Games like 9 Kings
If 9 Kings is your kind of game, the closest matches are Balatro, Slay the Spire and Seekers of Eclipse — picked from the ranked list below. Reviewers single out its challenging, competitive and immersive. Each pick is ranked by what players of this game also play, shared genres and tags, and review-mined similarity — not a generic popularity list.
Get personalized picks →9 Kings is a strategy RPG that combines deck-building roguelike mechanics with army synergy gameplay, developed by Sad Socket and published by Hooded Horse and Sidekick Publishing, released in 2025 at $19.99 USD. Players pursue multiple class specializations while engaging in achievement-hunting and boss-battles across procedural runs, with the core loop revolving around build-crafting and combo-based combat. Reviewers highlight the dark fantasy setting and atmospheric presentation alongside the competitive multiplayer elements, with players describing sessions as slipping from casual play into hours unnoticed due to the build variety and varied king strategies. The game supports solo play with verified Steam Deck compatibility, and currently holds a 93% positive rating from 8985 Steam reviews.
About 9 Kings: A fast-paced roguelike kingdom builder. Grow your empire and fight massive battles against powerful rival kings. Break the game with thousands of insane builds to become the King of Kings.
Players who liked 9 Kings also play
Steam players who put hours into 9 Kings also tend to own these titles — a signal called collaborative filtering. imho.run cross-references millions of library ownership patterns to surface games whose real audiences overlap, regardless of whether their genre tags match.
Balatro
WHY THIS
Shares build crafting, endless mode and a competitive mood with 9 Kings.
Top pick for 9 Kings fans by collaborative filtering across millions of Steam libraries. Shares Strategy with 9 Kings.
The poker roguelike. Balatro is a hypnotically satisfying deckbuilder where you play illegal poker hands, discover game-changing jokers, and trigger adrenaline-pumping, outrageous combos.
Slay the Spire
WHY THIS
Shares faction politics, deck building and an immersive mood with 9 Kings.
Second-strongest match for 9 Kings fans by collaborative filtering across millions of Steam libraries. Shares Strategy with 9 Kings.
We fused card games and roguelikes together to make the best single player deckbuilder we could. Craft a unique deck, encounter bizarre creatures, discover relics of immense power, and Slay the Spire!
Seekers of Eclipse
WHY THIS
Shares tower defense, deck building and atmospheric with 9 Kings.
Third-strongest match for 9 Kings fans by collaborative filtering across millions of Steam libraries. Shares Strategy with 9 Kings.
A turn-based roguelike combining city-building and deckbuilding. Build thriving towns as you forge a path towards the eclipse. Strategically produce resources to appease the gods and unleash their divine wrath upon your enemies.
SpellRogue
WHY THIS
Shares deck building and a whimsical mood with 9 Kings.
Ranked #4 for 9 Kings fans by collaborative filtering across millions of Steam libraries. Shares Strategy and RPG with 9 Kings.
SpellRogue is the ultimate tactical turn-based roguelike! Draft from over 350 powerful spells to assemble the perfect combination and crush your enemies in 70+ unique encounters. Face brutal choices, adapt to impossible odds, and strike back at the horrors that destroyed the world.
C.A.R.D.S. RPG: The Misty Battlefield
WHY THIS
Shares deck building, build variety, roguelite and a challenging mood with 9 Kings.
Ranked #5 for 9 Kings fans by collaborative filtering across millions of Steam libraries. Shares Strategy and RPG with 9 Kings.
This game combines roguelike-style deckbuilding with SRPGs to create an all-new experience! Follow Vel as she leads the Clausewitz Battalion into battle against Fahftania and the Hellmuth Brigade. Collect 100 different cards to build the strongest deck and fight enemies on a map shrouded in mist.
Pairs & Perils
WHY THIS
Shares difficulty scaling, deck building, roguelite and a whimsical mood with 9 Kings.
Ranked #6 for 9 Kings fans by collaborative filtering across millions of Steam libraries. Shares Strategy and RPG with 9 Kings.
Pairs & Perils is a memory-game roguelike and dungeon crawler. Match cards to attack enemies, avoid traps, shop for relics and consumables. Sharpen your mind as you journey through the depths of the dungeon in search of The Dealer.
Astrea: Six-Sided Oracles
WHY THIS
Shares a whimsical mood with 9 Kings.
Ranked #7 for 9 Kings fans by collaborative filtering across millions of Steam libraries. Shares Strategy with 9 Kings.
Astrea is a DICE-deck-building roguelike that flips the script on deckbuilders by using dice instead of cards and a unique dual “damage” system: Purification vs Corruption. Build a dice pool strong enough to purify Astrea's out-of-control corruption and save the Star System.
