A celebration of roguelike games | Hacker News Reader

A celebration of roguelike games

roguelike.club

46 pointstodsacerdoti30 comments

There are many roguelites I enjoyed, but often I've wished for a less hardcore mode that let me enjoy the content without starting from scratch. I must have half a dozen platformers where I've seen the first 10% of the levels a hundred times and nothing beyond that. Most recently, Rogue Legacy 2.

I guess I should embrace "losing is fun", and accept that in case it isn't, the game just isn't for me.

It's a tough call.

It's certainly one thing to have an "easy mode" that lets the game be a cakewalk, and can be great for tourists.

Similar can be said for "cheat codes" that can empower the same thing.

But at the same time, it can be a tough balance because those things CAN "ruin the game".

Running around D2 with a character edit L99 Amazon one shotting everything and everybody, en masse as well, is fun! Rip roaring, monster slaughtering, boss bonking fun.

But that fun doesn't last. At the same time, you try to go back to play "normal" and, boy, it's hard. It's hard to go back to the 30 hit point character with the 5 dmg sword, no pack space, boots of slowness, no food, etc.

The best technique, I think, is simply a "cheat death". I'm with many, I don't want to have to play the game 10 hours to get into a position where I am ready to encounter the new tough monsters that kill me, so I can learn tactics and techniques for them. I'd rather just restart on the level (or whatever) so I can try again.

Keep me off the score board, kick me off the ladder, that's all fine. But hard to learn how to balance the higher end goodies and tougher monsters when they one shot you and you just lost several hours of game play.

> The best technique, I think, is simply a "cheat death". I'm with many, I don't want to have to play the game 10 hours to get into a position where I am ready to encounter the new tough monsters that kill me, so I can learn tactics and techniques for them. I'd rather just restart on the level (or whatever) so I can try again.

Isn't this literally just every game. Vast majority of games work like this...

Ya, sell "cheat death" amulets at the store. Tune price till happy. Maybe 1gp, maybe 1000gp.

Funny that in nethack, tourist is the hardest character to play and their camera is basically useless

Accidentally quadratic dungeoneering?

There are two species of roguelike player. The conqueror and the explorer.

I am the second type. I only care about death insofar as it inhibits my ability to explore.

Roguelikes generally play to the conqueror a little more than suits me.

Maybe it's an economic constraint. Like the game designer has only so much new amazing stuff to show you. So he has to throttle it to make it last. Put up barriers and such. Lard the exploring with grinding.

A truly deep generative roguelike wouldn't require that. It would have hot and cold running novelty coming out its eyeballs forever.

As a side note, do you think that turned-based-ness is great? The main upside that I see is that it makes the game more relaxed.

Doesn't Rogue Legacy 2's upgrade system mostly solve this issue? You'll eventually outscale the early game enemies and bosses, even if you're not very good?

I read upon accessibility recently and it surprised me how much of it was about simply making the game easier - aim assist, invulnerability, story mode... specifically for gamers like you.

yeah same, games should allow to adjust difficulty or do it automatically.

As a once-serious competitive shooter player, I can say that roguelikes and roguelites has been great substitutes as I've aged and lost the drive and time required for competitive team games.

I love the process of going from getting my ass kicked to speed running with multiple stacking difficulties. Roguelikes are also much easier to pick up and put down.

Do you have recommendations? Same story for me, and I've been trying to find low-involvement, fast pick-up games that I can play when I'm brain dead after work but it's surprisingly hard to find.

Slay the Spire, Inscryption (which now has an endless mode), and Ring of Pain are a few relatively new games that comes to mind.

Also, not a rougelike but the newly released Marvel Snap is a really well thought out card battler where every match is just 2-3 minutes long.

Great recommendations. For a more traditional roguelike, I’d add Caves of Qud to the list. It’s really good.

Shattered Pixel Dungeon on Android and iOS is excellent. I guess it's on steam now as of this year if you prefer not to play on a phone. Great game, entirely free and donation supported.

Besides other recommendations:

* Across the Obelisk: A decent deckbuilder

* Risk of Rain: A 2d side-scrolling platformer. There's also Risk of Rain 2, but 1 is better IMO

* The Binding of Isaac: Top down bullet hell - the game that 'resurrected' this genre

* BPM: A rhythm shooter

* Darkest dungeon / darkest dungeon 2: A party based dungeon explorer

* Death's Gambit: 2D dark souls basically

* Salt and Sanctuary: 2D dark souls

* Hades: Top down brawler

* Monster train: Deckbuilder

* Enter the Gungeon: Top down shooter

* Neon Abyss: Side scrolling shooter

If you want to try Rogue Light, Vampire Survivors has been a blast to play. Similar: Brotato.

I really like Dead Cells

Binding of Isaac is really great as an approachable Roguelike.

FTL and Streets of Rogue

I recently saw a really fun and informative talk on procedural generation from their YouTube channel by a well known developer in the community https://youtu.be/TlLIOgWYVpI.

There's tons of interesting talks there if (traditional) roguelikes or their development really pique your interest.

Speaking a huge deep enduring fan of rogulikes, it would be awesome to meet my peers irl.

Yes, like many of you, I have contemplated my own rl project. However my soul is reserved for other things.

Real-life and rogue-like have the same acronym. WOAH

As a two time irl attendee, I hope you get a chance some day. The excitement everyone brings has a palpable electricity to it.

A lot of these aren't roguelikes.

The people who are most deeply involved in the roguelike community have moved past that ontological debate as it's proved exceptionally useless at providing value.

You mean I don't have to buy tickets over and over again, watching the same presentations over and over again until I watch them just perfectly and unlock the final penultimate talk?

Funny joke, and I hate to be that guy, but isn’t “final penultimate” a logical contradiction? :)

It's not a contradiction, but redundant insomuch as there can only be one penultimate thing and it is always the final (and first) of its kind.

There can be multiple penultimate things. If you have two quest chains, each one will have a penultimate and an ultimate quest.

But I thought that penultimate meant next to the last, not the last (i.e., final).

That's correct, but it's not a contradiction to say "the final penultimate" thing for the reason that it's not a contradiction to say "the final last" thing. Just redundant.

Though the sibling has a point that there may actually be multiple penultimate things if there isn't a strict ordering between them.

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