Game file / ROGUE BY ROGUERavenswatch
Fallen heroes of old folk tales and legends: you are on the verge of a crucial battle against the Nightmare invading and corrupting your world. A roguelike action game from the creators of Curse of the Dead Gods©, playable solo or in online co-op.
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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 MOBA-flavoured action roguelike from Passtech Games (Curse of the Dead Gods) where fairy-tale and legend heroes such as Beowulf, Scarlet and Geppetto fight a corrupting Nightmare across three timed chapters, solo or in up to 4-player online co-op.
Players land at Mostly Positive on Steam (about 80% of roughly 22.8k reviews) and critics are warmer (Metacritic 84 from 11 reviews, Metacritic user score 7.0 from 110 ratings). Almost everyone agrees the art, the distinct hero kits and the co-op are excellent, and the people who click with it log hundreds of hours. The common complaint is thin content: the same three maps and bosses forever, with new post-launch content mostly arriving as heroes, skins and events. Netcode problems, in particular no way to rejoin after a disconnect, and a steep and poorly explained learning curve sour many negative reviews. It left Early Access on 26 Sep 2024 (1.0) and has kept getting updates, though some players call the pace slow and dislike paid hero DLC.
What players praise
- Heroes play like MOBA champions (passive, abilities, ultimate unlocked at level 5) and feel genuinely different from each other
- Fairy-tale and literary roster; the art style, animation polish and music are praised even in negative reviews
- Co-op is the highlight: no meta-progression gaps between friends, so anyone can jump in on equal footing, and some heroes (Romeo and Juliet) reward playing off each other's moves
- The countdown to the boss creates risk/reward routing: rush the boss for bigger rewards, or clear the map for power at the cost of a harder boss
- Day/night cycle and map points of interest affect which enemies and objectives are worth doing, rewarding map knowledge
- Skill and game knowledge matter more than grinding; several long-time players say every hero has multiple strong builds and the game becomes addictive once it clicks
- Highly replayable for enthusiasts: multiple reviewers report 300 to 1000+ hours, and free updates added events, enemies and quests
- Critics call it an accessible, polished, stylish roguelike (Metacritic scores 78 to 100)
What players criticize
- Only three maps, three chapter bosses and a limited set of enemies, so runs feel samey after the first ~20 hours
- No rejoin after a crash or disconnect, and if the host drops the whole run is lost; players report this persisting for years along with lobby bugs, random disconnects and multiplayer that fails to start for some
- Steep learning curve with little in-game explanation of items, map objectives and build synergies; newcomers often die a lot and bounce off
- Combat and difficulty scaling: enemies feel spongy, and higher difficulties mostly add HP, damage and XP penalties rather than new mechanics
- Shallow meta-progression and few reasons to continue after clearing the top difficulty; build variety within a hero is described as narrow by some
- Hero balance is uneven and some heroes (for example Scarlet and Geppetto) are called poor starting choices
- Steam Deck complaint of a locked 720p image with black bars
- Sound and music become repetitive over long play
Distinctive features
- A PvE MOBA-style roguelike: hero kits with passives and ultimates in an ARPG-roguelike loop, compared by reviewers to Battlerite and Risk of Rain
- A visible timer to the boss that scales the boss up if you are late, and offers bigger rewards if you go early
- No traditional meta-progression: unlocks are horizontal additions to the item and talent pool, so power comes from knowledge, not hours
- Day/night system that changes enemy behaviour and what you should fight and when
- A roster built on folk-tale and literary figures
Divided opinions
- The boss timer: seen as excellent pressure and routing by some and as unwelcome stress by others
- Difficulty: fans say it is fair and rewarding once learned, while others find it punishing and not rewarding like Elden Ring-type games
- Build variety: some players find strong builds for every hero, others say the best build is obvious
- Content roadmap: some see steady free updates (events, Songs of Thieves) while others call the updates hollow and object to paid DLC heroes
