If you were building a Mount Rushmore of rougelike games, you’d have to by law put The Binding of Isaac up there. While the genre itself isn’t called ‘Isaaclikes’, you can still feel ripple effects of its influence in roguelikes years later. With that high of a standard set, I had really high hopes for Mewgenics, the next roguelike from the creator of The Binding of Isaac. Now that a few of us at Palette Swap have played quite a bit of it, I think we can agree that those expectations have absolutely been met.

I remember back when Mewgenics was first announced, and reading Game Informer talking about the upcoming new project and getting relatively excited for it. The initial version of the game still operated under the same concept: you would breed cats, trying to build up a collection of high stats and circumstances to create the best cat army you could. It wasn’t until development restarted around 2018 that the game shifted into the tile-tactics roguelike it is today.

I was given an opportunity to send a few questions to Edmund McMillen and Tyler Glaiel, the developers of Mewgenics. I wanted to find out more about the route Mewgenics has taken through its development, what outside influences have altered the path of Mewgenics since its inception, and whether or not they’ll tell me any crazy unlock conditions for additional content (spoiler: they did not spill the beans on this one).

Q: I want to talk about the sort of twisting development path Mewgenics has had. It was announced initially back in 2012 then put on ice for a while, then brought back with the change over to the turn-based system we see in the final game. How does it feel finally being at the end of that road with the game coming out imminently?

Ed: Very very exciting… The last few weeks have been a serious hype ride.

Tyler: Yeah I’m starting to feel the excitement but I still gotta be chill about it so I can finish the last few bits and pieces.

Q: In 2013 (on the Mewgenics blog), you talked about how Mewgenics was “feature creep: the game”. You mention something similar in the NoClip mini doc about how chock full of stuff Mewgenics is. What was your way to balance that feature creep into cohesive systems that all worked together?

Ed: I mean once we had the systems locked into place and knew stuff was going to work, the more we could add to each one the better. I think we just came up with realistic and doable numbers for each system and just made it happen. We knew the meat and potatoes lied in the class abilities so we locked down 75 for each early on, originally we hoped to have 100 events and 400 items and ended with 200 events and 950 items. I think feature creep for a game like this is fine as long as you can get what you can in by release!

Tyler: Yeah when you divide content up by classes and areas, the amount of stuff feels more manageable and it gives a good template for adding new stuff in a way that adds to the game instead of muddling things up.

Q: Were there any outside influences since its inception that altered the direction of the final version of Mewgenics?

Ed: yeah board games. The last 10 years of my life has been heavily focused on table top RPGs and board games, I just love their systems a ton and traditional video games just haven’t been scratching that itch for me, I think the board game influence is obvious in [Mewgenics]. Magic the gathering, Dnd, DCC, Kingdom Death, Blood Bowl, Warhammer.. The list goes on.

Tyler: Ed should probably also mention how him being a parent shifted a bunch of the themes from just cats to parenthood and legacy as well, especially when we started adding the Disorders to the game.

Q: There were a lot of different side-games originally planned for Mewgenics: cat races, pageants, Pokémon style fights. Is there a chance we could see any of these come back in the form of DLC down the line, or are those ideas staying behind with the old idea for the game?

Ed: Yeah I mean we had a few prototyped when we restarted [development] 6 years ago, I have a feeling a DLC could bring them back to the surface, once everything else we want to do is in.  

Tyler: It’s possible. But adding those back in in DLC would come at the expense of “other stuff”. Since each minigame would probably take around a month of work total to polish completely.

Q: The Binding of Isaac has some absolutely ridiculous unlock paths for some of its content (The Forgotten is a good example, I’m 200 hours in and still don’t have that dude). Does Mewgenics have any similar insane steps for unlocking aspects of the game? Do you think there’s things the community will go years not noticing?

Ed: I’m not answering that! I will say there are so many very rare aspects to this game you could play for 1000s of hours and only see something once, or not at all.

Tyler: I will say though we do try to be clear with what you need to do for general progression through the game.

Q: Is there any way to memorialize your favorites in-game, or do you just have to go off the memories you had with them (and maybe a screenshot or two)?

A: Oh yes, your family tree will live inside each cat’s DNA, as long as you keep a blood line going the family tree visual will be there as a reminder of your past runs.

Q: In one random encounter, I ran into a reference to Junji Ito’s The Enigma of Amigara Fault, which isn’t something I was expecting in a million years, and I was in stitches when I ended up with a cat that looked like a stretched out nightmare. When crafting the random encounters, was there a philosophy you had for what would work and what wouldn’t?

