You suddenly have an hour of free time that you don’t know what to spend on? I can tell you another alternative to big games, flash games, movies, books, sports and dinner – these are the so-called Coffeebreak roguelikes (five minute bagels).
First, let me clarify what requirements must be met for a game to be called a roguelike. The original requirements that are most often used are listed in the "Temple of Roguelikes". Below will be listed the most important requirements:
1) random content generation – the world and its components are basically generated anew with each new game;
2) unrecoverable death – the main character pays for your mistakes with his life, and after the hero’s death you have to start the game from the very beginning (because of this, the whole feeling of the game changes);
3) step by step control – the player takes one step, the world around him also lives through the time of one step, this allows you to take pauses of any length in the game (to think, have a snack or have a snack while thinking);
4) general management – the player should have access to all commands in any game situation, for example, the player can start sharpening his sword even when some goblin starts beating him;
5) open world – progression in the game should not be strictly linear, the player should have the opportunity to choose what and when to do, this applies not only to the game map;
6) discovery of game mechanics – the player has to independently study how this world and the objects in it work, and a large amount of content makes this activity more interesting.
I will list some roguelikes that fulfill the following requirements:
— short – that is, they require less than a day of play to complete, usually 2 hours of thoughtful play;
— like bagels – that is, they fulfill all or almost all of the most important requirements for this genre from the list above;
— little-known – there is no point in describing the wonderful games of the roguelike genre, about which enough has already been written almost everywhere;
— interesting to me personally – that is, those that I remember very strongly, and which I even replayed after the victory.
List of games to review
Game reviews will follow the following template:
— a brief description of the gameplay;
— determination of the measure of compliance with the genre;
— a list of the features of the game that made me especially like this game;
— a list of features that can (unnecessarily) scare players away;
– links to resources where you can get this game.
These aren’t all good five-minute roguelikes, naturally, but they’re a good start for those who decide to explore the world of the roguelike genre.
These are the games:
— Drakefire Chasm;
— DoomRL;
— Demon Tactic;
— Brogue;
— Desktop Dungeons;
— Gruesome.
Drakefire Chasm
The game begins with you choosing the race of your future dragon.
Different dragon races not only have different stat bonuses, but also several unique skills. You start playing first as a baby dragon who has just hatched from an egg and begins to hunt all sorts of rats and earthen gnomes. This is one of the most difficult levels.
By eating the corpses of enemies, the dragon becomes stronger, smarter or more resilient, the bonus depends on whose corpses the dragon eats: thieves, magicians or tenacious barbarians. After clearing a level, the dragon matures and the player can choose a skill to improve.
Most levels are simple caves with random enemies scattered around randomly. But some are special: a round cave with adventurers who come in your shoes; one single but strong hero; the last epic battle with a whole crowd of heroes.
The game still has a basic inventory in the form of dragon spheres, but usually they are worth saving only until the last battle.
The game meets all points except the 5th "open world", since the entire game life of the dragon is predetermined in advance. However, it’s still fun to replay.
What’s good about the game? It is very short, tolerably complex and most importantly – you raise your dragon, which by the end of the game turns into an ancient wyrm, eating heroes in batches, nice minimal ASCII animation.
What may scare you away: ASCII graphics; sometimes unfair randomness (but correct play reduces its effect); linear order of levels (which are however randomly generated along with random enemy classes).
Links.
In the collection of bagels http://www.roguebasin.com/index.php?title=Drakefire_Chasm
On the Drakefire Chasm developer website
Roguelike version of the legendary Doom. Among roguelike fans, it is true that this is a very well-known game, but among newcomers to this genre, it may be unknown.
You play as a special forces infantryman who is dropped at the Phobos base and you must crush all the demons you encounter and, most importantly, their bosses into cabbage. For the roguelike genre, it is very rare to use firearms and ranged attacks as the main way to fight opponents, but here it looks simply gorgeous (yes, it’s both simple and gorgeous at the same time).
The battle tactics are very original: you can shoot from around the corner (shooting from behind cover); you can shoot into the void, anticipating possible monsters (this requires more ammunition, but it allows you to wound enemies in advance).
The game has a sufficient number of unique monsters, weapons, inventory upgrades, armor and various skills and their combinations. In general, skills are what makes this game so replayable. The game also has great voice acting, which is very rare among roguelikes.
