Enter the Gungeon

Dodge Roll, a small independent studio, released Enter the Gungeon on April 5, 2016 as a bullet hell dungeon crawler built around a single absurd premise: at the bottom of a living fortress made entirely of gun mythology lies a weapon capable of killing the past, and a handful of regret-laden misfits are going to fight their way to it.

Each run descends through a procedurally assembled sequence of floors constructed from hand-designed rooms. Difficulty scales as the player makes progress, introducing tougher enemy configurations and traps in response to victories rather than holding escalation to fixed floor transitions. The enemies, collectively the Cult of the Gundead, are visually patterned on bullet and gun iconography and fight with dense projectile patterns that demand constant movement and precise dodge rolls. Flipping tables for temporary cover is a real defensive option, not a cosmetic flourish.

The gun roster is the mechanical centerpiece. Dozens of weapons range from conventional ballistics to projectiles made of rainbows, fish, foam darts, and bees, each with distinct firing behavior and situational value. Items and guns found on a run interact in ways that reward experimentation, and merchants encountered in the dungeon offer further purchasing options mid-run. Several playable characters are available, each carrying different starting loadouts and passive traits tied to their backstory. Local co-op supports a second player.

Post-launch development continued well past release. Dodge Roll shipped patches through early 2017, then delivered the named Advanced Gungeons and Draguns update in July 2018, followed by A Farewell to Arms in April 2019, which was presented as the game’s final content update. A companion game, Exit the Gungeon, arrived on Steam in March 2020. An announcement in April 2025 confirmed Enter the Gungeon 2 is in development, with a planned 2026 release.

The dodge roll mechanic that gives the studio its name is the game’s tightest design constraint: it grants brief invincibility frames but must be aimed and timed against patterns that can fill the entire room, making spatial awareness as important as the gun currently equipped.