Roguebook
WHY THIS
Shares an immersive mood with 9 Kings.
Ranked #8 for 9 Kings fans by collaborative filtering across millions of Steam libraries. Shares Strategy and RPG with 9 Kings.
Embrace the challenge of a roguelike deckbuilder with unique mechanics from the developers of Faeria and Richard Garfield, creator of Magic: The Gathering™. Build a team of two heroes, unleash powerful combos and defeat the legends of the Roguebook!
Reviewers mention these as similar to 9 Kings
Surfaced from review text: when other players write 'if you liked X, try Y', we catch the name and resolve it back to a Steam game.
XCOM® 2
WHY THIS
Shares an immersive mood with 9 Kings.
Reviewers of 9 Kings cross-mention this title as a similar play. Shares Strategy with 9 Kings.
XCOM 2 is the sequel to XCOM: Enemy Unknown, the 2012 award-winning strategy game of the year. Earth has changed and is now under alien rule. Facing impossible odds you must rebuild XCOM, and ignite a global resistance to reclaim our world and save humanity.
Risk of Rain 2
WHY THIS
Shares build variety and an intense mood with 9 Kings.
Reviewers of 9 Kings cross-mention this title as a similar play.
Escape a chaotic alien planet by fighting through hordes of frenzied monsters – with your friends, or on your own. Combine loot in surprising ways and master each character until you become the havoc you feared upon your first crash landing.
Slay the Spire
WHY THIS
Shares faction politics, deck building and an immersive mood with 9 Kings.
Reviewers of 9 Kings cross-mention this title as a similar play. Shares Strategy with 9 Kings.
We fused card games and roguelikes together to make the best single player deckbuilder we could. Craft a unique deck, encounter bizarre creatures, discover relics of immense power, and Slay the Spire!
Monster Train
WHY THIS
Shares deck building and a challenging mood with 9 Kings.
Reviewers of 9 Kings cross-mention this title as a similar play. Shares Strategy with 9 Kings.
Monster Train is a strategic roguelike deck building game with a twist. Set on a train to hell, you’ll use tactical decision making to defend multiple vertical battlegrounds. With real time competitive multiplayer and endless replayability, Monster Train is always on time.
Slay the Spire 2
WHY THIS
Shares deck building, build variety, character progression and a punishing mood with 9 Kings.
Reviewers of 9 Kings cross-mention this title as a similar play. Shares Strategy and Early Access with 9 Kings.
The iconic roguelike deckbuilder returns. Craft a unique deck, encounter bizarre creatures, and discover relics of immense power in Slay the Spire 2!
Cheaper alternatives
Games in the same vein priced at least 40% below 9 Kings at current Steam store prices.
Lethal Company
WHY THIS
Priced ~50% under 9 Kings on Steam right now. Shares Early Access with 9 Kings.
A co-op horror about scavenging at abandoned moons to sell scrap to the Company.
Fallout: New Vegas
WHY THIS
Priced ~50% under 9 Kings on Steam right now. Shares RPG with 9 Kings.
Welcome to Vegas. New Vegas. Enjoy your stay!
Vampire Survivors
WHY THIS
Priced ~75% under 9 Kings on Steam right now. Shares RPG with 9 Kings.
Mow down thousands of night creatures and survive until dawn! Vampire Survivors is a gothic horror casual game with rogue-lite elements, where your choices can allow you to quickly snowball against the hundreds of monsters that get thrown at you. Be the bullet hell!
R.E.P.O.
WHY THIS
Priced ~65% under 9 Kings on Steam right now. Shares Early Access with 9 Kings.
An online co-op horror game with up to 6 players. Locate valuable, fully physics-based objects and handle them with care as you retrieve and extract to satisfy your creator's desires.
Sid Meier's Civilization® V
WHY THIS
Priced ~63% under 9 Kings on Steam right now. Shares Strategy with 9 Kings.
Create, discover, and download new player-created maps, scenarios, interfaces, and more!
Slay the Spire
WHY THIS
Shares faction politics, deck building and an immersive mood with 9 Kings.
Priced ~69% under 9 Kings on Steam right now. Shares Strategy with 9 Kings.
We fused card games and roguelikes together to make the best single player deckbuilder we could. Craft a unique deck, encounter bizarre creatures, discover relics of immense power, and Slay the Spire!
Free alternatives
Free-to-play games that recommended players of this title also tend to enjoy.
Grimm's Hollow
WHY THIS
Free-to-play pick from the same recommendation pool — no purchase to try it. Shares RPG with 9 Kings.
