"Soccer is about 22 men chasing a ball for 90 minutes and at the end Germany wins," goes a popular saying. Naturally, the Germans' love for the sport has long been extended to video games, so it's no surprise that they'd come up with one of the wildest takes on soccer to date: fusing it with roguelike dungeon crawlers like Hades.
Footgun: Underground is a roguelike platformer with pixel art visuals that combines elements of soccer and billiard with genre staples, creating an intriguing mix of the familiar and unknown.
Soccer's popularity partly stems from its simplicity and accessibility and the indie game clearly took those lessons to heart. At its core, it's very simple: You kick a ball, though not into a net. While etiquette in soccer dictates that players shouldn't deliberately aim at their opponents, Footgun very much encourages it, motivating you to kick the ball as hard as possible to evaporate foes through overwhelming force.
In typical roguelike fashion, you dive into a dungeon, following twisted paths that feature various room types with unique challenges and rewards, such as equipment, character updates and brand-new balls.
Aside from the soccer aspect, the game incorporates elements of pool -- rooms will often feature neutral balls, which can be used to create lethal chain reactions if you play things in a clever way. Several different biomes and randomly generated dungeons await, securing replayability.
Footgun: Underground received nominations at the German Computer Game Awards and German Developer Awards, showing its great potential despite not clinching any of the trophies at the end.
The PC version of the game launched in 2024. Now, a Nintendo Switch port has been released, bringing the title to a handheld device -- and Nintendo's console isn't the only one. Footgun: Underground received its Steam Deck verification at the same time, meaning it fully supports the portable gaming PC's control scheme.