Neon Deck Dive Deckbuilding Roguelike
Choose a path, fight enemies with cards, and grow your deck on the way down through three layers. If you fall, you start over, and the map and the cards on offer change every run. It works on computers and phones.
💡 About This Tool
Each layer is a map of 8 rows plus a boss. You move from the bottom up along the connected lines. There are 7 kinds of node:
- Battle: fight regular enemies. A win gives gold and a choice of 1 card out of 3
- Elite: fight a tough enemy. A win also gives a gadget (an item that works just by being carried)
- Event: make a choice, such as trading HP for card upgrades
- Shop: buy cards and gadgets, or remove a card you no longer want
- Rest: recover HP or upgrade one card
- Chest: get a gadget
- Boss: beat it to go to the next layer with full HP
Each turn your energy refills to 3 and you draw 5 cards. The number at a card's top left is its energy cost, and 1 unused point carries over to the next turn. The icons above an enemy show its next move, so you can raise Shield when an attack is coming and strike when it is not. Shield halves at the start of your next turn.
There are 2 characters:
- Breaker: every attack builds Heat, and Heat makes attacks stronger. Going over the limit of 6 causes an overheat, so vent it into Shield in time
- Weaver: every 3 cards played weaves a single-use Glow Thread. Threads grow stronger when played in a row, and Virus wears enemies down. Win once to unlock this character
There are 83 cards and 27 gadgets in all. A bigger deck makes the card you want harder to draw, so skipping a card is often a good move.
Your score adds 10 points per step, 25 per elite and 100 per boss. A win adds 300 points plus twice your remaining HP.
You can also play by keyboard. Number keys pick a card, ← → pick an enemy, and Enter plays the card. Esc cancels and E ends the turn.
🧐 FAQ
Q. Can I close the page and continue later? Yes. Your progress is kept even in the middle of a battle, and the title screen shows Continue run the next time you open the page.
Q. I cannot select Weaver. Weaver unlocks after you win once with either character. Only Breaker is available at first.
Q. What is the seed for? It is a code for the map. The same seed starts on the same map, so friends can compare runs on the same route. If you leave it empty, a random one is used.
Q. Can I move my records to another browser? Yes. On the Settings and save tab, press Export to make a save code. Paste it on the same tab in the other browser and press Load.
Q. The card text is too small to read. Press a card once and its full text appears in the description area of the battle screen. Press Cancel to go back.
📚 Fun Facts
The word roguelike comes from Rogue, a 1980 game made by Michael Toy and Glenn Wichman while they were students at UC Santa Cruz. For years, players argued over what deserved the label.
In 2008, attendees at the International Roguelike Development Conference in Berlin wrote a list of traits sorted into high-value and low-value factors, now known as the Berlin Interpretation. It was meant to help people study the genre, not to tell developers what to make. Many critics have since objected to treating it as the standard, and the word roguelite spread for games that borrow only some of these ideas.