As you progress you’ll gather experience and items that will stay with you even if you fail, allowing you to grow and improve. Maps have bosses, too, which you may often be forced to tackle early if you run out of ink to explore with. From power-ups and treasure to enemy encounters and fonts to replenish your health, there’s always something to work towards. Once painted, you can walk on them to reach points of interest. You will begin with a certain measure of ink, which allows you to fillin the blank spaces. At the beginning of each run it’s featureless save for the odd tantalising icon begging to be reached.

That said, you’ll spend as much time exploring the map as fighting on it. Learning when to risk an attack and when you need to block is the toughest aspect early on. It may not be quite as complex as some deckbuilding games, but it has enough elements that you won’t feel cheated out of a challenge. Roguebook makes you think, that’s for certain. These will apply various buffs or aids but can’t be used like the main characters. The only external help you’ll get comes in the form of summons. You can’t switch out during a run though, so be prepared before you begin. As you play through the story, two other characters will join Sharra and can be selected to accompany here instead of Sorocco. Enemies deal damage to the character in front, so a miscalculation can leave a vulnerable character exposed. Some allow you to hit multiple enemies, others only trigger as counter attacks. There are, of course, lots and lots of cards. In order to defend against an attack, you’ll need to play a defensive card with the character in the lead. Sirocco is tougher, with more defensive cards in his hand. For example Sharra is fast, deals heavy damage but can’t mitigate it well. Each has their own deck based on individual attack types. The former is the white-haired warrior that graces all the art the latter is a frog-like ogre. Of course, you’ll pick up new cards as you play, and new decks in the form of playable characters. You’ll find artefacts that carry forward through runs, level up your deck to give you more action points to play with. The roguelite element may not be wholly fresh, but it works wonderfully well alongside the card collecting element. A lot of it works, but some of it doesn’t. But here, there’s a definite sense that Abrakam have taken what they know and attempted to apply a degree of newness. Roguebook seems to be aiming closer to the middle ground between strategy and strong-arming, though it still remains much closer to the former.Ībrakam Entertainment are better known for their Faeria series, which in fairness isn’t a far cry from what’s on offer in Roguebook. But the simple truth I’d rather not admit is that I don’t have much of a head for tactics. I’ve played a few over the years, like Hearthstone, Gwent, and Slay the Spire. I’ve never really gotten my head around deckbuilders.

Roguebook skidrow