Glory on Pluto’s new demo turns a rocket engine into the most chaotic build in roguelites

The numbers-go-up roguelite has spent the last few years at card tables, shop counters and slot machines, borrowing the shapes of the real world to make its arithmetic legible. Glory on Pluto, the debut of Bristol solo developer Tom Stockley, points the same compulsion at the sky. Its engine is not a metaphor for a build. It is the build, and every run is a question of whether a rocket stuffed with absurd fuels will hold together long enough to reach the edge of the solar system.

The premise is disarmingly simple. You assemble a circular engine out of fuel cells, crew and modifiers, hunt for the combinations that feed one another, and spend the resulting power to break orbit and boost from planet to planet. Between stops come waypoints with events, traders and encounters, and the occasional pirate crew that wants a share of the cargo. Find the right synergy and the numbers spiral upward; get greedy and the engine tears itself apart, which the game treats less as failure than as spectacle.

The circular rocket engine grid and the fuel salvage selection screen in Glory on Pluto — Image: Little Big Ears / Yogscast Games

That sense of spectacle has an origin. Stockley spent more than a decade as a freelance motion designer before turning to code, and the announcement frames the project as his exit from the cynical advertising world: a game with no ulterior motive beyond joy. It also stakes out a design position, steering the non-violent roguelike away from the real-world analogues it usually leans on. Pluto, demoted and beloved, is a fitting finish line for a game about wanting something a little too much.

The new demo, now live on Steam, is a substantial rework rather than a trailer companion. The interface has been redesigned and now supports custom themes that players can swap through community share codes, while dragging fuel into salvage slots has been smoothed out. Runs are faster and the stakes higher, with boost tokens running out sooner. New animations and pulsing cues make the engine easier to read, the tutorial has been streamlined, and unlockable stickers arrive alongside collaboration designs with The Subminer and Yogscast. Full localisation has been added for Japanese, Korean, Thai, and Simplified and Traditional Chinese.

An incoming call from a salvage ship with a pirate chance warning in Glory on Pluto — Image: Little Big Ears / Yogscast Games

The full game promises more than 250 fuel items spread across categories with their own archetypes and playstyles, over 50 crew members to hire and promote, and segment modifiers that bend a build further. It is a deliberately deep toolbox for a game whose pleasure lies in watching a plan become an accident.

Behind Stockley stands a publisher that knows the territory. Yogscast Games, founded in 2017 to back small teams making games as fun to watch as to play, scored with PlateUp!, which has sold more than two million copies on Steam, and Dungeons & Degenerate Gamblers, which grossed over $1 million in its first month. The Steam listing also names GamerSky Games as co-publisher.

Glory on Pluto launches on PC via Steam on November 12, 2026, and the demo is available to download now. Whether the engine reaches Pluto is up to the player; whether it survives the trip is another question entirely.

Tags: indie games, Glory on Pluto, Little Big Ears, roguelite games, Tom Stockley, Yogscast Games