Recent reviews by griby

Perhaps the best game people don't know about.

It's good alright.

I've been gaming since the 90's and Vault of the Void (VotV) has, without a doubt, one of the most refined game design I've had the chance to experience. In my opinion, it clearly has a leg up on Slay the Spire (StS) (which is obviously an amazing game in its own right) with VotV putting even more emphasis on planning ahead of time by giving you hints of the cards and interactions to come.
I'd describe the planning phase as "deep", but not "overly complex". It only takes you a few minutes at the start of each dungeon floor to plan both where your deck is heading and the path you'll take to crawl through the dungeon, then you can start your journey. Planning helps you mitigate RNG when it comes to the deckbuilding part and I believe it makes each run much more consistent and relevant than in StS, without making it predictable.
Each part of the design complement each other very nicely and feeds into a constant need to "trade-off", both during combat (for instance by giving up a card or a bit of health to set up a strong following turn) and out of combat (by turning down an interesting card to access a possibly more powerful set of cards or items at a shop).
Additionally the various classes/specializations offered truly bring their own flavor of gameplay, especially in light of their matchups against the various dungeon encounters. Card upgrades and void stone combinations add even more depth to the deckbuilding aspect and the available combos.
All in all I strongly recommend giving it a try even if you're not really into card games and deck building. It's a 10/10 and it's still in Early Access if you can believe that.