A turn-based tactics roguelike from Greek myth
Orpheus goes down into the Underworld with his lyre and Apollo's spear to bring Eurydice back. Every enemy moves by clear rules, so every turn is a small puzzle you can see all the way through.
About the game
Eurydice is dead, taken by a serpent's bite on her wedding day.
Orpheus, the greatest musician who ever lived, takes up his lyre and Apollo's spear and goes down into the Underworld to bring her back.
Orpheus Descending plays out on a small hex board. Walk past a Shade to strike it, stride through the air with Hermes' help, cast the spear across the board, or play a Chord on the lyre to knock the dead back, into each other, off the edge or into the fires of the Phlegethon. Shades, Stygian Archers, Furies with brimstone urns and Lampads each follow their own rules. Learn them and turn them against each other.
Every depth has two Descents, and each leads to a god's house below: Calliope, Apollo, Hermes, Thanatos or Persephone, each with boons of their own, some for the price of a heartstring. Eighteen depths and six regions lie between the Shores of the Styx and the Palace of Hades, where Eurydice waits. A run takes minutes.
The ending follows the myth.
Now: a seasonal event
Night of the Dead
October 24 – November 2, 2026
From Halloween through the Day of the Dead, the dead walk restless, as they did in Athens at the Anthesteria. Three hand-built challenges are free to every player, one region of the Underworld each, with boons from the gods of sleep, night and death:
- The Restless Shades, in the Asphodel Meadows
- Hecate's Crossroads, on the banks of the Phlegethon
- Thanatos Walks, in Tartarus
Win all three to keep a lamp burning beside Orpheus on the title screen for good.
How it plays
Every move is a puzzle
Stab, lunge and stride
Walk past a Shade to strike it, stride through the air with Hermes' help, or cast Apollo's spear across the board.
Play the lyre
A Chord knocks the dead back, into each other, off the edge, or into the fires of the Phlegethon.
Know the dead
Shades, Stygian Archers, Furies and Lampads each follow their own rules, shown on the board before they act.
Choose your way down
Two Descents on every depth, each leading to one of five gods' houses with its own boons.
Eighteen depths, six regions
From the Shores of the Styx through Asphodel, the Fields of Punishment, the Phlegethon and Tartarus to the Palace of Hades.
Short runs, deep strategy
A run takes minutes, and every descent is new. No timers, no energy, no ads.
Screenshots
On the board
iPhone, 1320 × 2868. Select a screenshot to open it at full size.
Worth knowing
Behind the game
Every sound is made in code
There are no audio files in the game. The lyre music, the Chords, the fire and every other sound are synthesized on the device as you play.
The myth keeps its ending
Orpheus can bring Eurydice to the edge of the daylight. What happens there is what happens in the myth, and it is the reason the lyre must go down again.
Pixel art on a small board
Every figure, tile and effect is pixel art at the scale of the board, snapped to whole screen pixels on every device.
Read the board, not a wiki
Omens mark the tiles where Orpheus would be struck next turn, and short lessons teach each enemy and action before the first run.
Logos and art
Assets
Free to use in coverage of the game.
