Mewgenics has clawed its way to the top of Steam’s roguelike charts, peaking at 115,428 concurrent players and edging past Hades 2’s previous high-water mark of 112,947. Alongside the new peak, the cat-breeding tactics roguelike has roared out of the gate with blockbuster sales, and the developers have already hinted at DLC and console plans. Here’s why this milestone matters, what fueled the surge, and what comes next for this weird and wonderful feline phenomenon.
If you’ve spent any time on your Steam friends list lately, you’ve probably seen an unusual surge of cat avatars and chaos. That’s Mewgenics, the long-gestating passion project from Edmund McMillen and Tyler Glaiel, finally strutting into the spotlight. Over the weekend, the game hit a massive 115,428 concurrent players on Steam, a new peak for a roguelike on the platform. The previous leader, Hades 2, reached 112,947 five months ago—no small feat for any game to surpass.
The numbers don’t stop there. According to the developers, Mewgenics sold roughly 150,000 copies in its first six hours and crossed the 500,000 mark within 36 hours of launch. For a quirky indie built around breeding, battling, and occasionally breaking your heart with trait roulette, that’s meteoric.
Why this record matters
- A new standard for roguelikes on Steam: Surpassing Hades 2’s concurrent peak is a statement. Roguelikes typically thrive over time as word-of-mouth spreads, but launching with this kind of momentum suggests Mewgenics has tapped into both genre diehards and curious newcomers.
- A win for weird: Roguelikes are often defined by their combat loops and progression hooks. Mewgenics folds in genetic tinkering, tactical positioning, and team-building in a way that feels genuinely fresh. It’s part lab experiment, part dungeon sprint—and it turns out that’s a potent combo.
What is Mewgenics, exactly? Imagine a tactics roguelike where your party members are cats, and your most powerful tool isn’t a sword or spell—it’s a family tree. Run after run, you breed, select, and field a squad of felines whose traits stack into strange and delightful synergies. One cat might inherit a damage-boosting quirk but also pick up a glass-cannon downside. Another becomes a defensive anchor with regeneration and taunt-style tricks. You’ll juggle positioning, cooldowns, and environmental hazards while trying to coax the perfect little monster out of your gene pool.
It’s absurd in the best way. You get the rush of buildcraft roguelikes with a breeding sim’s long arc of investment. Every victory feels earned, every loss a lesson in how one tiny trait can reroute a whole run.
How it broke big
- Dev pedigree helps: Fans of The Binding of Isaac and The End is Nigh already trust McMillen and Glaiel to deliver sticky, replayable systems. Mewgenics wears that lineage proudly while steering into a new design space.
- Spectator catnip: Watching a squad evolve from scrappy strays into a min-maxed murderclowder makes for bingeable streams and clips. Once creators started showcasing busted builds and tragic misbreeds, curiosity did the rest.
- A fresh fantasy: We’ve had card-based roguelikes, bullet hells, and deck-breachers. A genetics-forward tactics roguelike? That’s new enough to spark a “you have to try this” wave.
Sales momentum and what it signals Those early milestones—150k in six hours, then half a million in a day and a half—point to more than hype. They suggest strong retention. Roguelikes live or die on the depth of their decision trees. Mewgenics has a sprawling space of outcomes thanks to trait inheritance and unit interplay, which means experimentation pays off over dozens of runs. If the team continues to polish balance and expand content, that staying power could grow.
What’s next: DLC and consoles The developers have already confirmed DLC is on the roadmap, though no timeline is set yet. It’s easy to imagine new traits, classes, and encounter types deepening the sandbox without disrupting the core. A console release is also planned, again without firm dates. If the UI and controls translate well to gamepads, Mewgenics could find an even broader audience beyond PC.
Tips for new breeders and battlers Not sure how to start shepherding your supercats? A few run-saving ideas:
- Draft for roles, then refine with breeding: Aim for at least one durable frontliner, a reliable damage dealer, and a utility piece that manipulates the board. Use breeding to tune edges, not to reinvent your comp mid-run.
- Traits are tools, not destiny: A downside can be an upside in the right build. A fragile high-damage cat can work if you invest in displacement or shielding.
- Positioning wins fights: Your gene lab matters—but battles are decided on the grid. Learn how push/pull, line-of-sight, and zone control stack with your traits.
- Don’t hoard, invest: Spend early to stabilize. Upgrades and targeted breeding attempts in the first few encounters pay dividends later.
- Embrace failure data: A doomed run is a free scouting trip. Note which trait combos felt clunky and which synergies surprised you, then pivot next time.
- Keep a breeding plan: Random rolls are tempting, but setting a simple goal—like stacking bleed enhancements or amplification around a crit engine—keeps your team coherent.
The bigger picture for roguelikes Seeing a genetically chaotic tactics roguelike top Steam’s concurrent charts underscores how flexible the genre has become. We’re past the point where “roguelike” signals just permadeath and loot pinatas. Today, the term is a canvas: deckbuilders, soulslikes, autobattlers, twin-sticks—and now, a cat-breeding tactics lab—can all find massive audiences if they bring fresh systems and strong feedback loops.
Final thoughts Mewgenics isn’t simply riding novelty. It earns its momentum with a smart blend of inheritance mechanics, tactical combat, and that classic “one more run” energy. Breaking the Steam concurrent record for roguelikes puts it in rare company, and early sales suggest it has real legs—or paws, if we’re being honest. With DLC teased and console versions planned, the clowder is only getting bigger. If you’ve been waiting to see whether the hype is real, consider this your sign: it’s a great time to start your bloodline.