Ten Years of The Binding of Isaac

It’s a special year for The Binding of Isaac, one of the most notable indie games of the last decade, between having its final major update and soon turning ten.

The Binding of Isaac is a roguelike game developed by Edmund McMillen of Super Meat Boy fame. The game draws on biblical themes and imagery, with the player taking control of Isaac, a young boy who flees into his basement to escape his mother, who is convinced the voice of God wants her to sacrifice him.

Gameplay consists of moving through randomised rooms on each floor in a top-down perspective, akin to the original Legend of Zelda game. Isaac attacks with his tears, firing them from his eyes, and the player needs to dodge enemy shots as well, leading to some bullet hell sections in more packed rooms. Along the way you can pick up items that power up and augment Isaac in various ways. These items usually change something about Isaac’s appearance, and often come from dark concepts.

The game’s tone can certainly be described as a little messed up, but that’s all a part of the experience. And the game doesn’t steer away from anything taboo- one minute you’re making a literal deal with the devil so you can shoot lasers of blood from your mouth, and then the next you die to a sentient piece of poop. It’s all a part of Isaac’s strange charm.

Now acquainted with the Repentance DLC, Isaac has its final content update, so we figure it’s time to a have look back at the separate stages of its lifetime. Where better to start than at the beginning…

Just some of the characters available to play now in Repentance- enough choice to keep every run different.

Base Game

Released onto Steam on September 28th, 2011, McMillen was unsure how the game would perform. After the success of Super Meat Boy, releasing a game exploring his conflicted feelings and experiences with faith and Christianity seemed like a risk. Nevertheless, Isaac swiftly became popular, and arguably lead to the surge of new indie roguelikes that would follow in future years.

Gameplay was the core Isaac experience- it is the base of it after all. Along with items that would passively or actively aid Isaac, bombs and keys could be found, the former being used for offense or finding secret rooms, and the latter to open locked doors- such as the shop, where Isaac could spend coins to purchase additional items. By completing certain prerequisites, new playable characters could be unlocked.

With the surprise success of The Binding of Isaac, McMillen set about working on further additions to the game, most notable the first expansion.

Wrath of the Lamb

May 2012 saw the release of the first expansion pack for Isaac, which sought to add to the game in magnitudes. More boss fights, more endings, much more items, and even new alternative floors to explore, Wrath of the Lamb was set to make for a harder experience with more depth. Newly added were trinkets, passive items that could be found just like bombs and keys that provided small bonuses, but you could only carry one at time in most cases.

While McMillen intended to release an additional expansion to this version of Isaac, limitations with the flash engine were proving difficult. Thus, Isaac needed to go under some changes.

The Brimstone item makes you look like a demon and lets you shoot a blood laser- it’s extra powerful!

Rebirth­

With the help of developers Nicalis, Isaac returned on November 4th, 2014, with a new set of graphics and a different engine. Now in 16-bit pixel art, The Binding of Isaac: Rebirth was a separate game from the original, but contained all the same content but with even more added.

Multiple new characters were added, along with further additional new items- this would be the basic additions for every future expansion. The new engine allowed for items to synergise better together with each other, often combining for interesting and powerful effects. It also allowed new room layouts to occur- rather than just basic square rooms, maps could involve skinnier rectangles, large 2x2 rooms, and even L-shaped layouts.

A multiplayer mode was introduced, which would see improvements throughout each expansion.

Rebirth was also able to release on various consoles, eventually being available on PS4, PS Vita, Wii U, Nintendo 3DS and Xbox One.

Afterbirth

Released on October 30th, 2015, Afterbirth was the first expansion for Rebirth. Adding the usual set of additional content, a new game mode was introduced- Greed mode. The mode played much the same as the standard game, but with an emphasis on fighting waves of enemies and managing coins to purchase items and build a powerful run.

