I for my part enjoy this game. It's like some sort of a casual "Dungeon Master".

Ok there really isn't much depth to it but then again, I don't always want the depth of an epic game like "Dungeon Master" or "Eye of the Beholder". Sometimes this depth is just overhelming. This one here is easy to pick up and easy to lay away to play on later. It's fun. Really. Just don't expect it to be epic.

Apparently I find the graphics quite enjoyable and the sound is athmospheric enough for such a kind of a game. It all suits my taste really well. I like the spoken intro too. The voice over is professionally done, sounding good and clearly understandable. The game even has some nice touches (like eastereggs) to it, for e.g. the disk scratching sound when you're saving your game just like in good old Amiga days when playing from floppies. That's cool!

Gameplay wise it's a classic Dungeon Crawler through and through and there is everything in it you would expect from such a game: keys, doors, switches, levers, monsters, mazes, riddles, loot ...

I must say it can't compete with the classics in any regards except the updated dungeon graphics but I think that wasn't the intention when creating this game either so rating it in it's own regards I can easily recommend it.

There are only one or two little letdowns for me in this game:

1. The fighting is too slow. I guess this comes from being a mobile port. In this game here it's not possible to walk in a backward circle around strong enemies hitting them from the side while evading their attacks. (I think classic Dungeon Crawler players know what I mean ... ;). In fact it is somewhat possible but too unreliable and waaay to slow, it gets boring to do it but it's not necessary either because your magic characters have literally unlimited mp so you just stand still in front of the enemy and heal your party all the time. Not nice but it works. Only I liked the more action oriented version from classic games more.

2. Speaking of fighting: Daggers can't be thrown, either can't arrows - you need a bow to be able to shoot the arrows. Again the fact that the party as a whole is using arrows from the same pool makes the game even more casual. No micromanagement here. And I think you can't sell items, and probalby there will ever be three items to buy in the shop the whole game through ... You could see this all as a positive though as it makes the game more casual ...

As I said before this game can't compete with the classics (my personal favourite still being the underrated and mostly forgotten "Black Crypt" for Amiga) but that's okay for me ...

Maybe it should be priced a little lower, like 4,99 €, but when it's on discount and you're looking for a nice snack of oldschool dungeon crawling you can get quite a lot of fun out of it. If you did like games like this in the old days chances are high this game here sends you right down memory lane. And it does it in a nice and easy package.

@ngel

tl;dr: Awful mobile version of a watered down Legend of Grimrock. Don't get this game even at your own risk.

Why?

To attack with phisical weapons you use 1 to 4. To use magic, you need to click on each character pentagram and then click on the spell. Well, the 2 casters are on the back row (as it usually goes), so is unconfortable to keep moving the mouse from one spot to the other.

Characters start w/o weapons. You get 5 lame arrows that hit nothing, and maybe a knive if you find it. They cannot even punch the enemies with their fists.

Childies dialogs, which became totally expendable when you meet the 2 NPCs, making the plot forgetable.

Stick with Legend of Grimrock and forget about this game.

No idea how this game just apeared in my library, but I totally regret it.

Legend of Grimrock, I said.

You have been warned.

It's a nice little dungeon crawler, extremely easy if you are used to these kinds of games but worth a play through to pass the time.

First off I have to say this isn't a bad game, but it just isn't very good either. The puzzles are so easy that it isn't fun anymore and the combat is slow even for this genre. The enemies are uninspired and music/sound is seriously lacking. The controls arent't geared for keyboard use even if you switch to the "traditional controls". All in all it's just an obvious iOs port of a shallow game. It just isn't worth the price.

I like the game overall, but it would be nice to have a better tutorial and a way to pick up items that you can't click on.

Dungeon Crawler with a different side story. Worth the play

love this old style dungeon crawler

8/10
Quite Fun! It reminds me of the good old days of cRPG but I cant quite decide which one it is similar to. Very much like Might and Magic 1 through 6 but with less story. Also alot like Bards Tale 1.

