Slay the Spire entered Steam Early Access nine years ago today, on November 14, 2017. Its all-time player record on Steam came eight years later, in December 2025.
If you have never played it: you pick a hero and climb a tower called the Spire, one fight at a time. Every fight is played with a deck of cards, and after a win you can add a new card to it. The path up the tower changes every run. Lose, and the run is over. The next attempt starts from the bottom with a fresh deck.
It was the first game from Mega Crit, a small indie studio. The Early Access version, sold while the game was still in development.
The start was quiet. When it launched in 2017, Slay the Spire had 193 players online at the same time, as Mega Crit itself pointed out in March 2026.
The game's all-time peak of 57,025 came in December 2025. Not many games get their biggest day eight years after launch.
Coverage of the sequel still calls the original the game that defined the roguelike deckbuilder, the genre of card games where every run starts from scratch.
Slay the Spire 2 is still in Early Access
The sequel, Slay the Spire 2, entered Early Access on March 5, 2026. Mega Crit says it sold 3 million copies in its first week. It brings back the Ironclad, the Silent and the Defect, adds new heroes, and lets friends climb the Spire together in co-op.
In its August 2026 newsletter, Mega Crit said it is working on an alternate version of Act 2, the game's second stage, and on a new character. The studio has not shared a release date yet.
