases the damage an enemy takes with each stack. With either of those approaches, you’ll also earn golden eggs that can be cashed in for bonus artifacts between battles, or held onto for bonuses for certain units that are more powerful the more eggs you have in your cache. The Lazarus League has a fun Frankenstein’s Monster theme I love to play with. Then you have the Banished, fallen angels who focus mostly on building up Valor (basically a new spin on Rage) to buff both damage and, for the front unit, armor generation. Some units earn Valor by moving, so using spells and abilities to shift them from front to back or between floors creates a highly mobile style of play that’s completely unique to them, while others build Valor through Revenge – which triggers whenever they take damage – creating damage sponges who get spongier (and hit harder) the more they soak up. Finally, there’s the magic-focused Luna Coven, who, like the Stygian Guard before them, are my personal weakest faction because I’m not as good at building spell damage as I am buffing up a juggernaut unit. Even so, I’ve found success with them by making use of units that build their power with every Moon Cycle – the moon alternates between full and new every turn, with each phase granting bonuses to certain units, like attack boosts or sweep during a full moon. That is, it alternates every turn unless you meddle with it using spells and abilities to run up that score, affecting all units you have deployed who like when it switches from one to the other. They can also specialize in building up Conduit stacks on units that serve to amplify their spell power on that floor, and if you slot in a Mage Blade weapon it enhances their attack as well. Naturally, all units can be upgraded twice by default from options in shops, and when you mix in some special options that you can only get out of a random event, it leads to some truly wild combos. One of my favorites I’ve done was to upgrade a Pyreborne Gildmonger dragon, who is a weak fighter but gives you a golden egg when he dies, with the Endless power. That lets you get him killed every turn to cash in on those eggs – but even better was lucking into the Worthy Sacrifice upgrade afterwards, which gave him a special ability that let me kill him off myself in exchange for more action points to use for other things that same turn. Then I duplicated that card a few times. Things got really crazy by the end of that run, but it still wasn’t enough to get me more than two battles deep into the new Endless Mode – the challenge ramps up to insanity in the second post-final boss battle, and I haven’t been able to beat the third... yet. Things got really crazy, but it still wasn’t enough to get me more than two battles deep into the new Endless Mode. On top of the traditional customizable runs with increasing challenge tiers that unlock every time you beat one (up to 10) and randomized Daily Challenges that throw in three often dramatic game-changing mutators, there are also a set of 21 hand-built Dimensional Challenges to play through. Those range in difficulty from pushover to a couple I had to try multiple times just to get started, but they do unlock some extra stuff, like new Pyre Hearts and the ability to cosmetically customize your train’s three floors. I wouldn’t say they’re vastly different from the mutators you’d get from a Daily Challenge, but I’m all for more ways to play. It’s a little odd that there doesn’t seem to be a leaderboard for each of these standardized tests of skill, but I’ll be able to make do with the boards for the Community Challenges, which anybody can custom-build themselves. Finally, there’s a bit more story this time than the first game’s simple setup, told through visual novel-style cutscenes you can watch between runs. We do get a little drama between the fallen angel Fel and her corrupted brother Seraph that’s taken seriously as the gang seeks to retake Heaven from the Titans who conquered it, but the rest of it is just goofiness between the greedy dragons, honorable mushrooms, wacky Frankenstein monsters, etc. It’s not bad at all, just kind of superfluous next to other innovative roguelike storytelling like that of Hades or Blue Prince, and given that it’s not voiced or fully animated it’s hard for there to be a break-out personality among them. Given that it’s entirely optional to read, though, there’s no harm in building a little bit of character around this cast of monsters and their creative cartoonish designs. Along with another excellent soundtrack of jaunty music, there’s plenty of personality on display. Overall, there’s just a tremendous amount of content here – especially because (spoiler alert for anybody who's been following the trailers, plans to play this already, and likes surprises!) it turns out that Shiny Shoe has pulled a Left 4 Dead 2 and included all five of the original Monster Train clans alongside the five new ones. (The only one missing at launch is the Wurmkin, which were added in an expansion.) So there are actually 10 clans to choose from, for a total of 45 potential pairs – as compared to just 10 pairings for five clans. Getting to play as the Umbra, Hellhorned, Awoken, Stygian Guard, and Melting Remnant with all these new systems makes this feel like the only Monster Train I really need (though I do miss the unit-combining power from the expansion). View the full article