jeremy winslow
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Writing For
Polygon 
Playstation Lifestyle 
GameSpot Latest Reviews
Whether or not I make it to the end of the level is almost immaterial; I feel powerful and free from the moment the game begins.
While rogue-likes have been around since the 1980s—with the seminal Rogue often cited as the root—it wasn’t until more recent games like Spelunky, The Binding of Isaac, and Rogue Legacy that popularized the subgenre, pinning it on the games industry’s bulletin board as a destination to visit. But like flyers stapled on top of each other, filtering through them is exhausting, especially since a vast majority both look and feel the same. How do you know to go to Kevan’s party when Keven’s flyer looks just like Kevan’s? Thankfully, Dead Cells is not another Kevin, as it manages to be an accessible and addictive rogue-like that rewards you for understanding—and often exploiting—its systems, even if those systems are trite.
By the time I fought Mother for the third and last time, I was prepared to throw my controller because of how quickly she evaporated my energy and health bars the first two times. Ruiner is one of those games that is unabashedly difficult for the sake of being difficult. It demands you face waves upon waves of the same enemies and mini-bosses before you can even see the final, incredibly trite cinematic. Are you the ruiner or the ruined? I won’t spoil the answer that the game offers up, but I will say that I sure didn’t feel triumphant when I finally set the controller down.
