I have finished the game after 26 hours of playtime (including the "Pirate's Cove" DLC. And I think that this is a wonderful game which, I have enjoyed every minute of it.

It is important to get some updates earlier in order not to get frustrated by too many defeats. However you can always do some grinding if that is not the case.

There are many classes and each of them have some unique cards and an ability that can be imitated by some of the cards. My favorites were Ranger and Mime in first tier, Ranger and Shape shifter in second tier, Troubador, Knight and Cartomancer in the last tier.

Although you can die many times before defeating the game and chance plays an important role, this is definitely a fun game.

Battle scars are the only thing for successful warriors to add some abilities like starting with extra life or a beneficial discipline in their next challenge. However, rarely they can also be harmful, like gaining "Stupidity" and all of them goes away if the warrior dies.

I believe I will play this game again after a couple of years, as it has become one of the classics of my collection.

Solid little roguelike. Really liked the card laying mechanic and how little changes between classes make big differenced in a fight. I think the gold income could be balanced to give you more incentive to mill your minions. Also, a way to make the starting classes more relavant in later stages would be great, i miss using my cat burgler.

Anyhow, overall loved it. Enough to double dip and get the iOS version too!

So... I just finished the game. To me, the game was worth it. This game is kind of a hybrid between roguelike and a cardgame and a dungeon crawler. Definitely unique. This game is a one time playthrough however. Once you beat the game, you'll have no desire to go back to it. I certainly didn't.

It will probably last you about ~12 hours. It took 25 hours for me, because I had to start the whole game over. The difficulty spikes up a lot in a section with dwarves, and I hadn't unlocked tier 3 class by that time, because I was exploring all the classes. There's no way to farm gold in this game, so I had to start over. Bad game design there. But, once I started over and focused on a class I liked, I beat the game with little difficulty.

For the novelty of the game, I can honestly recommend it. It has charm and is a fun casual game. And I don't mind paying 15 dollars to get 10+ hours of gameplay. If you're in the same boat, and you like what you see, give it a try. There's always the steam refund if you absolutely hate it, but I think you'll like it.

Good Game.
Simple yet addictive gamplay with decent depth.

I love indie games, card games, roguegames and D&D so this game looked pretty perfect for me. I watched a friend play it for a few hours before deciding it looked interesting and unique enough to buy. If I was reviewing this game in the first few hours, which I see a lot of people have, it would be 100% positive, it takes delving a little deeper to discover some of the flaws.

You choose your class (6 choices progressively unlocked through a gold-based tree) and this gives you your deck of cards (attacks and defense). Each turn you are randomly assigned cards that can include monsters, rooms and treasures. You place these to create a dungeon, and your adventurer (who you don't control), will be motivated to get the shinies. You can build your "deck" of attacks by choosing equipment (much of which is unlocked through the gold-tree).

The quirky monsters, attacks, dialogue bubbles and item descriptions are awesome. For example, if you play the bruiser, you're the chavviest chav ever. If you're the cat burglar, you will literally, throw cats. I won't spoil the rest, a lot of the fun in this game is the personality that shines through as you play.

You complete quests which unlocks more rooms in your guild (through gold), you get more dungeons, you complete more quests, and it repeats. Some of the quests are catered towards different classes, so you have to unlock the right classes and figure out what the strengths and weaknesses are and take in the right adventurer, whilst your graveyard piles up with the bodies of the minions who failed. Whilst simple, it can be pretty challenging and you do have to really think about what you're doing.

If I could leave it there, this would be 100% positive - but after the first six hours or so I did feel the game was very monotonous. That's a side effect of the fact that every single dungeon you start again at level 1. After a while you realize you're just playing the same monsters, the same room types, the same abilities from a small card set vs the same mechanics that you start with, over and over in a very repetitive grind. Progression takes a lot of gold, grinding and time, and for me, felt quite slow and stale. The game needs a much larger monster, class and equipment pool if it wants to pull that off without it getting boring by the end and a more interesting set of options and permanent carry-overs to reduce the time you spend grinding as you progress.

The roadmap mentions an "endless mode" with a high score table, which may add some competitive play and certainly a lot of replayability, so I look forward to seeing how long I can survive in that.

My recommendation is still positive because I do think it's a unique idea with a great style, especially the writing, and I did enjoy playing this game a lot - it's just too simplified and reptitive to be taking full advantage of it's potential and that makes me sad. When this comes up on sale or perhaps when patches are added in the future, I think this will be better value.

TL:DR Great basics, tons of potential, very unique and interesting game, can be a bit grindy/reptitive, needs more content. Would still recommend.

First impressions of the game were great. I was excited to play, everything was funny and great to discover - and then it clicked: I already saw everything the game had to offer.

