Game file / ROGUE BY ROGUEHeroes of Hammerwatch 2
A rogue-lite action-rpg that offers extensive persistent progression. Build your town, upgrade and equip your heroes, before taking on the ever-changing Dark Citadel - either solo or with a team of friends.
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Video reviews
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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 pixel-art twin-stick action-RPG roguelite from Crackshell (published by Team17) where you build up a hub town, level seven classes and push through the Dark Citadel solo or in 4-player co-op, then grind endless New Game+ tiers.
Players rate it Very Positive on Steam (about 82% of roughly 6,600 reviews, with the store page showing Mixed, about 69%, for the most recent 30 days), and it appears to have sold well (Boxleiter-style estimates of 1-2M owners, about $3.4M gross). The praise is for the snappy twin-stick combat, class variety, the account-wide meta-progression and co-op. The criticism is that it is light on roguelite variety (same zones in the same order), long-run balance collapses in New Game+, and content has been thin since the 1.0 launch in January 2025. Critic coverage is almost absent: Metacritic has one critic review (TheSixthAxis, 100) and no Metascore yet, and I could not find an OpenCritic page. It is fully released, not early access, and has received free updates (Epic Missions, Epic Weapons, hotfixes) plus the paid Celestial Ruins DLC with a new class. Some long-time fans now feel the developers are monetising a stagnant game.
What players praise
- Snappy, satisfying dual-stick combat with kiting; auto-fire skills and big lightning or piercing attacks that clear hallways of enemies feel great
- Seven classes with three specialisations each; classes play distinctly and encourage experimenting
- Account-wide buffs from levelling every class mean alternate characters make real progress, so you always keep something after a run
- Town building and upgrades give a sticky long-term progression loop; the town is shared across characters and you keep most of your resources
- Co-op for up to four players is a highlight, with easy drop-in and drop-out and the ability to leave and resume a run later; a Gauntlet-like slow-burn feel
- Gorgeous pixel art, good lighting and effects, strong sound design; a solid sequel improvement over the first game's pacing
- Runs are quittable and resumable at area boundaries, which suits short sessions and Steam Deck play
- Responsive dev support on save problems and free post-launch updates that added missions, weapons and mode variety
What players criticize
- Roguelite elements are thin: the main run goes through the same zones in the same order with only tile and enemy shuffling, so runs feel alike
- Late-game and New Game+ scaling breaks: enemy HP grows faster than gear and trinkets, some subclasses become too weak, and you eventually get one-shot with nothing to counter it
- Content is limited after 1.0 (few bosses, maps, legendary gear); reviewers call it barebones or like an early-access game and feel 2025 roadmap promises were underdelivered
- Character builds lack depth: no skill trees, upgrades are mostly flat stat increases, and loot is many tiny numerical bonuses with little identity
- Save-file loss and character-deletion bugs reported by multiple players, including after updates, with some needing support tickets to restore backups
- Balance issues: non-piercing weapons and single-hit defensive skills are weak at high difficulty, making some classes (e.g. Ranger) worse
- Slow health and mana regeneration leaves you waiting between fights, and the screen can get cluttered by effects so you cannot read what is happening
- Paid DLC (Celestial Ruins) drew anger from some players who say it should have been base-game content and that updates are scarce
Distinctive features
- Blends a Diablo-style ARPG with a roguelite meta-loop, built around a persistent town with NPCs and building upgrades
- Account-wide class-level bonuses apply to every character, so alternate classes keep pushing your main roster forward
- Dual-stick shooter-style combat with cooldown abilities, reminiscent of Gauntlet and Children of Morta
- You can leave a run mid-dungeon at a level boundary and resume it later, including in multiplayer
- Endless New Game+ tiers and one-time special maps unlocked through the town
- Keep most resources on death (with a penalty of roughly 40% of carried gold and materials), so failure still yields progress
Divided opinions
- Difficulty and pacing: some find it never unfair and even a bit easy, others call the early game a gear-check grind and the late game a slog
- Whether it is really a roguelite: fans enjoy the slow-burn RPG progression, others say the roguelike mechanics barely matter
- Value: many say it is worth the $20 and hundreds of hours, especially in co-op, while others say content runs out after 15-20 hours
- Post-launch support and DLC: praised for free updates and dev responsiveness, but criticised as too sparse and monetised
