At Summer Games Fest, we got to go hands-on with the upcoming Moonlighter 2: The Endless Vault from 11 Bit Studios. For those unaware, the series sees you play as a shopkeep from an RPG that must venture into dungeons at night to stock his shop with items to sale to travelers that come to his shop during the day. It’s such a novel concept, but it works so well.

We got to play the game for a decent chuck of time with us first going out to the dungeon to find items. The dungeon itself is set up as a roguelike where it changes each time you and the loot you find changes. The dungeon is infested with monsters that you must take out using your trusty sword and a gun with limited ammo. Then, you’re also able to knock an enemy once they take enough damage that will cause massive damage to that enemy plus any enemy that it is knocked into.

With the treasure you find, it could come with many different abilities. Some treasures gain more value depending on other conditions. One such gained more value depending on how much driftwood you also had in your inventory or another had an ability to gain value if it was burned which paired nicely with another treasure of lesser value that burned other items in your inventory. Inventory placement also matters as some items you find point to other items and have an effect on those treasures. You are able to proceed through the dungeon as much as you want until you fill your inventory or you can leave at any moment at the press of a button. Though, you are also given the option to leave once you die or you can also retry the dungeon, but you lose all the treasure you have collected if this happens.

As for your actual day job, you stock your shop with the items you collected the previous night, and the shop we had only had six spots for selling items. As customers came in, we had to maintain the shop such as by sweeping up dirt that accumulated throughout the store. Though, when someone did want to buy the item we were able to negotiate to gain more for the item, this increasing our revenue for the day.

For those who enjoy a mix of roguelike and shop management games, Moonlighter 2: The Endless Vault will be the game for you. The game is set to release at some point later this year.