'It's kind of like you're a butcher': Hundreds of Slay the Spire 2 card ideas were cut during development in an 'incredibly destructive process'

‘It’s kind of like you’re a butcher’: Hundreds of Slay the Spire 2 card ideas were cut during development in an ‘incredibly destructive process’ | PC Gamer Skip to main content Open menu Close main menu PC Gamer THE GLOBAL AUTHORITY ON PC GAMES US Edition UK US Canada Australia Subscribe Sign in View Profile Sign out Search Search PC Gamer Games Hardware News Reviews Guides Video Forum More PC Gaming Show PC Gamer Clips Software Codes Coupons Movies & TV Magazine Newsletter Affiliate links Meet the team Community guidelines About PC Gamer PC Gamer Magazine SubscriptionWhy subscribe?Subscribe to the world’s #1 PC gaming magTry a single issue or save on a subscriptionIssues delivered straight to your door or device From$1Subscribe now Don’t miss these Card Game Slay the Spire 2 is the #1 seller on Steam, above Marathon and Resident Evil Requiem Action Desert Strike spiritual successor Cleared Hot’s next update brings better Steam Deck support and arcade missions, but I’m more excited about using my winch to slingshot missiles back at enemies: ‘I’ve been waiting months to work on this again’ FPS Highguard’s failure is emblematic of something that has tormented videogame investors for years now: past live service hits do not equal future live service hits Card Game After its disastrous launch last year, I’m here to tell you that 2025’s most promising auto-battler finally lives up to its potential Games The best indie games on PC Roguelike Steam Next Fest is full of Balatro-likes: here’s 7 demos I think you should try FPS Occult deckbuilder The Killing Stone is introducing a ‘dynamic’ scare system originally considered for BioShock 2: ‘It’s very fun as a gamedev to be surprised by something in your own game’ Roguelike This dice-rolling roguelite is like Balatro on steroids, and its bosses are pure evil Roguelike Two of Mewgenics’ most memorable areas were directly inspired by a brutal and brilliant tabletop RPG Roguelike Thanks to Mewgenics’ cruel sidequest items, I’ve accidentally created the conditions for the most cursed run ever Card Game Surprise: Slay the Spire 2 is bringing 4-player co-op when it hits early access on March 6 Card Game If you’ve ever had a crippling Vampire Survivors or Slay the Spire habit, avoid Vampire Crawlers at all costs Roguelike Mewgenics review: The creator of The Binding of Isaac has transcended his own past work with this sprawling, ridiculous, and endlessly surprising roguelike FPS ‘We don’t need [player counts] to be super huge in order to be successful’: Highguard devs respond to posters declaring it dead on arrival Roguelike It’s going to take you over 500 hours to 100% complete Mewgenics, according to creator Edmund McMillen PopularNEW: PC Gamer Clips!MarathonArc RaidersBest PC gearQuizzes Games Card Game Slay the Spire 2 ‘It’s kind of like you’re a butcher’: Hundreds of Slay the Spire 2 card ideas were cut during development in an ‘incredibly destructive process’ News By Tyler Wilde published 6 March 2026 Designing the hit roguelike deckbuilder involved a lot of culling, says Mega Crit. 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From first-look trailers, interviews, reviews and explainers, we’ve got you covered. Signup + Once a month SFX Get sneak previews, exclusive competitions and details of special events each month! Signup + An account already exists for this email address, please log in. Subscribe to our newsletter Even in early access, Slay the Spire 2 contains more stuff—cards, enemies, and so on—than the original Slay the Spire, according to the developers at Mega Crit. Yet studio co-founder Anthony Giovannetti has described refining the hit roguelike deckbuilder as an ‘incredibly destructive’ process.Speaking to PC Gamer in an interview last year, Giovannetti said that 100-200 cards were considered for each character before paring their collections down to around 60 each.”It’s kind of like you’re a butcher,” Giovannetti said. “You generate thousands, tens of thousands of different ideas and then you look at them all and you go, ‘these are bad,’ and you just cut them all away. There’s this constant culling process. Very rarely is there this golden idea you keep from start to finish. Most of it is this incredibly destructive process.” You may like Slay the Spire 2 is the #1 seller on Steam, above Marathon and Resident Evil Requiem Slay the Spire gets the best Christmas present a deckbuilder could ask for: a new all-time concurrent player peak on Steam nearly 7 years after release Surprise: Slay the Spire 2 is bringing 4-player co-op when it hits early access on March 6 There’s more carnage to come: Mega Crit plans to keep Slay the Spire 2 in early access for one to two years, or “until the game feels great,” and will add new “cards, events, environments, enemies, and more” as it approaches that 1.0 release.My first run felt pretty great already, but it has to be a wildly complicated game to balance with so many possible interactions between cards, temporary status effects, relics (objects that apply permanent effects to a run), and the special abilities of its peculiar and sometimes dastardly mons