That's the important part to remember: Repentance takes some control out of your hands. I ended up dying in Depths II, because as good as this was, I still lost control of later rooms. For example, I use Jacob's Ladder to electrify all my tears so damage is chained between nearby enemies, and a demonic pickup that builds my rage-per-enemy killed to turn me into a rainbow-colored fiend that damaged any enemies I touched. You can still find worthwhile synergies, of course, they're just not likely to make for easy runs like before. You still get your full room blood coverage, it's just not quite as lethal. Others have been tweaked to prevent certain game-defining powers, such as Tammy's Head, a powerup that fired tears in ten directions, no longer gives Brimstone a damage bonus. Some fan-favourite components are just gone, like Polyphemus, which increased damage and made shots go through enemies they killed. The list on release was long, and it sought to challenge fixed approaches.

The real nitty-gritty of The Binding of Isaac: Repentance is in its weapons changes. Your favourite combo probably doesn't work any more The first patch upped the frequency of max-level shops and tinted rocks appearing, thus granting better access to those killer items, and increased the chance of heart drops during grueling runs. That said, this has been tweaked since release. Repentance makes some effort to throw those preconceptions out of the window.Įnemies are faster, and getting those S-tier synergies is now considerably tougher.

The last full expansion, Afterbirth+, launched in 2015, so now many in the community know every likely difficulty spike. This sounds trite, but the higher difficulties in The Binding of Isaac: Repentance have been calibrated to make sure seasoned players have a tough time. (Image credit: Nicalis) Hard Mode is still hard

Binding of the lost