Across the Obelisk: A Roguelite That Rewards Planning Over Luck

Across the Obelisk entered Steam Early Access in 2021 before receiving its full release in August 2022. Developed by Dreamsite Games and published through Paradox Arc, it has quietly become one of my favourite examples of the roguelite deck-building RPG.

At first glance, it resembles another descendant of Slay the Spire: branching paths, turn-based card combat, repeated runs and gradually increasing difficulty. The important difference is not that Across the Obelisk eliminates randomness. It gives the player far more control over what happens before and around it.

A four-character party, persistent perks, town upgrades and deliberate card crafting allow a strategy to be constructed rather than merely discovered among whatever rewards happen to appear. Luck still matters, but planning determines how exposed you are to it.

Official artwork for Across the Obelisk, developed by Dreamsite Games and published by Paradox Interactive. Used for purposes of review and commentary.

A Party-Based Deck Builder

The most immediate departure from the usual formula is that you do not control one hero with one deck. You assemble a party of four characters drawn from four broad classes: Warrior, Scout, Mage and Healer.

The game contains sixteen heroes across those classes, although only four are available at the beginning and the others must be unlocked through play. Each hero belongs to a recognisable archetype while possessing cards, traits and interactions that make particular builds more natural.

A warrior might concentrate on armour, retaliation or direct physical damage. A scout can specialise in speed, poison, ranged attacks or support. Mages and healers similarly divide into damage, defence, cleansing, regeneration and combinations that blur the apparent class boundaries.

The party therefore matters as much as any individual deck. A powerful hero can still fail if the other characters cannot support the timing, damage type or status effects around which that build depends.

This makes combat feel closer to constructing a compact role-playing party than piloting four independent card decks. Initiative order, energy generation, buffs, curses and resistance reduction must be considered across the group.

Co-operation Built into the Structure

One of the game’s more unusual features is full online co-op for two to four players. Each player can control part of the four-hero party and participate in the decisions made during events.

I have not explored this aspect extensively, but it feels like a natural extension of the design rather than a multiplayer mode attached afterwards. The game already asks the player to coordinate specialised characters. Dividing those characters among several people turns internal planning into actual negotiation.

That may also produce a different kind of difficulty. In solo play, every deck contributes to one plan. In co-op, each player may arrive with a different idea of what the party should become—and a different opinion about who deserves the next piece of equipment.

Four Acts and Branching Routes

A standard Adventure run proceeds through four acts. The first begins in Senenthia, while later stages allow choices between different regions before the party reaches the final act.

Each map contains branching paths, battles, events, shops, quests and optional encounters. Routes may provide better equipment, unlock a hero or pet, fulfil an earlier quest, or lead towards a particularly dangerous fight.

The map is not simply a choice between safe and risky roads. Knowledge accumulated across previous runs changes the meaning of individual nodes. An event that once appeared arbitrary may become part of a longer chain whose reward depends on carrying the correct item, choosing a particular hero or visiting locations in the right order.

At the time of writing, the recently released Necropolis of the Damned expansion added an alternative route through Act Four and a different ending. That is a more significant addition than another isolated character pack because it alters the shape of the complete journey.

A branching Adventure-mode map in Across the Obelisk. Gameplay screenshot captured by the author.

Planning Before the Run Begins

The game’s persistent progression is central to why it feels less arbitrary than many roguelites. Heroes gain experience and perk points that remain available between runs, allowing their starting strengths and weaknesses to be adjusted.

These perks do not preserve the deck assembled during a completed adventure. Each new run still begins with a fresh set of cards and equipment. What persists is the ability to shape the conditions under which that new run begins.

Town upgrades serve a similar purpose. Supplies earned through play improve the facilities available at the beginning of each act. Cards can be crafted, upgraded or removed; equipment and pets can be purchased; and decks can be refined before the party confronts the next region.

This produces an unusual relationship between roguelite progression and deck construction. Early runs contain more improvisation because the towns and perk trees offer fewer options. Later, the player can enter with a much clearer plan.

