Monster Train

''Monster Train'' is a roguelike deck-building game developed by American studio Shiny Shoe and published by Good Shepherd Entertainment. It was initially released on May 21, 2020, for Windows, followed by releases on Xbox One on December 17, 2020, and iOS on October 27, 2022. A Complete Edition of the game titled ''Monster Train First Class'' was released for Nintendo Switch on August 19, 2021. The game received positive reviews, being nominated in the category of Best Strategy/Tactics Game at IGN Best of 2020, as well as Strategy/Simulation Game of the Year at the 24th Annual D.I.C.E. Awards.

A sequel, ''Monster Train 2'', was released on May 21st 2025, by Big Fan Games, a label of Devolver Digital who acquired Good Shepherd Entertainment.

Gameplay

The game has a vertical field, a train with 4 floors, with a pyre on the top floor. The enemies will try to reach the pyre to destroy it, and the player must protect it to achieve victory. For this, the player will use several cards that can summon monsters or activate special effects to defeat the invaders, but the player can only summon their creatures in the train's first three floors.

Reception

The game received positive reviews, reaching 86 points on Metacritic. Dan Stapleton, from IGN, wrote that the game is "a ticket to dozens – if not hundreds – of hours of challenging and surprising roguelike deckbuilding runs, thanks in large part to its mechanically diverse set of decks and the way they interact with each other when combined in different ways", and in his verdict, scored the game 9/10. Cody Peterson, from Screen Rant, wrote "Monster Train is an enjoyable deck building roguelike game that manages to reinvent both genres with some interesting new game mechanics", giving the game a 4 out of 5 star rating.

Reviewing the Nintendo Switch version, titled ''Monster Train First Class'', Waselenchuk of COGconnected praised the extensive amount of enemies and cards available; on the other hand, the author lamented the lack of touch screen functionality for the game: "I think many would agree; card games are often the ones that benefit the most from a touch screen".

As of January 2023, the game had over 15,000 reviews on Steam, with an overall rating of "Overwhelmingly Positive" (equating to "10/10" and 96% positive reviews).

Awards

The game was nominated to IGN Best of 2020 list, in the category of Best Strategy/Tactics Game for the year 2020, which was ultimately awarded to ''Crusader Kings III''. During the 24th Annual D.I.C.E. Awards, the Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences nominated ''Monster Train'' for " Strategy/Simulation Game of the Year", which was ultimately awarded to ''Microsoft Flight Simulator''.

Sequel

''Monster Train 2'' was announced in February 2025 to be published by Devolver Digital under its publishing label Big Fan Games. It was released on May 21, 2025 for the Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 5, Windows, and Xbox Series X/S.

References

External links

* {{Official website, https://www.themonstertrain.com/

2020 video games
Digital deck-building card games
Digital collectible card games
Fantasy video games
Good Shepherd Entertainment games
Indie games
IOS games
Nintendo Switch games
Roguelike video games
Single-player video games
Video games developed in the United States
Windows games
Video games set on trains
Xbox Cloud Gaming games
Xbox One games