This time today, I will be in Seattle for PAX West, and hopefully, I will not be jet-lagged. Regardless, I covered this demo a few weeks ago, and I bought it shortly afterward. I haven’t stopped playing this week’s game, and I am sure I’ll be playing it long after this review goes live.

This week is Sephiria.

Sephiria is an action roguelite from Team Horay. The game was released on PC at the end of July 2026 and retails for $15.

On the Day of Destiny, a kind of “Tree of Destiny” reveals that Bunnyville will be slaughtered by a foe named Askard and their unimaginably large cult following. The tree offers visions of the future, and there is still time to shape it by acting in the present. Build up Bunnyville and venture down into the depths to defeat Askard and save the future.

Sephiria is a pretty do-ey game when you are not in your inventory, min-maxing your gear for ultimate efficiency. Artifacts come in A LOT of shapes, sizes, and rarities (Team Horay describes more than 300) and a lot deal with aspects that we’ve come to know and love from the genre: Things like critical hit chance/damage, elemental effects (fire, poison, and frost), fire rate, THE LIST GOES ON. What is interesting here is the rarer items and their functionality. There are planets that send projectiles out, dealing damage every few seconds, an ice hammer that deals massive frost damage, and sun blades that are reusable projectiles.

Bunnyville is working together, which means townspeople will bombard the player with ways to make their run succeed. There are plenty of weapon types, from heavy broadsword to the ranged crossbow, to suit any kind of playstyle. There are way more characters to play as I expected (There has to be at least 20+), all with different starting attributes. The Destiny Tree contains the roguelite elements of more items, ability points, weapon unlocks, THE WORKS. Lastly, the player’s home also has upgrades, which feels so odd, but aspects like defense, HP, and MP can have ability points slotted in to make runs a little easier.

Customization is borderline endless, with the number of items Sephiria offers, the variety of starting characters, and the stuff to do in Bunnyville, which can get a little overwhelming at times. There was a moment when I felt like I was lost, unable to use the currency to upgrade my character. It took me all of 15 minutes to relocate the Tree, and then I threw all 45 sapphires into my unlocks. Once you get the gist of it, it unlocks a world of extremely fun possibilities.

I completed my first run with a build that dealt in critical hit chance, attack speed, and Sun Blades that rebounded back to me, so I was dealing extra fire damage and regular damage. Needless to say, I was living the power fantasy.

Gameplay is pretty standard, but gets a little wonky when grimoires are introduced. Move with WASD and shoot with the left mouse, special attack with the right, dash with space, and cast spells with left-shift. Fights are fast and sometimes frantic. There is a parry system that rewards the player for perfectly timed blocks, which incentivizes more aggressive combat. I really like how fast the combat is and, with that, how fast I can move throughout a run.

Each of the levels is composed of a number of separate battle rooms until you find the way out. The player gets to choose a route that can consist of upgrades, money, experience, merchants, artifacts, and tablets. Every single choice carries weight because many of the items are very powerful.

One of my favorite things about the Moonlighter series is the backpack mini-game I was forced to play, and in Sephiria, it’s amplified tenfold. Leveling up and stumbling across reward artifacts that the player has to put in their backpack. Artifacts have power levels, and tablets increase those levels (sometimes by more than 1 level at a time), BUT they take up backpack space, so the player will be moving things around quite often. It is satisfying to shuffle the backpack around because the end result is a more powerful build, which is exactly where I want to be all of the time.

Sephiria’s 8-bit art style is so relaxing on the eyes, while allowing me to enjoy the specifics of each character, minion, and boss. Bunnyville is gorgeous, the mole stronghold is dark and damp, and the wasteland is just that. The animations are done great as well. Enemies have a glowing red box when attacking to assist with the parrying system. I also just really enjoy the character portraits when you talk with them; the townspeople are always so cute.

Studio Mosso has done a great job with the soundtrack. This theme of adventure and heroics, grand yet so soft on the ears, is so nice to listen to. The boss music is heavy and really adds to just how tough they are to fight. I REALLY like the song that plays while you are in the training ground/player home; I whistle it at work, a banger.

I was skeptical of Sephiria after getting lost and overwhelmed by the number of unlockables and stuff to do post-run, but I sat down and really studied it, and I think this game is one of my favorite Steam Deck games. It is action-packed, incredibly fun, and rewarding when it comes to experimenting with builds, and it never feels bad to die because the player is always achieving something. Narrative is fine, nothing special. A simple game that is tough to master at a really great price point. I haven’t rolled credits, and I am about 15 hours in. I am looking forward to playing Sephiria on my plane to and from PAX West.

8/10