In these cases, you can lose track of one of the factors at play, only to kick yourself when you realize you've wasted an opportunity by playing cards in a less-than-ideal order. On occasion, you can stumble into having such a complex set of cards and relics, with so many layers of interaction, that it can border on overwhelming. And it's in these moments in between combat, agonizing over how to expand your deck-or whether to pay to remove a card, rather than put that gold toward a new card or relic-that the game is at its best. You might be presented with a tantalizing new card, but does adding it to your deck represent too great a risk? Will a card or relic, while terrific in a vacuum, actually dilute the groundwork you've laid? It can be painful to pass up a great card, but doing so can be the right choice. But even when acquiring a seemingly run-defining relic such as this, there's always the chance that you might be able to pivot again, such as happening upon a card that increases your max HP when it deals a killing blow, letting you claw back some of your previous sacrifice.īecause you're presented with the opportunity to acquire a new card after each battle (in addition to your occasional visits to shops and other special events), you're forced to re-examine your approach constantly, identifying and analyzing the ripple effects of any new acquisition. For that to be viable, you have to avoid amassing a large deck, so as to ensure one of these cards regularly cycles into your hand. In another run, you might be offered the chance to significantly reduce your maximum health in exchange for a handful of cards that reduce all damage taken to 1 for a single turn. Or you might seek to do the exact opposite, due to a relic providing some benefit but hard-capping the number of cards you can play in a single turn. But suddenly you earn a relic that doubles the damage of every 10th attack, thus incentivizing you to favor 0-cost attacks to activate that effect more often. You might be pursuing a strategy that centers around keeping your deck size small, so as to maximize the number of times a good, high-cost card enters your hand. But by defeating enemies, saving up gold to spend at shops, opening chests, and making choices at dialogue-driven encounters, you'll acquire many others, and these will come to define your run, for good or ill. Making progress permanently unlocks additional, more complex cards that you can encounter and integrate into your deck during future runs, which expands your range of choices, but it's in the relics system that the game reveals its true depth.Įach of the four character classes is equipped with a starting relic that provides some of its identity (in addition to the unique cards each starts with and can acquire). The structure is familiar, and it's easy to assume that your early runs (which can last up to two hours or so) show you all that Slay the Spire has to offer. Whether you make it to the end or not, you'll then start all over again, only to face another randomized set of encounters with a fresh loadout. Battles see you ascend the titular spire and acquire new cards, relics, and single-use potions, and you'll need to weigh the various routes as you go, opting in or out of mini-bosses that promise great rewards but threaten to bring your run to a halt. Most cards in and of themselves are relatively simple, consisting of a straightforward action and an associated cost. Slay the Spire sees you take part in a series of battles, amassing a collection of cards that dictate your every action in combat: There are cards that launch attacks, allow you to defend yourself, buff you, or nerf enemies. Yet thanks to a setup that encourages experimentation and is rewarding to play even when you're failing, Slay the Spire marries roguelikes and deckbuilders beautifully-and it's easy to see why it's helped to popularize this burgeoning mix of genres. Trying to determine synergies and strategies when starting out is a tall task, and pairing that with a roguelike-where failure in battle will send you back to the start of another randomized dungeon-might seem downright overwhelming.
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