The game mechanics are the same from start to finish.
Do quests, use money to upgrade guild hall, get new equipment, do quests, use money to upgrade guild hall, get new equipment... Sure, this is every RPG-style game, is it not? There's always some *reason* why you're doing this, though. Some end goal. Something to motivate you to continue. Some change in game mechanics. Here? Nothing. It's really a one-trick pony. Do quest, get new equipment, do quest, get new equipment, rinse and repeat.

I found myself bored within hours. There was nothing that captivated me, here. The narrator starts to grate on you singing the same tune at every significant event. You feel no love for your heroes, they die, and are instantly replaced. There's no benefit to keeping them alive longer.

Bottom line, Guild of Dungeoneering is extremely lacklustre.

Guild of Dungeoneering feels like it should have been a mobile game, where you would play a dungeon and come back in a few hours time when your heroes are ready to go again. There's so little meat and potatoes to the game, I'm disappointed.

Just finished the game at 15hrs. Interesting game with innovative system. Still, I had to consider really long whether to say I'd recommend this game or not. In the end, the positives won out.

Something very important you should know before buying the game: despite the misleading name and description, gameplay-wise this game is not a dungeon crawler, neither is it a RPG. It is more like a twist on deck-building card game. If you understand that before playing the game would be a lot easier to play.

• Innovative system.
  Almost every mechanic in the game is card-based, and require you to plan each step of the fight. The ability to build your dungeon and choose your enemies based on your character deck is both challenging and fun.
  
  
• Many character classes with unique playstyle.
  This part of the game is extremely well done. Each class is vastly different from the others, and all of them are very fun to play. The feeling when you finally get to buy that building and test out the new class is trully thrilling. Though I would love to have classes' info available to see outside of dungeons. Right now you have to actually get into a dungeon to see your new class' ability.
  
  
• Neat dark humor and an evil bard mocking your dungeoneers every time you fail. Or win. Or do pretty much anything. His sole meaning of existence is sacarsm.
  
  
• And of course interesting art style. But I guess you can already judge it yourself.

• There's no tutorial.
  Ok, actually there's one hint for what you should do at the first turn of the game, and that's it. You have to figure out how the game works yourself. Took me 4 hours before I got a rough grasp of the game. And the last hour before realization was very, very discouraging. You have to be patient and figure out things with trial and error.
  
  
• No possibility to improve weak classes.
  Although each character is unique, the lower-tiered classes are a lot more powerful than their earlier counterparts Mainly because they have more starting health, which is quite important in this game. And there's no way to upgrade character in this game, meaning you will practically have only 5 choices for the endgame, which is a watse. I really love the Bruiser class but it's at the 1st tier so it get shadowed pretty soon.
  
  
• A lot of a lot of a lot of small, irritating UI bugs especially with pop out windows and click handlers, and occasional game freeze.
  And I don't mean this as toilerable. This is the main reason why I considered giving this game a "Not recommended".
  
  
• The game feels like a beta test version
  Several screens seem to be just there to be a place holder. For example you have a guild building where you can choose where to build each room/hall, and... that's all. You have an entire screen that doesn't really serve any purpose other than listening to its music.
  
  
• No end game content.
  After you clear the game you don't even have enough money to buy all buildings for the guild, and yet you can't go back to cleared dungeon. Meaning once you clear the game it's the solid end. Expect a 15 hours game for 15 bucks.

In the end I would recommend this game if you:

• Enjoy deck building card games and had experience playing them in real life. Many effects and buffs/debuffs in this game are not tracked, which is not something players of digital card games are used to, and will lead to miscalculation and frustration.
  
  
• Want to enjoy an indie game that focus more on gameplay quality than quantity.

Don't play this game if you:

• Prefer a simple, easy to jump in game. Prepare to spend at least 4 hours to understand what the game's about. You can see that most of the bad reviews are at around 3 hours of gameplay. I myself struggled at the 3rd hours mark too. Heck, that conveyed such strong messages that if I were the developers I'd do something about it immediately, but what am I to say, I can't even design a decent card game.
  
  
• Have low toilerance for semi-finished game. The game is lacking in content AND contains a ridiculous amount of bugs. They aren't game breaking bugs but they are irritating nonetheless.

Wow. Really, wow. Wowies. Wowzers. I did not expect this. This is a game that will force my review to be as blunt as it gets. I expected a simple Pen-and-Paper game that would allow me to kick back and reminisce of the old days when adventures on paper were actually fun. I got surprised big time. I watched some youtube videos of this game but none of them prepared me for what it represents.

