I mean, just as an aside, but if you ever wanted to see that psychological issue f2p games exploit where the conversion of currency causes individuals to lose track of the value of a dollar, wow. Watching people spend $12 in gems on a game that is going to go on sale for $5 in less than 24 hours is impressive for seeing that particular mechanism in action. It wasn't like you couldn't just immediately sell the gems for $12, the market was the same number of mouse clicks away!
Anyway so the one game that did seem to be a reasonable price ... Wasn't this game. It was Endless Space: Emperor Edition, or Gold, or whatever which displayed the wrong item and with the DLC price included was a pretty reasonable amount. So I looked it up and realized they'd apparently made three games, sort of, in the shared universe. That's really cool, but apparently Dungeon and Space are the weaker titles to Legend...
But I ended up with this game, because it has some sort of weird arse coop set up and I think a friend bought it for me to play with them (I think?) while I got Space from the auction. I haven't even unpacked space yet, since its been wall to wall games this year, but I'll get around to it probably after I finish off Dungeon or more likely get sick of Dungeon.
Dungeon is especially interesting, though, because when you peel away the pixel graphics and the excellent audio you're left with the guts of several games connected to a roguelike skeleton. It is actually really weird, the game hybrids elements from tower defense to the point it almost feels like a Heroes of Might and Magic game, or a city builder, and there's some weird ideas I feel like came out of horror even.
If I was going to give it a genre, I'd peg it into "Roguelike flavored quasi-reverse tower defense" and then just keep talking because that tells you nothing...
So, as I said, Dungeon of the Endless is a roguelike dungeon crawl, it has tower defense elements, and then it has heroes with equipment and leveling. The heroes are not your exact will, much like a HoMM game, but you don't have a specific hero you are per se. It also has levels, and an elevator, and alien ships so it kinda reminds me of Toejam and Earl a lot more than you'd think. You also build and upgrade, and the budgeting of resources gives it a slick city-builder feeling to boot. If that sounds like a lot of elements went into the game, well, the game is basically all system and abstraction, almost like a board game. DoTE is essentially a retro style pixel art game, although as with stuff like Legend of Dungeon, the usage of psuedo-3d with dynamic lighting and shadows allows the game to have more atmosphere than the simple style would normally possess. The pixel artwork is pretty damn good, though there are a couple rough patches - the one hero, Sarah, her portrait looks like a dude with a blonde beard to me. I can't quite figure out why, I just glance up and think "isn't she a girl?"
The game is not turn based, but it is also not really real time either. You have infinite time to durdle around once a wave has cleared, barring a couple events, until you 'open a door'. The game measures turns in doors, and opening doors creates a lot of interesting tension. Essentially, you can shape how the dungeon opens up and changes, by choosing which doors to open, and which rooms to 'power'. As a door is opened, unpowered rooms have a chance to spawn enemy units, which make their way toward you from their spawn point, with the ultimate goal of smashing your power source. Your ultimate goal is toejam and earl style to find the elevator to go up to the next level.
There are other resources in DOTE; besides power which is level based and doesn't move forward as you advance forward, there is also Industry, Science and Food. These might be better shortened to Construction, Research and Leveling up, which is what they do. Industry is the one you have the most control over, so to speak, since it is extremely granular and industry is used to produce more industry assuming you have a spot to put down a "large module". Modules need power, and part of what makes the game initially confusing is to sort of mentally shorthand that modules are where power goes.
Science is used up when you find research stations, and food can be used for emergency healing or leveling up your heroes. Heroes don't level under other circumstances, which I sort of find weird. All of these resources have a lot of budgetary tension, which is why it ends up feeling like a city builder. Industry can also be used, and is aimed primarily to be used, to make automated defenses which will perform various actions or grant various bonuses. Defenses are cheap, but they're stationary and difficult to maintain if not attended to, so you end up rebuilding them and costs do add up. Once you've found the exit, you have to grab the power source in the middle of the map and then the third phase of the level begins. All hell breaks loose, and every unpowered room vomits no end of monsters all rampaging toward the crystal. You have to move the hero carrying it, the others to try to screen that hero (but still stay alive, cuz the enemies will attack them too) and then all meet up at the exit.
If this doesn't really explain the game, well, I really don't know what else to compare it to. Dungeon is very familiar and yet very different at the same time
The pixel art and pixel animations are simple but fluid, constantly in motion and lively. Everything casts moving, interesting shadows and interacts with the scenery, one way or the other. I do find the art style breaks down a little on the minor modules - which are basically your TD element - but the psuedo-3d thing means it would be really easy to go overboard on those effects and lose the game's perspective. DOTE is, unfortunately, already a little too visually busy with limited information to be gleaned from the hyper visuals, so I'm actually thankful they kept it under control.
Soundwise I ... Very oddly wish the game was voiced, which is sort of strange, but somehow DOTE really feels like it needs it. The audio is generally spot on, with most of the effects perfectly encapsulating what is going on, honestly better than the UI generally does. The music is excellent, very moody and ambient with good switch ups.
