Infamous Keepers, I think, might be a game about the games industry. It’s not about making games explicitly, not in the slightest. It is a tower defence roguelite, one where you run a dungeon, with this as the narrative setup, however: “Your employer, the Dungeon Company, has recently gone through massive layoffs, putting their dungeons to the test by closing the portals that connect them… if a team of heroes makes it all the way through, you can kiss your career goodbye.” You do have to replace a few words to get back to our reality, but there’s certainly a resemblance to the one we live in.

Beyond being a metaphor, Infamous Keepers is also a spin-off of Legend of Keepers, which too saw you fending off intrepid heroes from the spoils of your dungeon. Where Legend of Keepers was more of a reverse Darkest Dungeon, Infamous Keepers keeps the management aspect but trades it for some isometric tactical plotting.

Being a dungeon keeper, you can see across the entirety of your dungeon, and it’s up to you to lay all manner of traps and devices to stop adventurers from wandering in and nicking all your loot. Placing deadly towers in just the right spots is imperative, but it’s not the only thing you have to consider. There’s also all of your employees! Who you can either send to the front lines to do some killing themselves, or plop them on to a tower to increase its stats.

How far the metaphor I have imposed upon Infamous Keepers can go, I’m not entirely sure. It’s unclear how much, if any, story there is to be found here, but I’m always intrigued by a reversal of genres. It’ll be a while before we can see if it’s any good too, as it’s currently slated for release in early 2027. You can wishlist it on Steam in the meantime.