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Following my time with more than 200 fresh titles this year, It's time to wrapping things up on 2025. My annual roundup is out in the world, and I am at peace with the concluding selections, accepting that a host of stellar titles likely fell through the cracks. At this point, it's job is to except relax, disconnect briefly, and maybe enjoy a nice walk in the— oh no, stumbled upon a great game. There go my plans!

A Surprising Front-Runner Appears

During my laid-back sessions, typically earmarked for a few oddball curiosities, I've discovered what might become my earliest beloved game of 2026. Sol Cesto is a distinctive procedural dungeon crawler for Windows PC that reimagines a conventional dungeon crawler into a luck-based game of high stakes peril and prize. Consider this a preview for the in-the-know: If you take pride in knowing about a game before it hits the mainstream, sample Sol Cesto so you can make a dent in your indie credit card.

A Strategic Roguelike Twist

Sol Cesto is a tactical roguelike that's unlike anything I've previously experienced. The concept is that you must venture into a dungeon, going down level by level on a quest for the sun, which has disappeared from the fantasy world. When you play, that makes for some standard crawl progression. Choose an adventurer with their own attributes and skills, defeat enemies on every stage of foes, acquire some permanent upgrades (which are teeth), and vanquish a few area guardians. Easy to grasp!

The Unique Gameplay Loop

The way you actually clear a area, however. Each instance you start another stage, the game presents a 4x4 grid of boxes. Every tile either contains a monster, a loot box, a trap, or a healing strawberry. To proceed, you choose on one of the horizontal lines, but which square you select is up to chance.

You may face a row with two monsters, a strawberry, and a reward box in it. You initially will have a one-in-four probability of selecting any given square in a row.

Subsequently, your probabilities change. So do you take the risk, or do you click on a safer line first and try to make less risky choices early? Herein lies the risk-reward dynamic on display in Sol Cesto, and it's captivating after you develop its rhythm.

Manipulating Probability

The roguelike twist is that your odds can be manipulated over the course of a session by gathering teeth that modify the types of squares you're drawn toward. As an instance, you could acquire a perk that will decrease your odds of landing on a trap, but will also decrease the odds of finding a treasure chest too.

• Crafting a loadout is about influencing the statistics optimally to have a higher chance at getting your desired outcome.
• During one attempt, I focused my power boosts toward melee prowess and chose every teeth possible that would increase my odds of landing on monsters of that variety.
• On a different attempt, I built my character around treasure chests and coupled it with a perk that would reduce the power of surrounding monsters whenever I opened a chest.

The strategic possibilities are limited, but it provides ample to experiment with to allow you to tweak the odds to your preference.

A Constant Tension

Of course, at its heart, it's a game of chance. There's always the chance that you have a high probability to hit the desired tile but ultimately choose on an enemy that would eliminate your last bit of health. Every move is a gamble, so a persistent nervousness exists as you clear a floor out and decide when to continue selecting or to proceed to the next floor as opposed to risking it all.

Items like enemy-killing bombs aid in reducing the chance, as do some special skills. One hero's special power, powered up by clearing four squares, lets gamers to select a column instead of a row during that action. If you play your cards right, you can reserve that option for a crucial point to sidestep a dangerous choice. There's a shocking level of strategy in the basic action of clicking.

Future Development

Sol Cesto is still in development, and it has a final update to go before the final game is unleashed. Another playable adventurer and a fresh guardian are scheduled to arrive sometime in January. The official version probably isn't far behind, but the game's developers haven't set a specific release window yet.

A Parting Endorsement

Whenever its 1.0 launch occurs, you should consider put Sol Cesto on your wishlist. For the past week, I've been thoroughly captivated with it, finding all of hidden nuances and banking my earned gold in each run to access a constant flow of permanent unlocks, including fresh adventurers and items purchasable while playing. As of now, I am yet to completed the dungeon, and I get the feeling I'll still be working on that task when 1.0 finally hits. Count me in for the entire experience.