Have You Played… Streets of Rogue?

Have You Played? is an endless stream of game retrospectives. One a day, every day, perhaps for all time.

Accidental death simulators are wonderful. In Streets of Rogue, you can slip on a banana peel and set off a land mine. You can hack a computer and get caught by a policeman, who’ll cave your head in. You can set a bunch of stuff on fire but then run into the fire and die in the fire because it is a fire why did you run into that?

It indulges you with silliness. Procedurally-generated quests keep you busy as you explore multiple floors of a futuristic city block that cares only for chicken nuggets and mayhem. Playable characters include an investment banker who needs to take cocaine just to keep himself alive, a gorilla who is hated by scientists but who will free and gather other gorillas into an army of primates, and a tiny naked man with red eyes who can jump into other people’s bodies and control them like a skin suit, using their skills and attributes at will. Honestly, it’s got a better cast than Overwatch.

It’s still in development, with creator Matt Dabrowski mulling over future features such as a final encounter (this is a roguelite romp, after all) and more environmental hazards. If the new Deus Ex games were too po-faced and limited for you, this is one of the cheapest and most cheerful antidotes available. A roguelite that takes the immersive sim and covers it in clown make-up.