Game file / ROGUE BY ROGUEGoobies
Battle thousands of blobs in this roguelike auto-shooter. Travel from island to island, defeat bosses, collect and upgrade items to become more powerful and discover lag-inducing combos in an endless blobbath.
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Video reviews
Reviews and deep dives from YouTube and Bilibili, in every language. Open the original video to watch.
Other voices, for reference.
Archived third-party reviews and community material may refer to different versions. External opinions and ratings are presented separately; consult the original videos for their full context.
Community discussion
A cheap 3D-rendered, top-down roguelike auto-shooter (bullet-heaven/survivor-like) where you kite thousands of goofy blobs across islands, beat bosses and stack item and weapon synergies, from solo Swedish studio Hoganas Spel.
Goobies is Very Positive on Steam (about 91% of roughly 1,960 reviews, 1,868 counted on the store page) and sells for about $6, so most players treat it as a charming, cheap, easy-to-pick-up survivor-like. The praise centres on the bubbly art style, build combos and quick runs. The criticism is slow progression, repetitive enemies and maps, balance that breaks once everything is unlocked, severe late-game lag and clutter, and cloud/save problems. It has no Metacritic critic coverage and no confirmed OpenCritic coverage, so reception is almost entirely player-driven. The developer shipped patches from 1.0.6 (Aug 2023) to 1.1.3 (Jan 2024), plus a small artifact tweak in Oct 2025, then announced development was on hold to focus on the sequel. Recent negative reviews complain of no content updates, and Goobies 2 (third-person co-op, demo out, 2026 release) is the successor.
What players praise
- Cute, goofy, bubbly blob visuals and humorous character names give it a distinctive charm; even negative reviewers call the look its strongest part
- Simple to start and easy to begin or abandon a run, which suits short sessions and casual players
- Item and weapon synergies, including 'lag-inducing' combos, and weapon upgrades that evolve into stronger versions with added traits rather than plain stat boosts
- Satisfying power fantasy of mowing through swarms of thousands of blobs; described as addictive and mindless in a good way
- Five champions with different passives, 30+ items and 20 artifacts give a fair amount of build variety for the price
- Developer was praised in Steam reviews for quickly implementing player suggestions (leaderboards, rerolls, boss mutations)
- Low price (about $6) and low barrier; one reviewer suggests it is a gentle, non-violent way to introduce kids to the genre
What players criticize
- Severe late-game performance problems: FPS drops, lag that can crash the engine, and lag from large numbers of XP pickups
- Visual clutter in mid and late game makes threats hard to read ('I can't see anything')
- Repetitive content: basic maps, low enemy and boss variety, and runs feel same-y after a few hours
- Balance issues: with everything unlocked from the start and no real stacking limits, builds converge and runs feel too easy or dull; some also call RNG harsh
- Cloud save handling is a recurring complaint; some players report save resets or wiped progress after touching save settings
- Bugs: Queen units spawning inside terrain and becoming invincible, a controller menu selection bug, and swarm spawns landing on the player
- Development has been paused, with no major content updates in a long time
Distinctive features
- Soft, inky, non-violent blob aesthetic in 3D with a bouncy momentum-based player character, unlike gritty Vampire Survivors clones
- Island-to-island structure with discrete levels and a boss at each island, instead of one continuous timer
- Weapons evolve into stronger variants with added traits rather than just stat upgrades
- Boss mutations that accumulate over time, a daily leaderboard and a 'Mega Crit' mechanic (added in patches)
- Item and roulette rerolls (one per island) plus artifacts that change core mechanics
- Sequel Goobies 2 adds third-person camera, co-op, genetic mutations and Omens, showing the series moving beyond top-down
Divided opinions
- Simplicity: praised as approachable and kid-friendly, but others find the strategy too shallow and boring
- Difficulty and balance: some love the broken combos, others say everything unlocked from the start makes runs trivial and samey
- Momentum-based player movement feels charming to some and awkward or nauseating to others
- Value: at about $6 many call it a bargain, while some say it does not respect your time and recommend other genre entries
Repetition and friction
- Slow levelling: around level 40 players report roughly one level-up per world or boss
- Steep meta-progression grind that feels unrewarding for the hours invested