If you liked the older style games (1980's and 1990's) before they became all graphical fluff but dont want to waste time with a story (beyond "Im here to kill sht") then you may like this game too.

That said, it is lacking in depth. There is no story beyond "Hey im in a dungeon, lets kill stuff" and it feels more like someones early work rather than a polished full fledged cRPG.

I have really wanted to finish this game but around 15th or 16th floor I just cant take it anymore. First few floors are ok but since around level 10 its just empty straight coridors, since lvl 15 filled with more mobs to grab some extra play time.

Graphics are fine, style not so much. Same wall on every level so far. "Puzzles" (dont know if I can call it puzzles) are super easy, rarely requiring deeper thoughts. Combat is unnecessarily long and boring. No customization beyond portrait and 4 attributes. Difference in weapons seem to be just in shape. 1-8 long sword is no different than 1-8 mace.

First timers or people who just got hyped into this type of games by some of the latest good games should avoid. Wouldnt recommend it even for the people who are desparate for more games in this genre. Just go play your favorite game once more.

p.s. one of the Janecs journals describes the feeling after playing this game. Bored. Bored. Bored. Every single word in whole journal entry.

Rating - 60/100
Recommendation - Play Legend of Grimrock instead

By all outwards appearances, this is a pretty decent game. However, it greatly annoys me for one big reason: It's a quintessential mobile game, in every way.

I have nothing against mobile games in general, but the entire mobile game market is FLOODED with carbon-copies and even copy-pasted games. Try to count all the match-3 Bejeweled clones in the App Store, and you will go insane. Try to find all the Flappy Bird clones in the Google Play Store, and your family/friends will have to stage an intervention.

This game is no exception. It is nothing but a slightly-dumbed-down mobile version of Legend of Grimrock, full-stop.

The graphics are good-looking (not within a stone's throw of LoG though), and the character art is pretty fantastic, but movement feels like LoG (albeit clunky and restrictive), secret buttons feel like LoG (with far less imagination), puzzles are similar to LoG (albeit not clever, and RIDICULOUSLY simple), and combat feels like LoG (albeit stripped to its most basic).

Now, to be fair, Legend of Grimrock was far from groundbreaking in the dungeon-crawling genre to begin with, but in a world where Legend of Grimrock exists (and has workshop support!), why would you play a game that is almost exactly the same (or worse) in every way?

Legend of Grimrock felt mysterious, and alive, and it had a distinctive dark and brooding atmosphere. The puzzles were incredibly clever, bordering on diabolical, and combat was tough but rewarding. This game, however, feels bright, friendly, and... I hate to say it... casual. Combat is slow and boring, puzzles are insultingly easy, and the whole thing feels like it's catering to 15 minute playsessions.

I've barely put any time into this one, and I can't see myself putting more in. With LoG, rather, I got in trouble for putting off work to play it.

If you ABSOLUTELY LOVED Grimrock, have played all the high-quality workshop content, and are utterly dying for more dungeon-crawling, it might be worth waiting for this to go on sale. Myself, however? I'm deleting it and moving on. There are far too many excellent games in my backlog for me to spend time replaying a detuned version of one I already beat.

This review is dedicated to my beloved human cells, which died during this 11 hour game.

Ok, so far i would give this game like 3/10. Cause it is below 5 i can give only negative recommendation.

Why?

Pros:
- cheap in a bundle
- nostalgy factor, lack of alternatives, if you played already all the other games like Grimrock

Cons:
- only 1 save slot
- no real hotkeys for quicksave for example or maybe they are hidden?
- what is the story?
- you can buy only 3-4 items inside a game shop/merchant
- warrior and rogue classes are crap and like babies, they can't even kill a rat, they miss all the time
- caster/cleric classes are the most important, caster kills all the enemies in the game with ease
- sometimes if you save in front of the lever and reload again, you can't move to nowhere cause you are diagonal (solution: cast a teleport to another level)
- after reload you can't move, you need first to click on character
- click, click, click fight: where is automatism?
- cr cr cr cr cr crap ending

Ok, i will stop here with cons!

