Games Like Heart and Slash (2026)

Shared: Permadeath, Procedural Generation

Completely free, permanently complete, and built by one person responding to a YouTube dare. If you have 90 minutes and a friend with a Steam account, there is no excuse not to try Muck.

Shared: Permadeath

Surviving alone was already brutal - surviving with friends who make catastrophic decisions is another beast entirely. A deep, unforgiving co-op survival game that rewards patience, preparation, and someone on the team who knows what a Science Machine actually does.

Shared: Permadeath

Few action games move this well and fewer still make dying feel this instructive. Dead Cells is the roguelite that converts roguelite skeptics, and it has years of post-launch polish behind it to prove it.

Shared: Procedural Generation

Seven alien races, procedurally generated galaxies, and a sandbox that respects your attention span, Starbound is the space explorer's Terraria, for better and occasionally worse.

Shared: Permadeath

A brutally honest survival sim where the Canadian wilderness is the only villain. No zombies, no jump scares, just cold math and bad decisions.