Monster Train is a roguelike deck-building game created by the American studio Shiny Shoe and published by Good Shepherd Entertainment. It was first released on May 21, 2020, for Windows. Later versions were released for Xbox One on December 17, 2020, iOS on October 27, 2022, and PlayStation 5 on July 25, 2024. A Complete Edition called Monster Train First Class was released for Nintendo Switch on August 19, 2021. The game received positive reviews, including being nominated for Best Strategy/Tactics Game at IGN Best of 2020 and winning the Strategy/Simulation Game of the Year award at the 24th Annual D.I.C.E. Awards. A sequel, Monster Train 2, was released on May 21, 2025, by Big Fan Games, a label of Devolver Digital, which bought Good Shepherd Entertainment.

Gameplay

The game takes place in a vertical area with a train that has four floors. The top floor has a fire. The enemies want to reach the fire to destroy it, and the player must protect it to win. To do this, the player uses cards that can call monsters or activate powerful abilities to fight the enemies. However, the player can only bring their creatures on the first three floors of the train.

Reception

According to the review website Metacritic, the game Monster Train received "generally favorable reviews." Dan Stapleton from IGN wrote that the game offers many hours of challenging and surprising gameplay through its varied deckbuilding mechanics and the way different decks interact. He gave the game a score of 9 out of 10. Cody Peterson from Screen Rant described Monster Train as an enjoyable deckbuilding roguelike game that introduces new ideas to both genres. He gave the game a rating of 4 out of 5 stars.

The game was nominated for the IGN Best of 2020 list in the category of Best Strategy/Tactics Game. The award was given to Crusader Kings III. At the 24th Annual D.I.C.E. Awards, Monster Train was nominated for "Strategy/Simulation Game of the Year." The award was given to Microsoft Flight Simulator.

Sequel

Monster Train 2 was announced in February 2025 by Devolver Digital through its label, Big Fan Games. The game was released on May 21, 2025, for the Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 5, Windows, and Xbox Series X/S.