Basement door games
There was something insidious about it Rogue Legacythe 2013 platform game “roguelite” developed by Cellar Door Games.
I remember sitting down to play the game for the first time on Friday, and before I knew it it was Sunday night. I came out of that game-bending machine blurry-eyed and disoriented, totally unable to explain where my weekend was headed.
Rogue Legacy 2, which started as an Early Access title in 2020, was released in full late last week and it looks like Cellar Door has done it again. I sit down to play “just one run” before starting my day, and suddenly it’s dark outside and I realize I’ve skipped two meals. For a certain kind of player, this game is a black hole.
Like its predecessor, Rogue Legacy 2 puts you in the role of an adventurer who sets out to kill monsters and get their stuff. You jump through 2D levels and attack bad guys with swords, bows, wands and various other death tools. Starting out as a puny weakling, you gradually upgrade your character to become strong enough to take on the game’s six bosses, who rule the game’s six biomes.
Actually, that’s not quite right. Instead of upgrading one character, upgrade your legacy. The game is a “genealogical roguelite”, according to the developer, meaning each new character is the son or daughter of your previous character. At the start of each “run” you are given a choice of three new characters to play; these are the “heirs” of your kingdom.
Rogue Legacy 2 is a roguelike (or “roguelite”, if you prefer – we’ll get to that in a moment), meaning it deals in procedurally generated dungeons, randomized items, and permadeath. Permadeath is arguably the genre’s defining feature; when you die on a run, that’s it – your character is done and you have to start over. And you will die. In general, roguelikes are known for their crushing difficulty, arcane mechanics, and propensity to scoff at hand-holding niceties like “instructions” (Rogue Legacy 2 is much friendlier when it comes to tutorials).
The reason roguelikes are so appealing to theory-crafting number-obsessed role-playing fans is that they distill the long, slow character progression of a traditional RPG into a bite-sized snack. In The Binding of Isaac-a modern example of the genre and one of the greatest games of all time – you start each run as a limp milk sack barely able to take on the game’s weakest foes. Forty-five minutes later you are a true god, filling the screen with colorful waves of destruction. Roguelikes provide that familiar dopamine trickle of constant character progression, only sped up and condensed. But when a run is over and you want to start over, you’re back to square one.
Rogue Legacy was different. The game pioneered a now-popular offshoot of roguelikes—often referred to as “roguelikes” today—that emphasized “meta-progression.” during a run; you move forward instead among runs.
