Several of the games I’ve covered in my Roguelike Highlights series have recently received some major updates. First up is DoomRL v0.9.9.6 (read my highlight of DoomRL here). DoomRL is, of course, a roguelike based on Doom, and the new version is the first to include a graphical tileset (although the original ASCII graphics can still be used). The graphics, incidentally, are made by Derek Yu, the same man responsible for Spelunky. There are several gameplay and balance changes as well; the full changelog is here, and you can see some shiny new screenshots here.
Then there’s the big one: Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup has been updated to v0.10. If you thought that after v0.9 they would be forced to hit v1.0, you were wrong; it seems Dungeon Crawl will keep receiving updates for some time. There are a whole bunch of changes in this release, and many of them have been a bit controversial among fans. For example, Mountain Dwarves have been removed from the game. Long-time favorites for new players, Mountain Dwarves were deemed too similar to Minotaurs and Hill Orcs, so they were removed. I am a bit saddened by this news, as my first (and only) victory, documented in the Saga of Urist Redbeard, was with a Mountain Dwarf. But I haven’t yet tried v0.10, so hopefully I will be pleased by the other changes.
And there are plenty of other changes. A new race, Octopodes, have been added, who are apparently like octopus-men. Octopodes and many snakes can now constrict enemies in combat. All polearms can now attack enemies that are two spaces away. The Hive has been removed, but many new vaults and special artefact items have been added. The terrifying Abyss has been made even more terrifying. Minotaurs and Hill Orcs have been rebalanced to make them less similar. And transmuters no longer get the ability to turn their potions into grenades, instead focusing more on morphing themselves for melee combat. The response among players (judging from the comments thread on the announcement) is mixed, with many quite happy and others concerned about the shift away from traditional fantasy tropes, or that the new changes will make the game even harder for new players. There are even rumors that one of the developers left the team after catching a lot of flak for the removal of Mountain Dwarves (drama!). I am going to withhold judgement until I have played the new version for a while.
Finally, Brogue has been updated to v1.6.2. This update is less massive than the others, with relatively few changes to the core gameplay, but these changes focus on the most interesting parts of the game. The “quest room” mechanic has been expanded, and really adds a lot of flavor to the dungeon. The keys to these rooms often trigger special, deadly traps like collapsing floors or raging fires, but the rooms contain treasure, imprisoned allies, and more. The interface has been further streamlined, meaning Brogue is quite easy to pick up and play but still offers a good challenge and strategic depth. One strange thing about the new update, though, is that it defaults to a window that is too large for my screen. I soon learned that the PgUp and PgDn keys will re-size the window, but only once the game has started (not on the title screen). Other than this, I’ve been having a lot of fun with the new version. [EDIT: Turns out I was still using v1.6.1; the window size is fixed in v1.6.2]
Hopefully you’ll enjoy these updates as well!
Eric
How nice with a blog writing about roguelikes! I enjoyed all your posts, especially the story about your win in Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup and how you really captured the thrill of guiding an adventurer through the dangers that comes with a roguelikes. 🙂
I will have to try Dungeon Crawl some time. I saw the web client they built for it which makes it a huge want-to-try factor for me.
Though what got me to love roguelikes just a few months ago was this “Angband variant” called TomeNET. It was actually started by the same guy who is currently developing ToMe, which you have written a blog post about. TomeNET has been actively developed since he left the project and is still very much active. The big difference from other roguelikes is that it is multiplayer and real-time. I can understand that could put you off if you are a long time roguelike player, but as a newbie myself, I love it! Playing together with friends and having an in-game community is awesome. Maybe you could give it a try and write something about it? I would love to read your thoughts about it. 🙂
Cheers and keep it up!
waltorious
Glad you’re enjoying the blog! TomeNET sounds interesting; I’ll take a look at it. I should warn you, though, that I have far more games I want to play than time to play them, so it will likely be a while before I have time to play it, let alone write anything about it.