Repetition and friction
- The early hours are a grind of the first zones; dozens of hours to build out the town and vendors in single-player
- Re-fighting identical maps and enemies in the same positions and order across runs, including late game
- Runs that turn into kiting huge mobs for long stretches once you are outscaled, with hundreds of enemies per floor on high difficulty
- Waiting for health or mana to regenerate between encounters, sometimes alt-tabbing while you wait
- Some permanent upgrades are per-character, so starting another class means regrinding
- Control complexity for some: aiming, moving, dashing and managing several cooldowns at once (a reviewer refunded after 36 minutes)
Hoped-for improvements
- More variety in tilesets, zone order, bosses and maps so runs differ more, which is the most common request
- More build-defining depth: talent or skill trees, more abilities earlier, and loot with distinctive effects instead of small flat stats
- Rebalance late-game and NG+ scaling so gear, trinkets and weak subclasses keep pace, and fix useless defensive skills and non-piercing weapons
- Reliable cloud saves and save-loss fixes, plus an easy manual backup and copy option
- Quality-of-life: faster out-of-combat regen, less visual clutter, local co-op, and more language translations (e.g. Spanish) requested on Steam forums
- Deliver a larger post-launch roadmap with more maps, bosses and legendary gear
Launched as a full 1.0 release on 14 Jan 2025 (Windows only, $19.99, Steam). Early reception was positive from players and TheSixthAxis gave a glowing review centred on NG+ replayability; Metacritic has only 1 critic review so no Metascore, and user score is 6.7 from 9 ratings. Steam ratings drifted: Very Positive overall but Mixed for the last 30 days as of the store page I fetched, with negative reviews in 2026 citing stagnant content, the paid Celestial Ruins DLC (new class, priced separately or in a Deluxe Edition) and lost saves after updates. The studio shipped free Epic Missions and Epic Weapons updates and hotfixes, and players mention a 2026 roadmap; some call that roadmap an undersell. Steam Deck works well per player reports, though sleep/resume can cause lag. Steam owner estimates are 1-2M and gross revenue estimates about $3.4M per steam-revenue-calculator (rough). Searches were unavailable (budget exhausted), so critic coverage beyond Metacritic could not be checked and OpenCritic was not located; Reddit was not fetchable.
Community sources
- Top helpful positive and negative English Steam reviews (local file) ↗
- Local Steam metadata: app 619820, review totals, tags, SteamSpy owner range ↗
- Steam store page: all-time and recent review summaries, features, Celestial Ruins DLC ↗
- Steam community discussion titles: patch threads, requests for more bosses/maps/gear, translation, local co-op, cloud saves ↗
- Metacritic page: one critic review (TheSixthAxis, 100), no Metascore ↗
- Metacritic user score 6.7 from 9 ratings ↗
- Revenue estimate (Boxleiter method): about $3.43M gross, $1.01M net ↗
Archived creator commentary 1
Third-party summaries based on automatic captions may contain transcription or interpretation errors.
Tier list Part 3 (2025)
Heroes of Hammerwatch II is a top-down action-adventure roguelike sequel where you start in a village, push through fixed biomes (forest, cave, church, and so on) to a final boss, and rebuild the village between runs. He disliked the original somewhat but enjoyed this one enough to finish it twice. He loves the exploration, visuals, village-building meta progression and epic bosses, but finds the gameplay very simple and repetitive, with samey room-and-enemy levels. After beating the final boss he felt done. He places it at a very high B tier.
What the creator praises
- Very nice, immersive visuals and environment that give a real sense of adventure
- Village meta progression: new buildings and NPCs unlock new abilities after each death
- Persistent character levelling with freedom to pick or switch classes at any time
- Subclasses change playstyle drastically and make you much more powerful
- Run-only abilities and items have cool effects and are enjoyable
- Boss fights feel epic, killing huge monsters as a tiny character
- Strong drive to upgrade and see the next area or boss; a solid sequel
Issues raised by the creator
- Gameplay is extremely simple and gets repetitive, doing the same ability the same way
- Levels are repetitive, mostly rooms of enemies despite good visuals
- Characters and monsters are hard to see
- Subclass unlocks arrive very late (about 70% through playtime)
- Little reason to continue after the final boss; no hidden worlds or biomes like the first game's DLC
Design observations
- Village-building meta progression gives an almost RuneScape-like feel of a persistent character
- Fixed biome and boss order makes it about full exploration from village to deep final layer
- Subclass system dramatically reshapes play, though gated late