Ed: Events are a fun dice roll to an otherwise very very structured game, they add chaos/fun/excitement to runs in ways most people won’t fully appreciate till they play the game, outside of using them for lore/world building and introducing very rare disorders and items the only rule we had was we never fully kill a cat within one… Well unless you critically fail that one even you mentioned. But that’s a fate worse than death.  

Tyler: Generally the events here are meant to flavor the adventure, give you some unexpected problems to overcome or deal with from fight to fight or just to help these cats make their adventures their own.

Q: Just to give an example of how out there the cat synergies can get, what is the most game-breaking combination of cats you’ve seen?

Ed: There is a passive that lets you place bear traps where you attack.. And a crown that makes your basic attack deal 1 damage to every tile on the playfield…

Q: I ran into Steven. Am I a bad person?

Ed: The fact that you have talked to Steven doesn’t make you a bad person, it just proves you are a person.

Tyler: Who’s Steven?

Mewgenics has been a blast to get through so far; every new run has felt fresh and exciting, and every success (or failure) has the juice to make you want to instantly run it back as soon as you finish. The average time to get the true ending is 200 hours, which sounds shocking, but I can easily see those numbers racking up extremely fast, and I’m looking forward to seeing where Mewgenics can go next.

Mewgenics is available on Steam today.

The post The ‘Mewgenics’ Team on Inspirations, Feature Creep, and Whether or Not I’m a Bad Person appeared first on Palette Swap.

NEW YORK — A third-grader at P.S. 151 Mary D. Carter in Queens had an unusual excuse for why they hadn’t uploaded their weekend Language Arts homework after heavy snow shifted New York City public schools’ Jan. 26 classes to remote learning.

“My Digimon ate it!” Tatum Bellucci-Barton, 9, reportedly told their teacher. “I scanned the worksheet like you said, but then Elecmon popped up on the computer screen and chewed it up!” When asked for the physical worksheet, Bellucci-Barton explained, “Elecmon liked the file so much that he jumped out of the computer to eat the real sheet, but I guess paper doesn’t taste as good as data, so he spit it out and zapped it into dust.”

Digimon, or “digital monsters,” are the titular focus of a media franchise that originated in Japan with a line of virtual pets in 1997. Bellucci-Barton’s teacher, Daisy Asaji, 34, a fan of the franchise herself, was surprised to hear it be referenced by someone so young.

“There’s a fascinating irony to coming up with such an elaborate story to get out of diagramming five sentences,” Asaji mused. “But the thing that really gets me is, Digimon was already Pokémon’s Hydrox at its peak—now they barely do anime dubs. How does an American nine-year-old even know what a Digimon is to tell this lie? Did that unnecessary Adventure reboot really hit with Gen Alphas?”

Steve Bellucci, 38, Bellucci-Barton’s father and a cybersecurity consultant, says neither Digimon nor dishonesty were things his child would’ve learned about at home.

“All the tech-for-its-own-sake integrations we’ve seen in American education, not to mention the encroachment of so-called ‘A.I.’ into every aspect of our digital lives, and we’re surprised a kid constantly exposed to that is aware of Digimon?” scoffed Bellucci via video call from his home office while subtly nudging a Digimon Story Time Stranger Collector’s Edition Jupitermon figurine out of frame. “Seems to me like this call might be coming from inside the schoolhouse.”

At press time, authorities have received multiple reports of a “rotting blob monster” by Newtown Creek and an “angel with a bo staff” in Calvary Cemetery.

The post Remote Learning Student Claims Digimon Ate Their Homework appeared first on Palette Swap.

CLEVELAND — When asked if there was anything he would change about his 94-year-long life, a man with mere days left to live revealed that he harbored just one regret.

“I wish I had spent more time memorizing boss battle attack patterns,” said Victor Lemort, surrounded by grieving loved ones. “Money, power, happiness, love? Those are all fleeting. That feeling when you run back into a boss battle that felt impossible at first, but this time you only take two or three hits because you put a bunch of effort into remembering the attacks the boss does and planned around them? Now that’s time well spent.”

Lemort was an active gamer until he contracted his terminal illness. Nevertheless, death’s imminence left him wishing he had played even more video games with bosses you have to fight over and over again until you can recognize the five or six different things they can do.

