868-BACK Review
Michael Brough’s 868-BACK expands the cult roguelike 868-HACK into a punishing cyberpunk campaign built around risk, experimentation, and hard-earned mastery.
868-BACK. Credit: Michael Brough / Finji
Michael Brough’s work is small, punishing, and precise. Tiny decisions can have terrible consequences. The "Broughlike" is an actual subgenre now, built around minimalist systems that hide extraordinary depth. Tiny grids and simple rules create situations where every move feels loaded. 868-BACK, his collaboration with FINJI and composer Tara Macalister (yakfox), is the sequel to his 2013 cult roguelike 868-HACK.
Where 868-HACK dropped you into isolated server runs, BACK builds something larger around them. There's an overworld map now, routes between locations with their own modifiers and risks, a campaign structure that makes each run feel like part of an ongoing infiltration rather than a standalone score attempt. The cyberpunk framing fits it well: you're a hacker dismantling MegaCorp servers from the inside, stealing data, which is a thin narrative but fantastic vibe. The anti-corporate message is explicit without becoming preachy. The whole thing has a punk-rock sensibility that the unpolished, dirty visuals reinforce.
Those MS Paint-style visuals put me off at first. It’s genuinely ugly and getting past it took me a couple of sessions. But the gameplay is king. You hack corporate servers, you steal data, and everything you take spawns more enemies. Every reward comes at the price of more danger. On a 6x6 grid, that tension is constant and immediate. How greedy are you willing to be? The programs (“progs”) you steal and deploy in combat combine and interact in ways that are sometimes surprising and make you feel smart. That rush makes up for the crushing defeats.
868-BACK. Credit: Michael Brough / Finji
This is a true roguelike. There is no metaprogression, no permanent upgrades. Failure is part of the experience. What you build is knowledge. You learn which progs can save you from doom, how enemies can be manipulated, and exactly how greedy you can afford to be before the server crushes you. That mastery loop is deeply rewarding, but the learning curve demands patience and genuine experimentation rather than the gradual power-curve most modern roguelites use to ease your progress. I lost. A lot. It only motivated me to keep throwing myself at it to get better.
868-BACK is demanding in exactly the way Brough's games have always been demanding. The visuals never stopped being ugly. I just stopped caring. Be ready to lose and you’ll have a blast.
868-BACK
868-BACK looks rough, plays mean, and rewards persistence with an endlessly compelling cycle of risk, failure, and discovery.
