Recent reviews by Water Cat

Read my full review here:

https://watercat5.tumblr.com/post/170737269079/why-slay-the-spire-isnt-good

I'll sum up my thoughts since my review is about 7000 words long.

Slay the Spire is a deck-building roguelite in which you climb procedurally generated levels, facing off against enemies in turn-based combat.

Pros:
-Very well-done and informative UI
-Weekly updates
-Interesting art style
-A large variety of cards and relics to ensure no run is the same

Cons:
-Slow, easy, and monotonous combat
-Generally boring early game
-Overly simplistic enemy design
-Sometimes unfair enemies
-Building a deck is frustrating due to design and RNG
-Although decks are often different, the simplistic mechanics makes many decks play the same

Slay the Spire is well-crafted, but the core design decisions trivialize many parts of the game. Combat is simple and largely just a basic math puzzle. Enemies are too obvious and sometimes unfairly punishing. Designing a deck is a frustrating experience due to RNG and the game's progression, and even when it works out, using it is still unsatisfying due to the simplistic combat.

Overall, the game is fairly mediocre to play. If you enjoy card games a lot, or you like to play games over and over to try and get things just right, you might like Slay the Spire. There is also some novelty to it, and many players will likely spend 30 or more hours before coming bored. I grew tired of it after about 10-15, so it wasn't worth the money to me.

However, if you are looking for a game that allows you to draft cleverly constructed decks and play them against enemies that respond in kind, you are much better off looking at standard TCG games.

As I discuss in my review, the developers are unlikely to be able to make significant changes to make the game better without overhauling their card system. They are planning to add more characters, so that should extend the longevity of the game some.

For me the game wasn't really worth it, but I can see why some people would like it, especially if you haven't played a lot of similar card games. I don't think the game is good from a design standpoint, but as you can tell from the rest of the reviews, people tend to like it.

If you do take the time to read my review, please let me know what you thought!