Pathogenic review: this twin-stick roguelite lets you play as the virus

Pathogenic, a new roguelite twin-stick shooter from indie developer Aberrant Labs, has quietly become one of the more talked-about small releases on Steam — racking up 100,000 sales and an overwhelmingly positive rating in short order.

The game puts you in the role of a bodily invader, fighting against immune systems rather than alongside them. It's a twin-stick shooter at its core, built around the roguelite loop of repeated runs and incremental mastery.

Action roguelites are crowded territory right now, and most don't break through. Aberrant Labs appears to have found the hook that makes Pathogenic stand out — the premise alone flips the usual power fantasy on its head, and the Steam numbers suggest word of mouth did the heavy lifting.

The reviewer came in skeptical, as the genre warrants, but the combination of strong community buzz and hard sales data was enough to earn a genuine look — and apparently, a genuine recommendation.