RoguedexPart 4 (Dec 2025) · #10 of 10 in that tierWatch the moment (1:15:33)
Hollow Survivors
- Developed by
- Danny Deer
- Published by
- PlayWay S.A., Gameparic
$9.99
Battle through hordes of horrific creatures as you hack and slash your way to the top of the Tower in this rogue-like dungeon crawler game. Choose from a variety of upgrades and weapons, and save the Tower.
Consensus
D64.6/100
Steam players82.1% positiveVery Positive201 reviews
VG Insights estimate ↗≈4.8K copies · ≈$33.4K gross
What creators say
What players say
A top-down action roguelite from solo dev Danny Deer (published by PlayWay/Gameparic) where you fight up a tower of about 20+ floors of monster hordes, picking soul-card upgrades and building up a settlement between runs, in a Vampire Survivors/Hades hybrid style.
Players rate it Very Positive on Steam (82% of 201 reviews) for its snappy, fast combat, art, and quick meta-progression, but many recommend it only on sale because the content runs thin after a few clears. The few critics who covered it echo that: Worth Playing scored it 75 and said the loop is fun but does not sustain interest beyond a couple of hours. Negative reviewers find the combat clunky (contact damage, forward lunge on attacks, non-invulnerable dashes) and the meta-progression grindy. It is a full release (not early access), launched 10 Apr 2025, and at least one 2026 reviewer asks whether it was abandoned since Aug 2025. Sales look modest: one estimator puts it near 19k USD gross.
Players love
- Fast, fluid, snappy combat when kiting hordes; several reviewers enjoy the roguelite-deckbuilder plus bullet-hell mix
- Pixel art and grim atmosphere praised even by players who dislike the gameplay
- Progression feels smooth and quick, with a steady ladder of unlocks so you rarely feel stuck
- Bosses, weapons (scythe, great axe and others) and spells give variety; spell-based upgrades are the ones with real synergies
- Story has a grim opening and a Loop Hero-like tone that one reviewer found enjoyable
- All achievements obtainable through normal play with no guides needed
- Difficulty described as fair, not too easy or too hard, for a cheap indie; controller support and Steam Cloud included
Common complaints
- Clunky combat: touching enemies deals damage, attacks lunge you forward into enemies, and dashes lack full invincibility so you often dash into damage
- Shallow content: only a handful of unlockable weapons and subweapons, and the same power-ups recur
- Most upgrade picks are generic stat buffs or simple triggers; few meaningful synergies outside spells
- Confusing boss hitboxes and inconsistent drops (a run with no health orbs, then four or five in one stage)
- No in-game encyclopedia or explanation of upgrade-card mechanics; weapons can only be judged from panel stats
- Price feels steep for the amount of content (about 10 USD) according to several reviewers
- Higher difficulties scale weakly, so post-game replay value is limited
Can feel tedious
- Grind for meta upgrades: one reviewer with 4 hours and thousands of coins said the game still felt like its first five minutes
- Alternative weapons and spells are a grind to unlock and some are no better than the starter weapon
- Rare materials and keys come only from the latest bosses, punishing players who usually die around floor 17
- The per-floor reward alternation produces a linear, boring power climb
- Repetitive enemies and same-feeling moves become monotonous after about an hour for some
What's unique
- Survivors-style auto-fight fused with a per-stage reward pick (alternating essence currency and upgrades) instead of XP-gem levelling
- Hades-like camp where you invest currency in permanent stat upgrades (one reviewer calls this artificial friction)
- Fixed-length tower (about 20 to 24+ floors) with a handful of set bosses rather than endless survival
Players want
- Add an in-game codex and clearer explanations for upgrade cards and curse mechanics
- Fix contact-damage and forward-lunge combat, and give dashes real invincibility frames
- Add more content: more weapons, subweapons, enemies, stories or quests per character, and stronger endgame difficulty scaling
- Rework upgrade pools so there are fewer dead cards (curse cards need their enabler) and more build-defining synergies
- Make unlock and material acquisition less grindy, since rare materials come only from late bosses and boss rewards are random
- Post-launch support: a player notes no updates since Aug 2025
Summarised from Steam reviews and community discussion.
Steam tags
Bullet HellRogue-liteAction RoguelikeHack and SlashStory RichDungeon CrawlerRPGDifficultPixel GraphicsAction RPG
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Tier list Part 4 (2025)
Hollow Survivors is a fairly traditional action roguelike where you climb a tower out of hell, with a Hades-style hub between runs and survivorlike hordes of enemies in the rooms. He was drawn in by its vibe and art style, and he enjoyed the journey to the ending thanks to meaningful meta progression. After completing it, though, he finds content and replayability thin: boons are the only thing that changes a run, and there are no shops, events or weapon-specific upgrades. He places it in the low-to-middle B tier for now and hopes for more content updates.
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