Game-related ramblings.

Tag: Caravel Games

History Lessons: DROD: The City Beneath

Other History Lessons posts can be found here. In this case, you should read the History Lesson posts about DROD: King Dugan’s Dungeon and DROD: Journey To Rooted Hold in particular before proceeding. Lastly, as always, you may click on images to view larger versions.

DROD: The City Beneath is the game I thought I was getting when I first played Journey To Rooted Hold. Back then I expected a story-driven puzzle game, only to be confounded by its rigid 25-floor structure, in which every room of every floor must be cleared even if it had nothing to do with protagonist Beethro Budkin’s mission. It wasn’t until I started the DROD series from the beginning that it finally clicked, and I completed Journey To Rooted Hold — even its crushingly difficult later levels — eager to see what came next.

History Lessons: DROD: Journey To Rooted Hold

Other History Lessons posts can be found here. In this case, you may want to read the History Lesson post about DROD: King Dugan’s Dungeon in particular before proceeding. Lastly, as always, you may click on images to view larger versions.

DROD: Journey To Rooted Hold is the second game in the DROD series, and a direct sequel to DROD: King Dugan’s Dungeon, which was the subject of its own History Lessons post on this blog. But Journey To Rooted Hold is actually the first game in the series I tried. I made two attempts to play it, eventually giving up both times. I feared that the DROD series simply wasn’t for me, until I took a crack at the first game and it finally clicked. After completing King Dugan’s Dungeon, I felt I was ready to tackle Journey To Rooted Hold (originally released in 2005) again.

History Lessons: DROD: King Dugan’s Dungeon

Other History Lessons posts (including my Introduction) can be found here. As always, you may click on images to view larger versions.

DROD stands for Deadly Rooms of Death, although it is almost universally referred to by its acronym. I’ve actually mentioned it on this blog before, as part of my post about games without stories. In that post I was hopeful that I’d continue to play through Dustforce and DROD alongside whatever else I was playing, but DROD is the only one I stuck with. Now that I’ve finally finished it, it’s time to write about it.

Games Without Stories

As always, you can click on images to see larger versions.

After finishing The Witcher 2, with its epic and dark tale full of twists, betrayals, and monsters — human and otherwise — I decided I needed a break from games with strong stories. I love story-focused games, as any longtime reader will know, but such games require something of an investment every time I play. I need to remind myself of everything that’s happened so far, and let myself get absorbed by the events unfolding before me. This makes it hard to play such games in short spurts. Normally, when I only have a little time to play, I favor roguelikes or other games with shorter play sessions, but even these involve stories, although they are written in large part by the player. The time investment may be smaller, but the investment in the unfolding story is not.

So I decided to seek out games without any stories. I’ve played some games like this before, but tired of them before I was finished. I think that’s because I tried to play them the way I play story-heavy games: all at once, to the exclusion of most other games, until I’ve finished. This time, I thought I’d tackle a few of these games simultaneously, returning to them occasionally when I’m in the mood, alongside whatever else I decide to play. I’ve written about three of them here.

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