In Rebirth, McMillen and the team had hidden several secrets to be found, and expected some elements such as the hidden character “The Lost” to take the community a while to discover. However, thanks to datamining efforts, these secrets were uncovered within five days. To keep Afterbirth’s hidden character “The Keeper” more of a secret, McMillen instead set up an ARG involving real life clues for the community to hunt down.

Afterbirth was released with the wrong build of the game, unintentionally causing some promised items to not be included, leading to some of the community to hold the team in a more negative light. McMillen and his team were able to rectify and patch the game, and the expansion was held in a mostly positive light beyond a rocky start.

Greed mode pits you against waves of enemies in order to earn coins- smart play can lead to some very powerful runs.

Afterbirth+

Released on January 3rd, 2017, Afterbirth+ once again followed the formula of additional content, however with a slightly different approach. Afterbirth+ initially included less new content than previous expansions, but updates called “Booster Packs” would infrequently add more, allowing a slightly steadier stream of content to be released.

The main draw of this expansion was the improved mod tools, making it easier for the community to make and play their own content. The most popular and high-quality content would even be included in the Booster Packs, making it in as official content.

Due to the randomised nature of Isaac, smaller content updates meant it was actually harder to encounter new additions, especially with how much had been added over the years. This left some fans wanting something more fresh, comparable to the initial release of Rebirth. And the community mod scene allowed for exactly that.

Antibirth

Antibirth, a fan-made full expansion for The Binding of Isaac, released in December 2016, predating Afterbirth+. With five years of experience, Isaac fans had become adept at the game, and Antibirth provided a more difficult option for these players to enjoy. New items, levels and characters were unique and creative, and the scope of the mod was on par with that of the official product. Some aspects of Antibirth made it into the official Booster Packs, but the slow roll of content meant many fans would return to Antibirth between these updates.

In many regards, Antibirth could be considered the “endgame” for Isaac players. Those that have completed the game to the point of needing a new challenge could move onto this free of charge.

Antibirth earns its place in the halls of Isaac’s history, not just for holding the fort when fans were growing dull of the official game, but also for the fact that it essentially acted as the prototype for Isaac’s next big step.

Intro screen for the Min-Min boss fight, a new boss featured in one of Repentance’s harder floors.

Repentance

Announced in the September of 2018 and eventually released on March 31st, 2021, Repentance is Isaac’s final expansion pack. Working with the Antibirth developers, much of the mod’s content would be the basis for the update.

More characters, more levels, more enemies, more bosses, more items, and a tougher challenge all round, Repentance set itself to be the ultimate send off to The Binding of Isaac, and it delivered. The long development time ensured a level of polish that prior expansions had struggled with, and fan reception was highly positive this time. The single main gripe some fans have is the rebalancing of the game, making it much harder to obtain absurdly strong sets of items.

But perhaps the most important addition Repentance brings is closure. While every version of the game has provided a set of endings to experience, none were positive- Isaac met a depressive fate in most of them, such as suffocating in a box or being crushed by rubble. But not this time. Claw your way through Isaac’s most hellish journey yet and you receive the ultimate reward- a happy ending. And after ten years of fighting your way through the monster-infested basement, there’s no better way for things to end.

And that’s where The Binding of Isaac stands today. A few side gigs have occurred along the way, such as a prequel spin-off in 2019 and a separate card game, but the only thing remaining for Isaac on the horizon is Repentance’s console release, coming to Switch, PS4 and PS5 in Q3 of this year. We don’t know the exact date yet, but it would poetic for it to release in September to honour the game’s legacy.

And a legacy it has been. The 2010’s saw many prominent roguelikes rise up in popularity, often rivalling Isaac, such as Enter the Gungeon and Dead Cells. And truly, Isaac carved the opening in the market and founded a place for indie games to explore the infinitely replayable roguelike genre, which still remains popular to this day. So when Isaac celebrates his birthday this September, I’m sure many will wish him, and Edmund McMillan, the best.

The Binding Of Isaac: Rebirth Complete Bundle with all games mentioned above is available for £37.36 through Steam.