Inscryption

Daniel Mullins' 2021 game is a deckbuilding roguelike for its first act and something else entirely afterwards, and describing what happens is the one thing reviewers agreed not to do. The opening is a card game played across a table from a figure in a dark cabin who will not let you leave: creatures cost sacrifices of other creatures, the scales tip toward whoever is dealing damage, and losing means having your photograph taken. The cabin itself is a first-person space you can stand up and search, which is where the game starts leaking. Mullins had already built two games about software that misbehaves, and this is the most disciplined version of that idea - the meta-narrative is structural rather than a gimmick, and the card game underneath remains genuinely strong throughout every form it takes. It won the 2021 IGF Grand Prize and a pile of narrative awards. Go in knowing nothing; a Kaycee's Mod endless mode was added later for people who wanted the pure roguelike.