Rogue Legacy, the excellent rogue-lite platformer from way back in 2013, is finally getting a sequel. Developer Cellar Door Games first teased Rogue Legacy 2 on April 1st, before confirming that it was no joke the next day.
The original Rogue Legacy was one of the early members of a roguelike resurgence that started in the 2010s, bringing the merciless rules of roguelike games into other genres and introducing the slightly more forgiving concept of the rogue-lite. Fellow early-2010s roguelikes Risk of Rain and Enter the Gungeon have also gotten sequels recently, but where they’ve branched out into entirely different types of games, Rogue Legacy 2 looks like it will be focused on refining the formula of the original. Featuring incredibly tough enemies, perma-death, and randomized levels on each run, the roguelike trend continues to this day, with popular games like Dead Cells and Slay the Spire.
Cellar Door’s April 1st tease looked like it may have just been a cruel April Fools’ Day joke, but fortunately the developer followed it up with details and screenshots of its Rogue Legacy sequel. Much like in the first game, Rogue Legacy 2 players will control a whole family of adventurers working to defeat a series of challenging bosses, taking over as the descendant of their previous character after each death. Every character has randomly generated traits that can be helpful or harmful, but this time negative traits will award bonus gold, adding a new element of trading risk for reward. Also returning from the first game are Judson Cowen and A Shell in the Pit, the composers of Rogue Legacy’s soundtrack.
Although it looks like Rogue Legacy 2 will feel very familiar to returning players, lots of things are changing, too. The class system from the first game is being expanded to include unique equipment for each class, and players will now be able to stack an infinite number of upgrades in the form of runes if they take the time to earn them all. The most obvious change comes from Rogue Legacy 2’s new art style, which replaces the original’s pixel art with an eye-catching hand-drawn style. Cellar Door Games says that there’s a lot more new content in store that it will share as the game gets closer to release. While Rogue Legacy 2 doesn’t have a solid launch date yet, the game’s Steam page lists it as summer 2020.
Cellar Door’s last game, the co-op action RPG Full Metal Furies, was great in its own right, but the announcement of Rogue Legacy 2 looks like it’s already drawing a lot more attention. Rogue Legacy was an important game for a lot of players, introducing many to modern roguelikes, and its sequel looks like it’s on its way to being a worthy successor.
Source: Cellar Door Games