Dexterous: Time to Steal

A fun take on a match 3 / rougelite game -- perfect fit for the Steam Deck. The progression of leveling up blocks is really satisfying and intuitive.

This game is a blast! If you like games where you have to mix + match items, this one will hit you perfectly! There is such a wide variety of moves to make, you have to be strategic to win and will consume many hours of your life!

POLecam

Cool and underrated game. Nice combos and mechanics. Definitely deserves more attention. PS! I got all the difficulty levels done!

As i was asked to stream this game, i did say a bunch of random things with no start or end so here my less chaotic review. my first n major gripe was the sound effects of blocking since it sounded very high pitched and similar to the sticky keys windows option. But the dev directly updated me about his plan to change it! thank you! The game looks like a simple match-4 like candy crush with the extra addition of attacks n blocks n spells like blocks. While it may seems unimpressive, the game plays like all roguelikes n scales higher n higher with your choices. And again like many roguelikes, luck can make or break your run. At times you get your combos only manually other times by simply starting the round and having all blocks match immediately before you move. Is it balanced? not sure. is it fun to see the enemy explode before you make a step? hell yeah. Graphics are very simple, true and i have nothing against it. but if i could give a feedback without demanding too much is for an update or in a future game, to add more "special effects" to give extra oomff to the actions of the player, so the result of the fight isnt just a number go down or a health bar depleting. some flames, some blood flying or an explosion or two would make wonders. an action giving a visual feedback that it hurts, helps a lot to feel the damage you are doing. for example: a simple 2D slice effect being big n visible when you attack in melee would feel more impactfull without needing whatever fancy jrpg animations. My other gripe is that most events are just text on a blank screen. Just add a window around the text to distinguish it from the background more clearly, and it would be good enough, no need of fancy artworks or detailed background. The screen just feels empty so it needs a lil more than just text on blank screen. For a debut game from a solo dev, big applause! the game works, i did not have any visible or gamebreaking bug, it provides the challenge n explosives reward like most roguelikes, but it just needed that extra work on visual feedbacks to the player and a better design of reward screens/market places. I may play it a little more to see how far i can get with the difficulty, but i wanted to encourage the developer to keep improving the game or with his next project if he has one. :)

Игра смело 9 из 10, прикольная три в ряд , под драйвовую музыку, рекомендую

[h2]It's a bit addictive...[/h2] I've really enjoyed Dexterous and I tend to rate roguelikes/lites first and foremost on their gameplay loop; is it satisfying, is the RNG acceptably annoying, does the progression feel gradual or like pulling teeth etc? So with that in mind... [h3]+++[/h3] [list] [*]Unique battle mechanic of matching tiles to inflict damage/gain shields/life etc. I'm showing my age here but I got heavy Destruct-o-match vibes from my Neopets days xD (this is a v good thing lmao) [*]Augmenting tiles to fit the run you want to play feels quite varied. I've had a few runs with different 'styles' so far and enjoyed the different playstyles you can go with. There appears to be a good amount of variety in terms of how you can proceed through each run. [*]Runs are further augmented with relics much like Slay The Spire and can make a huge difference in the rest of the round. Much like other roguelikes these relics can come with [i]side effects[/i] which adds a bit of balance. [*]Great visual theme that all feels really well tied together, decent music throughout. [*]You can upgrade your 'home' to add permanent upgrades to future runs using resources found throughout each playthrough. [*]The character does a very Michael Jackson-esque moonwalk to return to their original position after an attack and it tickles me every time, so good! [/list] [h3]---[/h3] [list] [*]The relic icons seem to squish into one another throughout the round which can make it difficult to track what you're using; it seems to push the mouse-over tool-tip askew. [*]Not sure if this is because of the above, but I do find it hard to track what is happening in combat sometimes because my character will do something that I didn't cause via blocks, so it must be a relic, but I can't always tell why x is happening (this may very much be a me thing lmao). [*]Whenever you're on the map it seems to load in off-center. You can scroll up/down and horizontally across the map but for some reason it's not centered on pop-up. [b]Overall I've really enjoyed Dexterous so far and can see myself playing more of it. Speaks volumes really that my only issues with the game have been small visual issues! I enjoyed the game-play loop a lot and would highly recommend fans of Slay The Spire, Balatro and the like try Dexterous out for size. Looking forward to seeing this game develop over time and thank you for the key! :)[/b]

This is a great take on the match-3 genre that follows the random upgrades structure that you see in a lot of roguelikes. It starts off very easy to understand, but by the higher difficulties is a real challenge. You can collect relics that improve you in a variety of ways and upgrade or remove the blocks that are available to fill the board. Each color block has unique upgrades, and you can get bonuses for match-4s and 5s. While some block types can feel much stronger than others and there could be some more varied or interesting effects from relics or more relics/blocks in general, it's still a great hidden gem of a puzzle roguelike. Definitely pick this up if you like the idea of building your own strategy from the ground up in a match-3!

I enjoyed my time with it. There were definitely some good ideas that made the gameplay compelling. However, it would benefit greatly from some thorough balancing and polishing. The game UI is very rough around the edges and you're bound to run into some bugs. My experience was still positive though, and none of the bugs were gamebreaking.

Fun little match-3 roguelite. RNG can swing from handing you the keys to the city to waffle-stomping your face down the gutter. Gets incrementally harder with each successful run until you reach the midnight hour, but by then you should be running on autopilot. Incredibly satisfying when you get a stack-clearing combo.