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After playing well over 200 recent games this year, I am officially wrapping things up on 2025. My best-of compilation is live, and I'm satisfied with the concluding selections, even knowing a host of stellar titles probably slipped through the cracks. Currently, my only nothing for me to do except relax, unplug a little, and possibly go for a refreshing hike in the— well, shoot, discovered one more brilliant title. So much for my peaceful respite!

An Early Contender Emerges

With my casual gaming time, typically earmarked for a selection of unusual games, I've come across potentially my earliest beloved game of 2026. Sol Cesto is an unusual procedural dungeon crawler for Windows PC that deconstructs a conventional dungeon crawler into a luck-based game of high stakes risk and reward. Take this as a hipster's insider tip: If you enjoy in knowing about a game before it's popular, sample Sol Cesto so you can burn a spot in your wallet for unique titles.

A Tactical Dungeon-Crawling Innovation

Sol Cesto is a tactical roguelike that's unlike anything I've ever played. The setup is that you are tasked with descending into a dungeon, progressing deeper and deeper in search of the sun, which has gone missing from this mythical realm. Mechanically, this results in some familiar roguelike structure. Select a character with their own stats and abilities, fight through each level of enemies, pick up some passive buffs (which are teeth), and defeat a few area guardians. Simple enough!

The Unique Core Mechanic

The way you actually clear a dungeon room, is unique. Every time you start another stage, you're shown a sixteen-square board of boxes. All spaces holds a monster, a loot box, a trap, or a healing strawberry. To explore a room, you choose on one of the four rows, but the exact space you end up on is a matter of probability.

You could encounter a row with two monsters, a strawberry, and a treasure chest in it. You initially will have a one-in-four probability of landing on any given square in a row.

Subsequently, your chances are recalculated. The question becomes: Do you go for it, or do you opt on a alternative option first and attempt some less risky choices early? Herein lies the risk-reward dynamic in action in Sol Cesto, and it's captivating once you get a feel for it.

Shaping the Odds

The meta-layer is that your odds can be manipulated through a run by picking up teeth that alter which objects you're more likely to land on. As an instance, you could acquire a perk that will decrease your odds of hitting a trap, but will also decrease the odds of getting a treasure chest too.

• Creating a build is about manipulating math to the utmost to have a improved likelihood at getting your desired outcome.
• During one attempt, I focused my power boosts toward physical attack/defense and chose every teeth I could that would improve my probability of landing on monsters with that damage type.
• During a separate session, I built my character around treasure chests and paired that with a perk that would reduce the power of surrounding monsters whenever I claimed a reward.

The customization choices are somewhat constrained, but there's enough to experiment with to enable you to influence the odds the way you want.

A Constant Risk

Of course, it remains a game of chance. You constantly face the possibility that you have a high probability to select the preferred space but wind up hitting a foe that would deplete your last bit of health. Each click is a gamble, so there's a constant tension as you work through a stage and choose whether to keep clicking or to proceed to the next floor as opposed to risking it all.

Items like destructive ordnance help cut down the chance, as do some hero powers. An adventurer's signature move, activated once making four moves, enables you to choose a vertical line in place of a row for that move. Should you use your cards right, you can hold that ability for an optimal time to circumvent a perilous selection. You'll find an astonishing amount of nuance in the simple act of clicking.

The Road to 1.0

Sol Cesto is currently in its preview phase, and it has at least one more update planned before the final game is launched. Another playable adventurer and a new boss are expected to drop before the conclusion of January. The official version may not be long after, but the game's developers haven't committed to a final date yet.

A Parting Endorsement

Regardless of when it's fully released, you should consider put Sol Cesto on your radar. For the past week, I've been thoroughly captivated with it, finding all of little secrets and banking my earned gold in each run to unlock a steady stream of meta progression rewards, featuring additional heroes and items available for acquisition mid-attempt. I still haven't found the deepest level, and I have a sense I'll still be pursuing that objective when the official release drops. Count me in for the entire experience.