Enter the Gungeon is a 2016 video game created by the American studio Dodge Roll and published by Devolver Digital. The game takes place in a setting called the Gungeon, which is themed around firearms. Players control characters known as Gungeoneers who explore randomly generated rooms to find a special gun that can "kill the past." The Gungeoneers battle enemies shaped like bullets using both regular and unusual weapons. The game includes a permadeath system, which means that if a Gungeoneer dies, they lose all collected items and must restart from the beginning of the game. Between attempts, players can visit an area called the Breach, where they can interact with non-player characters and discover new items that appear randomly during gameplay.
Development of Enter the Gungeon began in 2014, when four employees from Mythic Entertainment left to form Dodge Roll. The lead designer, Dave Crooks, got the idea for the name "Gungeon" after listening to the soundtrack of the game Gun Godz. Dodge Roll designed and tested each room in the Gungeon individually, then used procedural generation to arrange them into unique configurations. Many of the game’s weapons were inspired by earlier games such as Mega Man and Metroid, while other features were added to encourage players to use level layouts creatively.
Enter the Gungeon was first released on April 5, 2016, for Linux, macOS, PlayStation 4, and Windows 10. By June 2020, it had sold over three million copies. Critics praised the game’s creativity and weapon designs, though they also noted its difficulty. The game received positive reviews when it was released, with comparisons to The Binding of Isaac and Nuclear Throne. Dodge Roll released several content updates between 2017 and 2019. A platform game called Exit the Gungeon was released in 2019, and a direct sequel, Enter the Gungeon 2, is planned for release in 2026.
Gameplay
Enter the Gungeon is a top-down shooter game with many bullets and random levels. The player controls one of four characters—Marine, Convict, Hunter, or Pilot (called "Gungeoneers")—who must travel to the bottom of the Gungeon to find a magical gun that can "kill the past." Each Gungeoneer begins with unique items and weapons but can all shoot guns, knock over tables for cover, and avoid attacks by rolling to become temporarily invulnerable. The player has a limited number of "Blanks" that can remove all enemy bullets in a room. Combat requires learning enemy patterns and using cover and rolls to avoid damage.
The Gungeon has five floors, each with about twenty rooms. The layout and rewards of each floor are randomly created using pre-made rooms and are filled with bullet-shaped enemies called Gundead. To defeat Gundead, players use many types of guns and items, which can be found by opening chests, buying from shops, or defeating bosses. When enemies are killed, players earn bullet casings and keys. Bullet casings can be traded at shops for guns and items, while keys unlock chests. Guns range from regular pistols and rifles to unusual ones, like a unicorn horn that shoots rainbows or a mailbox that fires envelopes. Each floor ends with a random boss that must be defeated to move forward. Like other roguelike games, Enter the Gungeon has a permadeath system: if the player dies, they lose all items and guns and must restart from the first floor.
As players complete multiple playthroughs, they may meet non-player characters (NPCs) inside the Gungeon. Once encountered, NPCs either set up shops inside the Gungeon or travel to the Breach, a central area. At the Breach, players can unlock new items that appear randomly in the Gungeon or accept quests from NPCs. Both actions require spending currency earned from defeating bosses. Unlocking new guns increases the variety of weapons available during a playthrough.
Development
Development of Enter the Gungeon began in 2014 when four employees of Mythic Entertainment left the company to start their own project before the company closed later that year. According to developer Dave Crooks, he was listening to the soundtrack of the game Gun Godz by Vlambeer and thought of the name "Gungeon" the next day. Crooks shared the name "Enter the Gungeon" with his team, and they created the game’s story during a lunch meeting. Over the next few weeks, they tested early versions of the game’s mechanics. While Crooks said The Binding of Isaac had a major influence on the game, the team also drew ideas from Nuclear Throne, Spelunky, Dark Souls, and Metal Gear Solid.
In the game, dungeons are created randomly, but Dodge Roll, the studio, found it better to design each room by hand. They tested each room separately and then connected them randomly to form a dungeon. The designs of the guns took two years to complete, with most work done by artist Joe Harty. Many of the guns were inspired by other video games and systems, including the NES Zapper and weapons from games like Mega Man, Metroid, Shadow Warrior, and Serious Sam. The boss characters were designed through a mix of ideas from Crooks and Harty, which were then shared with gameplay programmer David Rubel to decide how the bosses would attack players.
