Vagante is a cute retro styled roguelike that came out in 2014 apparently. I never heard of it until a couple days ago randomly but the game is pretty impressive so far for being released almost 10 years ago now.
I googled it and apparently Shovel Knight and Binding of Isaac rebirth came out that same year so it is no wonder it didn't get more publicity.
I find that some roguelikes are better about making you feel like you're making progress while dying over and over and this one does a pretty good job in my opinion.
The pixel art is the biggest draw for me - and I think the art here is very nice overall.
Anyway, it is wild to me that this game is almost 10 years old and I never heard of it. We are at a point where Steam contains hidden gems like it's a classic console.
Also the game is mad cheap I got a key on g2a for like 2 dollars.
Yeah I really like the controls to Vagante, it's like one of the few action roguelikes that i can think of that promotes slow and methodical play (descending down gaps by ledgegrabbing, stab and dodge back-and-forth against the lil goblins, throwing objects at arrowtraps before proceeding onward) i think it has a lot of potential (if they ever decide to do updates or even community mods) if there were more unlockables or an increase/class unique traits in the 5x5 tile trait list, it has the gameplay down pat but there's little in the sense of progression outside of the 5x5 trait tiles or unlockable classes. It's still a very fun game though and I hope that community modders will pick up the game to give it a little further polish.