Entertainment
10 Best Roguelike Games for Beginners
# 10 Best Roguelike Games for Beginners The roguelike genre, with its reputation for punishing difficulty, permadeath, and procedurally generated lev...
10 Best Roguelike Games for Beginners
The roguelike genre, with its reputation for punishing difficulty, permadeath, and procedurally generated levels, can often feel intimidating to newcomers. The very mention of "starting over from scratch" is enough to make many players hesitate. However, this challenging genre has exploded in popularity, branching into countless sub-genres and producing some of the most innovative and endlessly replayable experiences in modern gaming. The good news is that not all roguelikes are designed to be brutally punishing from the outset. Many developers have crafted brilliant "gateway games" that gently introduce the core mechanics of the genre while still providing the immense satisfaction that comes from a successful run.
These beginner-friendly titles often feature meta-progression systems, where each death still contributes to permanent upgrades, making subsequent attempts a little easier. They might have simpler controls, clearer objectives, or a more forgiving difficulty curve. They serve as the perfect entry point, teaching the fundamental rhythm of a roguelike: learning from failure, adapting to randomness, and celebrating the thrill of overcoming steep odds. This list is dedicated to those games—the ones that will get you hooked on the "just one more run" gameplay loop without crushing your spirit. From stylish mythological adventures to strategic deck-builders, these are the 10 best roguelike games for beginners.
1. Hades
Supergiant Games' Hades is a masterclass in game design and is arguably the best entry point into the action roguelike genre. Its brilliant blend of fast-paced combat, compelling narrative, and a forgiving progression system makes it incredibly welcoming for players who might be put off by the genre's typically harsh nature.
### A Story That Embraces Failure
Unlike many roguelikes where death is simply a reset, in Hades, every failure pushes the story forward. You play as Zagreus, the snarky son of Hades, attempting to escape the Underworld. Each time you die, you return to the House of Hades, where you can interact with a cast of fully-voiced, charismatic characters from Greek mythology. These interactions reveal new dialogue, advance relationships, and uncover more of the central plot. This genius design choice reframes failure as an opportunity for narrative progression, actively encouraging players to keep trying.
### Accessible Yet Deep Combat
The core combat is easy to pick up but has a high skill ceiling. Zagreus has a simple set of moves—attack, special, cast, and a dash that provides brief invulnerability. The true variety comes from the Boons gifted by the Olympian gods. These powerful upgrades dramatically alter your abilities on each run. One run might see your dash deflect projectiles thanks to Athena, while another might have your arrows call down lightning from Zeus. This system allows for incredible build diversity and experimentation, and the game is balanced so that many combinations are viable.
### Forgiving Meta-Progression
Hades features a robust meta-progression system that ensures you're always getting stronger. Resources collected during your escape attempts can be used back at the House of Hades to unlock permanent upgrades via the Mirror of Night, such as extra health, an additional dash, or even a "Death Defiance" that lets you revive upon dying. For those still struggling, the game includes a "God Mode" that provides a scaling damage resistance boost with each death, making the experience more accessible without removing the challenge entirely.
2. Slay the Spire
For those who prefer strategy and tactics over fast-twitch action, Slay the Spire is the quintessential deck-building roguelike. It brilliantly fuses the mechanics of a collectible card game with the run-based structure of a roguelike, creating an addictive and deeply strategic experience that is remarkably easy for beginners to grasp.
### Familiar Card-Based Gameplay
At its heart, Slay the Spire is a card game, a format familiar to many. Players choose from one of four unique characters and ascend a spire, fighting monsters in turn-based combat. You play cards to attack, defend, or use special abilities. The genius of the game lies in its clarity; enemy intentions are clearly telegraphed, showing you exactly what they plan to do on their next turn. This allows new players to make informed tactical decisions from their very first run, learning the fundamental balance of offense and defense.
### Building Your Deck on the Fly
The core loop involves building and refining your deck as you progress. After each combat, you are offered a choice of new cards to add to your deck. This is where the roguelike element shines, as you must adapt your strategy based on the cards and powerful relics you find. You might start building a defensive deck based around blocking damage, only to find a relic that rewards having a very small, efficient deck. This constant decision-making keeps every run feeling fresh and engaging.
