How roguelikes like Slay the Spire 2 and Balatro changed my life, and why I love them for it

I have a problem. If you’d asked me about my favorite genre of games just a couple of years ago, I wouldn’t have known what to tell you. I’d have sounded like one of those annoying people who tell you they like ‘all sorts’ of music, which usually just means they like whatever is on the radio, rather than an actual eclectic taste ranging from Captain Beefheart to MF Doom. Now, I’ve discovered my favorite game genre, the roguelike. The problem is, I love roguelike games, including the likes of Slay the Spire 2, Hades 2, and Balatro, so much that I’m struggling to enjoy anything else.

So, what is it about the roguelike genre that keeps me coming back for more? Well, dear readers, I am a depressed man. When I say I’m depressed, I don’t mean I’m miserable; in fact, I like to think I’m pretty chipper, but if I spend more than ten minutes in a room on my own with nothing to occupy my mind, you can bet it won’t be long before I start thinking about what happens when we die, the fabric of reality, and the eventual heat death of the universe. What I need is something that grabs onto my brain, almost like a parasite, and absorbs it.

That’s exactly what I get from the best roguelike games. When I’m playing Balatro, I’m thinking about what Joker card I need next, what Planet cards I could benefit from, and what deck I should pick for my next run. The same applies to Slay the Spire 2, as well as Hades 2, and that latter example might be even more egregious, as each run pushes the narrative a little further along in a way that always leaves you eager for more juicy lore tidbits. This engaging gameplay experience leaves very little room for existential dread, which can be a problem in games with massive open worlds that require lonely traversal or RPGs that aren’t consistently challenging (with apologies to my beloved Pokémon).

Basically, it’s the gameplay loop, the infamous one-more-run factor, and the constant decision-making that grabs me. This isn’t unique to roguelike games; it’s something I also pointed out in my retrospective Stardew Valley review, with the indie game’s 20-minute days always leaving you with something to do the next day, so you keep playing, and before long, you’ve been on the farm for the best part of four hours. It’s even more accentuated in a roguelike, though, because if a run ends early, you learn lessons and want to apply them right away, but if you succeed, then you want to keep the good times rolling and go again.

Let’s look at some hard data, shall we? Since it launched in early access on March 5, I’ve spent over 80 hours in Slay the Spire 2. Those 80 hours are more time than I’ve spent in every other game I’ve played this year combined, including Pokémon Pokopia, Monster Hunter Stories 3, and Mario Tennis Fever. The most damning statistic, though, is my Balatro playtime, which is upwards of 300 hours, and that’s just on my Steam Deck, not accounting for what I’d guess is about 50 hours playing the version that’s part of the Apple Arcade games library. I am in deep.

There’s another factor in why my favorite roguelike games have got their hooks in me, but it’s a slightly more abstract one. I’m talking about failure. I’m not going to fall for the trap of saying that games are too easy these days, but I do think that they’re harder to fail. What I’m saying is, a lot of modern platformers have done away with the concept of lives completely, while incessant auto-saves take some of the edge off falling foul of a boss, as you can often take them on again right away with little in the way of consequences. When you fail in a roguelike, the run is over, and the build that you thought was god-tier just minutes before is lost to time. It’s a meaningful sort of failure.

This, again, plays into my funky mental health situation. Fear of failure is a big deal for me and always has been – yes, I’ve save scummed in my time, and no, I don’t feel bad about it. It might sound like I’m reaching here, but I genuinely believe that roguelike games have helped me come to terms with that, at least a little bit. Time slows down when a run ends prematurely, and you’re mad for a second, then you get a moment of clarity when you see where your build went wrong and acknowledge it. Lesson learned, and like Dave Grohl, you’re done, done, onto the next one.

So yes, I have a problem with roguelike games, but honestly, I think there are worse problems to have. It might mean there are a bunch of new Switch games and upcoming mobile games that I don’t get around to playing, at least, not for a while, but if it means not thinking about the end of the world in the dead of night and finally learning how to cope with anything but success, I’ll take it.