Btw i finished this game.

If you have plenty of time and finished Grimrock and other RPG-games, then you should definitly buy his game and play it!

I paid $1.74 for this game and it was worth it. It was worth exactly that amount. It has ancient hard drive sounds.

Hard game to play. When I say hard, I mean the controls and interaction with the game is challenging. Items that can be picked up with a single mouse-click got really hard as I move around the item just so that I can get an angle just close enough to pick it up. That's the only glitch I found in this game.

Now for the good stuff. The visuals of this game is really nice and pleasant. The standard dungeon raiding game but with an active-turn based RPG type of feel, this game can actually be addicting. Other limitations to the standard gaming would be the ability to teleport back to town is limited to the number of... whatever that glow red floor panels were. Then the ability to revive can only be done via Altars only which makes this game even more challenging in saving your team from getting annihilated .

Other parts of the gameplay, is that this game is really meant for mobile and not for desktop gaming. The controls were not really my style to play this sort of game but it still utilizes the WASD standard.

Nothing much about the Audio. Pretty average.

I can see myself playing this if I really don't have any other games to play.

Unplayable if you have surround/eyefinity. There is no resolution options, (in fact there is no acceptable options menu at all), all GUI optimized for touchscreens and game is in real time, so you really have to frantically try to attack or cast spell by pushing buttons on opposite sides of screens while being eaten by enemies.

TL:DR - See FINAL VERDICT at the bottom.

Ok, after playing for a bit. My impression is this is a "dungeon crawl (beyond incredibly) lite" for mobile.

It is not for a hardcore RPGer. It is definitely not for a PC gamer who is expecting the depth (whether story or mechanics) that comes from real PC RPGs.

IF I played games on my phone (and I dont- I'm VERY anti mobile game, esp those ported to PC - See thread "i hope this is as good as it sounds" for why), and IF I was looking for an RPG to while away some time on the train or whatever, It'd be ok for that.

Definitely not a "suck away an entire weekend in dungeon crawling bliss" game though.

Ok for starters, yeah. The textures are really uninspired basic texture packs as Gwion noticed and Angelo pointed out. You could probably find the exact same pack on the web for purchase with a few words on google.

The story is...Meh. Thats not really surprising. The dungeon crawl genre isnt known for its stories, but for its intricate dungeons full of monsters and traps.

Yes theres 2 NPCS Ive met so far, an "innkeeper and a "shop". The story of why theyre there is beyond weak. And as far as I can tell, you cant buy or sell anything but arrows, rations, and fishing gear at the shop. Why even have a shop? Why not an arrow and rations vending machine?

It would have been served better to just have very little story, as Dungeon Master and LoG did. Just a "a big evil dungeon and you have to defeat the big evil at the end of it". That worked for the old games.

But in this one, your characters actually talk to each other sometimes. And the writing is bland and not really worth being there. The screenshots are misleading, as they show the charcaters talking to an NPC and each other.

The NPCs are dispensers, the writing of the charcater's speech sounds like it was written by a junior high schooler. NOT needed.

The thing that gets me more than anything is beyond a few screens of basic instruction (that any RPGer pretty much knows automatically) there is NO ingame helpfiles. NO tutorial, no nothing. And the ones you do get are impossible to look at once they're gone.

So you get basic self explanatory introduction (Minus what the "gestures" are - I still cant figure out how to strafe and it was only through experimentation that I figured out how to work them at all), and NOTHING about unique aspects of the game that you need to know.

Like for instance in the character screen there is a yellow bar next to my health. Whats that? Experience? Fatigue? Food? No idea. Suppose Ive got to fiddle around with it till I figure it out.

I'm all for not hand holding, but this game doesnt even tell you basic stuff you need to know.

That and theres no options screen. So I hope the resolution, graphics, keymap and sounds are to your liking. Cuz you CANT CHANGE THEM.