### A Manageable Learning Curve
Slay the Spire does an excellent job of easing players into its complexity. The starting character, the Ironclad, has a straightforward mechanic of dealing big damage and comes with a starting relic that heals after every fight, providing a nice safety net for newcomers. While the game features a punishing "Ascension" mode for veterans, the base difficulty is perfectly tuned for learning. Because the game is turn-based, there's no pressure to act quickly, giving beginners all the time they need to read their cards, assess the enemy's intent, and make the best possible move.
3. Dead Cells
Dead Cells describes itself as a "rogue-vania," a perfect blend of the run-based progression of a roguelike and the exploration and ability-gated level design of a Metroidvania. Its incredibly fluid combat, stunning pixel art, and rewarding meta-progression make it a fantastic, albeit challenging, entry point for action-platformer fans.
### Fluid and Responsive Combat
The first thing players will notice about Dead Cells is how incredible it feels to play. The movement and combat are exceptionally smooth and responsive. You'll be dodge-rolling through attacks, parrying with shields, and slashing through enemies with a vast arsenal of weapons. This focus on satisfying, skill-based combat provides an immediate hook, making every encounter a joy to engage in.
### Persistent Unlocks and Progression
While you lose your collected gold and cells (the main upgrade currency) upon death, Dead Cells features a significant meta-progression system. Between levels, you can spend your collected cells to permanently unlock new weapons, mutations (passive buffs), and abilities. Once an item is unlocked, it can appear in future runs. This system provides a constant sense of forward momentum; even a failed run contributes to a richer and more varied item pool for the next attempt.
### Learning Through Repetition
The game's structure encourages learning and mastery. Each biome has a distinct set of enemies with unique attack patterns. Through repetition, you'll learn how to deal with each threat effectively. Furthermore, as you defeat bosses and progress, you unlock new runes that grant permanent abilities, like growing vines or teleporting, which open up new paths in earlier levels. This "rogue-vania" aspect ensures that while individual runs reset, your overall progress through the game's world is permanent.
4. Vampire Survivors
Perhaps the most minimalist game on this list, Vampire Survivors exploded in popularity due to its incredibly simple controls and deeply satisfying power fantasy. It strips the roguelike formula down to its bare essentials, creating a perfect "gateway game" for players who might be overwhelmed by more complex titles.
### One-Stick Gameplay
The gameplay in Vampire Survivors could not be simpler: you move your character with one analog stick (or directional keys) and your character attacks automatically. That's it. Your only job is to navigate a sea of ever-growing monster hordes, collecting the experience gems they drop upon death. This minimalist control scheme removes any execution barrier, making it accessible to virtually anyone, regardless of their gaming experience.
### The Joy of the Power Creep
The core addictive loop comes from leveling up and assembling a build of weapons and passive items. With each level, you are given a choice of upgrades. Do you take the whip that attacks horizontally, or the magic wand that targets the nearest enemy? Do you upgrade your Bible so it spins faster, or find a new item that increases your movement speed? As the run progresses, your character evolves from a single, weak attacker into a screen-clearing whirlwind of destruction, providing an immense sense of power and satisfaction.
### Short, Addictive Runs
A single run in Vampire Survivors lasts a maximum of 30 minutes, making it the perfect game to pick up and play in short bursts. Despite the simplicity, there is a surprising amount of depth in the synergies between different weapons and items. Unlocking new characters, weapons, and stages through a simple meta-progression system provides a constant stream of new content to explore, fueling that "just one more run" feeling.
5. Risk of Rain 2
For players who enjoy third-person shooters and chaotic co-op action, Risk of Rain 2 is an excellent introduction to the roguelike genre. It translates the formula into a 3D space with explosive combat and a unique difficulty mechanic that keeps the pressure constantly mounting.
