10 Video Game Genre Flips That Blew Our MIND
8. Inscryption
When Inscryption was released in 2021, it quickly gained recognition as a cult sensation and one of the year’s most unusual and surprising titles, earning several major nominations and awards. At its core, it presents as a deck-building card game with distinctive artwork, but surprisingly, it incorporates multiple unexpected twists that set it apart from similar games.
What begins as the expected card format in a dark gothic cabin - where the gamer is playing matches under tough roguelike rules - reinvents itself every few hours, dipping into elements of escape-room puzzles, top-down old-school RPG, and even FMV adventure game.
It handles some truly bizarre genre swerves, yet the reason it works is part of its magic. The plot is told from the gamer’s point of view, and as it unravels and expands from what looks like a simple game on the surface, their experiencing it all in real time. It grips the player right up until its final baffling moments.
Now that’s how you reinvent deck-builders.