I’d recommend Cogmind. It’s still in EA, though, so keep that in mind.
Crusis
1962
Seconded. I love LOVE Cogmind. It’s original and has a ton of replayability.
Rogue Legacy is good and has a lot of replay/unlock metacontent. It is from 2013 and I think helped pushed forward the current wave of Roguelikes; more like Spelunky or Binding of Isaac.
I found Rogue Legacy super punishing and not very varied either.
There’s extremely little access to healing, so you can’t afford to take damage. Me? I’m gonna take damage. No ifs ands or buts about it. The counter to the difficulty is supposed to be that you can make permanent progression by upgrading your entire legacy, but the costs skyrocket rapidly and you have no ability to carry over meaningful amounts of currency between sessions, so I quickly hit a wall where I couldn’t survive long enough to earn enough currency to upgrade anything. Add to that the fact that many of the possible upgrades are found in chests that you have to survive long enough to locate and then potentially complete a difficult challenge to open it, and it just wasn’t going to happen. Really, really do not recommend.
Thraeg
1965
Seconded. Rogue Legacy ironically spits in the face of Rogue’s legacy, by demanding lots of grinding (in the form of throwaway runs that have no chance of victory but net you gold to spend on permanent upgrades between runs) before you can make real progress.
Other games do the meta-progression unlock thing in a much fairer and less punishing way.
Daagar
1966
Another thumbs up for Cogmind. I enjoy it simply for the awesome ASCII art of all the robotic parts and equipment.
Thanks, this is perfect, going through it slowly but surely!
For everyone else, I noticed the developer for Cogmind posted a 4 hour stream just today that walks beginners through and aims to help everyone have a successful early game to get into the interesting sounding mid-game.
Kolbex
1968
Holy shit, 4 hours. Still, lord knows I could use the help. Cogmind is good but tough.
I’ll be offering a 15-DVD set on getting started with Stone Soup. Be sure to pick up the 7 volume companion set of books.
Kolbex
1970
Welcome to the Congressional Library of Dwarf Fortress Tutorial. No, not plural, singular.
Did i mention my Cataclysm: DDA Tutorial series was at episode 173 when i put it on hiatus? <------ not a joke
Kolbex
1972
Do I get a certificate if I watch them all?
For Cogmind, this video is a nice introduction I thought. It isn’t very time-effective, but it is showing capital aspects of the game, and hinting at others without spoiling them:
He did a second video, which is much less interesting as he gets carried away and absorbed into his own game.
Gameplay loop isn’t so bad because unlocking all the upgrades and finding loot is addictive and will make you pretty powerful in the end. Not really a good roguelike though. It felt like it had more in common with SHMUPs if they were trapped inside a castlevania game. (bullet avoidance ho!). Also one of the last classes you unlock is a flying dragon thing.
I don’t remember the game being that hard, except there were boss rematches with more dificult versions. Those were tough.
Of the more recent roguelikes I’ve played that are of the classic genre, I’d have to rate the top four as:
- Caves of QUD
- TOME
- Dungeonmans
- Cataclysm: Dark Days Ahead
In terms of how good it is and how much fun it is, I would actually have rated Cataclysm as my #1 but the learning curve there is a tough one. There’s just so much to learn. Once you get though it, though, it’s a blast to play. You do need to watch the first few of those Vormithrax tutorials when you start playing though.
It would be addictive if it didn’t rapidly exceed my ability to continue with it. That’s my big problem with it.
Dunqan
1978
No certificate but you’ll certainly be certifiable!
Disclaimer: I’m a big fan of CDDA and Vorm’s videos too.
So when people say TOME, do they mean…
- Tales of Middle-earth
Or
- Tales of Maj’Eyal
Asking for a friend.