“Back in the day I was a Mega Man guy. In my later years I played all the Dark Souls. Sometimes I’d have to fight a boss 20 or 30 times, spending hours studying their attack patterns, before I stood a chance. Now that was living,” Lemort said, as his granddaughter left his hospital room in a flurry of tears. “Sometimes I’d get to the boss room and die to its first couple attacks. Then the game would reload and I’d have to run back to the boss, having gained nothing. I probably spent hours of my life just reloading and running back to boss fights. Looking back, I wish I had gotten to do that even more. Were kids really the right choice for me?”

One of Lemort’s nurses was touched by his words and committed to spending more time memorizing boss attack patterns herself.

“I used to think Lies of P looked a little derivative of games I’d already played. It seemed like there were probably better ways to spend my time,” she said. “Now I know the hours and hours it will take to memorize the different ways the guys I have to fight slash their swords is what makes life worth living.”

At press time, Lemort had reportedly passed. According to those present, he used his last words to share that he also wished he had spent more time reading JRPG dialogue and completing various fetch quests in open-world games.

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Mewgenics was never on my radar. I didn’t follow Edmund McMillen’s past work, and I haven’t gotten into The Binding of Isaac. But, if you show me something that:

1. Has tiles
2. Is a roguelike

I’m probably going to like it! So, after hearing it was a “tactical RPG roguelike,” I was paying attention.

After playing it for 58 hours, Mewgenics frustrated me a ton. Mistakes are heavily punished, and carry heavy consequences. And with over 200 hours of main campaign content, it will be a while before I see the end. Yet, it’s a wholly unique experience, and as I write I want nothing more than to jump back in and play it right now.

Tactical Tiles

The moment-to-moment gameplay of Mewgenics is a tactical RPG. The battlefields themselves are quite small-scale, but the damage numbers and scaling feel at home with a proper tactics RPG. Think the arena of Into the Breach with the damage numbers and class system of Fire Emblem.

Speaking of which, the mixing and matching of classes is one of the most fun parts of the gameplay. Every class has a different style of basic attack, and a different pool of abilities to pull from. You start with the basic attack, one active ability, and one passive ability, and draft the rest of the abilities as your cats level up.

The name of the game here is combos. There are no end-all be-all abilities that will make everything easy, or that you’ll want to take 100% of the time. In every great roguelike, the answer to every question is “it depends.” I’m happy to report Mewgenics follows in the footsteps of those greats.

As you navigate a run, you’ll go to different combat arenas, shops, and events. These events often come with choices: do you sacrifice half your HP for an unknown benefit? Do you try to pass this skill check, despite there being literal stink lines coming off your cat’s stats? It’s tough to know, and the wrong choice can doom your whole run, or worse.

Roguelike… Roguelite… Rogue-ish?

The progression of Mewgenics is hard to describe. Send cats on tactical adventures that almost always yield some forward momentum. Unlock new locations, classes, and items. This is happening constantly. But, you will undoubtedly return to the same locations across multiple runs, using those new classes and items to complete quests and learn new things.

After those runs, though, Mewgenics’s hook really begins. Not only can you keep items in storage, but your cats will breed to help create your next run’s chosen ones. You’ll also need to find food and money along the way to help keep the next generation full and focused.

I was never much of a Chao Garden guy, so it surprised me how invested I was in the breeding aspects. It was fun to see what little monsters my kitty crew would create — and what random names they would get.¹ It was a little awkward playing on the Steam Deck and knowing the guy next to me on the plane was watching these cats get it on, but I’m sure he would’ve understood if I told him “it was for stats.”²

Something that struck me most about this strange hybrid structure was the way it makes each run feel so consequential. When I’m playing Slay the Spire, for instance, I live my life a quarter mile at a time, almost always choosing the riskier, higher-payoff option. I either win this run or I start over, so who cares?

In Mewgenics, I was a lot more calculated. I need to get these guys home safe, because I need them to defend the house. I want them to pass on a strong ability, stat, or mutation. This cat is named “Little Man,” and that’s fucking awesome. If something were to happen to him, I’d end it all. Whatever the reason, I almost always felt a strong attachment to my cat squadron, and felt like I was calculating risk in a much different way than other roguelites.

Eternal Life

Above, you’ll see my save file. You’ll notice that aforementioned 58 hours, along with a number that may terrify you: 38% complete. I cannot believe those numbers are staring at me right now. If you are like me³, that combination of numbers might terrify you, too. But Mewgenics makes the most of every hour.

