Cobalt Core

Cobalt Core is a sci-fi roguelike deckbuilder built around an unusual tactical layer: combat takes place on a single horizontal axis, with both ships sliding left and right to dodge incoming fire and line up their own weapons. The result is a tighter, more spatial kind of card play than the genre usually allows — each turn you're not just managing energy and damage numbers, you're managing position, telegraphed missile trajectories and angles of fire.

The ship-building half is broad. Cards function as orders to your crew, with hundreds of options and branching upgrade paths ensuring that no two runs converge on the same engine. Each crew character has a fully unique playstyle and a personal story arc; you bring three on a given run, mix their decks together, and watch how their personalities mesh. The roster combined with the ship variants generates hundreds of starting configurations before you've pressed Start Run.

A daily challenge stream layers fixed-seed modifiers over the loop — win with only one crew member, win with a ship that scrambles itself between fights, etc. — for players who want competitive leaderboard hooks. A narrative thread about untangling the time loop unlocks new playstyles as you progress, and the soundtrack is 90-plus minutes of original music by Minecraft composer Aaron Cherof. The studio, Rocket Rat Games, made Sunshine Heavy Industries before this — Cobalt Core is their answer to what a deckbuilder looks like with their design sensibility applied to the genre.