Even after spending literally hundreds of hours in Slay the Spire over the past six years, I don't think I ever expected to see a sequel. This is a game that kickstarted a genre, but to my mind the entire roguelike deckbuilding craze was surplus to requirements after Slay the Spire perfected the whole thing.
You might imagine, then, that after years of silence around its next project, the news that developer MegaCrit was developing Slay the Spire 2 would feel like a mixed blessing. If the first game had "perfected" an entire genre, why would I need a sequel? Slay the Spire, like most roguelikes, is a game about attempting to achieve the same goal over and over again, adapting to the obstacles and opportunities that the game throws your way.
That tends to mean that throughout the genre, expansion tends to triumph over reiteration when it comes to keeping games alive for longer. Exceptions to that rule certainly exist, and I'm looking forward to seeing how Hades 2 builds on the narrative elements of its predecessor. But there's not a huge amount in Slay the Spire 2's trailer to justify its existence as a full-fledged sequel – a new class and new art are very much the headline features, and that could prove a tough sell.
Hello… again
Dig just a little deeper, however, and the most interesting aspect of this sequel jumps out. The story of Slay the Spire is far from its greatest selling point, but a fascinating, mythical lore underwrites the game; the steady realization of the many, many times that you've climbed the tower, the avian and reptilian cults that haunt and hinder you on your way up; the mysterious conflict between the corrupt Heart of the Spire and your equally mysterious cetacean benefactor, Neow.
Neow, who helps you on your way each time you ascend the Spire, is at the heart of what interests me the most about this sequel. Slay the Spire 2 is set 1,000 years after the events of the first game, and Neow – who brings you back after each run and only rests when you've defeated the game's final boss – is here to greet you once again. The exactitudes behind your own longevity remains to be discovered, but it seems clear that this benevolent whale overlord is an important part of it.
The story of that missing millennium seems likely to be a crucial aspect of Slay the Spire 2. Your 1,000-year absence seems to have allowed the enemies that once beset you to evolve and mutate – even with the sequel's new art, it's clear that some of these enemies are those you faced before, altered from those original forms but still recognisable. Encounters speak of the extreme age of the inhabitants of the tower, the evil of their centuries-long lifespans seemingly built into the brickwork.
The deep lore of Slay the Spire is unlikely to be what brings new or returning players to its sequel in their droves. But this kind of drip-fed storytelling is what's drawn me to some of my favorite roguelikes, and kept me coming back to them. These mythologies are present in the likes of The Binding of Isaac and Hades, a treasure trail of tiny stories for those who wish to seek them out. Despite no single roguelike deckbuilder ever capturing my attention in the way that Slay the Spire managed to in 2017, the promise of another crumb of this narrative will bring me straight back to the Spire.
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