izigame.me

To think I started playing this game about 10 years ago and it still holds up pretty well to this day...
I love FTL. It was my first Roguelike ever and my introduction to the genre; It's hard to compare to other popular roguelike games like Risk of Rain or Hades, because a run in this game can take several hours... And it is also very unique in its style.
The game has you command a spaceship and the crew inside of it. If all of the crew dies or the ship's hull (health) is depleted, you lose. There are sooooo many different ways to stop this and just like that there are so many ways for it to happen. The amount of multitasking this game has you do is unparalleled to anything I've ever played. Oxygen is down? Well, now they might suffocate. Med bay is down? How will you heal your crew! Ah shoot, they drop a stasis bomb on your weapons and you can't shoot back! well, let's wait for it to be fixe-- aaaaaaand you were boarded and now they're destroying your shields. And I'm only scratching the surface! Fires can spread, hull can be breached and oxygen leaked, systems can be hacked, drones can be deployed, minds can be controlled, DOORS CAN BE OFFLINE... And there is also a plethora of different weapons in the game. Some definitely better than others but the large variety allows you to create so many different combinations! (You can pause the game at any point and said pause button is the only thing making this anything close to fair, because even with its use you can still lose!)
There are 10 different ships, 8 of them with 3 styles, 2 of them with 2 styles. There are 3 levels of difficulty and excluding about 12 of the ships, you can decide whether or not to include the DLC which significantly increases the difficulty. So you combine all of those different ways to start the game with the aproximately 50 weapons in the game plus the 8 different races with their 6 possible abilities to develop plus the ones that already come with each race..... rest assured, every run is going to be different.
I know it says about 120 hours on the record at the time of this review, but I probably have close to 200 (I started out of steam and I just transferred my game later). It is to this point, the most difficult game I've 100% so far.
It is incredibly punishing with an extremely steep learning curve, unforgiving mistakes, and random enemies that at times may be just straight up unfair... and even so, this is still one of my favorite games of all times. It is not for everyone, that's for sure! But after you make that first successful run and defeat the rebel flagship you'll feel so excited that you just need to do it again with a different ship!... Actually, who am I kidding. You will feel just as excited every single time. I know I did!
I cleared the game at least 8 times on easy without DLC for the type A of the original ships, then 10 times in normal with the DLC for the types B of the originals and A of the extra ones and then 10 times in hard with the DLC for the C of the originals and B of the extra ones. I've spent so much time on this game that is weird for me to even think that I've completed it. For those out there who still want more, there are mods that expand the game beyond the extremely high amount of content it already has!
Subset Games knocked it out of the park with this one. I hope we get a sequel at some point in the future because this game is well worth it! <3
PS: The DLC is free and already included with the game. The game is 10$ and normally goes on sale for a mind-bogglingly low price. If you have any wish to ever try it, there is no reason for you to not get it.