That does make progression materially easier, but it does not simply replace strategy with permanent statistical bonuses. Many improvements expand the space of possible builds. The reward for continued play is greater control and experimentation rather than only larger numbers.

Character, deck and progression systems in Across the Obelisk. Gameplay screenshots captured by the author.

Resources and Delayed Rewards

The persistent economy uses supplies, gold and crystals. Supplies develop the towns, while gold and crystals support equipment purchases, services, card crafting and upgrades.

Completing a run also produces rewards that can be carried forward. The game allows several reward chests to be stored, letting the player decide when to use a larger reserve of gold and crystals to strengthen the beginning of a future attempt.

This system could easily have turned repeated play into a simple grind for overwhelming starting wealth. Instead, higher difficulties create reasons to preserve and deploy those resources strategically. A strong opening may be useful, but it cannot rescue a party whose decks, resistances and damage types do not work together.

Adventure Mode and the Roguelike Alternative

Adventure mode is the part of the game I find most distinctive. Its persistent perks, established heroes and developed towns make it explicitly roguelite: failure contributes to greater preparation for the next attempt.

The game also contains Obelisk mode, which moves closer to the conventional roguelike deck-builder. Cards are drafted and the adventure is more heavily randomised, reducing the influence of long-term progression.

This distinction matters when comparing the game with the template established by Slay the Spire. *Across the Obelisk* can provide a more traditional drafting challenge, but its principal campaign is built around gradually earning the ability to plan more precisely.

The two approaches reward different pleasures. Drafting asks how well you can improvise with an uncertain deck. Adventure mode asks how carefully you can construct a party and then adapt when the path refuses to cooperate.

Madness and Corruptors

After progressing far enough, Madness levels and corruptors allow the difficulty to be adjusted in increasingly specific ways.

These modifiers do more than increase enemy health. They can change resistances, resources, card costs and other assumptions on which a comfortable build depends. A strategy that dominates ordinary Adventure mode may fail once its most convenient interactions are constrained.

The higher settings therefore provide the necessary answer to persistent progression. Perks and town upgrades gradually make the player stronger, while Madness forces the player to understand why a build works rather than merely repeat it.

Madness levels and difficulty modifiers in Across the Obelisk. Gameplay screenshots captured by the author.

The DLC Question

As with many games associated with Paradox, Across the Obelisk has developed through a long series of paid additions accompanied by free updates.

The catalogue includes story expansions, individual heroes, cosmetic packs and, more recently, an alternative final act. That model will not appeal to everyone, particularly when the accumulated list begins to make the complete game look fragmented.

My experience, however, is that the base game already feels complete. Its original heroes, regions, progression systems and difficulty modes provide a substantial strategic game without requiring additional purchases.

The DLC primarily expands the number of combinations available: more heroes, new routes, additional cards and fresh reasons to construct another party. That is a better use of expansion content than withholding a necessary ending or a basic system, although the distinction may become less comfortable as the catalogue continues to grow.

Planning Over Luck

All of these systems—four-character parties, persistent perks, town development, map knowledge, stored resources and adjustable difficulty—give Across the Obelisk remarkable replayability.

It does not remove randomness, nor should it. Cards are drawn in an uncertain order, events require choices and rewards do not always support the build you intended.

What the game changes is the player’s relationship with that uncertainty. A weak run is less likely to feel as though one unfortunate reward destroyed an otherwise sound strategy. More often, it reveals that the party was too dependent on one card, lacked an answer to a particular damage type or had been optimised for a sequence of events the map never promised to provide.

I spent a great deal of time with Slay the Spire, and its cleaner design and harsher improvisational demands remain enormously impressive. Yet I think I enjoy Across the Obelisk more.

Its deeper customisation gives me more ownership over each run. When a strategy succeeds, it feels less like discovering a powerful deck and more like assembling a machine whose parts finally began working together.

Luck determines what the game places in front of you. *Across the Obelisk* is at its best when it makes preparation determine what you can do with it.