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Following my time with well over 200 new releases this year, I am officially wrapping things up on 2025. My best-of compilation is published, and I'm satisfied with the concluding selections, despite being aware plenty of stellar titles likely fell under the radar. Now, there's plan is to but sit back, take a short break, and maybe enjoy a nice walk in the— ah crap, found another great game. So much for my peaceful respite!

A Premature Front-Runner Appears

With my off-hours play, often set aside for a selection of unusual games, I've come across what might become my initial top game of 2026. Sol Cesto is a peculiar roguelike for Windows PC that reimagines a traditional dungeon crawler into a chance-driven game of major consequence danger and payoff. View this a hipster's insider tip: If you relish in knowing about a game before it's popular, test out Sol Cesto so you can make a dent in your wallet for unique titles.

A Strategic Genre Subversion

Sol Cesto is a strategy-focused dungeon crawler that's unlike anything I'm familiar with. The setup is that you must venture into a dungeon, progressing deeper and deeper to find the sun, which has gone missing from its world. When you play, that makes for some familiar roguelike structure. Select a character who has parameters and powers, fight through each level of foes, acquire some permanent upgrades (in the form of teeth), and overcome a few biome bosses. Simple enough!

The Novel Gameplay Loop

The way you truly navigate a dungeon room, is unique. Whenever you enter a new floor, you're shown a sixteen-square board of boxes. Every tile features a monster, a reward cache, a trap, or a healing strawberry. To proceed, you simply click on one of the four rows, but which square you land in is up to chance.

You might see a row with a pair of enemies, a strawberry, and a treasure chest in it. You begin with a quarter likelihood of landing on a specific tile in a row.

Then, you'll chances are recalculated. So do you go for it, or do you choose on a different row first and try to make less risky choices early? Herein lies the risk-reward dynamic on display in Sol Cesto, and it's engrossing when you acquire its rhythm.

Manipulating Probability

The meta-layer is that your percentages can be shaped through a run by collecting teeth that change what things you're more attracted to. For example, you could acquire a perk that will reduce the probability of encountering a trap, but will also decrease the odds of finding a reward too.

• Creating a build is about influencing the statistics as best you can to have a better shot at landing where you want.
• During one attempt, I focused my stat upgrades toward physical attack/defense and selected all the teeth possible that would increase my odds of being drawn to monsters aligned with that strength.
• During a separate session, I constructed my hero around reward boxes and paired that with a perk that would reduce the power of surrounding monsters each time I opened a chest.

The strategic possibilities are somewhat constrained, but they are sufficient to work with to let you manipulate probabilities the way you want.

A Persistent Tension

Naturally, it remains a game of chance. There remains the possibility that you have an 80% chance to land on the desired tile but ultimately choose on an enemy that would deplete your final hit point. Every move is a gamble, so a persistent nervousness exists as you navigate a level and choose whether to press onward or when to move on to the next floor rather than risking it all.

Items like destructive ordnance aid in reducing the chance, as do some special skills. One hero's unique ability, charged after clearing four squares, enables you to select a vertical line instead of a horizontal line for that move. By employing this strategically, you can reserve that option for an optimal time to sidestep a dangerous choice. There's a shocking degree of depth in the simple act of clicking.

Looking Ahead

Sol Cesto is still in its preview phase, and it has another update to go until the full version is released. An additional hero and a new boss are expected to drop before the conclusion of January. The 1.0 release may not be much later, but the studio haven't committed to a concrete launch day yet.

A Concluding Recommendation

Regardless of when the complete game arrives, you should consider put Sol Cesto on your radar. I've been thoroughly captivated with it, finding all of little secrets and saving my accumulated currency in each run to access a constant flow of meta progression rewards, such as additional heroes and items purchasable mid-attempt. To this day, I have not found the deepest level, and I suspect I'll still be working on that task when 1.0 finally hits. Count me in for the entire experience.