- Patches: a co-op group reported each update made runs harder and diluted the reward pool, while others enjoy the added events
Repetition and friction
- Repeating the same three chapters, about 18 minutes each, many times to beat each difficulty; top difficulties feel slow and grindy
- Reduced XP on high difficulty means you barely level or find loot, leaving some players quitting after the first stage
- Losing long runs to disconnects or crashes, since there is no rejoin
- Scale-or-perish pacing: the timer forces fast snowballing, which some find stressful and punishing, especially when missing telegraphs under visual clutter
- Paid hero DLC on top of the base game irritates some players
Hoped-for improvements
- New maps, bosses and enemy factions, not just new heroes and skins; this is the most repeated request
- Reconnect and host-migration support plus more stable netcode and lobbies
- An endless or sandbox-style mode for power-fantasy play after the highest difficulty, plus more meaningful reasons to attempt higher difficulties
- Better onboarding and tutorials for items, map objectives and heroes
- Deeper build choice and wider use of the co-op combo mechanic from Romeo and Juliet across the cast
- Accessibility and platform fixes (colour-blind modes, Steam Deck resolution)
Launched in Early Access in 2023 and reached 1.0 on 26 Sep 2024 on PC, with PS5, Xbox, Switch versions and a Switch 2 release listed on Metacritic. Post-1.0 support includes the Nightmares Unleashed update (Jan 2025), the paid Merlin hero DLC (Jan 2026), the free Songs of Thieves update (27 May 2026, new Thieves faction, boss Stingy Jack, multiplayer pause) and a Kintaro hero DLC that Steam news lists for Oct 2026. Steam lists the price at $24.99. Patch notes through 1.4 and 1.5 mainly target network stability, reconnect pop-ups and bugs. Steam-side figures from third-party estimators (not audited): SteamSpy owners 200k to 500k, and steam-revenue-calculator estimates about $7.9M gross and $2.3M net revenue. OpenCritic score could not be located. Some recent negative Steam reviews accuse the developer of locking the discussion board and of slow content pace, while veteran players are fairly positive about the game today.
Community sources
- Local file of top helpful positive and negative English Steam reviews (18 each) ↗
- Local Steam data: review totals, price, release date, SteamSpy owners, revenue estimate ↗
- Metacritic page: Metascore 84 from 11 critics, user score 7.0 from 110 ratings, platforms ↗
- Critic outlet list with scores and gists ↗
- Metacritic user review breakdown and common praise and complaints ↗
- Steam news feed: updates, DLC (Merlin, Kintaro), Songs of Thieves, patch notes ↗
- Steam community hub: forum category sizes and pinned threads (Known Issues v1.5) ↗
- Third-party Boxleiter-method revenue estimate (gross about 7.88M, net about 2.32M) ↗
Archived creator commentary 1
Third-party summaries based on automatic captions may contain transcription or interpretation errors.
Tier list Part 2 (2024)
Ravenswatch is an Early Access action roguelike that he describes as essentially Diablo in roguelike form, with selectable heroes, big explorable maps, mini quests and random events. As a big Diablo fan he was excited, but he finds the gameplay clunky and the difficulty scaling poor. He thinks many issues are easy fixes and looks forward to the full release. For now he places it in mid B tier.
What the creator praises
- Visuals are great and capture the Diablo feel
- Classes/heroes appear to play very differently with many builds per character
- In-run roguelike elements (leveling abilities with unique attributes) are great
- Abilities are unique from one another
- Exploration with mini quests and random events on big maps
- Early Access, so he sees strong potential after fixes
Issues raised by the creator
- Clunky combat: attacks have long animations that cannot be cancelled
- Dash stores only one charge with about a 3 second cooldown, so players keep taking damage
- Higher difficulty scaling is poor: enemies become damage sponges and XP gain is reduced, slowing upgrades
- Bosses can take around five minutes, and one hit late can cost half your health
- No permanent roguelike meta-progression beyond unlocking characters and abilities
- Level cap of 8 per run leaves no reason to gain XP afterward
Design observations
- A Diablo-style action RPG recast as a roguelike with selectable classes
- Design lesson: difficulty should raise enemy challenge, not make players wait longer to upgrade
- Not every game needs meta-progression, but this one feels like it is missing it given sponge-like enemies
