Heia all! Do you have some recommendations on any strategy roguelites where you get bonuses that you keep between games?
My favorite one, even though it is a bit different of course, is Against The Storm, a roguelike city builder that essentially removes all the later stages and makes you re-live the first 20-60 minutes of a fresh - and highly randomized - map again and again.
To me it removes all the tedium I always get from city builders. It’s tense, and somewhat depressing in its setting, but also very pretty and super fun.
- Slay the Spire
- FTL
- Into The Breach
- Bloons TD6
- Wildermyth
- Renowned Explorers: International Society (personally I feel this one doesn’t get enough praise. It’s super underrated)
Similar but not exactly roguelike since they have an overarching campaign for metaprogression rather than completely independent “runs”:
- Darkest Dungeon
- XCOM
- Most XCOM-like games eg Xenonauts, Battletech, Mechanicus
Wait what? Slay the Spire was on your list? Care to elaborate on that a little bit more?
All my Slay the Spire runs start with the exact same starter deck and I do not have extra health, damage, or other bonuses from my prior runs. I don’t get your point.
FTL? What the heck. If I beat the flagship I don’t get any bonuses for beating it for my next run.
I don’t know if we understand ‘roguelite where we get permanent bonuses for next round’ in the same way. In Hades and Rogue Legacy your run will most likely be more stronger than your last run because of permanent upgrades. In FTL, Slay the Spire or Into the Breach you don’t get those - you just expand the available starting gear / setups.
STS has unlockable cards, characters, and relics by earning XP on each character. This is easy to forget if you’ve been playing a long time because you probably unlocked all of that stuff within the first 10-20 hours of play.
Additionally, you could consider the progression of ascension levels up to A20 as a form of metaprogression. Also the whale bonus changes depending on how well your last run went.
FTL and Into the Breach
I don’t want to toot my own horn too much here, but I’m developing a card game that is much more roguelite than rougelike, with strong meta-progression. It’s all free and open source and playable at superspruce.org.
If you like strong meta-progression, you might also like incremental games, such as Cookie Clicker, Antimatter Dimensions, and Realm Grinder. These games are satisfying due to the pure progression you experience within them.
I gotta admit, Im done with incremental games, it doesnt give me anything anymore. But I will take a look at ur game, thanks! ☺️
FTL and Into the Breach. Mostly between games it’s unlockables, but still super fun.
If you like dungeoncrawling and math (and wizards), Noita is an absolute banger.
