This week we add the 2017 top-down stealth "defenestration game" Heat Signature to the tier list. This is one that blurs the line on "when does a roguelite become not a roguelite" - how will that influence the tier list placement?
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This week we first talk about the developer Suspicious Developments Ltd which describes itself as a company "specializing in sneaky games that let you think of clever plans and/or knock people through windows" then try to wrap our heads around where a Heat Signature run starts and ends. Heat Signature does have a very distinct, and fun, core gameplay loop of breaking into ships and trying to achieve specific objectives. There's also some bigger picture game-level objectives you're working towards, and most of the time a character death doesn't lead to a full reset but rather an ejection into space and some sneaking back into the ship to try again.
You do have permadeath in that individual characters can die and you lose your inventory, but there is a lot of persistence between characters as well as overarching world persistence based on your progress through the game. Our tier list placement for this one ended up being really impacted by this concept of "is this a good roguelite specifically" even though we both felt the core gameplay was fun and engaging (albeit a bit repetitive).
See the developer's blog here: https://www.pentadact.com/
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