The disadvantages include: the same level template https://pink-casino-online.uk/login/ with weak generation of the cards themselves, very high complexity very quickly. Usually, in order to learn how to play well, it would be better to watch successful playthroughs on YouTube on higher difficulties.
Links.
In the collection of bagels http://www.roguebasin.com/index.php?title=DoomRL
On the DoomRL developer website
Demon Tactic
The game starts right away with a big battle between demons and devils.
The hero fights on the side of the demons, being a demon himself. In this battle he is cool and strong and wears the most powerful armor. But the battle is so difficult that most likely he will die here anyway.
After the first death, the main game begins, where the demon hero finds himself in an endless dungeon with one of the random backstories (for example, running away from an angry dragon or a cloud of amoebas).
As you progress, the hero enters into alliances with some races and starts a war with others. The hero can achieve one of several endings: become the leader of one of the factions or simply escape from the dungeon.
The game has a basic inventory: several elixirs and armor. You can accumulate your own mini army of assistants. There is also an extensive bestiary, and due to the significant number of different skills, different battle tactics have to be applied to different monsters.
The game has specific controls, but it allows you to do various tactical tricks:
— attack several enemies at a time;
– you can throw an enemy into another enemy, wounding the victim;
— you can throw monsters into lava lakes, getting rid of them immediately;
– you can use melee monsters as a shield from their ranged allies.
This makes the game look a little like a puzzle.
The game meets all the most important requirements for roguelikes, but the “open” world is only partially related to the point, since the choice consists of freely concluding temporary and permanent allies, but choosing the next map to explore is very difficult. However, the opportunity to escape from the map and ignore the unwanted scenario is always open.
The game is good with opportunity roleplaying:
– you can rob trade caravans, buy and rape slaves, betray recent allies;
– is it possible to support the “good” races, exterminate the races of necromancers, demons, devils.
However, the game does not provide a strict division between good and evil; all decisions lead to different reactions of different factions to the main character. You are given the opportunity to control the demon, and you decide whether he will be evil, kind or an unscrupulous careerist. Nice tile graphics. The game has Russian language, which is rare for bagels.
Among the shortcomings, we can highlight the fact that the game is still in active development and there are some voids. Also, the game is only available in online mode, which, however, protects your saved games from bugs that delete games (which sometimes happens in roguelikes), and of course prevents you from cheating with saves.
Links.
In the collection of bagels http://www.roguebasin.com/index.php?title=Demon_Tactic
On the Demon Tactic developer website
In this roguelike, you play as a nameless ragamuffin adventurer who has entered a deadly dungeon in search of the legendary Amulet of Yendor, which is kept on the 26th floor. He is a ragamuffin because he went on this journey with only a dagger, leather armor, one ration of food and darts.
In this roguelike, your main task will not be to exterminate monsters, but to wisely use very limited resources. The selected food will be enough for you to travel down to get the amulet and return back. It is very likely that your hero will die of hunger if you wander aimlessly around the dungeon for a long time. You will have to determine all scrolls and drinks at random: drink / use or throw at monsters.
Basic pumping model:
— collecting elixirs of power to increase the hero’s strength;
– collecting elixirs of life to increase life reserves;
– finding armor and weapons that you would like to spend all your time with and improve them with rare scrolls;
– the same applies to magic rings;
— and if you plan to play as a magician, then magic staves.
The game meets all the requirements for a roguelike, but only partially satisfies the requirements of an open world. However, here too the hero can make decisions:
– develop the power of magic rings, or armor, or weapons, or magic staves;
— fight a strong guard for the sake of an artifact or simply escape from it;
— clear the dungeon or just try to quickly reach the Amulet of Yendor.
The backpack is small, so you always have to give up something and just throw away some useful things.
The main game feature is the absence of restrictions on the power of artifacts. This means that you can find the best weapon or armor with good enchantment literally on the first floor with weak enemies. But this still does not guarantee you victory, since the weapon can be damaged by monsters with erosion, and the hero’s strength may not be enough for heavy armor at first. The initial floors are quite easy, but the latter ones become really hardcore and without a good plan there is very little chance of winning.
