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I can’t knock Epic’s annual tradition of giving away a ton of games every holiday season. The Epic Games Store free games list always contains a few big name surprises like Death Stranding or Vampire Survivors that I expect a lot of PC gamers already own, and for those who don’t it’s mighty nice to be able to pick them up for nothing. In between the big drops are obviously smaller games, like today’s—but I’d encourage everyone to grab Astrea: Six-Sided Oracles while the grabbing’s good. If you’ve exhausted Balatro already, this underplayed deckbuilder could sneak up on you and swallow your whole holiday break.
“Deckbuilder” is actually a misnomer there, because although Astrea follows in the footsteps of Slay the Spire, it trades out cards for dice, a simple but novel enough swap to really change up how the game plays. It’s also really pretty, and made by a tiny indie team in São Paulo, Brazil punching way above its weight.
In his 80% review for PC Gamer, Dominic Tarason praised how dramatic a turn in Astrea can be, which might be just the kind of thing you’re craving coming off Balatro runs where you’re scoring billions of points or whatever:
“Astrea hinges on an ingenious system called Virtues, abilities intrinsic to each character that become usable as you take Corruption damage. These abilities can sometimes drag you out of trouble (most characters have a ‘reroll’ virtue usable on any dice, including enemies), but they’re a reliable way of dealing damage, meaning that you’ll be whalloping yourself with a nasty die, firing off your Virtues, and healing back before the opponent has time to act. If you planned right. If not, you can end up being knocked over by a small breeze, or just plain blowing yourself up.
“It’s always a tense tightrope walk, and it creates a thrillingly ‘swingy’ game where things can go wrong almost instantaneously if you don’t plan two moves ahead. The saving grace is that most characters have three lives (restored when beating a region’s end boss), preventing a single miscalculation from spoiling a whole run. But those lives can be wagered for permanent upgrades, another temptation I found turning me into a gambler. The result is a deckbuilder where almost every single turn is engaging and often butt-clenching.”
Astrea came out on PC in September 2023 (it just hit consoles a couple months ago), and since launch it’s gotten a healthy list of updates including some rebalancing, official mod support, a daily run feature, and “custom runs” where you can pick and choose from a bunch of modifiers to change up how the game plays. With those additions it has the flexibility that true roguelike fiends long for.
Considering Astrea is currently $18.74 in the Steam sale, this giveaway’s absolutely worth grabbing and actually playing, rather than left to rot in your cellar of neglected Epic Store freebies. Give it a shot—it’s absolutely a hidden gem.
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Kurt Indovina
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