Game-related ramblings.

Tag: Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup Page 1 of 3

On Learning

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I haven’t played Paradox Interactive’s grand spacefaring strategy game Stellaris, but I have enjoyed reading about it. It’s great at generating stories, like the one recently chronicled over at Rock, Paper, Shotgun. They’ve written a lot about the game, in fact. Writer John Walker, intrigued by comrade Adam Smith’s enthusiastic assessment of the game, decided to try it, despite his general dislike of and inexperience with strategy games. He wrote about his frustrations with its user interface and general obfuscation, concluding that “Stellaris, it turns out, doesn’t want new people. It wants people that already understand how to play Stellaris.”

After reading his account, however, I had a different conclusion: “Ah, so it’s like Dwarf Fortress, then?”

Roguelike Updates: This Time It’s Personal

Readers unfamiliar with roguelikes may wish to read my introduction to the genre, and possibly peruse some of my Roguelike Highlights posts. And maybe read about why we might want to start calling them deathcrawls instead. Also, as always, you can click on images to view larger versions.

My favorite roguelike, Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup, has updated to v0.18.1. For many players, the most exciting part of this update may be the new god, Pakellas, who specializes in evokable devices like wands (and the associated changes to wands in the game). Or it might be the new monsters and items, or the revamped Charms spell school, or the changes to the Orcish Mines, Elven Halls and Abyss branches. It might even be the improved interface graphics and tiles. But I will remember v0.18.1 for another reason: it was the version in which I had my first successful foray into the “extended game”, going beyond simply winning in favor of tackling the toughest challenges the game has to offer.

There will be spoilers in this post, like last time. And you’ll want to read that post too, if this post is to make much sense.

More Magical Misadventures

Readers unfamiliar with roguelikes (or should I say deathcrawls?) may wish to read my introduction to the genre first. I’ve also posted about Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup a lot, so you might want to read those posts too, but keep in mind that the game is continually updating so the older posts may not reflect the current state of the game. Lastly, as always, you may click on images to view larger versions.

In my last real post (no, I’m not counting the obvious filler) I wrote about my first, clumsy attempts to seriously play a magic caster in Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup. I was even gently mocked for my ignorance over at the official forums. I don’t blame them; it’s kind of ridiculous that I’ve played the game for so long without ever learning the art of spellcasting.

To be fair, however, there is a lot to learn. And once I finally started to learn it, I was drawn into the game more strongly than I’ve been for a long time. I kept playing new Conjurers instead of finishing the other games I’ve been meaning to write about. So I decided to write about the things I’ve learned about magic in Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup, and the story of my latest Conjurer, who came painfully close to winning the game.

This post will have spoilers (although not as many as Urist Redbeard’s epic saga), so players who are new to the game and wish to learn about magic themselves should probably skip this one.

Roguelike Updates: Square Dancing On Stilts

Readers unfamiliar with roguelikes may wish to read my introduction to the genre, and possibly peruse some of my Roguelike Highlights posts. And maybe read about why we might want to start calling them deathcrawls instead. Also, as always, you can click on images to view larger versions.

I haven’t had as much time to play roguelikes as I’d (rogue) like, so this coverage of recent updates is far from comprehensive. But I have managed to follow the latest developments for Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup, Caves of Qud, and Approaching Infinity. Read on for some thoughts.

In Space, No One Can Hear Your Roguelike Updates

Readers unfamiliar with roguelikes may wish to read my introduction to the genre, and possibly peruse some of my Roguelike Highlights posts. Also, as always, you can click on images to view larger versions.

Well, it’s been another long delay between Roguelike Updates posts, largely because I haven’t had much time to play roguelikes recently. But I do want to highlight a couple of big updates. First, Approaching Infinity has been at version 1.1 for a while, with another update imminent. Second, Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup forever marches forward, now on version 0.16.1. I’ve had a chance to play both, and offer some quick thoughts below.