Sure, there’s a ton to see. But even without unlocking everything, there’s plenty of times you could call it quits. There’s no rush to get to the end. There’s no cutscenes with key exposition you forget if you set it down for a few months. Take your time! Hop in for a run or two every week! Maybe spend a couple hours at a time managing your cats in the house to breed your perfect soldiers with dragon wings and ADHD!

As with any roguelike, there’s bound to be plenty of repetition during this long runtime. Luckily, it’s got an incredible soundtrack to keep you humming along to. Seriously, these songs are catchy. In a genre where I usually put in earbuds with a podcast, I was turning up the volume on the Steam Deck and humming along.

Mewgenics is abrasive. There’s a ton of mechanics and combinations for both the players and enemies, losing always has permanent consequences, and it feels like the mountaintop is still so far, despite the time I’ve put in. There will be some people who just don’t click with this game.

Luckily, I’m not “some people,” and I think it’s fantastic. Let’s go 150 more hours till that file says 100%, baby.

The post Mewgenics is Unforgiving, Unrelenting, and Never-Ending. I Love It. appeared first on Palette Swap.

SAN MATEO, Calif. — After hearing that Nintendo Switch lifetime sales figures had finally breached 155 million units, executives at Sony were anxiously trying to decide whether or not to hit the big red button that unveils a bunch of previously unreported PlayStation 2 sales again.

“Anytime the competition gets close, I press this button, and somehow a janitor finds a bunch of old receipts in our warehouse,” explained Hideaki Nishino, CEO of Sony Interactive Entertainment. “Suddenly, it looks like we might have sold another five million PS2s and just not said anything to anyone. But it could always be more, depending. I would still like to congratulate the Nintendo Switch on being the best selling Nintendo console of all time, and let’s leave it at that, shall we?”

Many gamers were bewildered by the new developments.

“Are people just buying PS2s instead of PS5s or something?” read a response on Bluesky. “You have to wonder where this is all coming from. I mean, nobody could have predicted this. The GameCube lost in sales to the PS2 big time, but like, that’s over and done with. Why are they still trying to compete? The console wars are over, man.”

Nintendo responded in kind with additional information.

“Well, well, well, would you look at that,” said Nintendo President Shuntaro Furukawa. “I think we forgot to carry the one here, and… yeah, my math was totally off. We actually sold, like, ten million more units than I thought. My B. So yeah, make sure you write that down. 165 million units. Way more than the PlayStation 2. And if I hear anything otherwise I may have to check my math again.”

At press time, Sony unveiled plans to just release the PlayStation 2 again in lieu of new hardware.

The post Sony Exec Nervously Hovering Finger Over Additional PS2 Sales Button appeared first on Palette Swap.

LOS ANGELES — Fresh off of breakout appearances in hit games Dead by Daylight, and Fortnite, Ghostface has landed a role in the upcoming Scream 7, sources confirmed. 

“Good for him branching out into other media,” said horror fan Shawn Greene. “I always wanted to know more about him after he showed up in a few of my favorite games. I wonder if he will be playing a good guy or a bad guy? Maybe he’s the new lead, since they fired Melissa Barrera for vocally opposing the genocide in Gaza. Ghostface better not use that silly voice of his to speak up for Palestinians. They’ll can his ass.” 

Many fans of Ghostface’s various video game appearances were skeptical that he had the acting chops to transition to film. 

“Crossing over into movies isn’t for everybody,” said skeptical gamer Lizzy Ward. “Mario and Sonic did okay, but those were animated films where they were merely voicing characters. Ghostface is going to have to actually act. I’m surprised they didn’t want to cast a more well established presence, but oh well. Oh, and I think Lara Croft is going to be great as Gail Weathers’ newest on-air competitor. Or was that a Fortnite thing I read about?”

Regardless of some fans’ skepticism, the film’s director assured fans that the franchise was in good hands. 

“People have been saying this movie is doomed, and I can’t wait to prove them wrong,” said director Kevin Williamson. “Sure, the lead from our last installment got fired because of her support of Palestine way back in 2023. Sure, no horror franchise has ever stayed good for seven movies. And sure, the casting of Ghostface is a little stunt-y. But uh, you know. Just please go see it. We gotta pay for this damn Skeet Ulrich hologram that cost more than Skeet Ulrich would have.”

As of press time, when asked for a comment about the role in Scream 7, Ghostface just kept asking us about our favorite horror films. 

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