With Balatro taking the world by storm, I’ve been on the hunt for more puzzle-focused roguelikes and roguelites. Hades, Dead Cells, and Risk of Rain will always be special, but too many of the genre’s stalwarts are all about combat. Trading cards for tiles, then, RoGlass is an incredibly unique roguelite that’s been around for a while, but only just managed to get a Steam demo. The best part, it absolutely rules.
Here’s how it works. RoGlass is a tile-based roguelite puzzle game where you need to place and expand your stained glass squares, getting as high a score as possible as you do so. You start with just a few tiles and spaces to work with, using each tile’s abilities in combination to unlock achievements tied to expanding your play area. From here you unlock more stained glass tiles, have more space to work with, and can rack up higher scores to unlock all 100 achievements. With Steam demos getting a big overhaul, the new RoGlass demo is very welcome.
RoGlass strings together a plethora of mini-challenges with the achievements, but still rewards you as your score gets higher and higher. While playing the demo I was quickly locked in a dance of considering what tiles I could use, where to place them, and which achievements to go for while trying to raise my score. It’s a little bit like how Tetris tells you what piece is coming next as you quickly plan where to place each block, but without nearly as much pressure.
Despite coming out in 2023 developer James Castle just released a free Steam demo, and RoGlass is already sneaking up on me as a totally sublime roguelite. It’s oddly relaxing, and alongside Balatro shows how roguelikes and roguelites can embrace a more chill gameplay loop.
RoGlass isn’t overly long and is laser-focused on its core premise, which is greatly to the game’s benefit. As you grow to understand tile combos, where they’re best placed, and how to best use what limited offerings you have, you enter a flow state not dissimilar to the one in Balatro. Now though, instead of spotting poker hand combos milliseconds after they appear, you know exactly where a tile needs to go for the best score.
Eventually, you’ll have more tiles to pick from and can even reroll your current offerings, and these are the types of meaningful changes you get as you play. RoGlass has a really good difficulty curve, as it gives you harder achievements and higher scores to reach while slowly upping how you get there. If you own a Steam Deck, I can see RoGlass being perfect for those lazy evenings.
The RoGlass demo is available now while the full game is 50% off, so expect to pay $4.99 / £4.35 until Monday August 19. You can check out the game right here.
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