Close Menu
  • Login
  • Support Us
  • Newsletter
  • News
  • Features
  • Interviews
  • Reviews
    • Video Games
      • Previews
      • PC
      • PS5
      • Xbox Series X/S
      • Nintendo Switch
      • Xbox One
      • PS4
      • Tabletop
    • Film
    • TV
    • Anime
    • Comics
      • BOOM! Studios
      • Dark Horse Comics
      • DC Comics
      • IDW Publishing
      • Image Comics
      • Indie Comics
      • Marvel Comics
      • Oni-Lion Forge
      • Valiant Comics
      • Vault Comics
  • Podcast
  • More
    • Event Coverage
    • BWT Recommends
    • RSS Feeds
Facebook X (Twitter) Instagram
Support Us
But Why Tho?
RSS Facebook X (Twitter) YouTube
Trending:
  • Features
    Battlefield 6 Classes - Support trailer image

    Battlefield 6 Really Wants You To Play Support (But Knows You Won’t)

    07/31/2025
    Battlefield 6 Multiplayer Reveal promotional image

    Battlefield 6 Classes, Maps, And More: Everything You Need To Know

    07/31/2025
    A glimpse at all the upcoming Star Wars stories coming to the galaxy

    Star Wars Stories: What We Learned At SDCC 2025

    07/25/2025
    Blindspot episode still

    It’s been 5 years since ‘Blindspot’ ended. Why haven’t you watched it yet?

    07/24/2025
    Strange Scaffold

    Strange Scaffold Summer Showcase Delivers Bizarre And Brilliant Games

    07/22/2025
  • Fantasia Festival
  • K-Dramas
  • Netflix
  • Switch 2 Games
But Why Tho?
Home » PC » REVIEW: ‘Cobalt Core’ Lets You Play Your Way (PC)

REVIEW: ‘Cobalt Core’ Lets You Play Your Way (PC)

Eddie De SantiagoBy Eddie De Santiago11/08/20235 Mins ReadUpdated:03/16/2024
Cobalt Core But Why Tho
Share
Facebook Twitter Pinterest Reddit WhatsApp Email

Cobalt Core is a roguelike deckbuilding game from Rocket Rat Games and published by Brace Yourself Games. While roguelikes and card games tend to scare off potential players, Cobalt Core is absolutely worth a try. Much like the deck of cards that players will be building to succeed, developer Rocket Rat Games has assembled a masterful experience that shines brilliantly. 

Boasting a pixel art style and cute anthropomorphic animal pilots, Cobalt Core is replete with imaginative ships, including one that resembles a sheet of crystal, a giant nautilus, or even a castle complete with a wizard pilot. The UI almost resembles a sleek sci-fi board game, and the design of the cards themselves is concise and aesthetically appropriate, cleanly displaying information like card effects and which pilot it belongs to. To get started, players must choose their own ship out of five options, and a trio of humanoid animals out of eight to serve as the crew and venture forth, battling other ships in turn-based combat as they attempt to escape the time loop they find themselves trapped in. While they remain aware of each loop, they struggle repeatedly to reach and board The Cobalt, the eponymous ship that awaits them in the third sector, providing both their ultimate goal and their toughest challenge.

Get BWT in your inbox!

Subscribe to our weekly newsletter and get the latest and greated in entertainment coverage.
Click Here

Get BWT in your inbox!

Subscribe to our weekly newsletter and get the latest and greated in entertainment coverage.
Click Here

Each character brings along their own deck of cards, along with dialogue and further cards and memories to unlock, while ships each possess unique mechanics regarding their weaponry and layout. When first starting out, players’ options are limited. A single ship and 3 crew members are available, but more can be unlocked over time. The requirements to unlock them are usually visible from the starting screen, giving players smaller goals to work toward when struggling to reach the end of the line. 

Once players are ready to go, they’ll be thrown onto a map strewn with paths, allowing them to decide how they’ll traverse space, including seeking out tougher elite enemies or avoiding them in favor of repair shops or random events. Battles entail taking turns with an enemy ship, which will telegraph its attacks, allowing you to respond before firing away. This back-and-forth makes each fight feel like a puzzle, with a solution waiting to be discovered; even when it seems like the next turn is your last, using a drone as a makeshift shield to survive is a uniquely thrilling scenario that becomes commonplace in Cobalt Core.

While the prospect of battling tougher ships can be daunting, the rewards are worth it, providing with each defeated elite new cards and artifacts, items that provide helpful passive abilities. Normal enemy ships still provide cards as a reward, but artifacts are vital and creative tools to utilize with each run. Additionally, while there is a wide array of enemies and elites, you’ll still run into them repeatedly during your time with the game. Each one comes with its own gimmicks or dialogue, making it easy to recognize them on subsequent runs. One particularly humorous moment pits you against a stubborn pirate-mole who begins the conversation with “Dead or Alive!” but refuses to bring you in alive anyway.

Cobalt Core - But Why Tho

Upon reaching the end of the third sector, players will face a boss battle that, when beaten, ends the run and restores one of their crewmates’ memories. This is where the bulk of the narrative is found. While your crew’s dialogue during various runs gives a peek at their lives and personalities—changing with subsequent runs to provide more and more information—these memories show the player how and why each character has been trapped in the time loop. Without delving into spoilers, the story was a delight. Learning about the characters and why they each have a specific type of card made them relatable and likable, even if they weren’t used very often in subsequent runs. The conclusion of the story, reached upon unlocking all three memories for each character, was incredible. The only negative was that there wasn’t more. 

