as long as i can remember Barony Lying beside me Steam Store page. It's one of those games I've been meaning to buy and kept finding reasons not to; The retro, blocky art style made most of the bounce; It reads like a simple, almost disposable, thing that you scroll past on the way to something shiny. That said, I finally ran out of excuses when the Steam Summer Sale came knocking Barony Down to $2, and even though I'm late to the party, what a party it is.
Beneath that pixelated exterior was not the cute little dungeon crawler the screenshots promised. Barony is a massive, punishing, system-sanctioned roguelike that honors the most archaic corners of the RPG genre while still feeling cool to play in 2026. For $2, it might be the most game-changing I've ever bought, and I've owned. Minecraft.
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What $2 actually gets you with Barony
For reference, Barony Turning Wheel LLC, is an indie first-person roguelike RPG from a small remote studio that launched it back in 2015 and has since refused to stop working on it. It actually surpassed one million copies sold this year, and that kind of slow-burn success only happens when a game earns a cult following one delve at a time. And from what I can tell, eleven years of updates have turned a rough 2015 release into something much stranger and deeper than its current price tag suggests.
According to developer Sheridan Rathbun, BaronyThe list of inspirations is quite extensive, as are the titles spelunky who System shock 2. My personal elevator pitch is Dungeons and Dragons Think the dungeon-crawling DNA of campaigns – filtered through the bones of early first-person RPGs. TES: Arena or Daggerfall In a modern package, welded to the ruthless logic of evil and nethack (Last existence Baronyof “greatest inspiration” according to Rathbun). In many ways, it's a love letter to an era of design that most studios spent the last two decades sanding the edges.
The story setup hasn't been particularly relevant to my time with the game, but it's admirably thematic as a piece of pure pulp fantasy: an undead lich named Baron Herx has cursed the town of Hamlet, and you descend into his dungeon to put an end to him. Barony Know what it is, though; The story is a thin excuse to send you somewhere dark and dangerous. Much of what's fascinating about this game lies in its systems, not its script.
Barony involves much less hand-holding and fewer apologies
The first thing I noticed was playing Barony It's that it's got an eight-part tutorial that covers every element of the game, from the intricacies of spell-slinging to hunger and how to throw stones. As stubborn as it seemed at first, it was absolutely necessary in advance. Whatever class you choose, you will die Barony—a lot—but the game refuses to feel bad about it, so you shouldn't either. Permadeath is the backbone of the entire experience, and dungeons are procedurally generated, so each run is a new set of traps, monsters, and bad decisions waiting; You can starve or eat rotten food, get flattened by a stone, or lose it all by recognizing the cursed potion with your taste buds instead of the scroll.
That last bit is where all those archetypal trappings of old school RPGs earn their keep, because in most ways, BaronyThe systems do not flatten themselves to be accessible. Items arrive anonymously, effects stack up that either ruin your afternoon or cover it up, and part of the recent Instrument of Destruction update revamps the entire magic system around three schools of magic and about eighty spells. Whether you're a human sword-and-board barbarian, a cursed, hungry vampire, or a duck-loving myconid hermit—Barony That assumes you're smart enough to figure it all out, which is both a compliment and a danger.
Note: The second part of the Instrument of Destruction update launches later this year with two new biomes, new secret levels, new music, and more.
Co-op, and a class for every type of Masochist in Barony
In terms of the nitty-gritty, the vanilla game has 13 classes that are human-based, 26 spanning multiple races when all three DLCs are considered, and they all range from reassuringly normal to wild chaos. If you want a softer landing, you can roll a standard warrior, sorcerer, or rogue, or you can choose a sexton, clown, or arcanist and admit that you chose violence. Each reshapes how the run actually plays, which is the key engine behind the game's replayability.
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Barony Unique in the sense that, despite its intense systems, the game also supports four-player co-op—online, split-screen, and crossplay—which turns the game on its head, making it feel even more immersive. Common spaces and friendly fire mean your party is just as likely to kill you as monsters, but Barony's pacing really seems like a lot more than that. Still, this is a co-op roguelike, so the fun deaths that your friends cause on purpose remain.
Barony's three quality, fully optional DLCs
now, Barony It's been over a decade, and it's still in live development, so it has paid DLC — three pieces of it, to be exact — but they're of modest value and quality in their own right. Myths and Outcasts and Legends and Pariahs each add four new monster races and signature classes, from Vampires and Succubi to Goblins and Insectoids, while the new Deserters and Disciples pile on five more each. They double the number of ways you can build and break a character, but they remain completely optional for those worried about losing the “original” experience.
Whether you're a human sword-and-board barbarian, a cursed, hungry vampire, or a duck-loving Myconid hermit – the Barony assumes you're smart enough to figure it all out, which is both a compliment and a threat.
Extensions add a meaningful layer of complexity, but in this specific instance, they also increase the deal by more than two dollars in a hurry. Base game is easy at ninety percent discount; The full experience with add-ons climbs to the cost of a typical indie game, sales or no sales. If you want a full monster-race buffet, the math stops being pretty stupid on your side, but again, it's not particularly necessary in any way. in my case, Barony Impressed enough that I almost feel compelled to go with it — Turning Wheel LLC earned my money fair and square, which feels surprisingly rare in this industry these days.
Barony is the easiest $2 you'll spend in the 2026 Steam Summer Sale
finally, Barony At this price it's a steal no matter who you are, but that being said it might not be an easy recommendation for everyone. The difficulty curve of this co-op title is immense, the interface shows its age, and a bad initial run can be over before you learn anything useful. Barony is a game that requires patience and careful improvisation from the player; If you need a game to meet halfway, it will have you standing in the lobby.
But the way I see it, that's exactly the point Barony Making – and if you lean into it and start speaking the language of the game, it can be very rewarding. If you're already on board with all of that, though, Barony The total package is: a feature-dense, decade-refined RPG that asks for patience, and rewards patience with the kinds of casual gameplay that some titles charge a fake $60 for. For the price of gas station coffee, Barony One of the most one-sided trades I've had in years.
Barony Available for $2 during the Steam Summer Sale.