### Ever-Increasing Difficulty
Risk of Rain 2's defining feature is its difficulty timer. As time passes, the game's difficulty level steadily increases, spawning more numerous and powerful enemies. This creates a compelling risk-reward dynamic: do you rush through the level to keep the difficulty low, or do you spend time exploring to find more items and become more powerful, at the cost of facing tougher foes later on? This constant forward pressure makes every decision meaningful.
### Endless Item Synergies
The heart of Risk of Rain 2 lies in its vast and eclectic pool of items. Each item you collect provides a passive bonus, and these items can stack and synergize in wild and unpredictable ways. You might find an item that gives your attacks a chance to ignite enemies, another that causes ignited enemies to explode on death, and a third that chains those explosions. Discovering these powerful combinations is the key to a successful run and leads to incredible power scaling.
### Co-op Mayhem
While fully enjoyable solo, Risk of Rain 2 truly shines in co-op multiplayer. Teaming up with friends allows for strategic coordination between different survivor classes and makes managing the escalating chaos more manageable—and often more hilarious. For beginners, playing with a more experienced friend can be a great way to learn the game's systems and secrets in a supportive environment.
6. Balatro
Balatro is a brilliant and fiendishly addictive roguelike that uses the familiar rules of poker as its foundation. It's a perfect gateway game for anyone, even those who have never played a deckbuilder or know only the most basic poker hands, thanks to its clear presentation and satisfying synergies.
### Poker as a Starting Point
The core gameplay loop is simple: you play poker hands to score a target number of chips. The game provides a handy reference for all valid poker hands, so no prior knowledge is required. You have a limited number of hands and discards per round to hit the score. This simple premise serves as the canvas for the game's true depth.
### Game-Breaking Synergies with Jokers
The roguelike magic comes from the Joker cards. You can purchase these from a shop between rounds, and each one provides a unique and powerful modifier to your run. One Joker might add a multiplier for every Heart card played, while another might give you extra cash for unused discards. The true fun of Balatro is finding incredible synergies between your Jokers, creating combos that can break the game's scoring system and send your chip count into the millions.
### Accessible and Deep
The game slowly introduces more complex mechanics like Tarot cards (which modify your playing cards) and Planet cards (which level up your poker hands), but the core loop remains easy to understand. Because it's based on the universal language of playing cards, Balatro feels instantly approachable, while the near-infinite combinations of Jokers and card modifiers provide the immense strategic depth and replayability that define the best roguelikes.
7. Into the Breach
From the creators of FTL: Faster Than Light, Into the Breach is a turn-based strategy game that feels more like a puzzle than a traditional tactics game. Its focus on perfect information and predictable enemy behavior makes it an incredibly accessible and cerebral roguelike experience.
### A Game of Tactical Puzzles
In Into the Breach, you control a squad of three giant mechs fighting off an alien invasion. Each turn, the alien Vek will telegraph their exact moves and targets. Your goal is not necessarily to kill all the enemies, but to use your mechs' abilities to push, pull, block, and manipulate the enemy forces to prevent them from damaging civilian buildings, which power your grid. This turns every battle into a perfectly crafted tactical puzzle where you have all the information you need to find the optimal solution.
### Consequences and Control
The game's turn-based nature allows you to take your time and carefully consider every move. An "Undo Move" button lets you take back an action before you commit, encouraging experimentation without punishment. This design philosophy removes the randomness often associated with combat, placing the emphasis squarely on the player's strategic decisions.
### Meaningful Progression
When you inevitably fail to save a timeline, you can choose one of your pilots to carry over to the next run, retaining their experience and skills. This, combined with the ability to unlock new mech squads with entirely different tactical abilities, provides a strong sense of progression and encourages replayability. The bite-sized missions make it a perfect "just one more run" game for strategy fans.
8. Brotato
Following in the footsteps of Vampire Survivors, Brotato is a top-down arena shooter that refines the "auto-shooter" formula with more character customization and tactical depth. It maintains the simple, satisfying gameplay loop while adding layers of strategy that make it a compelling next step for fans of the subgenre.
### Deep Character Customization
Brotato begins with a choice from a huge roster of different "potatoes," each with unique starting stats and game-altering traits. One character might get stronger by standing still, while another can wield twelve weapons instead of the usual six. This incredible variety ensures that each run feels distinct from the very beginning, encouraging players to adapt their playstyle to the chosen character's strengths and weaknesses.
