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Following my time with well over 200 fresh titles this year, It's time to wrapping things up on 2025. My annual roundup is out in the world, and I feel content with the concluding selections, despite being aware numerous excellent games likely fell through the cracks. At this point, it's job is to except relax, unplug a little, and possibly go for a pleasant stroll in the— oh no, discovered one more amazing experience. And just like that, goodbye to my peaceful respite!

A Surprising Contender Emerges

In my more laid-back sessions, often set aside for a few oddball curiosities, I've come across potentially my first favorite game of 2026. Sol Cesto is a distinctive procedural dungeon crawler for Windows PC that breaks down a conventional labyrinth explorer into a chance-driven game of high stakes risk and reward. Take this as an early adopter's heads-up: If you take pride in knowing about a game before it's popular, test out Sol Cesto so you can burn a spot in your indie credit card.

A Strategic Genre Subversion

Sol Cesto is a thought-provoking procedural game that's a departure from all I've previously experienced. The setup is that you are tasked with descending into a dungeon, descending floor after floor on a quest for the sun, which has vanished from the fantasy world. Mechanically, this creates some familiar roguelike structure. Pick a hero who has parameters and powers, clear floor after floor of enemies, acquire some permanent upgrades (represented as teeth), and defeat a few stage-ending champions. Straightforward, right!

The Unique Gameplay Loop

The way you actually clear a chamber, though. Each instance you start another stage, you're shown a sixteen-square board of boxes. All spaces either contains a monster, a treasure chest, a trap, or a life-giving berry. To proceed, you choose on one of the four rows, but the exact space you land in is a matter of probability.

You may face a row with multiple foes, a strawberry, and a reward box in it. You initially will have a quarter likelihood of hitting a particular space in a row.

Subsequently, your odds shift. So do you take the risk, or do you choose on a alternative option first and attempt some less risky choices early? This is the push-your-luck gameplay in action in Sol Cesto, and it's captivating once you get a feel for it.

Shaping the Odds

The roguelike twist is that your probabilities can be influenced during an attempt by picking up teeth that modify the types of squares you're drawn toward. To illustrate, you could acquire a perk that will lower your chances of landing on a trap, but will similarly reduce the odds of landing on a reward too.

• Crafting a loadout is about manipulating math optimally to have a better shot at getting your desired outcome.
• During one attempt, I invested my power boosts toward melee prowess and chose every teeth I could that would increase my odds of attracting me toward monsters aligned with that strength.
• During a separate session, I built my character around reward boxes and coupled it with a perk that would weaken adjacent enemies every time I opened a chest.

The strategic possibilities are not endless, but they are sufficient to experiment with to let you manipulate probabilities the way you want.

A Persistent Gamble

Naturally, at its heart, it's a game of chance. There's always the chance that you have a likely outcome to select the square you want but ultimately choose on an enemy that would deplete your last bit of health. Every move is a gamble, so a persistent nervousness exists as you work through a stage and determine if to continue selecting or when to move on to the subsequent stage as opposed to pushing your luck.

Tools such as destructive ordnance assist in minimizing the chance, similar to some hero powers. A particular character's signature move, activated once selecting four tiles, allows players to click on a column instead of a row on a turn. If you play this move wisely, you can save that move for an optimal time to sidestep a dangerous choice. There's a shocking amount of nuance in the seemingly straightforward task of clicking.

Looking Ahead

Sol Cesto is still in early access, and it has a final update planned before the full version is released. An additional hero and a new boss are planned for release before the conclusion of January. The full launch probably isn't far behind, but the game's developers haven't announced a final date yet.

A Parting Recommendation

No matter when its 1.0 launch occurs, you might want to put Sol Cesto in your sights. I have been completely engrossed with it, discovering its small details and storing my run rewards every session to unlock a steady stream of permanent unlocks, featuring new characters and items purchasable mid-attempt. As of now, I am yet to reached the bottom, and I suspect I will remain pursuing that objective when 1.0 finally hits. Count me in for the complete journey.