Slay the Spire

Joel Haddock Mar 12, 2024

Card-based games have been around for a long time. But over the past few years, they've popped up with a lot more frequency. A lot of that is thanks to Slay the Spire.

Slay the Spire is, at its core, a deck-builder. But in a twist on the normal style of simply playing one deck against another, Spire uses the deck as commands to be issued in turn-based battles against various monsters.

The player starts their run with a very basic deck of attacks and block cards, along with a few strong abilities. As they progress up the tower, winning battles and completing map events rewards them with more and more powerful cards and relics that can dramatically change how their deck performs.

On the metaprogression front, each run you complete in Spire earns you more experience for the class used. As the classes level up, they unlock more cards and relics that will appear in subsequent runs. As the player levels up, these cards can get extremely powerful and unlock some truly unique builds.

Big blob, little hat

One of the key features of Spire is that on every turn, the player can see exactly what actions the enemy monsters will take. Given they know what's coming, the trick becomes figuring out how to maximize the cards in your hand to thwart their moves. This can lead to some immensely thrilling, satisfying moments where you work your way out of a dire situation with a cascade of interactions that somehow propel you to victory.

With four classes to play and a huge variety of cards for each - not to mention the massive varitey of rule-altering relics - no two runs of Spire are ever the same. Even if you think you have the "perfect" strategy for one class or another, the randomness of drops means you usually have to build a strategy on the fly.

With speedy action, huge variety, and endless thinking on your feet, Spire is naturally addictive.

Even now, five years after launch, I'm still finding new interactions or wild things to do.

That's why Slay the Spire is the best roguelite.