That might be OK for mobile, but on a PC it is an absolute necessity. Not everyone has the same configuration. Not everyone has hands that can use a keyboard to steer. (I have partial paralysis.)

The "gestures" are a good thing. I really like that as an alternate movement. But theres no tutorial of what to do to work them! It took an "aha" moment and 10 minutes of experimentation to figure out why my mouseclicks were spinning the PCs around.

So, in summary. This is a PC port of a mobile dungeon crawler. For mobile games that Ive seem, its pretty good. By the standards of the PC, no.

Go play Legend of Grimrock or even the old Dungeon Master. If you like dungeon crawls and have an iWhatever, get this game on there. Then you can while away time in the waiting room or on the bus.

But I'd recommend actually playing real dungeon crawlers on the PC.

FINAL VERDICT:

Uninspired, run of the mill mobile dungeon crawler with non unique textures. Will not in any way shape or form impress a PC RPGer, but its worth poking at a bit if its on sale for $2 and youre really really hard up for a dungeon crawler. Way overpriced here though.

The lack of any sort of re-readable helpfiles, and not giving basic information about the game's mechanics really sucks. That and THERE IS NO OPTION MENU. That might fly on mobile. Not here.

If you have an iThing and want a dungeon crawl to waste time while waiting for the bus or whatever, get it on there. Its ok by the standards of mobile. Not by the standards of the PC.

So little is explained here. If you think that you want a low rent version of Grimrock...you don't. Just go play Grimrock.

Introduction story is poor and its gets worse from then on. The game mechanics are sluggish and not intuative. I'm old enough to remember this style of game in its heyday and it doesn't do them justice at all.

as others have said before me, not worth the price tag :-(

having grown up on clasics like, dungeon master series and eye of the beholder i was really hoping this would have improved on the clasics and have gamers once again trawling through dungoens.

sadly after playing this i think it would take a miricle to revive any sort of intrest in this type of game that Grimrock rekindled.

to also find out its a port from mobiles!! i think it should have stayed there!
avoid.

The game isn't bad if you're looking for something light and a little comedic, but f the dungeon crawlers I've played in my day, this is the least of them. I've seen other games that were ported from the mobile market that did fantastically, so that's not my major malfunction.

What I do take issue with are these things:
-You can't sell anything at the one shop - you're forced to depend entirely on the gold you've collected to buy things, and just dump your old equipment you replaced on the ground. For players like me, that drives me up the wall.

-No settings. At all. Nothing. SO WHEN THE GAME IS BLASTING YOU WITH MUSIC WHEN YOU FIRST OPEN IT, YOU HAVE TO GO TO THE VOLUME MIXER IN WINDOWS TO LOWER IT.

-The puzzles are stupid easy, like you would have to have some serious mental problem (or just be really stupid*) to not understand them. I expected at least a small challenge, and was disappointed.

-There's no help area at all. You get the tutorial windows popping up at the first part of the game, and that's it. There's also no Index, Compendium of Knowledge, whatever-you-want-to-call-it for getting to know the classes while in the game- what weapons and armor they use, etc.

-I'd also expect an RPG to have something like a Monster Index, where you can see information about monsters you've killed, but I've played RPGs without 'em, so that's more of a want, not a complaint.

-That big blue guy. I don't like him.


If you're looking for a good dungeon crawler, I'd recommend you look elsewhere.

*"Really ADD" joke removed because someone got butthurt and i'd rather not deal with people with no sense of humor. I'm comfortable with my mental problems and laughing about them, maybe one day they will be too.

Not a Pearl, but not entirely bad either. It has some nice ideas, like the wheels and colored doors, but that's it. Everything would have been better, if it would have been a mod for LoG. But it's a nice game to spend some time with it and if you like such kind of games you could have some fun. Most players will probably be disapointed, because everything in the game is rather basic and the game itself is too short and too easy to beat. You could say, it's a dungeon crawler rather for beginner than hardcore RPG player.