Three Roguelite Devs Explain Why They Chose the Genre
The three answers split on cost versus narrative, and the split is itself the report: the genre's economics and its storytelling are being weighed differently by studios in three markets.
Key Facts
- Cinderia from MyACG Studio, Witch's Garden from Team Tapas and CRYMELIGHT from Furyu were represented in the discussion held in Tokyo on September 20 during Tokyo Game Show 2026.
- Cinderia entered Steam early access in March 2026 and sold 100,000 copies within 10 days, according to Game Spark.
- Witch's Garden received its full release in August 2026 and holds a Very Positive rating on Steam reviews.
- CRYMELIGHT is scheduled for release on November 5, 2026.
- Witch's Garden lead programmer Kim Minseu said the team assumes players are about 30% worse at action than the developers when setting difficulty.
Reporting from 2 sources: Automaton, Game Spark.
At the Tokyo Game Show 2026 event stage on September 20, the teams behind three action roguelites met at UKIYO GAME BAR in Yurakucho, Tokyo, for a cross-border discussion. The participants were Xiao Yu, producer of MyACG Studio's Cinderia from China; Kim Minseu, lead programmer of Team Tapas's Witch's Garden from Korea; and Takumi Isogai, producer and director of Furyu's CRYMELIGHT from Japan. Asked why they built roguelites, the answers split. Xiao Yu said the genre keeps production costs down because the same scenes can be reused, which suits small teams. Kim Minseu said an early prototype closer to Vampire Survivors led the team to look for a genre that would let strong animation and action carry a project at limited cost. Isogai said CRYMELIGHT needed repeated retries for its story and staging, and that Hades raised the genre's recognition in Japan.
Isogai said he was "a little surprised that everyone cites cost as a reason," and the other two laughed. Cinderia producer Xiao Yu put the economics plainly: with roguelikes "you don't need to prepare 100 or 200 scenes to let players play for a long time."
- Cinderia (MyACG Studio): dark fantasy roguelite, close to Cult of the Lamb visually; hit 100,000 copies in its first 10 days of Steam early access in March 2026.
- Witch's Garden (Team Tapas): full release in August 2026, Steam rating "very positive"; the team wanted a gateway title for players new to action roguelites.
- CRYMELIGHT (Furyu): launches November 5, 2026; Isogai directed the screen look toward a Tim Burton Alice in Wonderland mood and the tears and eye animation of its heroines.
Kim said the Witch's Garden animator, Lee Seonwoo, drove the pivot after an early Vampire Survivors-style prototype. Isogai traced the genre's spread in Japan to Cult of the Lamb, and picked out Shiren the Wanderer and Torneko no Daibouken as the older Mystery Dungeon titles he grew up on.
Synthesized by Yomimono from the 2 cited sources below, including Japanese-language reporting where cited, then editorially reviewed before publishing.