Gameplay is, as I said, rather complicated in overview but very simple most of the time. It is a resource anticipation game, more than anything, with how you plan your moves and what is available to you - or what is, actually, available to the monsters - shifting the difficulty of the map as you go. Sometimes you don't have enough power to really explore a floor, and sometimes you have an abundance that you can use to snowball into other resources. Doors measure time, and how many doors you open per floor is generally self-controlled. I do sort of feel like the game has pacing issues, as planning during downtime can end up taking a while due to process through as your selections get put into place, but it does keep the flow of the game consistent. Distance traveled is generally the same, and characters move as they move, no matter the point in the game.
On the most part, the game is played room by room and comes together as just stressful enough to be enjoyable. It doesn't have the "watching a plan come together" feeling that tower defense does, unfortunately, feeling more like a machine you need to constantly make adjustments to, to keep it running in just the right way. That can feel a little off-putting at times, given the weird quasi-turn based nature of the game. You're mentally inclined to relax a little, but you really shouldn't, which can be kinda lame.
Before I get into the big swinging door that is my problems with DoTE I wanted to briefly comment upon a very small niggle - the writing is, as I said, quite good! The problem: There isn't enough of it. Characters make comments in the elevator, when opening doors, when doing this and that - But their comments are painfully limited and I don't understand why? It's just text, it doesn't take up much space or consume much in the way of development resources. This stuff always drives me nuts, but it's really annoying here. I always feel like games should have more voice acting, but this is JUST text! Give the writer another two hours to come up with another five hundred words.
This is probably not relevant to everyone who reads this or even most of the gaming audience out there, but I've been gradually getting accustomed to an idea I will refer to as 'Roguelike fatigue'. I put up a review of Legend of Dungeon recently, and at the time I was wondering why I just couldn't find it in me to give the game much of a chance. Playing Dungeon of the Endless, which has a rather similar name - and mind you, is a better game no questions asked - I have begun to realize I am tired of this sort of game design conceptualization.
Roguelikes are meant to be "hard" and I guess the easiest way to do this is to convey as little as possible to the player, who must then try to reconstruct from what scraps they are given what they're doing wrong. This is a noted part of Risk of Rain, which I saw lots of people on the SA forums just give up on, and I feel like it is rapidly becoming part of the roguelike genre's DNA moving forward. While this perhaps gives you the same sentiment as solving a murder mystery, I feel like a lot of core gaming conventions get left to the wayside and one of those is fun. Instead the beginning of the game is tiring, drawn out and just sort of exhausting as you pick through things, wondering what the point of different elements of the system and its abstractions are, so forth.
I can honestly encapsulate a lot of my problems with Dungeon, and the genre it is partially submerged in the muck of, with one simple point. The game offers you two difficulties at the start: Too easy and Easy. Though perhaps layered behind a thin veneer of innocuous humor, the truth of the matter is this weird idea that roguelikes live realm that is "unassailable position of having shitty learning curves and treating the player poorly". The game makes little effort at conveyance, coupling poorly with having a really mediocre user interface and extremely minimal attempts at feedback. There is limited attempt at visual distinction, at least as best I can tell. The response is to mock the player, and you're left with the rather grim realization that gaming yearns to be binary on its spectrum. This sits across from the weird suspicion it isn't even fully intentional, that it is 'just how this is done' and you sort of sigh...
Of course it always comes back to this: You can look up guides, you can read up on a game, you can allow the developer to be lazy because if you put the work in and your peers put the work in, a good experience can be crafted from a game that didn't really bother to try. Dungeon is certainly not the worst example of the ethics going into crafting roguelikes, but the concept still lies there, tiring me out.
If the answer to a player question is "I feel completely lost and don't understand what I'm doing wrong" is "look up a guide" I don't really think the game is ever truly successful at being a game. I never really feel comfortable saying to someone - pick this game up! - if its systems aren't at least somewhat self-explanatory. Twenty hours into the game and I still feel like there's a lot I'm not understanding, but I just don't feel like digging around to play more. I didn't end my play time with DOTE satisfied, rather, I'm just tired of it. That's not a great place to end up.
Getting away from that, seriously, the UI is just awful. There is so much on screen and so little of it is useful at a given moment. Is it Roguelike that I can barely tell where monsters are, or who is under attack? You switch to the map, but some events aren't displayed on the map ... What? What is the point of the game being psuedo-real time if the proper way to play is to jam the pause button every single time you open a door? And I mean, once the door is actually opened because goodness what this game needs is that slow ass opening animation where you sit on your hands for a couple seconds. Most of the elements could do with being moved around, and more information should be on screen or on the map screen. Having to switch between the two to manage the situation is just infuriating, given yes - you can just pause - so it's not a matter of game difficulty but limitations in the design. The UI just doesn't flow at all.
Regardless of all this negativity, Dungeon of the Endless is a really unique and fantastic game. The detraction of a long, painful learning curve and a mediocre UI mean I wouldn't casually recommend it, but I think there is a wonderful mishmash of so many games joined together by the roguelike skeleton. I don't think I've played anything in a long time that plays quite like dungeon, though I haven't played many board games and it feels to me a lot like an extension of a board game into the realm of electronic game. I just sort of wish it explained more, showed more and was built around a somewhat different set of ideas.
I'm pretty hyped to unpack and try out Endless Space now, as I like the style of the lore and writing. Of course, 4x games take forever and ever to learn then play, so...
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