The review is below, but when you're done reading, check out my Perpetual Steam Game Giveaway list and think about picking up a free game. Just added a few more

Sights & Sounds
- Peglin is one of those cases in which I shied away from the promotional art but really liked the in-game visuals. Lots of charming little pixel art characters populate the forests, caves, and castles that dot the land. The Peglins (the little green goblin guys) are particularly cute with their floppy ears and little bags full of orbs
- The music is excellent. I thought that this was the type of game that I would mute while playing and instead listen to an album or a podcast, but I'm glad I tuned in to the game. The regular "fights" are backed by what sounds like great music from a platformer, while the boss battle themes sound like the corresponding songs from a JRPG
- The sound design was also quite good. In a game with extremely repetitive actions (all you do is aim and fire orbs), poor choices in sound effects have the potential to render a game too annoying to play. It's an odd compliment, but Peggle did a good job of choosing sounds for the constant reload, launch, ricochet, and explosion sound effects

Story & Vibes
- Is there a story in this game? I'm genuinely asking. If little goblins are going around attacking forest creatures and well-populated castles, they have to have some motivation, right? Not really
- There's tiny crumbs of world-building occasionally, but beyond that, this is a roguelike that doesn't appear to even bother with a framing story. Some may think a small narrative would be unnecessary in a game like this, but it's still a little disappointing string a few successful runs together and still learn nothing about why you're doing what you're doing
- The vibes are extremely chill since the gameplay isn't very active and the soundtrack is good. I could see this becoming a rainy day game. With so much of the game owing to luck (no one can really predict where the ball will go after the second ricochet or so), there's fun little successes and disappointments to keep things interesting, too

Playability & Replayability
- What's in a name? Well, in this case, a reference to the legendary Popcap game Peggle portmanteau'd together with the word "goblin". That second part's irrelevant to the gameplay, but the first part clues you into the core mechanic. Peglin is Peggle, but with a tasty roguelike RPG zing to it
- Like many roguelikes that take a page from Slay the Spire, Peglin maps are comprised of sets of branching one-way "trees" that intersect at symbols representing battles, slightly harder battles, shops, treasure rooms, and mystery spots. Regardless of the choices you make, however, all paths converge on the boss (picked from a small pool of them, it seems) you must defeat to progress to the next level
- Like Peggle, aiming the ball while trying to hit multipliers and simultaneously clearing as many pegs as possible is still your main objective, but instead of points, you do damage, and multipliers are crits. How much damage you do is highly dependent on the interactions between the special orbs and items you buy or otherwise find on your run. You can also level up your orbs to do more damage and add effects to them
- Failure is part of the game in roguelikes, but I'm having a hard time seeing the reward cycle in Peglin. There's no metaprogression, and with only 3 classes to unlock at this point, there's not a lot to try to chase down
- I often found it hard to get a good run going in Peglin. Sure, some synergies are extremely powerful, but the RNG deciding how where, how, and why certain items and orbs show up means that you'll often wind up with runs that go nowhere. My typical experience was finding a few pieces of a cohesive build early, then never seeing a relevant item or orb again. I'd then try to switch over to a backup plan and die before I could get my damage high enough
- Those rare runs were everything seems to go right, though? They're a good time. For example, I had a run with incredibly high DoT, a large number of crit pegs, and the ability to pierce an additional enemy with each crit. Most fights ended in a couple turns
- The replayability is a mixed bag. As much as I felt motivated to chase down those fun runs, they were unfortunately rare. And with no metaprogression and everything already unlocked, they kinda felt like a waste of time
- There is a challenge mode called Cruciball, but I haven't given it a try yet. Maybe when I make more items available in it (done by beating a run with that item first), I'll give it a try

Overall Impressions & Performance
- I really wanted to like this game more than I wound up enjoying it. It's very fun when things are going well, and I love the core gameplay loop. But a roguelike really needs to give you some reason to keep coming back
- Despite my complaints, I still wound up with an overall positive impression and think that it's a game worth playing. It's fun to buildcraft and strategize in Peglin, and the core pachinko gameplay is addictive in its randomness. I know the game is still in early access, so a lot could change, but I hope effort is put into trying to hook players rather than trying add more items or orbs. I think that would just compound my issues with the game
- This is an excellent Steam Deck title. I can easily see myself wanting to boot this up while traveling

Final Verdict
- 7/10. [insert overdone joke about sexual act here]