The developers Shiny Shoe have revealed their hand on the upcoming DLC for roguelike deckbuilder Monster Train. It’ll be called The Last Divinity and you can try it out in a public beta through this weekend. Along with announcing the name of the DLC, Shiny Shoe have also revealed details about its new clan and features.

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Yesterday, Xbox Game Pass for PC got a couple of tasty additions to it’s already very good lineup of games. Everyone’s favourite new smash-hit murder ’em up Among Us has joined the party, along with RPS faves Monster Train and Wilmot’s Warehouse.

There’s a bunch more too, including The Dark Pictures Anthology: Man of Medan. Plenty to keep us all busy over the winter holidays then. (Or rather, plenty to distract me from playing the two giant new RPGs I don’t think I’ll ever finish.)

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Deck-building roguelikelike Monster Train last night officially launched its mod support, after a short beta, opening it up to all sorts of player-made newness. Possibilities include new cards, new monsters, new looks, and so on, and I see some folks have already made a whole new playable faction. After seeing how much Slay The Spire mods shook up that other card-slinging dungeon-crawl, I’m dead keen to see what happens here. I’m already digging that fan-made faction, the floor-shifting Arcadians.

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We’ve got some new passengers aboard the Monster Train, folks, so let’s clear some seats and make some room. The Friends & Foes update arrives today, bringing a party of new heroes aboard the one-way trip to hell – alongside two new baddies, a more chilled-out final boss, and some shiny new artifacts to pick up along the way. Choo-choo, deckbuilders.

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If a train of monsters riding through hell is too sensible for you, rejoice: you can now stick googly eyes on everyone Monster Train. Presumably inspired by the best Slay The Spire mod, the new option puts rolling googly eyes on all your monsters and enemies in battle (alas, not everyone on all screens, not like the Spire mod). Small. Pointless. Delightful. Pop into the settings menu, flick the switch, and get a-googling.

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Rejoice, for the Monster Train has been updated. Cry, for your favourite cards are probably worse now. Yesterday’s patch to Shiny Shoe’s splendid roguelike deckbuilder introduced optional mututators that tweak the rules for each run, but I’m more struck by the balance changes. Shiny Shoe say they’ve gone after “the outliers”, aiming for a state where choosing a certain card is “never a ‘no-brainer'”. That’s reasonable, but it does make me long for Dota’s balancing philosophy where buffs were always prioritised over nerfs.

It’s not all bad. Morsels look pretty strong now.

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Halloo, gentle reader. Since we’re half way through the entire year of 2020 (yet somehow it is also still March?), we decided to run down, lasso and tie up some of our favourite games from the last six months, and force them into a nice list for you.

2020 still has plenty of new PC games to come, of course, but these are the ones closest to our little hearts so far. We’ve got strategy, we’ve got card games, we’ve got systematic reclamation of scraped spaceships. And, since Nate Crowley is one of the contributors to this list, we’ve got fish. Statistically speaking, there’s bound to be at least one game on here that you’ll ruddy bloody love too!

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I am still very much riding the Monster Train. When you write a review as positive as the one I did for Shiny Shoe’s stupendous Slay The Spire-like, you do end up doubting yourself. Oh God, you think, what if it isn’t all that great, actually? What if this was one of those times where a game really specifically catered to my preferences, and my enthusiasm was overblown? What if I stop playing this in a few days, rather than the years (or at least months!) I anticipated. What if I’m bad, actually.

Yeah well forget that, because Monster Train is still ace. I want to talk more about why, and how other games can learn from it. There are loads of lessons I could choose from, but let’s start with clan combos. I think you could apply the principles here to almost any roguelike.

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Monster Train is a game about chuffing through the hills and vales of Hell while mincing up angels with your demonic fiends, angry plants and waxen gentry folk. As Matt has declared, it’s extremely good, and one of the things that I love about it is the way it escalates>. That train ride you’re on is a wild, careening one into multiplying attack and defence.

The result is a sense of soaring power. And the coal that fuels that engine is the fact you can upgrade your cards, giving them buffs and boosts that often feel like you’re breaking the game. Monster Train’s upgrades are great. (more…)

Two weeks ago, Monster Train breezed into my life like a man wearing a trenchcoat stuffed with cocaine. I’ve been playing Shiny Shoe’s roguelike deckbuilder almost every night since, and I have no intention of stopping.

I can’t believe I’m about to say this, but it’s at least as good as Slay The Spire.

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