[h1]Epic Not-Idle Pixel Grinding[/h1]
[i]Epic Idle Quest 2[/i] is a grindy pixel RPG that feels even more grindy because of the babysitting you'll need to do.
The game starts simply enough, your choice of male or female skins and only two areas open to you to fight in. Later areas will open up as you level up. You also can choose Hardcore (standard permadeath) or Normal (respawn) for that character.
When you choose an area, you can choose the level of the area, which means what level enemies you fight.
Each area has its own mostly-unique array of enemies, ranging from the human and humanoid to elemental-based beasties, fairly standard RPG bestiary stuff.
Battles are automatic and turn-based, and the only "idle" thing in the game. A scroll below the battles reports details of each side's attempt that round.
Normal and elemental damage are possible. In all but the first area, enemies have an elemental theme and some hits are with that element. Area enemies also have a weakness to some element.
There is a chance for a blow to be blocked, dodged, or reflected back. Healing only comes via leech/vampirism or an automatic slight regeneration. The only status effect is Stunned, lose a turn.
HP on both sides is rendered as a health bar with a percentage.
Defeat an enemy and you win whatever they had on them. Interestingly, you automatically get to see their equipment next them, in an equipment display in the same six-slot cross format as your own.
Equipment includes a hat/helm. a chest plate, gloves/gauntlets, boots, a weapon, and a shield. Weapons are always melee. Sometimes equipment has small percentages for Block or Stun or critical hit multipliers, or Magic Find.
Weapons also can have elemental damage effects, and armor can boost those damage effects or provide resistance to enemy attacks. However, sometimes those elemental effects come with an extra weakness toward one of the other elements.
Equipment comes in several rarities: basic, common, rare, exquisite, and epic. Higher rarities have more buffs. Equipment also has a level same as the level you found it on. Level, rarity, and the specific tier of equipment all contribute to what stats the piece has.
A major annoyance here is that, despite moving into new areas, you don't stop finding the early-game loot. A run at level 100 got an "epic" early dagger.
Managing inventory is a pain, as you have a limited number of slots. Runs will quickly fill up them up. You have three main options for dealing with inventory.
During a run, you can click on the chest next to your health bar to open inventory, where you can drop lesser equipment. Your standard mouseover item comparison tool helps you decide what's a keeper, even during the heat of battle.
When a run is finished, either through retreat or wipeout, you return to town and can now sell off loot and equip any good stuff. A simple click switches the item with the current one in its slot.
Equipment value scales up very slowly with rarity/level. You also are limited in being able to carry (100 x level) in gold. When you reach the gold limit, though, you automatically convert anything else to an equivalent amount of scrap. Your scrap pile has the same level limit as your gold purse.
You can spend a little gold/scrap at the Smith back in town to enhance any item you have equipped, in a few different ways. Each action can only be performed once on an item.
Reforge allows you to pick an attribute to reroll. Temper is a reroll of all values, but keeps the attribute/element types. Upgrade sacrifices another item of the same type and nearly the same level to improve an item. Attune trades one element attribute for another. Enhance increases the value of an attribute.
Or, you can spend some gold at the Merchant. Every five runs, the Merchant has an array of six items, chosen at about the same rates as your own loot finds. You can easily compare them to what you have on before you buy.
The Merchant also has two of the three magic scrolls in the game. These always persist, but the prices are re-calculated with each Merchant refresh.
The "Scroll of Pickyness" automatically restricts the loot you pick up to the rarity of the scroll or better, but you still see the lesser loot drop in the battle results. This comes in either Common, meaning you don't get the lowest rarity, Basic; or Rare, which drops both Basic and Common. The rare scroll will wipe out around 80% of your gold and scrap, making it the perfect way to drain your reserves.
The other scroll the Merchant has is a Taming Belt to collect pets.
As you make a dungeon run, you can pick up either Pets or Skins. Both can be equipped in the Town Well.
Every few enemies is a (mini) boss. A win against a boss that is lower level than you give you a chance to tame it as a pet. Pets follow you into battle and have a chance to hit the enemy, usually with the element of the area you find it. They have different attack ranges and chances to hit.
The Taming Belt increases the chance to tame a boss as a pet. Taming a pet you already have improves its level.
Skins are for your character. Any enemy you defeat can give you its sprite to use as your character's avatar.
The third scroll is the Nightmare scroll, which summons a Nightmare, an overpowered version of the enemy on the scroll, which could be anything. The scroll gives a multiplier for HP and power above the base "normal" version, generally 4-5x HP and around 1.5x attack. Nightmares have somewhat better equipment and better XP, of course.
The Tavern in town allows for PvP duels and a Hall of Fame.
The game has two Realms. The Temporal Realm uses Seasons, two-month periods with some interesting condition. This is a new game, and so Season One had a double XP condition going. Only new characters can enter this Realm, and only when a Season is on. Clean slate, level battlefield for PvP and such.
Seasons give unique rewards based on leaderboards at season end. Leaderboards include for player level and PvP performance, for both normal and hardcore characters. Winners gain a special skin. Any participant gains [strike]a participation trophy[/strike] another skin. Participants also gain a special pet. Season One players gained a pet with Magic Find, scaled according to their best result across all leaderboards. These rewards will be available to any and all characters connected to the player's account.
The Eternal Realm is just that, eternal. Temporal Realm characters move into the Eternal once their Season is over, and keep levels and equipment and backpack inventory. There's no difference in enemies between the Realms besides whatever the current Season conditions are.
Graphics are a nice throwback to DOS pixel days. Some text can be toggled between pixel and a more modern font.
Unfortunately, the grinding combined with the babysitting required are dealbreakers for me with this game. Despite the title, it's not very "idle."
The game has a cycle of sending the character out on a dungeon run and returning to town to sell off loot and re-equip, but there's no automation outside of the autobattles during a run and a toggle to attempt to equip the best equipment.
Thus, the most efficient use of game time requires a bit of babysitting to catch wipeouts or near-wipeouts, sort through and sell loot, check the Merchant, and go back on out.
Or, you set the level to something low enough that you'll probably won't be drained and die, and let it run on and on. But that risks missing some good equipment that drops after the backpack is filled and limits you to equipment at the lower level you are grinding at.
To be fair, this is only a mild thumbs-down. Game design is fine; it's just too much of a time sink to deserve the "idle" in its title.
