Ex Sanguis Key Art
Image: Lightbulb Crew & Firesquid

Sometimes, the style is the substance, and few can deny that Lightbulb Crew's high-femme hypergoth tactical roguelike Othercide was impeccably stylish. With today's release of Ex Sanguis into early access, it seems that they've still got ground they want to explore in the world of monochromatic warrior women fighting surreal and cosmic threats, and after playing a few hours of it pre-release, I wouldn't have it any other way.

Much like its predecessor, Ex Sanguis is a roguelite tactics game about leading a small squad of magical warrior women against the apocalypse. Only in this case, you're a bit late. After an encounter with a cursed eldritch moon, the world is now a dead, bleached husk patrolled by pseudo-angelic monsters. You, then, lead the Stillae, creatures of blood and life, trying to restore the world and its memories. It's surreal, it's abstract, and it's so goth that it would be shitting bats, if they existed anymore in this universe.

This is no XCom. There's no cover, and your units pick themselves up unharmed if any get knocked out during a mission, encouraging aggressive play. Similar to its predecessor, Othercide, it's a bit closer to Into The Breach. While you're not told explicitly what moves enemies will make, they do follow strict rules, which can be confirmed with a click. When it next moves, one enemy might chase down the nearest one of your Stillae and go in for a melee attack, and so can be baited out of formation if you stand just out of reach. Another might float around the edge of the battlefield buffing other monsters.

With the full timeline visible (and your units having their next turn delayed if they exhaust themselves by spending too many action points), you always know what's roughly going to happen, and can plan around it. That doesn't mean it can't get really messy and chaotic. Online Othercide, the maps here are littered with volatile blood-sacs and gore-filled eggs that enemies are going to emerge from. Both can do a lot of damage if they explode, sometimes causing catastrophic chain reactions across the map. But also, you can just kick an enemy into one and watch the gore-fireworks, which is always satisfying.

This is a run-based game, designed to be played at steadily escalating difficulty levels, while you unlock small permanent perks to make your next adventure a little easier. Each run, you get to pick which of several missions to pick, with the goal of ending up at your target - a larger mission or a boss - before the clock runs down. As mentioned, death is only a temporary hiccup, so going all-in is a perfectly viable strategy, and blowing up nearly every enemy on is absolutely worth the cost of exploding one of your own soldiers.

While there's a good few hours to be had working your way up those ranks, there's not a huge amount more to the game than the earlier demo/preview version, content-wise: A tutorial, two biomes, one boss, and two minibosses. Plenty more is coming over the course of early access, with a roadmap posted directly on the game's Steam store page. More areas, more bosses, and more mission types are planned, with a finale coming in early/mid 2027. What I have played, though, is fun, but for those who haven't tried it yet, I'd suggest giving Othercide a spin and letting this one mature a bit.

Ex Sanguis is out now in early access for £16.75/$20, with a 10% launch discount running until September 24th, and at least six months more development planned. The game is also available in a slightly discounted bundle with the original Othercide. If you want to dip your toes into this particular blood-ocean, Othercide by itself is 90% discounted until September 14th, and I'd easily recommend it at that price.