$24.99Astral Ascent Escape the Zodiac, one run at a time
Pick a hero, stack spells into wild builds and fight through an astral prison, solo or with a friend beside you.
Is Astral Ascent worth it?
Astral Ascent is worth it if…
- you want a fast action roguelite where builds can get genuinely overpowered
- you like flashy spell combos and a screen full of effects
- you enjoy boss fights with real personality and a story that unfolds across runs
- you want a co-op game to play on the couch with a friend
- you prefer games that let you tune the difficulty up as you get better
Screenshots
Four heroes, four ways to fight
Each of the four playable characters plays differently, and the choice shapes every run. Ayla is an assassin whose blades land before enemies can react. Kiran swings with such raw strength his blows create shockwaves. Calie, a sculptor turned warrior, throws magical gemstones that pierce through enemy defenses. Octave, trained by a witch, summons ethereal weapons for every range. You are not picking a skin, you are picking a whole style: speed, brute force, precision or versatility. Their personalities come through too, in voiced dialogue and in how they talk to the Zodiacs before a fight.
Builds that go off the rails
The spell system is where runs get interesting. You unlock dozens of unique spells per character, then customize them further with augments, imprints and affinities, and stack them into a kit that is entirely yours. The combinations get genuinely ridiculous: builds that fill the screen with summons and effects, the kind where the fight ends before you fully understand what happened. It takes a few runs for the systems to click, and the in-game glossary helps. Once it does, theorycrafting becomes half the game, and every run is a new experiment.
Twelve Zodiacs standing in your way
The Garden is guarded by 12 bosses, the Zodiacs, spread across four hand-crafted worlds. Each one fights with its own attacks and style, has a backstory to uncover, and a reason of its own for keeping you locked in. They are a highlight: the fights are memorable both to look at and to learn, and several of them like to needle you after a failed run. Between bosses, you dash across big landscapes, jump and dodge through platforming sections, and pass through rooms with their own identity, from ambush waves to small challenges with useful rewards.
Better with a friend on the couch
There is a two-player local co-op mode, and it works well: you fight side by side, combine your kits, and watch the screen light up when both builds are fully online. Co-op is also a good way in: one player's first impression of the game changed completely once a friend joined, because the combat and boss fights land harder when someone is there to see the chaos with you. Destiny is heavy; sharing it is allowed.