Tactical component of the game very deep. You can get rid of the monster in the following ways:
– kill him in hand-to-hand combat;
– throw darts at him;
– conjure a fireball or lightning on it;
– poison him and run from him until he dies from poison;
– lure him into the bushes and set them on fire, burning even the thickest opponents;
– lure him into the gas chamber and set fire to the gas, provoking a powerful explosion;
– throw an elixir at it that removes the floor, as a result of which the monster will fall to a lower level, and may even survive and wait for you there;
– make one of the monsters’ allies mad, as a result of which the madman will attack the nearest neighbor;
– sneak up on a sleeping monster and deal triple damage to it (often fatal) and these are not all the alternatives.
This, by the way, is one of the rare games that is well suited for mouse control, which is very rare for roguelikes.
Among the game’s shortcomings, one can highlight ASCII graphics, which, however, very quickly becomes native. The brutal difficulty of the later levels can be quite frustrating, but after the first victory the satisfaction is overwhelming.
Links.
In the collection of bagels http://www.roguebasin.com/index.php?title=Brogue
On the Brogue developer website
Desktop Dungeons
This is a good mixture of puzzle and roguelike. Of all the other roguelikes on this list, this game has the shortest play session. By this I mean the free alpha version, which turned out to be more of a roguelike than the new one, and I liked it more than the new one.
First, you choose the hero’s race and class, which determine basic spells, vitality and the ability to deal melee damage. All this determines in what order and what monsters you can kill, as well as what gods and things are most suitable for the hero.
The gods play a very important role here. Worshiping one of them provides a number of benefits, but at the same time imposes restrictions on the player’s actions. For example, Taurog is the god of battles, gives faith points for killing enemies and magical things, but punishes for using magic. As bonuses, he gives very powerful equipment that allows you to do without magic.
The main features of the game: this is a real mathematical puzzle with constantly changing conditions! To restore lives and mana, you need to open new areas of the map, but this also heals monsters. To gain more experience, you need to kill enemies of a higher level than the current level of the hero, but this is much more resource-consuming.
Among the disadvantages: the same as the advantages – serious requirements for arithmetic calculations. To play successfully you do not need higher mathematics, but arithmetic and forecasting are strictly necessary here.
Again, I repeat, if you like bagels, then you will most likely like the old free version more.
Links.
In the collection of bagels http://www.roguebasin.com/index.php?title=Desktop_Dungeons
On the Desktop Dungeons developer website
You play as the monster Grue, which appears in various games, such as ADOM. This monster lives in the dark and devours travelers who dare to enter caves without light, because they are afraid of light.
Your goal is to reach the exit from the cave and at the same time hide from the light source from the travelers’ lanterns, sneak up on them from behind and eat them in one sitting. One hit of the light and you instantly lose, no extra lives or hit points. To eat a traveler, you must wait for him to step on you.
This is a very minimalistic roguelike. Travelers spin around themselves and randomly travel through the level, illuminating the area only in front of them. Different travelers have flashlights of different strengths, and if it’s quite easy to deal with one enemy, then if there are already two of them, then there is always a risk that an unexpected traveler will illuminate you and you will die.
However, Grue has magical abilities that he can use and improve as he gains experience (eating travelers): extinguish the lanterns of nearby travelers, making them easy prey; scout out the location of all travelers on the level. And also Gru can temporarily accelerate, thereby quickly catching up with his victim. It is worth noting that all these skills are strictly necessary for victory, and they are upgraded automatically. At the most difficult levels, the magic of extinguishing lanterns becomes the most effective.
The main advantages of the game: a unique opportunity to play as a monster from nightmares; This is an interesting stealth roguelike – very complex and very short. Those who know Pascal and any programming language in general will be able to easily find out all the useful formulas based on the hero’s skills.
Disadvantages of the game: simple ASCII graphics; a little difficult entry without reading the game explanations.
Links.
In the collection of bagels http://www.roguebasin.com/index.php?title=Gruesome
On the Gruesome developer website
All the games I listed are free and provide the player with a unique gaming experience. They also pose a serious challenge to the player’s intellectual abilities, and victory in them brings real satisfaction from successfully overcoming.
If you are new to roguelike games, then I recommend starting with Desktop Dungeons, Demon Tactic, DoomRL. Then try Drakefire Chasm and Brogue. And finally try Gruesome.
I hope you will seriously and for a long time get hooked on this wonderful genre of games.