The dodge roll mechanic was inspired by a similar feature in the game Ikaruga, which allowed players to avoid many bullets at once. The team also used ideas from the Dark Souls series to help characters move out of the way of attacks. The team liked this mechanic so much that they named their studio after it. They also added features like flipping tables or dropping chandeliers on enemies to encourage players to use the environment creatively. At one point, the team included a feature called "active reload," similar to Gears of War, where pressing a button at the right time during a reload increased bullet damage. However, they later removed this feature and limited it to a collectible power-up, deciding that the tension of waiting for a gun to reload was important to the game’s experience.
Release
In December 2014, during the PlayStation Experience event hosted by Sony Computer Entertainment, the game was officially announced for the PlayStation 4 and Windows, followed by the release of an announcement trailer. In 2015, the game was shown at several events, including E3 2015, where the co-op feature was revealed during the PC Gaming Show. On March 2, 2016, the developers announced the game would release on April 5, 2016. The game was planned to include free updates after its release, such as new weapons, enemies, and levels. The first update, called "Supply Drop," was released for free on January 26, 2017. This update added new guns, enemies, and room layouts. A version for the Xbox One, which included cross-buy and cross-save support for Windows 10, was released on April 5, 2017. A version for the Nintendo Switch was released on December 14, 2017. A second major update, "Advanced Gungeons & Draguns," was released on July 19, 2018, for all platforms. This update added more weapons and enemies and included balance changes to make the game easier for new players while still offering challenges.
While Dodge Roll was working on a third major update, the team decided in November 2018 to cancel it so they could focus on creating a new game. The developers noted that the time spent on "Advanced Gungeons & Draguns" brought the total time working on the game to five years. Each new weapon added required testing against existing game effects, which became very demanding for the team. In April 2019, Dodge Roll released a final free patch called "A Farewell to Arms" to fix remaining bugs and provide a final content update. This update included new weapons and two Gungeoneers named the Paradox and the Gunslinger. A version for the cloud-streaming service Google Stadia was released in late December 2020. Ports for iOS and Android were released in August 2025.
Reception
A review site called Metacritic reported that Enter the Gungeon received mostly positive feedback from critics. Another review site, OpenCritic, noted that the game was highly praised by 88% of critics. Many reviewers compared the game to The Binding of Isaac and Nuclear Throne. Destructoid compared the game’s dungeons to those in Zelda and said the game’s difficulty was similar to Nuclear Throne. It stated, “While it doesn’t totally change the twin-stick shooter genre, it has nearly perfected it.” Game Informer recommended the game to fans of roguelikes and twin-stick shooters, saying it improved on both The Binding of Isaac and Nuclear Throne. Nintendo Life called it one of the best indie games on the Nintendo Switch, and USgamer listed it as one of the best roguelike twin-stick shooters.
Reviewers liked the variety and creativity of the guns and items in the game but noted that many weapons were common. Game Informer said discovering new guns made each playthrough fun, while Eurogamer described the guns as “wondrously exotic.” Although IGN found many standard weapons too similar, it praised the game’s pop culture references, weapon designs, and sound effects.
The game’s difficulty was often discussed. Destructoid said enemies on lower floors were very challenging, and PC Gamer called the bosses “the hardest things I’ve ever encountered.” The Escapist said the game’s learning curve was fair but found some enemies and bosses frustrating. Electronic Gaming Monthly said the difficulty helped players improve their skills. Rock Paper Shotgun and Nintendo World Report said their struggles came from a lack of skill, not unfair game mechanics.
Enter the Gungeon sold over 200,000 copies in its first week across all platforms. Steam Spy estimated that 75% of these sales happened on Steam. By January 2017, the game had sold over 800,000 units across all platforms, according to Devolver Digital. Total sales across all platforms reached over 3 million by January 2020.
Legacy
A spin-off called Exit the Gungeon was created by Dodge Roll and first released for iOS devices through Apple Arcade on September 19, 2019. In Enter the Gungeon, players try to reach the lowest level of the Gungeon, while in Exit the Gungeon, players must escape the Gungeon as it collapses. The gameplay of Exit the Gungeon is similar to Enter the Gungeon, but it is a platform game instead of a top-down dungeon crawler. In 2019, an arcade spin-off titled Enter the Gungeon: House of the Gundead was announced and released in 2022. A sequel called Enter the Gungeon 2, which uses a 3D art style, was announced in April 2025 and is planned for release in 2026 on Windows and Nintendo Switch 2.