He's done it!!!! Endmund's finally brought The Binding of Isaac up to such a high standard of quality that I'm able to yet again feel confident in proclaiming that it's easily one of the best roguelites out there. The lacklustre output of Afterbirth+ honestly had me worried for a while that the game wouldn't be able to quite reach its former glory, but in the end my high hopes for Repentance weren't just met, but were outright exceeded. The reasons for this are numerous, but the big, obvious one comes down to the sheer amount of new content of the game being enough to almost have something for a totally different game, expanding playtim by a frankly insane amount. The other significant aspect however, is the huge overhaul and rebalancing of numerous components of existing content, which further contributes to creating an experience that feels different and unique to previous versions, but also remarkably cohesive in a way you wouldn't really expect from a game that's 3 huge expansion packs deep.
The decision to add the majority of content from popular mod Antibirth proved to be the single biggest tool to revitalising the game, with a lot of the most unique, interesting content being found in this side of things. Of course this isn't a 1 for 1 recreation either, with a lot of it being tweaked and reworked to fit more in line with the game's Afterbirth content, as to not feel out of place. This is certainly something that goes a long way to both represent the amount of care and effort put into every facet of the game, but also to open the door to some of the game's most vividly ambitious concepts. More than ever before, there are moments in this game that have an almost cinematic feel to them, and completely turn the game on its head. For the sake of this, I won't spoil any of these big new ideas, but the more you play, the more you end up realising the sheer quantity of novel, transformative mechanics that have been implemented. What's even more clever about this is how all of these curveballs are located in the lategame after the player will have completed an extremely high amount of runs. The purpose of this is twofold, both demonstrating the game's ability to continue being totally fresh and add new, exciting content even after hundreds of hours, and also ensuring that players are not exposed to too much new information at once due to having become deeply familiar with the core mechanics, systems and gameplay loop by the time they encounter it. This reinforces one of the biggest successes within The Binding of Isaac's design, the ability to prevent information overload even when the game is an endlessly deep well of content.
While definitely controversial, the other incredible aspect of the expansion is its large-scale rebalancing, both buffing and nerfing items in such a way that the power ceiling for runs feels harder to reach, but it's far more consistent to get acceptable, workable runs. This in turn adds more variation to each run, due to the increased viability of a bunch of items more prominently informing the formation and development of each individual playthrough. While this certainly ends up making the game far more challenging, and sometimes the nerfs are admittedly too much (holy mantle), the vast majority of this added difficulty contributes to a far more engaging loop that feels less reliant on just getting a couple of good items and steamrolling, and more a constant test of increasing skill that finally scales properly into the later areas, rather than the vast majority of runs that trivialised these sections in the past. The way these nerfs and changes influence the metagame is another interesting aspect of Repentance's alterations. Rather than there being a singular dominant strategy, the path to victory feels dependant on the trajectory of each individual run. Now rather than aiming for constant devil deals and stacking soul hearts for example, now the ratio of devil to angel deals taken will depend more on other qualities such as offensive capabilities and resources to pay, further contributing to the game's strongly dynamic nature that forms the crux of its entertainment value.
Overall, I would consider Repentance to be an absolute triumph that feels as if it's able to bring the game back to its roots while being something wholly distinct and worthwhile. Sure, the difficulty might be a significant jump from previous incarnations of the game, but it largely feels balanced and a step in the right direction for maintaining an engaging degree of challenge. With all the content and polish added to Repentance, I can quite confidently recommend this as the definitive version of Isaac and in all likelihood the most maximalist roguelite out there, providing what feels like a billion different things to consider at all times. An absolute essential for roguelite fans and even moreso for those who have enjoyed previous versions of this game.
The decision to add the majority of content from popular mod Antibirth proved to be the single biggest tool to revitalising the game, with a lot of the most unique, interesting content being found in this side of things. Of course this isn't a 1 for 1 recreation either, with a lot of it being tweaked and reworked to fit more in line with the game's Afterbirth content, as to not feel out of place. This is certainly something that goes a long way to both represent the amount of care and effort put into every facet of the game, but also to open the door to some of the game's most vividly ambitious concepts. More than ever before, there are moments in this game that have an almost cinematic feel to them, and completely turn the game on its head. For the sake of this, I won't spoil any of these big new ideas, but the more you play, the more you end up realising the sheer quantity of novel, transformative mechanics that have been implemented. What's even more clever about this is how all of these curveballs are located in the lategame after the player will have completed an extremely high amount of runs. The purpose of this is twofold, both demonstrating the game's ability to continue being totally fresh and add new, exciting content even after hundreds of hours, and also ensuring that players are not exposed to too much new information at once due to having become deeply familiar with the core mechanics, systems and gameplay loop by the time they encounter it. This reinforces one of the biggest successes within The Binding of Isaac's design, the ability to prevent information overload even when the game is an endlessly deep well of content.
While definitely controversial, the other incredible aspect of the expansion is its large-scale rebalancing, both buffing and nerfing items in such a way that the power ceiling for runs feels harder to reach, but it's far more consistent to get acceptable, workable runs. This in turn adds more variation to each run, due to the increased viability of a bunch of items more prominently informing the formation and development of each individual playthrough. While this certainly ends up making the game far more challenging, and sometimes the nerfs are admittedly too much (holy mantle), the vast majority of this added difficulty contributes to a far more engaging loop that feels less reliant on just getting a couple of good items and steamrolling, and more a constant test of increasing skill that finally scales properly into the later areas, rather than the vast majority of runs that trivialised these sections in the past. The way these nerfs and changes influence the metagame is another interesting aspect of Repentance's alterations. Rather than there being a singular dominant strategy, the path to victory feels dependant on the trajectory of each individual run. Now rather than aiming for constant devil deals and stacking soul hearts for example, now the ratio of devil to angel deals taken will depend more on other qualities such as offensive capabilities and resources to pay, further contributing to the game's strongly dynamic nature that forms the crux of its entertainment value.
Overall, I would consider Repentance to be an absolute triumph that feels as if it's able to bring the game back to its roots while being something wholly distinct and worthwhile. Sure, the difficulty might be a significant jump from previous incarnations of the game, but it largely feels balanced and a step in the right direction for maintaining an engaging degree of challenge. With all the content and polish added to Repentance, I can quite confidently recommend this as the definitive version of Isaac and in all likelihood the most maximalist roguelite out there, providing what feels like a billion different things to consider at all times. An absolute essential for roguelite fans and even moreso for those who have enjoyed previous versions of this game.