After 320 hours in my favorite roguelike, The Binding of Isaac just got a game-changing Path of Exile-style mod that could be the perfect excuse to go back

The legendary roguelike The Binding of Isaac has seen a huge overhaul of its modding scene, culminating in mods that entirely discard the rulebook.

At the very end of 2023, Repentogon, a script extender that promised the beginning of "a new era for Isaac modding," arrived on Steam. Put together by a team of modders "frustrated with the shortcomings" of the current game, Repentogon is a platform allowing for faster, more varied mods.

Recently, that's culminated in a mod simply called Passive Skill Trees. Originally released last month, its name sells the project pretty short. 'Passive Skill Trees' adds a tree that looks, at a glance, as though it would put Path of Exile's famously enormous leveling system to shame. The mod features both a persistent global tree, as well as trees for each character, and while each small node only offers a very small bonus - a sliver extra damage or XP, for instance, they add up over time. Larger nodes, however, offer bigger boosts, often enough to shape an entire playstyle.

There's a Binding Of Isaac script extender now that's letting modders to WILD new stuff like a massive Path Of Exile-inspired passive upgrade grid that persists between runs.https://t.co/DvwZgFOgie pic.twitter.com/V08s65nSzlSeptember 26, 2024

Perhaps purists won't feel great about it - this kind of thing does change The Binding of Isaac's relatively pure roguelike systems into a rogue-lite system that's more reminiscent of something like Hades. But, personally, having found a lot of joy in Hades but squeezed about as much juice out of Isaac as my abilities allow, a system that lets me find some progression in one of my most-played games ever is something I'm very interested in.

The Binding of Isaac creator Edmund McMillen is using his new project to right the roguelike's 11-year-old wrongs.

Weekly digests, tales from the communities you love, and more