Monsters are Coming! Rock & Road has been out for a bit over a month now, and as you can tell from their Steam page, the response has been great. With over 2000 “Very Positive” or “Mostly Positive” reviews, there isn’t a bad word in sight. With that, though, I am wondering why more people aren’t playing it?
At a time when every other email I receive says “It is like Vampire Survivors“, it is clear there is a demand for the genre. However, copying a genre can get old and tired. That is why I have been raving about Monsters are Coming! Rock & Road so much. It does pay homage to that sort of game, but it also completely flips the formula on its head and makes it its own.
I have been a fan of this game since the summer. It earned one of our Best of Gamescom 2025 awards, and when I reviewed it ahead of release, it scored a 9.5 because of the excellent gameplay loop, strong unlockables and unique mechanics. I have been truly hooked on the game; the only things I could wish for are more platforms and multiplayer. Monsters are Coming! Rock & Road would be a perfect Nintendo Switch 2 title.
Shortly after release, I was able to ask the creative director at Ludogram, Edouard Gaudel, a few questions about the game. We dove into the inspiration behind Monsters are Coming! Rock & Road, what the Ark really is and got a small peek at the future of the game.
For those who haven’t been able to check out Monsters are Coming! Rock & Road, could you give us a little rundown of the mechanics and the goal of the game?
Edouard Gaudel: Monsters are Coming is what we call a “Tower Survivor”. Players control a hero who must gather resources to upgrade their constantly moving city… and for good reason! A relentless horde of monsters is chasing it. From a gameplay standpoint, the idea is to use the hero as efficiently as possible to collect resources, fight monsters, and build the best city you can.
What is the Ark, exactly?
Edouard Gaudel: The Ark is the mythical place all wandering cities are desperately trying to reach. It’s a final refuge
where their long journey can finally end.
Survivor-likes are very popular right now, but games take a long time to develop. How long has your team been working on Monsters are Coming! Rock & Road?
Edouard Gaudel: We worked on the project for two-and-a-half years. In early pre-production, the main challenge was finding a way to represent a rolling city without it occupying the whole screen. The second challenge was designing the relationship between the city and the hero. All our design choices were built around the belief that both gameplay features should complement each other.
Where did the initial inspiration for Monsters are Coming! Rock & Road come from?
Edouard Gaudel: From a fascination with a brilliant book: The Inverted World by Christopher Priest, which tells the story
of a city in perpetual motion. We’d been captivated by that idea for a long time, but never found the right gameplay to explore such a universe. Survivor mechanics gave us the spark: “What if, instead of a hero being the core of the survivor experience, it was a moving city?”
Making your minion expendable and the Town Hall the main star is very unique. Was that the
plan from the beginning?
Edouard Gaudel: It evolved during production. Initially, every level-up allowed the hero to gain new weapons and stats.
But something felt off. We eventually realized the true “hero” of the game had to be the city itself. That’s why when the hero dies, they are immediately replaced by another, but when the city is destroyed, the run ends.
There are 10 Town Halls to unlock. How did you come up with the ideas for these Town Halls? And were there any that were left out?
Edouard Gaudel: Choosing wasn’t easy. We designed many concepts, but our selection criteria were to mix Town Halls
that are easy to grasp with others that offer deeper strategic twists. A large number of Town Hall designs are already ready, and we absolutely plan to add more in future updates.
Right now, the monsters lean more toward creepy-crawlers. Do you think there could be different kinds of enemies, or even collaborations with other games for content like enemies or locations in the future, similar to what Vampire Survivors has done?
Edouard Gaudel: There are still a lot of opportunities within the monster roster, and we fully intend to explore them. One idea we are very excited about is letting players fight other cities, be they small or gigantic. As for collaborating with other games, we would love to. But instead of asking “which monster should we add?”, we found ourselves dreaming: “Which iconic city from another game could appear in ours?” For example, imagine a Dome Keeper city appearing in Monsters Coming one day.
When I played the game at gamescom 2025, I chatted with someone about the possibility of multiplayer. Is that something that could be in the future for Monsters are Coming! Rock & Road?
Edouard Gaudel: It’s something we dream of adding. Multiplayer is expensive in development time, but more and more players are asking for it, and the game lends itself extremely well to a cooperative mode where several players would embody multiple heroes supporting the same city.
Are there any other future plans for Monsters Are Coming! Rock & Road that you can share with us?
Edouard Gaudel: We haven’t shared our full roadmap yet, but what I can say is that the January update will introduce a feature that players have been requesting a lot!
Just for fun, what is your ultimate Town Hall/Road combination?
Edouard Gaudel: Disclaimer: I’m definitely not the best player in the studio!
But I love building a Mirror City where symmetry helps me expand my fields quickly, generating a ton of gold so I can buy, upgrade, and fuel the “Gold Towers” in my build.
Now that Monsters Are Coming! Rock & Road is out there and in the hands of reviewers and players, how does it feel? What has the response been so far?”
Edouard Gaudel: It’s incredibly exciting for the entire team to see so many players jumping into the game. Players seem to really enjoy the gameplay, and they’ve given us extremely helpful feedback. This allowed us to release three consecutive patches quickly, improving balance and offering more options to help create wild builds and cities.
Monsters Are Coming! Rock & Road is available now on Steam for only $11.79 CAD, and it is also available in a bundle with the recently popular BALL X PIT, Noobs Are Coming or Dome Keeper!