### Manual and Auto-Aim Options
A key feature that makes Brotato accessible is the option to toggle between auto-aim and manual aim. New players can leave auto-aim on and focus purely on movement and dodging, similar to Vampire Survivors. As players become more comfortable, they can switch to manual aim for a more precise, twin-stick shooter experience. This flexibility allows players to tailor the game's controls to their own skill level.
### Synergize Your Build
The core of the game is surviving 60-second waves of enemies and then using the materials you've collected to buy weapons and items from a shop. The strategy comes from finding powerful synergies between your items and your character's innate abilities. With a vast item pool and numerous weapon sets that grant bonuses, the build possibilities are nearly endless, providing the depth and replayability roguelike fans crave.
9. Enter the Gungeon
For players who love a good challenge and a healthy dose of bullet-hell chaos, Enter the Gungeon is a top-down shooter packed with personality, secrets, and an absolutely staggering number of guns. While it is one of the more difficult entries on this list, its charming pixel art and rewarding gameplay loop make it a popular choice.
### A Celebration of Guns
As the name suggests, this game is all about firearms. The enemies are sentient bullets, the dungeons are gun-themed, and the arsenal is filled with hundreds of weird and wonderful weapons, from conventional shotguns to bizarre guns that shoot bees or black holes. A huge part of the fun is discovering a new, ridiculous weapon and figuring out its unique properties.
### The Importance of the Dodge Roll
The core defensive mechanic in Enter the Gungeon is the dodge roll. For the first half of the roll, you are completely invincible, allowing you to pass through waves of bullets unscathed. Mastering the timing of this move is crucial for survival and is a key skill the game teaches players. Learning enemy attack patterns and knowing when to roll and when to simply walk between projectiles is central to the gameplay.
### Rewarding Exploration
While the primary goal is to survive, the game rewards thorough exploration. Each floor has hidden rooms, shops, and chests that contain valuable items and weapons. For beginners, taking the time to fully explore the first floor is a great strategy to build up a strong arsenal early in a run. Though challenging, the game's mechanics are consistent, and with practice, players will see themselves getting further with each attempt.
10. The Binding of Isaac: Rebirth
No list of influential modern roguelikes would be complete without The Binding of Isaac. This top-down, twin-stick shooter is a pillar of the genre, known for its dark theme, massive item pool, and incredible replayability. While its cryptic nature can be challenging for new players, its core mechanics are simple to grasp.
### Simple Core Gameplay
The moment-to-moment gameplay is straightforward: you move with one set of keys and shoot tears in four directions with another. You explore a basement filled with procedurally generated rooms, fighting monsters and collecting items. This simple foundation makes the game easy to pick up and play. The initial challenge for beginners is to master movement and learn enemy attack patterns.
### The Power of Item Synergies
The true magic of Isaac lies in its hundreds of items, each with a unique effect. One item might make your tears home in on enemies, another might make them explode, and a third could give you wings to fly over obstacles. These items stack, leading to an astronomical number of potential synergies that can transform your character into an overpowered, screen-clearing force. A significant part of the game is learning what each item does and discovering these powerful combinations through experimentation.
### A World of Secrets
The Binding of Isaac is a game filled with secrets. There are hidden rooms on every floor, alternate paths, unlockable characters, and multiple "true" endings to discover. This depth means that even after hundreds of hours, players are still finding new things. For beginners, the journey of slowly uncovering these secrets and filling out the game's massive completion list is a deeply rewarding experience that embodies the spirit of the roguelike genre.
In conclusion, the roguelike genre is more accessible than ever before. These ten games serve as fantastic entry points, each offering a unique spin on the core formula of procedural generation and permadeath. They prove that failure doesn't have to be frustrating; it can be a tool for learning, a driver of narrative, and a stepping stone to an incredibly rewarding victory. So, if you've been hesitant to dive in, pick one of these titles and prepare to discover the addictive joy of "just one more run."