Debugging Hero is a cute hack n’ slash where you tweak enemy stats on the fly

Estimated reading time: 1 minute

I’ve never been so happy to see a spike trap as I was in Debugging Hero. At the start of each combat encounter, the demo for this roguelite hack n’ slash hands you several numeric cards and lets you pause the game to view both your and your enemies’ stats: health, damage, and durability. You then drag the cards on to the relevant stat to modify it, then unpause to continue real-time combat.

It’s a cute gimmick, letting you knock down high health enemies to a manageable number, or kill weak ones outright, or heal yourself. But it felt a tad shallow to carry a whole game, even one with dodges and parries in its real-time combat. Then, I entered a room with a trap tile that thrust sharpened spikes upwards at timed intervals, and realised I could manipulate the timer. I tuned it right down, and raucously chortled like a portly racoon at the bakery bins as it pneumatically skewered my idiot attackers.

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Editor-in-Chief for Robots Over Dinosaurs Anthony has been gaming since the 1980s. Working adjacent to the gaming industry for the last 20 years, his experience led him to open Robots Over Dinosaurs.

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