Beacon, A New Sci-Fi Roguelike, In The Works For PC And Xbox One

San Francisco-based developer Monothetic has revealed a new roguelike in development for PC and Xbox One. Introducing top-down shooter Beacon.

Beacon’s premise serves to support its game mechanics. You are Freja, a pilot-for-hire who recently crashed into an alien world. You will be exploring that world and seeking out the eponymous distress beacon that will take you to safety. At your disposal is a unique advantage; a cloning bay.

Small spoilers follow below, courtesy of Monothetic writing for Xbox Wire. Skip past the image if you want to avoid them.

The original Freja is already dead. However, thanks to the advantages afforded by futuristic technology, she can clone herself back to life. The trailer does show that the cloning process is automatically processed by the bay when Freja dies. The full details have not yet been fully disclosed (does her soul move between bodies, or is it technically a different Freja living the same life?), but this is part of what makes the premise so interesting.

Thanks to the cloning bay, your character can die multiple times and come back stronger and remembering everything that happened before. He or she can pick up weapons and equipment while traversing the alien world. Even better, after taking out an alien inhabitant, he or she can harvest its DNA, augmenting your body with new physical mutations. Monothetic states they hope Beacon will cross the line between real-time action and strategy elements.

Beacon is currently planned for release on Windows, Mac, and Xbox One. However, Monothetic is open to bringing it to more platforms in the future, as the opportunity arises. They are running the game on Unity 5, so it will have the advantage of being scalable and playable in different PC configurations. Hopefully, this also means they have the flexibility to bring it to more platforms as well.

You can watch Beacon’s trailer below and check out Beacon’s official site here.