3/5, 6/10
A Rogue-like in Flash - neat idea, not so great execution. To be honest, I've always adored this genre and I really appreciate projects trying to run such games on new platforms or create new possibilities ('Powder' is an excellent example). However, despite my love for Rogue-likes, I can't fully enjoy this game because of some annoying issues:
- to begin with, there isn't much customisation in the game. The we-know-better-what-you-want-to-wear system and too few items to choose from make every character option pretty much the same at higher levels. Not to mention it can get very frustrating by selling your favourite items. Yeah, thanks for deleting my +2 speed gloves and giving me +2 attack/defence ones instead, when I'm trying to create a rogue basing solely on fastness.
- Knight is actually the hardest to play at the beginning. While wizard can use the hit-and-run tactic and rogue can outrun every enemy, using deadly backstabs, warrior has to face them without any sophisticated methods, losing precious life points. Berserk doesn't help very much either.
- Some monsters are too hard to kill for melee fighters without any good spells (like speed, haste, sleep, berserk, freeze or polymorph), while magic users can easily kill them with two fireballs, shadowwalk and a teleport. A good example would be the minotaur.
- Every class can use every spell and every item. After a while, it doesn't really matter if you've started as a rogue - a few +spirit items, some deadly spells and voila, you're a wizard.
- No custom characters. I wish I could just distribute points between statistics myself and choose a starting spell on my own. Such option could be available after completing the game - if your goal is to ensure that players want to play again, I don't see any better options.
- Additional life. Come on, the rules are simple - you die, you lose! (Unless you have some kind of powerful artefact, of course.)
- Not much of a balance. Of course, I'm aware that all Rogue-likes base on randomness, but finding some spell at the beginning can make the game way too easy. Imagine having sleep, freeze and an extra shadowwalk while playing a rogue on the first floor. These things can happen.
- The coins seem to be useless. I was hoping for some kind of shop, to be honest.
- Well, it misses all these little things that make Rogue-likes climatic. Hunger, pets, darkness, various scrolls, having to identify items and so on. I understand that this is just a Flash game, but I do miss them in spite of all. I agree with some previous reviews: it's too simplified, which makes it a bit boring; especially for all these veterans that used to spend hours on such RPGs back in the old days.
To sum up, I really appreciate that you've made a Rogue-like game in Flash and I've enjoyed playing it for a while, but if you ever decide to make a sequel - make it much more complicated, as weird as it sounds. I'm sure a lot of people would enjoy this little RPG, if only it had many more possibilities.