While the gameplay and the story (and the amazing soundtrack, full of memorable songs) are enough to make Cobalt Core good, it’s the meticulous design that makes it great. Each of the eight crewmembers and the five ships offer a unique way to play. One ship completely lacks cannons, instead firing drones that attack enemies for you, while another ship can move just by playing cards on either end of your hand. The crew members specialize in drone combat, high-risk/reward attacks, and even a gambler-style deck that relies more heavily on luck than the others. These are just a few examples of how different each crew member plays, but you’ll need to assemble a crew of three for each run. Despite how different and mismatched they seem at first, each combination can grow stronger and more synergistic with each new card or artifact gained. 

This is Cobalt Core’s greatest strength: it gives the player the freedom to pick their playstyle, and it’s so well designed that there isn’t a combination that’s doomed to fail from the start. Proof of that concept exists within the Logbook in the pause menu, which shows each crew member and all of their combinations that have completed a run successfully. While it doesn’t keep track of the ships used, there are still hundreds of combinations to explore, and seeing each trio come together as a cohesive team is one of the best experiences in gaming this year.

Cobalt Core provides a memorable story with fun characters, tense gameplay moments, and a payoff that is nearly unmatched. Despite the characters’ best attempts to escape the loop, it’s a game that you should play over and over.

Cobalt Core is available now on PC and Nintendo Switch.

Cobalt Core
  • 9/10
    Rating - 9/10
9/10

TL;DR

Cobalt Core provides a memorable story with fun characters, tense gameplay moments, and a payoff that is nearly unmatched. Despite the characters’ best attempts to escape the loop, it’s a game that you should play over and over.

Share. Facebook Twitter Pinterest LinkedIn WhatsApp Reddit Email
Previous ArticleREVIEW: ‘The Marvels’ Is The Wrong Kinds Of Messy
Next Article Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood Crosses Over with Grand Cross: Age Of Titans
Eddie De Santiago

Eddie has been an avid gamer since he picked up a Game Boy at age 4. Now he loves streaming games and writing about them. When he's not gaming he's reading comics and manga, or making music in LittleBigPlanet.

Related Posts

Key art for Ninja Gaiden Ragebound
9.0

REVIEW: ‘Ninja Gaiden: Ragebound’ Is Excellent Nostalgic Chaos

07/30/2025
Tales of the Shire screenshot of personal playable character.
6.5

REVIEW: ‘Tales Of The Shire’ Has Magic, Even If Its Sometimes Hard To Find

07/28/2025
Killing Floor 3 promotional key art
7.0

REVIEW: ‘Killing Floor 3’ Is Co-op Chaos With A Familiar Flavor

07/25/2025
Wildgate promotional key art
9.0

REVIEW: ‘Wildgate’ Is Co-Op Space Mayhem Done Right

07/25/2025
Wheel World promotional keyart from Annapurna Interactive
8.0

REVIEW: In ‘Wheel World’ The Ride Is The Story

07/23/2025
Wuchang in WUCHANG: Fallen Feathers
9.0

REVIEW: ‘Wuchang: Fallen Feathers’ Elevates The Genre With Exploration And Creativity

07/22/2025

Get BWT in your inbox!

Subscribe to our weekly newsletter and get the latest and greated in entertainment coverage.
Click Here
TRENDING POSTS
Wildgate promotional key art
9.0
PC

REVIEW: ‘Wildgate’ Is Co-Op Space Mayhem Done Right

By Adrian Ruiz07/25/2025Updated:07/30/2025

Built for friends and tuned for competition, Wildgate is messy in the best way: smart, surprising, and bursting with room to grow.

Glass Heart
7.0
TV

REVIEW: ‘Glass Heart’ Offers Messy, Musical Catharsis

By Allyson Johnson07/22/2025

The musical drama series ‘Glass Heart’ soars when it focuses on the epic performances of it’s fictional band, TENBLANK.

Simon in An Honest Life But Why Tho
3.5
Film

REVIEW: ‘An Honest Life’ Is Terribly Dishonest About Its Own Politics

By Jason Flatt08/02/2025

An Honest Life is an overly severe misfire about a law student who falls in with anarchist burglars that can’t decide who it resents more.

Black Women Anime — But Why Tho (9) BWT Recommends

10 Black Women in Anime That Made Me Feel Seen

By LaNeysha Campbell11/11/2023Updated:12/03/2024

Black women are some of anime’s most iconic characters, and that has a big impact on Black anime fans. Here are some of our favorites.

But Why Tho?
Facebook X (Twitter) Instagram Pinterest RSS YouTube Twitch
  • CONTACT US
  • ABOUT US
  • PRIVACY POLICY
  • SUBSCRIBE TO OUR NEWSLETTER
  • Review Score Guide
Sometimes we include links to online retail stores. If you click on one and make a purchase we may receive a small contribution.
Written Content is Copyright © 2025 But Why Tho? A Geek Community

Type above and press Enter to search. Press Esc to cancel.

But Why Tho Logo

Support Us!

We're able to keep making content thanks to readers like YOU!
Support independent media today with
Click Here