As We Descend is a strategy game fan’s Slay the Spire

Hands-on with Box Dragon’s fresh take on roguelike deckbuilding

Box Dragon / Coffee Stain Publishing

In roguelike deckbuilders, you often delve into dungeons all by yourself with a single character as in genre staple Slay the Spire. Titles like Monster Train have modified the formula a little bit, using the deckbuilding aspect to build what is essentially a tower defense game. As such, Box Dragon is keeping well within traditional lines with its upcoming genre representative, As We Descend – a more strategic take on the well-known gameplay formula.

I got to meet Kevin Chang, the game director for As We Descend, at Gamescom 2024 to get a little hands-on time with the title and chat about Box Dragon’s plans for its contender in a highly competitive genre. If the name sounds familiar to you, your memory is sound: Chang is one of the developers we spoke to about how Early Access and demos are changing the indie market earlier this year.

The very first thing you’ll notice about As We Descend when jumping into a battle is how the map is structured – it’s not simply your guy on the left and the bad guys on the right with your hand of cards in-between on the bottom of the screen. Well, that last detail is still true. As We Descend makes it very clear right from the start simply through its perspective that it’s a different type of game, putting you into the bird’s eye view that’s so typical for strategy games of any kind.

This is not just an artistic choice: The map in As We Descend is divided into different zones that essentially wrap around your core – the structure you need to protect – like a defensive shell. In these zones, you can place your units. That’s right: You’re leading a small army consisting of a variety of troop types and it’s these units that contribute cards to your deck. Positioning is very important in this game: Naturally, melee units need to be in the closest area to the enemy to be at their most effective, while it’s usually wise to keep ranged units away from the frontlines – though sometimes you’ll want to get them nice and close for a point-blank shot that deals extra damage. 

Not your typical perspective for a roguelike deckbuilder, is it? / Box Dragon / Coffee Stain Publishing

Enemies will use their own abilities to target different zones with attacks like you’d see in Darkest Dungeon, so keeping your troops mobile and darting in and out of the danger zone is something you need to consider. Box Dragon is aiming to make As We Descend “a more tactical experience” than something like Slay the Spire.

And if you’re now worried that this sounds like the sort of sweaty micromanagement you’d have to do in a competitive RTS, don’t be: As We Descend is still a turn-based game. Enemy intention will be broadcast, so you have all the time you need to lay your plans.

Battles feel quite dynamic with the player being able to influence enemy actions, such as by staggering them through dealing enough damage. Some enemy types react differently to that, but basic foes will either be stunned for a turn if you leave them after staggering them or suffer a guaranteed critical hit if you want to press your advantage – it’s a meaningful choice. “We wanted to keep this aggressive, push-forward type of combat to make sure that the game changes on your turn, so that you don’t get stuck at any point,” Chang explains. “The game has more of an offensive spin to it.”

Bosses may instead initiate a counter-attack, so it’s important to know your enemy and plan around that, the game director emphasizes.

As We Descend always gives players a good way to use up all their energy each turn. Barriers, for example, partly stick around after being cast in this game, unlike in titles such as Slay the Spire. Even if you’re getting a hand of defensive cards and the enemy isn’t planning on attacking you that turn, it doesn’t feel like a waste to use them – you still get a return on your investment.

As is tradition, battle will reward you with some goodies to help you on your run. As the name suggests, As We Descend is all about delving deeper into ancient ruins and extracting things from them – treasure, relics, and so forth. And get this: They don’t even make you choose – you get to take all that stuff you just risked your life for back home with you. That makes more sense when you realize that the battle I just fought was an optional expedition, not a mandatory fight.

Each unit in the game comes with its own expandable mini-deck. / Box Dragon / Coffee Stain Publishing

The bounties of your expedition can be used once you’ve returned to your hub area, the city. It’s actually this humble town that descends into the ruins, but that’s a different story. Here you will encounter a bunch of NPCs, which can make use of the materials you gathered to provide you with all sorts of useful benefits – and that’s where the game asks you to make crucial choices.

“A big thing I focus on in As We Descend is making sure it’s not just about drafting cards, it’s also about drafting units – there are all sorts of sub-choices within the game,” the director says.

It is in this hub area where you recruit units, customize their card decks, get upgrades, solve event encounters, and so forth. You can even revive fallen troops in town, though this comes at the cost of resources or permanent injuries, which degrade their performance over time. The city is also your source of Favor, one of the secondary resources you can use up in battle – it allows you to throw away a card and draw a different one at any point.

“Our game has a lot of card types in it, so this is just to smooth out the RNG a little bit and add more depth to the game,” Chang explains.

Once you’re done preparing, you can end the current cycle and the city will descend into the next biome below, though you’ll first have to defend it against invaders.

As We Descend currently has something like 13 different troop types, but Chang says that it’ll probably be between 18 and 20 at launch. For him, this variety is another advantage of the RTS direction as opposed to the more traditional RPG way, which is limited by character archetypes. “We said, ‘Hey, you don’t just pick one character and their deck, you pick seven different characters with their own mini-decks,’ basically,” he says. “A lot of other roguelike deckbuilder devs have struggled with adding another class to their game.”

Events will deliver some lore and story elements in the town as well, though immersing yourself in the world is always optional. / Box Dragon / Coffee Stain Publishing

Like Age of Empires or Civilization, As We Descend will have different factions that share some of their units and mechanics, but come with a few unique troop types and different city systems. For now, three of these factions are planned, so there’ll be plenty of replayability value in the title.

Much of the impetus to make As We Descend so RTS-inspired was Chang’s love for the genre, but the game always was destined to be something strategic. “You won’t believe it, but early on we were a 4X roguelike deckbuilder,” he reveals. “And now on Steam we actually see like ten of these games, so in a way, I’m super happy that we will have the RTS direction.” The game was also originally planned to be non-violent, “but the more we played with it, the more we realized players just didn’t get the struggle. They didn’t get the friction, the tension. Not having combat really threw people off.”

Box Dragon’s lead artist, formerly of Riot Games, gave the team the final push to commit to the RTS direction by providing a strong art style to bring it to life. “I think without that hook, we probably would not lean so much into the heavy strategy direction,” Chang says.

“If you look at the existing roguelike deckbuilders, they’re either more like an RPG or like Civ – it’s super zoomed in or super zoomed out,” he continues. It’s the space in-between As We Descend aims to inhabit.

Chang says that titles like Slay the Spire and Monster Train “are really strategy games at their core, but I don’t think everyone engages with those games that way.” 

This is why the visual impact I mentioned earlier is so important and so well-executed by the team: One look tells you what this game is and sets expectations accordingly. “If I make my game look like a strategy game,” Chang reasons, “I think they will get it.”

Chang and his team have not quite decided on whether or not they want to do Early Access, but you can already wishlist As We Descend on Steam and sign up for its closed beta. As a strategy game fan, this is the roguelike deckbuilder to keep your eye on right now.