A spooky, freeware RPG where you search the afterlife for your brother. Reap ghosts with your scythe, explore haunted caves, and eat ghostly treats on your journey through death.
Iron Snout
WHY THIS
Free-to-play pick from the same recommendation pool — no purchase to try it.
Iron Snout is a fast, colorful and brutal fighting game in which you will be helping a piglet fight for its life against hordes of wolves.
Magic Archery
WHY THIS
Free-to-play pick from the same recommendation pool — no purchase to try it. Shares RPG with 9 Kings.
Train a commoner to become the greatest archer in this short incremental game! Increase your stats, gather wealth from quests, buy upgrades, and infuse your arrows with magic.
Coloring Pixels
WHY THIS
Free-to-play pick from the same recommendation pool — no purchase to try it.
A relaxing coloring by numbers game. Enjoy completing a variety of images with differing themes, complexity, and sizes.
Eternal Senia
WHY THIS
Free-to-play pick from the same recommendation pool — no purchase to try it. Shares RPG with 9 Kings.
Thoughts and expectations ARPG
There Is No Game: Jam Edition 2015
WHY THIS
Free-to-play pick from the same recommendation pool — no purchase to try it.
A little game that’s not a game, winner of an old game jam that nobody’s ever heard of. So DON'T INSTALL IT!
Cinderella Phenomenon - Otome/Visual Novel
WHY THIS
Free-to-play pick from the same recommendation pool — no purchase to try it.
The Fairytale Curse was only the beginning...
Tails Noir: Prologue
WHY THIS
Free-to-play pick from the same recommendation pool — no purchase to try it. Shares RPG with 9 Kings.
Tails Noir: Prologue is the first act of a post-noir narrative adventure. Become raccoon private eye Howard Lotor and explore dystopian Vancouver inhabited by animals as you uncover a deeply personal story of change and transformation.
Narrow it down
Head-to-head comparisons
Plays great on Steam Deck
Valve-Verified or Playable picks from the similar pool — ready to go on Deck out of the box.
Balatro
WHY THIS
Shares build crafting, endless mode and a competitive mood with 9 Kings.
Deck Verified — runs on Steam Deck out of the box. Shares Strategy with 9 Kings.
The poker roguelike. Balatro is a hypnotically satisfying deckbuilder where you play illegal poker hands, discover game-changing jokers, and trigger adrenaline-pumping, outrageous combos.
Slay the Spire
WHY THIS
Shares faction politics, deck building and an immersive mood with 9 Kings.
Deck Verified — runs on Steam Deck out of the box. Shares Strategy with 9 Kings.
We fused card games and roguelikes together to make the best single player deckbuilder we could. Craft a unique deck, encounter bizarre creatures, discover relics of immense power, and Slay the Spire!
SpellRogue
WHY THIS
Shares deck building and a whimsical mood with 9 Kings.
Deck Verified — runs on Steam Deck out of the box. Shares Strategy and RPG with 9 Kings.
SpellRogue is the ultimate tactical turn-based roguelike! Draft from over 350 powerful spells to assemble the perfect combination and crush your enemies in 70+ unique encounters. Face brutal choices, adapt to impossible odds, and strike back at the horrors that destroyed the world.
Pairs & Perils
WHY THIS
Shares difficulty scaling, deck building, roguelite and a whimsical mood with 9 Kings.
Deck Verified — runs on Steam Deck out of the box. Shares Strategy and RPG with 9 Kings.
Pairs & Perils is a memory-game roguelike and dungeon crawler. Match cards to attack enemies, avoid traps, shop for relics and consumables. Sharpen your mind as you journey through the depths of the dungeon in search of The Dealer.
Frequently asked about 9 Kings
- Is 9 Kings verified for Steam Deck?
- Yes — 9 Kings is Steam Deck Verified, meaning Valve has confirmed it runs well on the Deck with full controller, text legibility, and default configuration support.
- How much does 9 Kings cost?
- 9 Kings is listed on Steam at 19.99 USD (current store price; Steam sales may reduce this temporarily).
- What games are most similar to 9 Kings?
- Based on Steam play patterns and shared genres/tags, the games most often recommended alongside 9 Kings are Balatro, Slay the Spire, Seekers of Eclipse.
- Who developed 9 Kings?
- 9 Kings was developed by Sad Socket and published by Hooded Horse, Sidekick Publishing.
imho.run ranks Steam game alternatives using a mix of collaborative filtering (ALS / iALS / EASE / LightGCN), content scoring over genres, categories, Steam tags, developers, and publishers, plus AI-extracted vibes mined from review text. The page above is generated in seed mode anchored on 9 Kings.
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