A TL;DR Intro to Guild of Dungeoneering:

So, this is the Guild of Dungeoneering, who tries to rival the best guild ever who has the best stuff, the best people and the best intel. In short, you form a guild with the intent to show them who's better. Sadly, the people who join you will be rougher than the average... And that's put mildly... unless you, Sir/Madam, are good enough to show them the way.

What way? Well, it may be a way to glory, losing few people and actually showing the Ivory League guild who's the BOSS. Or you may send them to senseless deaths times and times over till the end of days. Everything goes. In the end, you will prevail.

So, let's take a look at what the game does well and what poorly.

THE GOOD:

1. The music and soundtracks: this is the most unique soundtrack I have heard to date, turning the bland background sounds into a bard-like storytelling. Whoever thought of that must be showered with gold. For reals.
2. The artwork: the game completely and thoroughly kicks back to the olden times when you could create adventures on pen and paper and make them fun through roleplaying, storytelling and jokes and jabs.
3. Good character class variation and your own guild to improve, build and create as you feel like.
4. No adventure is ever the same, because:
4.1. You choose your hero from a number of classes.
4.2. You choose your dungeon layout.
4.3. You choose the enemies you fight.
4.4. You actively participate in the action.
4.5. You do your best to fight your battles as best as possible.
5. This is not a game to keep you glued to your PC. You can play for a bit, take a break, and come back to it. The game will not lose anything from its charm.
6. The game creates stories from the gameplay. If you have been following my reviews, you would know that I love this about a game. Be it for a win or a loss, you get a mission or a playthrough that makes you go to the forums and share. That in itself is a huge plus in my eyes.
7. Good enemy variety, all of them with separate skills and setups.
8. Talking about skills: skills = cards. So you play cards to win encounters and use them to the best of your ability. The enemy plays a card and then you counter and try to win. SImple, yet engaging.
9. Ironman: there is a very select type of games that are worthy of an ironman experience and this one is certainly one of them. You do not get to save and load and fool the RNG.
10. Humor: plenty of jokes, jabs, easter eggs and pokes to various cultures, franchises and... let's generalize, popular stuff is to be found in this game.
11. A game that doesn't take itself seriously: this is one if the things that sells me out in a game. I love games that are jokingly frivolous and put a smile on my face. This one did it - many a time, even as I was losing horribly.
12. Tons of loot: another thing that I love about games. Loot. It is improving with difficulty, and it is worth taking.
13. Strategic decision win missions: while I said that I love frivolous games, I also love seeing my decisions amount to something. THis game does it for me.
14. Commanding a rag-tag army of dungeoneers and sending them to their demise has never been more fun for me.
15. Just like in real life, you can do everything right and still lose or get an unfavorable outcome.
16. The game has more depth than it looks.
17. And they even added animations, something that I, personally, did not expect.
18. A single play-through takes over 7 hours even if you know exactly what you're doing (barring luck falures, wins, etc.), meaning the game is good value for the money.

The BAD. Hold on to your knickers, people, cause the BAD is a lot. However, I would be so bold as to urge you to look at the BAD subjectively. Please decide for youself what's actually good or bad for you.

1. Steep learning curve. The game is easy to pick up but expects you to play it for a good amount of time in order to learn its quirks.
2. The game is frustratingly punishing. Winning a mission is not always a factor of character build and player skill.
3. If you are the type to get easily aggravated, frustrated, or flat out ♥♥♥♥♥♥ off at what happens on the screen, this game is not for you.
4. Your adventurers forget everything they did in the previous dungeon and start at level 1 every single time... But that's not all: they also completely lose the gear hey got from the last run. Now I, personally, think that they just get so happy for being alive in such a punishing game, that they get so horribly drunk in the city tavern and pass out and someone steals their gear and returns them to first grade. I blame it on the Ivory League. Them freaking cheaters.
5. RNG can screw you big time. It can even lose you a mission. This may happen so often, that it will force you to ragequit or dub the game as an downright infair, so much so that you might shelf it.
6. You will ragequit many a time, especially if you have a short fuse.
7. The game doesn't present much in terms of graphical and aesthetical fidelity for our modern age.
8. There are no RPG elements of any sort that many people would expect from this type of game.
9. There is no multiplayer. No co-op or LAN or anything.
10. Difficulty ramps up very quickly. If you don't know the quirks of the game, you might find yourself over your head in no time, which results in lost missions.
11. Some classes are need revamping and balancing, as they are better than the others.
12. So easy to lose a fight and the mission as a result.

And now, the conclusion. I will make it very plain and simple.

