Sword of the Stars: The Pit

Sixty years of war left everything scarred, including whatever’s buried beneath the surface of this planet. Somewhere in the Pit lies a cure for a plague threatening humanity, and reaching it means descending through 40 or more levels of monsters, mutations, and things that shouldn’t exist.

Sword of the Stars: The Pit is a turn-based, sci-fi roguelike dungeon crawler from developer Kerberos Productions. Managing inventory, resources, and mutations across a deep descent, choosing from a wide roster of alien species, and fighting through carefully paced, tactical combat, you’ll dig deep into humanity’s last hope for survival, one grueling floor at a time.

What Makes It Different?

• Descend through 40+ procedurally generated floors of turn-based danger
• Choose from a wide roster of alien species, each with unique traits
• Manage limited inventory space and resources with real strategic weight
• Embrace or resist mutations that permanently reshape a character
• Craft weapons and gear from scavenged materials found along the way
• Face careful, deliberate combat that punishes rushing headfirst into danger
• Take on a genuinely old-school, attrition-based dungeon crawling experience

A Slow, Deliberate Descent

Unlike faster roguelikes built around quick, repeatable runs, The Pit leans fully into deliberate, attrition-style dungeon crawling. Every floor demands careful movement, resource conservation, and thoughtful inventory management, since supplies gathered early on need to last through whatever’s waiting further down. That slower pace gives every decision real weight, turning a single successful descent into a genuine, multi-hour commitment rather than a quick dip in and out.

Mutation Is a Double-Edged Sword

Surviving deep into the Pit often means embracing changes that would be considered dangerous anywhere else. Mutations picked up along the way can grant powerful new abilities, but they come with permanent trade-offs, forcing real decisions about how far to bend a character’s biology in pursuit of survival. Combined with the wide roster of alien species available from the start, no two runs need to approach the Pit’s dangers the same way.

How Long Does a Run Take?

A single successful run typically takes between 10 to 15 hours on easier difficulties, and can easily extend much longer depending on playstyle, inventory management, and floor exploration. On average, players spend around 30 minutes per floor, since late-game levels require careful strategic movement, resource conservation, and micro-management.

A focused main objective run averages roughly 24 to 27 hours of cumulative playtime across attempts, reflecting the steep learning curve and frequent failures inherent to the genre, while seeing all aspects and achieving 100% completion takes upwards of 55 hours. Unlike fast-paced roguelikes where individual runs wrap up in under an hour, The Pit is a traditional, slow-paced attrition dungeon crawler where a single successful descent is a massive time commitment.

Controller Support

Sword of the Stars: The Pit features Full Controller Support for Xbox Controllers. Support for other devices is not known.

Good If You Like…

If you enjoyed Age of Legacy, Path of Achra, or Cardinal Quest 2, Sword of the Stars: The Pit’s mix of turn-based tactics and slow-burn dungeon crawling should be well worth a look.