Quest of Dungeons Review

Despite the fact that the game "Rogue" is older than I am, I never knew that it had sparked its own genre until I watched ProtonJon stream a game called "Crypt of the NecroDancer" back near the beginning of 2015. When Crypt of the NecroDancer went on sale as part of Steam's summer sale event, I decided to get it, and I fell in love with it. Now, I consider the roguelike and rougelite genres to be two of my favorite genres of games to play. That brings us to Quest of Dungeons; the closest game to Rogue that I've ever played.

Developed by Upfall Studios, Quest of Dungeons is a very simple top-down game all about exploring dungeons - hence the name. The premise is simple: a bad guy did a thing, and it's your job as the hero to undo that thing. I describe this in general terms because each of the three areas has a different story, yet shares the same basic elements. This is definitely done for comedic effect, as the writing definitely aims for comedy more than anything else, which makes the game quite charming.

Starting off, you will be given the choice between playing one of four characters: the Warrior, the Mage, the Archer, or the Shaman. As someone who enjoys simpler fantasy settings, I appreciate having the traditional roles of warrior, mage, archer/thief, and the often interchangeable forth party member as playable characters. Also in line with tradition is how each of these characters has differing skills and playstyles. The Warrior fights opponents head on, the Mage and Archer fight from a distance, and the Shaman uses a mix of both strength and spells. Each character has one skill/spell that they start off with, as well as a specific pool of skills and spells that can be found while delving the dungeons.

The core gameplay is, as with everything else up to this point, simple. You go from room to room, killing monsters and collecting treasure, which helps you get gold to pay for better equipment, potions and food, and keys to unlock doors and chests. The main goal is to get to the bottom of the dungeon to fight the area's final boss. Technically, you could move on as soon as you find the stairs to the next floor, but that's not a good idea. Even on the lowest difficulty setting, you'll need to explore as much of every floor as you can so you can level up and find new equipment, spells, skills, and more consumables.

Combat plays out slightly differently for each character. For the Warrior, you'll mostly just run in, strike with your melee attack, and take everything on the chin. The Shaman is similar, but he's not as tough as the Warrior, so he relies a bit more on his starting spell to help him avoid damage. The Archer and the Mage both attack at a range, but the Mage's attack costs him mana, so he's rather helpless if it runs out. However, both the Mage and the Shaman can cast some spells without waiting on a cooldown. Though, more powerful spells have both a mana cost and a cooldown, so it's not like they'll won't ever have cooldowns to wait for.

The Warrior

The Inventory

The Shaman

Load Screen

The Mage

Speaking of waiting; time doesn't flow like it does in any other action-based game. Time in Quest of Dungeons only moves when the player walks, attacks, or otherwise takes action. Thus, cooldowns aren't time based, but rather a count of phases. Humorously, since opening and closing doors counts as an action, you could stand in place repeatedly opening and closing a door to make time move. You'd better make sure there isn't an enemy on the other side of that door, though, as you'd be allowing them to make their advance at you if you do chose to do this. Enemies can only move or take action after you have, so you're given plenty of time to think out your next move during combat.

This pseudo-turn-based system in tandem with the straightforward combat system makes Quest of Dungeons a great place to start if you're new to the roguelike genre. However, this is sort of a double-edged sword, as the simplicity might bore someone who's played other, more fleshed out roguelikes. The combat can feel stale sometimes, since it can boil down to a war of attrition. Sometimes you can even get one-shotted by powerful enemies before you know what hit you. The game as a whole isn't very skill based, so you don't get better at it with each game over, you just get lucky with what loot you find on a new run. I think that this would be a bit less so if the characters had different starting spells. The Warrior and Archer's starting spells don't offer much in the way of strategic depth, and the Archer and Mage don't start off with options to use in the event that an enemy or boss gets too close. Speaking of spells, I think some spells are rather underpowered. There are spells that I felt were useless because of how little they help out - in fact, I consider the Archer's starting spell among these.

That said, I really can't find enough fundamentally wrong with Quest of Dungeons. Random generation helps counteract the overly simple combat, so I wouldn't say I haven't gotten my money's worth out of this game. Plus, the game can be pretty satisfying once you find all of your character's spells - or at least the good ones. I give Quest of Dungeons a 4 out of 5. Like I said before, this game is great as an introduction to the roguelike genre, so definitely give it a go if you're looking for an entry point.

Box-Art Source:

http://www.indiedb.com/games/quest-of-dungeons/images