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After playing well over 200 recent games this year, I am officially turning the page on 2025. My year-end list is published, and I'm satisfied with the ultimate rankings, despite being aware a host of stellar titles likely fell under the radar. Currently, my only plan is to but sit back, unplug a little, and possibly go for a refreshing hike in the— oh no, discovered one more great game. So much for my intentions!

A Premature Contender Emerges

In my more laid-back sessions, usually reserved for a few oddball curiosities, I've discovered what could be my first favorite game of 2026. Sol Cesto is a peculiar procedural dungeon crawler for Windows PC that breaks down a classic dungeon crawler into a luck-based game of major consequence risk and reward. View this a preview for the in-the-know: If you take pride in knowing about a game before it's popular, sample Sol Cesto so you can make a dent in your wallet for unique titles.

A Strategic Genre Subversion

Sol Cesto is a thought-provoking procedural game that's unlike anything I'm familiar with. The premise is that you need to explore a dungeon, going down level by level to find the sun, which has gone missing from the fantasy world. When you play, this results in some familiar roguelike structure. Select a character who has stats and abilities, clear floor after floor of foes, acquire some passive buffs (which are teeth), and vanquish a few stage-ending champions. Straightforward, right!

The Distinctive Central System

How you effectively complete a dungeon room, is unique. Every time you enter a new floor, the game presents a 4x4 grid of boxes. Every tile features a monster, a loot box, a trap, or a health-restoring fruit. To make a move, you choose on one of the horizontal lines, but the specific tile you land in is up to chance.

You might see a row with multiple foes, a strawberry, and a treasure chest in it. You initially will have a quarter likelihood of landing on any given square in a row.

Subsequently, your odds shift. The question becomes: Do you take the risk, or do you click on a safer line first and attempt some safer moves early? Herein lies the push-your-luck gameplay in action in Sol Cesto, and it's engrossing after you develop its rhythm.

Manipulating Probability

The meta-layer is that your odds can be manipulated through a run by gathering teeth that change what things you're more attracted to. For example, you might get a perk that will decrease your odds of encountering a trap, but will also decrease the odds of finding a reward too.

• Crafting a loadout is about manipulating math as best you can to have a higher chance at landing where you want.
• On a particular session, I invested my attribute improvements toward brute force and selected all the teeth possible that would boost my chances of attracting me toward monsters with that damage type.
• In another run, I constructed my hero around treasure chests and coupled it with a perk that would reduce the power of surrounding monsters every time I claimed a reward.

The build options are somewhat constrained, but there's enough to work with to let you manipulate numbers to your preference.

A Persistent Gamble

Of course, at its heart, it's a game of chance. You constantly face the possibility that you have an 80% chance to land on the desired tile but end up landing a foe that would take out your final hit point. Each click is a gamble, so you feel ongoing pressure as you work through a stage and decide when to continue selecting or to proceed to the subsequent stage instead of pushing your luck.

Items like explosive devices help cut down the chance, similar to some special skills. A particular character's special power, charged after selecting four tiles, allows players to click on a column in place of a row during that action. Should you use this strategically, you can reserve that option for the right moment to circumvent a perilous selection. It's a surprising level of strategy in the seemingly straightforward task of clicking.

Future Development

Sol Cesto is still in its preview phase, and it has at least one more update planned before the full version is released. Another playable adventurer and a additional end-level foe are planned for release before the conclusion of January. The 1.0 release likely won't be much later, but the game's developers haven't set a final date yet.

A Final Endorsement

No matter when it's fully released, you might want to put Sol Cesto on your radar. I've been completely engrossed with it, uncovering each of hidden nuances and saving my accumulated currency every session to reveal a continuous trickle of persistent upgrades, featuring new characters and items purchasable while playing. I still haven't found the deepest level, and I get the feeling I'll continue working on that task when the official release drops. Sign me up for the complete journey.