- Kiting blobs in circles and dodging AOEs against a limited roster of enemies feels repetitive
- Endless runs with no satisfying conclusion; the only real goal is Steam achievements
- Late-game lag and screen clutter turn the endgame into a chore
- Motion sickness from the bouncing or wobbling protagonist movement around screen centre, reported by at least one reviewer
Hoped-for improvements
- Fix late-game optimization and lag from pickups and enemy counts
- Add more content: enemy and boss variety, maps, and a real objective or ending for runs, since runs are endless
- Rework balance and add limits or unlock gating so builds stay varied and challenge holds up
- Improve readability: transparent projectiles, fewer cluttering effects, and options to reduce screen shake or protagonist motion
- Make cloud saves work reliably and expose clear save management
- Quality-of-life and feature requests from reviews: multiplayer, better mouse and dual-monitor handling, and better keyboard control for some characters
Released July 14, 2023 on Windows only (no Mac/Linux) at about $5.99. Early patches added cloud saves (1.0.6, Aug 2023), daily leaderboard and Mega Crit (1.0.7), boss mutations and rerolls (1.1.0), Queen nerfs (1.1.1, 1.1.2), and Chinese/Russian localization, autosave cycling and save-loss fixes (1.1.3, Jan 2024). An Oct 2025 tweak made the Abnormal Autopsy artifact easier to unlock. A pinned developer post says development is on hold, and players ask whether the game is dead. Despite that, recent negative reviews in 2025 to 2026 still complain about cloud saves and lost progress, so those issues persisted or recurred. Metacritic has a page with no critic score and only 3 user ratings (below the 4-rating threshold, so no user score shown), and OpenCritic coverage could not be confirmed. My WebSearch budget was exhausted, so no press reviews or Reddit threads were read; the picture rests on Steam data, store and community pages, and sampled Steam reviews. The top helpful positive review sample was empty in the local file, so praise comes from the Steam community top-rated page summary and the store page.
Community sources
- Local file of top helpful negative English Steam reviews (positive list empty) ↗
- Steam app data: 90.9% positive of 1,962 reviews, price, genres, SteamSpy owners, revenue estimate ↗
- Steam store page: description, features (5 champions, 30+ items, 20 artifacts), Very Positive summary ↗
- Top-rated Steam reviews: praise (addictive, charm, responsive dev) and criticism (2 fps lag, clutter, spawns) ↗
- Patch history from 1.0.6 (Aug 2023) to Oct 2025 ↗
- Community discussions: cloud save complaints, development on hold, balance feedback ↗
- Metacritic page: exists but has no critic or user reviews ↗
- Goobies 2 store page: third-person co-op sequel, 2026 release, demo available ↗
- Estimated gross and net revenue (Boxleiter method) ↗
- OpenCritic search attempt; page returned no usable listing so no score recorded ↗
Archived creator commentary 1
Third-party summaries based on automatic captions may contain transcription or interpretation errors.
Tier list Part 2 (2024)
Goobies is a top-down, single-level horde roguelite that embraces chaos and does not care about balance or taking itself seriously. He finds it satisfying to become absurdly overpowered and break the game, and he was briefly addicted while pushing it. The appeal fades after a few runs once you know how to break it. He first considered C tier but, having had a blast, moved it higher and calls it a guilty pleasure that is cheap and worth grabbing if you like breaking games. He never states the final tier letter aloud.
What the creator praises
- Satisfying power fantasy of becoming completely overpowered and broken
- Chaotic, fun, explosion-filled gameplay that does not take itself seriously
- Level-up stat wheel gives wildly random boosts (5% vs 50% crit damage)
- Different game modes and several characters that play a little differently
- Hub world meta-progression points that let you max stats once you learn to break it
- Cute, charismatic main character and very cheap price
Issues raised by the creator
- Deliberately unbalanced, with no real care for balance
- Abilities are fun but somewhat forgettable
- Once you learn to break it, it is easy and you are done after a few runs
- Visual mess, such as the screen filling with a single colour from massive explosions
- Not very minimalistic or deep; a basic game overall
Design observations
- Embraces being broken as a core design choice, focusing on player power fantasy over balance
- Random stat wheel with huge variance between outcomes
- Breaking the game quickly unlocks full meta-upgrade maxing in about three or four runs
Updated opinion
Considered placing it in C tier, then decided to put it higher after enjoying it; placed as a guilty pleasure. Letter not stated.
