One of my all time favorite games is Cultist Simulator, but I’ll admit it’s not for everyone. If you like puzzle type games and don’t mind learning about the world by reading lots of little snippets of flavor text, it’ll be right up your alley.

Also definitely check out Rogue (the og) and the first wave of games inspired by it. The meta-progression stuff is kind of a new wave thing.

As for newer games, Balatro is really popular right now if you’re into more ‘puzzle roguelikes’. Most of the things you unlock make the game harder rather than easier, or give you a different angle from which to play the game. There are a handful of things you have to unlock via meta-progression, but so far they seem pretty unintrusive.