''Roguebook'' is a

roguelike deck-building game A roguelike deck-building game is a hybrid genre of video games that combines the nature of deck-building card games with procedurally generated randomness from roguelike games. Gameplay aspects Most roguelike deck-building games present the pla ...

developed by Abrakam Entertainment.

Nacon Nacon SA (formerly Bigben Interactive SA) is a French video game publisher, holdings company and gaming peripherals manufacturer based in Lesquin. It designs and distributes gaming accessories, and publishes and distributes video games for va ...

published it in 2021 for Linux, macOS, and Windows. Console ports were released in 2022.

Gameplay

A magical book with an insatiable hunger for creating stories sucks everything from its surrounding environment into its pages. Players traverse an

overworld An overworld or a hub world is, in a broad sense, an area within a video game that interconnects all its levels or locations. They are mostly common in role-playing games, though this does not exclude other video game genres, such as some pla ...

map in the form of a lore book from '' Faeria'', with which ''Roguebook'' shares its setting. As players win battles with enemies, they acquire ink. This ink can be used to reveal the features of the map. Brushes can reveal a larger portion of the map. Combat is

turn-based Timekeeping is relevant to many types of games, including video games, tabletop role-playing games, board games, and sports. The passage of time must be handled in a way that players find fair and easy to understand. In many games, this is don ...

and uses deck-building mechanics. Players combine the decks of two characters, each of whom has their own unique

skill A skill is the learned or innate ability to act with determined results with good execution often within a given amount of time, energy, or both. Skills can often be divided into domain-general and domain-specific skills. Some examples of gen ...

s and tactics. Besides ink, players can accumulate money and gems. Gems can be used to enhance cards, giving them unique abilities. Each playthrough can permanently unlock new characters, cards, and other gameplay elements, making new games easier. To win, players must win engage in a

boss fight In video games, a boss is a significantly powerful non-player character and computer-controlled enemy created as an opponent to players. A fight with a boss character is referred to as a boss battle or boss fight. Bosses are generally far stro ...

. The boss is randomly selected from avatars of the book itself.

Development

The concept came from Abrakam's desire to connect their new game to ''Faeria''. The setup of fighting a greater evil gave them an excuse to have characters who disliked each other in ''Faeria'' to work together. The

open world In video games, an open world is a virtual world in which the Gamer, player can approach objectives freely, as opposed to a world with more linear and structured gameplay. Notable games in this category include ''The Legend of Zelda (video game ...

overworld map came from a desire to differentiate ''Roguebook'' from '' Slay the Spire'', which uses branches.

Richard Garfield Richard Channing Garfield (born June 26, 1963) is an American mathematician, inventor, and game designer. Garfield created '' Magic: The Gathering'', which is considered to be the first collectible card game (CCG). ''Magic'' debuted in 1993, and ...

helped design the game. Abrakam crowdfunded ''Roguebook'' via

Kickstarter Kickstarter, PBC is an American Benefit corporation, public benefit corporation based in Brooklyn, New York City, that maintains a global crowdfunding platform focused on creativity. The company's stated mission is to "help bring creative project ...

in June 2019.

released it for PCs on June 17, 2021; PS4, PS5, and Xbox One and Xbox Series X/S on February 24, 2022; and Switch on April 21, 2022.

Reception

Metacritic Metacritic is an American website that aggregates reviews of films, television shows, music albums, video games, and formerly books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted average). Metacritic was created ...

, ''Roguebook'' received positive reviews for the PC, PlayStation 5, and Xbox One versions, and it received mixed reviews for Switch. ''

PC Gamer ''PC Gamer'' is a magazine and website founded in the United Kingdom in 1993 devoted to PC gaming and published monthly by Future plc. The magazine has several regional editions, with the UK and US editions becoming the best selling PC games m ...

'' wrote that it has "a few clever twists" but "nothing in ''Roguebook'' is particularly novel". ''

IGN ''IGN'' is an American video gaming and entertainment media website operated by IGN Entertainment Inc., a subsidiary of Ziff Davis, Inc. The company's headquarters is located in San Francisco's SoMa district and is headed by its former e ...

'' praised the overworld and how two heroes combine their decks in combat, but they said this combat mechanic leaves player strategy less focused than similar games. ''

NME ''New Musical Express'' (''NME'') is a British music, film, gaming and culture website, bimonthly magazine, and brand. Founded as a newspaper in 1952, with the publication being referred to as a "Rock music, rock inkie", the ''NME'' would be ...

'' said it is a good game but " ddsa few too many ideas into an already stuffed experience". ''Digitally Downloaded'' praised its game balance and its depth, which they said help differentiate it from other deckbuilding games. Though they said the Switch version suffers from long load times, they said ''Roguebook'' is also very good for bursts of gameplay on a handheld system.

References

External links

* {{Official website, https://www.roguebook.net/ 2021 video games Windows games MacOS games Linux games PlayStation 4 games PlayStation 5 games Xbox One games Xbox Series X and Series S games Nintendo Switch games Single-player video games Indie games Digital deck-building card games Roguelike video games Turn-based strategy video games Crowdfunded video games Kickstarter-funded video games