How Cell Survivors works
One arena, one body, waves that do not stop. Here is exactly how the current build plays.
The loop
- Kill enemies. They drop motes.
- Motes level you up. Every level-up drafts a card, pick 1 of 3.
- A new wave lands every 40 seconds.
- Bosses hit waves 5, 10, 15, and 20, and always drop a chest.
- Beat wave 20 to win. The arena keeps running after that, endless overtime.
Your body is your health
- Size is your HP, the bar across the top of the screen.
- Getting hit shrinks you. Eating food and motes heals and grows you.
- Bigger means stronger weapons but slower turning. Know when to stop growing.
Weapons fire themselves
Primary Secondary x2 Support x2
- You steer, your weapons auto-fire. Press W to fire a volley early.
- PRIMARY is your build's identity. Picking a new one replaces it and restarts it at level 1.
- Two secondary slots hold weaker copies of a primary-class weapon.
- Two support slots round out the kit, plus utility mutations and stackable boons on top.
Toxic Trail Orbiting Spores Homing Ejects Ricochet Razor Membrane Nova Pulse Seeker Swarm Mine Layer Arc Lash Rot Field Fan Volley Ring Burst Stream
Deep dive: Weapons →The draft
- Every level-up pauses the run and deals 3 cards: two mutations and a boon.
- Common cards are weighted 6, rare 3, epic 1. Epics are worth waiting for.
- A new weapon fills an open slot. When your three weapon slots are full, a new primary replaces your current one at level 1, so late rerolls are a real decision.
Risk-split
- Split anytime, no cooldown. Every piece fires on its own and moves faster.
- A split piece can be eaten. That is permanent HP loss for you, and it feeds whoever ate it.
- Pieces re-merge on their own, but it takes 2.5 seconds.
Pickups
- Frenzy: 6 seconds of devouring everything in reach.
- Nuke: clears the field around you.
- Vacuum: every mote on the map flies to you.
- Chest: a boss reward, and sometimes an evolution. Max the right two weapons together and one transforms for good.
The Curse
- From wave 8 on, enemies hit harder, move faster, and show up more elite.
- They also drop richer XP, so the risk pays for itself.
- The longer a run goes, the more speed matters.
Bosses, chests, evolutions
- Every 5th wave is a boss. Each drops a chest worth two level-ups and a burst of XP motes.
- If a maxed weapon and its maxed catalyst are in your build, the chest evolves the weapon into a stronger form.
Winning
- Clear wave 20 and the Mitosis King to win the arena. Overtime waves keep going for leaderboard position.
Know your enemy
- Drones: gray-green, the backbone of the horde.
- Swarm packs: yellow, and faster than you.
- Splitters: orange, they hunt your split pieces.
- Spitters: purple, ranged.
- Elites: magenta, always drop orbs.
- Bosses: red.