Vibrant co-op roguelike Hyper Light Breaker finally hits Steam early access

First it created an addictive, Diablo-esque ARPG oozing in pixel style, Hyper Light Drifter. Then it took its visual style to the next level with the brilliant action platformer Solar Ash. Now, it’s time for Heart Machine’s third (and arguably most-anticipated) game to arrive, Hyper Light Breaker. This co-op action roguelike was revealed many moons ago and has suffered a few delays since, but the day has finally arrived – Hyper Light Breaker is out now in Steam Early Access.

Taking place in the same universe as Hyper Light Drifter but set decades before, Hyper Light Breaker tasks you with exploring a war-torn realm called the Overgrowth, battling your way through hordes of monsters and elite enemies known as Crowns. Playing either solo or as a team, it’s your job as Breakers to defeat them and their leader, known as the Abyss King, in order to gather and piece together their memories in order to understand the curse that’s plaguing the Overgrowth.

In this gorgeous roguelike, you’ll head into procedurally-generated open-world biomes to loot gear, slay enemies, and hunt down those Crowns. Crown battles are the hardest activity in the game, and feel akin to raids that you might find in MMOs. As this is just the early access launch of Hyper Light Breaker, there are only two Crown battles at the moment, but there are plenty more to be added in the future.

Combat sits between a full on hack and slash and a soulslike, with a variety of attacks and abilities you can use for offense and dodges and parries for defense. There are heaps of items and upgrades as well to further bolster your build for one of the three characters that’ll be in the game to begin with.

Your run can come to an end in one of two ways. Either you perish out in the Overgrowth, which results in you losing some of your gear and respawning back at the central hub called The Cursed Outpost. Or, you find an extraction point and teleport back to base with all of the gear you’ve gathered. However, you will have to wait for the teleporter to spin up, and waves of enemies will throw themselves at you as it does so, so defend that objective and stay alive until you’re ready to be beamed back to safety.

Overall, Breaker looks like a really solid and enjoyable roguelike experience that’s only going to improve as early access pushes on. But I still can’t get over just how beautiful the visuals are. Making the next graphical step up from Solar Ash, it realizes the color palette and aesthetics of the top-down, 2D, 8-bit-inspired Hyper Light Drifter and transforms them into a super slick 3D action game. It’s glorious.

Hyper Light Breaker is out right now in Steam Early Access, and you can get it (along with a free copy of Hyper Light Drifter) with 10% off up until Tuesday, January 21. You can grab it here.

For more, check out some of the best co-op games on PC right now. Alternatively, take a look ahead to see what else is dropping in the near future with our upcoming PC games list.

You can also follow us on Google News for daily PC games news, reviews, and guides, or join our community Discord to stay in the know.