You should buy the game if:
- you're a casual gamer
- you like in-game humor that puts a smile on your face
- you can accept the game for what it is - a parody to dungeoneering
- you like games that you can play for a bit every now and then when you feel like, but still return to them and have just as much fun as before
- you like jokes, jabs and pokes to various cultures and franchises
- you like card games
- you like skill based games
- you like challenges
- you like ironman games
- you like experimenting
- you don't care about losing, but enjoy learning from experience and adapting as a result

You shouldn't buy the game if:
- you are a very serious gamer that expects a huge value from a purchase
- you have a short fuse and get frustrated easily
- you dislike the random number generator
- you ragequit a lot
- you expect a game that will get you glued to the pc for days on end
- you dislike games with a huge learning curve
- you don't like seeing your minions die for the greater purpose

So why would I recommend the game?
I would recommend it because it is the right game for me. I love games that have lots of humor, don't take themselves seriously and put a smile on my face. This one did it - even as I was losing horribly. It never made me feel bad for it and always had this jovial feeling of letting me fool around with it - be it with additional classes, options, and avenues of advancement. I was enjoying myself regardless of what was happening, and I believe this to be one of the most important factors in a game.

(Big) Edit :

After playing some more hours I find myself beginning to enjoy the game quite better although I still feel disappointed.
So I'll recommand the game in the end if you're not concerned with :
-Character evolution and gears are reinitialised at the start of every mission.
-Only lasting evolutions are unlocked classes, blessings, and lootable gears in missions.
-Personalisation for each mission includes choice of a class (six starting cards), a blessing (little bonus), and then through the mission looting gears of four different types (you can keep only one by type).
No more, no less. Quite enjoyable still but feeling of evolution and variety do not last.
-In my very opinion : evolution is slow and although not that poor in the end still limited, just as variety of missions.

I'll had a special thought for a mechanic I really like : each looted gear do not directly give new cards but rather levels of skills that stack on the character, each level unlocking a new card.



First : it's NOT a BAD game. But...

TL;DR :
-Great game design ideas.
-Globally poor content although sympathic.
-Way too repetitive and boring due to the lack of evolution.

Lovely idea on the paper, building a dungeon with cards around a character that move itself through the rooms you're creating, populating, filling with loot. Then playing cards based combats, making your character evolve, collecting better gears giving better cards. Upgrading your guild with earned golds to unlock new gears and classes.

But...

Very few different gears in my opinion, very limited deck building possibilities (one class and one weapon/offhand/helm/body gear), no lvl or gear conservation through mission makes you start anew everytime, not much novelties to unlock in the guild, at least nothing that feel like...

Very sympathic but get tediously repetitive before the first half-hour.

I have to recognize a great realisation for all the graphic and music parts, very funny narrator and beautiful tracks, very nice paper style design.

But even for 15€ I feel ripped. The game is fun to play but so insanely repetitive. Played four hours, started to struggle to really enjoy myself before end of the first. I can only hope the promised gifted extension for pre-purchase will really enrich the game but I have few hope.

Great ideas but very unrewarding for the player due to the lack of evolution and real objectives beside. Missions are basically always the same, and even though there are some real tactical aspects they are, well, like all the rest, very poor in the end. Big deception because it's just a funny little time killer where it could have been quite a nice game.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z2HyvrNj6xo&index=1&list=PLTj9drPC92M2iXZVy0bCpf02SUE8zLaKG

Guild of Dungeoneering is a dungeon crawler card game where you play as a guildmaster sending different heroes into a dungeon, one at a time. When your start a dungeon quest, your chosen hero begins as level 1, and gains experience and gear as they progress through the level. Luck and randomization determine how your fare
in the dungeon, and the mechanics get a bit repetitive, as you start each new dungeon
again as a level 1 with no gear that carries over.

If your hero dies, you and your guild are not punished in any way, and another hero
of the same class appears in your guild to take the place of the fallen. This endless
supply of heroes that don't interact of coordinate with any of your other heroes gives
the game a disjointed feeling, and takes away a sense of progression as you level up your guild.

Because your heroes do not level up as your progress, and you are unable to bring any sort of gear into a dungeon with you, or have any choice in what cards you bring with you, the game relies heavily on luck and repetition. When it comes to beginnning a new dungeon, you are essentially thrown into battle with no ability to prepare for different types of enemies. The leads to having to repeat levels hoping for the right random cards, and a grinding feel.

The concept of this game, and the way this game was presented was very appealing, but at the end of the day, upon playing the game, the extreme repetitiveness and grinding nature of the game make it frustrating and time consuming to play. You have no emotional ties to any of the heroes, and have to start out each new dungeon at square one. There is virtually no deck building, and no depth to the game. This was a great concept, but it fell short of it's potential.

This is a summary of my review video, which I encourage you to watch
if you are looking for a more in-depth review.

Thanks for your viewership and support; for more videos click here:
http:/www.youtube.com/user/SocioPyscho