The roguelike style is one which’s exploded lately, with quite a few incredible roguelikes like Balatro and Hades II releasing for followers of the style. Cube & Fold is a newcomer, and its debut leaves me desirous to play a lot extra.
For my Cube & Fold assessment, I need to speak about why this recreation has gripped my consideration, and I’m very a lot trying ahead to the roadmap of latest characters and objects.
The sport’s premise is kind of easy – you dungeon crawl level-by-level, defeating card-based enemies utilizing your cube. Some enemies have to be defeated with a selected die quantity, whereas others have a cumulative rely to deliver to zero. To reinforce future runs, profitable a recreation with a hero will unlock trinket(s) – permitting you to equip small boosts to assist with the more difficult heroes.
A Bevvy of Heroes to Select
For every run, you’ll select a hero with a singular capability and are available throughout extra companions the deeper you delve, growing the variety of cube you may roll, and supplying you with an extra ability that can be utilized to your benefit as you make your solution to the ultimate boss.
Of the 20+ Heroes at launch, I accomplished each one, and every Hero actually compelled me to alter how I performed every time, ensuring I picked companions and bought store objects that complimented the talents I had out there.
Some heroes had been simpler to assert victory with, whereas others are tougher to grasp. In a twist I felt helped with steadiness, not each hero would have all 3 Trinket slots out there, making some heroes a lot tougher than others with out the small boosts they supply.
The hero choice, mixed with randomized companions, objects within the store, and even what remaining boss seems at stage 30, actually forces you suppose 5-10 phases forward, maximizing your coin earnings but additionally making certain you may hold sufficient well being to get to the top.
One of many balances of the sport that I discovered making me query my selections, was the 2 KEY selections you can also make after every roll: Do you assault enemies, or do you full the six cube slots to get additional gold on your subsequent store go to?
I appreciated is the enemy selection – there is a good quantity of repetition, however even after a number of hundred, you are bumping into new enemies and managers, or simply different/powered up variations of those earlier than. In typical roguelike style, you may’t anticipate what’s coming subsequent, which is why selecting what to do together with your cube is essential.
Nice Vibes
The art work is charming, and whereas it’s easy, all the things felt cohesive and polished. From the flips of the playing cards to the slight visible impact of inserting cube – each stage felt full.
In the event you’re somebody who likes ambiance, Cube & Fold has a lot. Mixed with the aesthetics of the art work, the background music jogs my memory of PS1-era video games a bit – the music is there, it feels proper, nevertheless it’s not the only real focus. One factor I did not discover instantly, was that each 10 phases it appeared to alter and intensify so as to add to the temper.
I might see myself placing this on as background music after I work too (Tavern lo-fi anybody?)
Cube & Fold is a Nice Problem
I felt challenged from the primary hero I attempted to the final, and I’m trying ahead to persevering with to play post-launch within the Onerous and Excessive modes now that I’ve actually bought a really feel for the sport.
The primary motive I delayed publishing this assessment, is as a result of the Trinkets weren’t but within the playtest construct. Received by defeating bosses, and with the power to win multiple with a selected companion and/or store merchandise, they provide a small enhance to your runs, and so they had been instrumental in serving to me clear a number of of the heroes!
- Reviewer Notice: Delaying my assessment additionally meant that I had a chance to see the flurry of post-launch updates that mounted plenty of points that existed at launch, as nicely. There have been some vital pre-launch bugs that compelled constant restarts of runs, which have been resolved, alongside steadiness tweaks.
There are 41 totally different Trinkets to unlock by ending runs with every hero, and you will want to finish extra runs after ending every hero if you wish to unlock each one. They provide quite a lot of possibility, letting you improve your expertise in the direction of your playstyle.
My go-to selections are a mixture of Creature Head (+3 Gold at begin of recreation), Divine Department (Begin the sport with a Uncommon companion), Moonstone (Store has Uncommon as a substitute of Frequent objects), and Wine Bottle (Companions have double their well being) relying on what number of slots every hero had.
This might let me focus much less on gold technology at the beginning, in addition to enhance total survival with more healthy companions, in addition to if you happen to bought Shopkeeper with the Divine Department you can REALLY get flying like I did within the screenshot above!
Cube & Fold Overview – Last Ideas
In a world stuffed with roguelikes, Cube & Fold brings contemporary concepts and style mixes that may have you ever delving time and again to unlock totally different heroes, and the replayability of the sport will scratch the “only one extra run” itch that we’ve come to like from video games like Slay the Spire, Balatro, and extra.
This roguelike is value a pickup, there’s loads of content material so that you can discover, and well-crafted mechanics that create a satisfying expertise that may make you come again for extra with the Onerous and Excessive difficulties.
Cube & Fold was reviewed on PC, over the course of 23 hours of gameplay. All screenshots proven above had been taken by the reviewer throughout gameplay.