Roguelike Updates: Let It Whip

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

It’s been a long time since my last Roguelike Updates post. Actually it’s been a while since I posted anything. I am running behind.

The biggest recent roguelike news (technically roguelike-like news) is that The Binding of Isaac: Rebirth, a remake/expansion of The Binding of Isaac, has been released. But I haven’t played it yet. I haven’t even bought it yet. That is how behind I am. What I have played, however, is the latest version of Brogue (v.1.7.4), which adds many things, including whips.

Roguelike Updates: New Crawlers and Redder Rogues

Readers who are unfamiliar with rogulikes may wish to read my introduction to the genre, or some of my Roguelike Highlights posts. Also remember that you can click on images to view larger versions.

One of the two updated roguelikes I’ve been playing is somewhat timely: Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup reached v0.14 a mere three weeks ago (and is now on v0.14.1 with some bugfixes). The other is not: Red Rogue (which is actually a roguelike-like) reached v1.0.3 over a year ago (and I even mentioned it an an earlier Roguelike Updates post), but I hadn’t gone back to try it until recently. And then I found myself drawn in once more, playing it far more than I expected and being impressed all over again. I decided it was worth adding to my original post about Red Rogue with my more recent thoughts on the game.

Read on for details on these two, plus a run-down of other updated roguelikes.

Roguelike Updates: Gargoyles Are Pretty Good

Readers who are unfamiliar with roguelikes may wish to read my introduction to the genre, or peruse the various Roguelike Highlights posts. Also remember that you can click on images for larger versions.

Only two of the roguelikes I’ve previously covered have seen updates since my last Roguelike Updates post. Brogue had been sitting at v1.7.2 for some time, but it’s now been updated to v1.7.3. I haven’t had a chance to play it much, but the major changes relate to the stealth system and the progression system for friendly allies. Given that the last major update removed player leveling from the game, making combat a completely optional endeavor, I’m excited to see how the new stealth system plays out. A sneaky adventurer who slips past enemies unnoticed would be fun to play.

The other big news was the release of v0.13.0 of Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup last month. I have had a chance to play with this one, and I tried the new playable species that came with it: the gargoyle.

Roguelike Updates: Axe And You Shall Receive

Readers who are unfamiliar with roguelikes may wish to read my introduction to the genre, or peruse the various Roguelike Highlights posts. Also remember that you can click on images for bigger versions.

Just because I spent four months playing nothing but indie platformers doesn’t mean that the various roguelikes I’ve covered on the blog have stopped updating. It’s time to catch up with the latest developments! The biggest news for me was the release of Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup v0.12 (it’s now at v0.12.2 with a few more bugfixes). While the nickname for this release, “High Vaultage”, refers to the redesign of the Vaults dungeon branch, I was actually more interested in another change: axes now hit up to seven targets around the wielder with each attack. This presented an excellent incentive to return to a race/class combination that I’d dabbled with before: the deep dwarf berserker.

Roguelike Updates: Who Needs Leveling, Anyway?

It’s time for another roundup of updates to the various roguelikes I’ve covered on this blog. The big news is that Brogue has reached v1.7, with some major changes.

With the exception of its scrolls of enchantment — which allowed players to customize their characters not by some up-front character generation choices but by which pieces of equipment they chose to enchant — Brogue was quite similar to the original Rogue on first release. But the scrolls of enchantment were a great idea, and the strict rationing of these scrolls created strategic dilemmas not found in other roguelikes. By the time I wrote about it, other features of Brogue had already started to follow suit. The player character’s strength (and therefore, ability to use heavier weapons and armor) was no longer tied to experience level, instead being granted by potions of strength which were rationed just like scrolls of enchantment. This meant that it was no longer necessary to fight lots of enemies before getting to use better equipment, and stealthy tactics were more viable.

Still, fighting monsters for experience points to gain levels remained at the core of Brogue, and gaining levels was the only way to gain more health. Until now. With v1.7, leveling has been completely removed from the game.

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