Heroes of Hammerwatch II

Deeplly Flawed Game -You struggle with ressources to upgrade your town and there is also have upgrade that use the same ressources needing to be bought on each character -You can't skip "Mission result" (where it shows gold and ressources gained after your run) and need to watch it slowly for 10-15s each run - The characters are as pixelated as the envvironment so they are hard to see (same for ennemies) -When you create character they all look like big viking man and sometimes they have female voice by default, and their picture is ugly (that's just a fact) -When you start a run you have temporary run upgrade that costs ressources (f u tavern) -You need to upgrade each classes to gain bonuses for all the others but the ranger is the most op one and the most rewarding to upgrade, some other are fully useless (even if they are also achievments that rewards stats they're meh , like the rogue gave -1.5% less damage of traps per level lmao) - Ranger > mages > melee classes - You loot sh*t , 5 temporary buff/trinkets and 1 equipment that often is not for your class per 20 min - Build and possibilities are very small , you have 2 attacks linked to your weapon 2 main spells of your class 1 passive and off you go -There is no invulnerability phase for your character , they can be stomped by a swarm of ennemies in 0.5s -There are swarm of ennemies that spawn in certain area around your character suddenly and can quickly kill you if you alt tab or check inventory (inventory doesn't pause game even in solo)

This hits a sweet spot between nostalgic gaming somewhen in the nebulous region of SNES-PS1 era combined with a modern ARPG gameplay loop

While yes, it's technically a rouge-ish, it's on the easier side of the genre. It's shorter than I'd like, but what's here is pretty good. I suppose it could also be described as an incremental in a very roundabout way, another genre I have a fondness for. Comparing to the previous Heroes of Hammerwatch: The main meta progression is largely the same, building up your town and buying upgrades within it for your characters using the resources gained during runs. Just like in the previous game, you will want to play all of the characters, as levelling them up gives more meta progression bonuses to other characters. Unlike the previous, resources lost due to taxes on a "failed run" also contribute to meta progression. What we've lost: Keys and locked chests/doors (yay). Puzzles (boo). While it makes sense for a rogue ish game in this style to do away with keys, I do wish that puzzle rooms would have stayed. Those were a standout from the original Hammerwatch. Also, it's reasonable to beat the main dungeon without modifying it (yay, ♥♥♥♥ the fountain, if you know you know). What we've gained: Every "level" has a unique flavor. Even the ones that are 'the same' have a unique flair to them. One forest level is in the day, another at dusk, another at night. One dungeon level is clean and sterile, the next is bloody and corrupt. Gone are the days of back to back identical tilesets. Also, you can do a lot more to customize your character now. Not aesthetically (boo), but mechanically (yay). There's diablo style loot, and the weapons you have dictate your first and second abilities. Third and fourth (and first passive) are dictated by the character you have chosen. Fifth (and second passive) are based on a sub class you can choose after progressing to character level 10. And then there's the buildcrafting IN THE RUN. Draw 3, pick 1. I want the devs to add more options in future updates, but what's here is pretty good. Trinkets return from the previous game, but there's also options for your character abilities. In short, it looks like the devs learned from their previous games and built what the community wants. What I want: More post launch support than what the previous Heroes of Hammerwatch got. That one got a couple DLC's one of which kinda sucked. Endless Mode: I want it, I don't like having my run cut off right when I finally have my build in 'go mode' just because I've 'won'. Warn me that it's not supported, and give me the option to throw myself into increasingly harder chaotic levels that are a mixmash of everything else in the game. Let me play my build intil it breaks or the game breaks me.

Boring

Sooooooo boring.

Fun little ARPG rougelike. Around 12-14 hours to finish the last boss. After that, you can start infinity new game plus, if you wish. My only pet peeve is that a full run is long. It took me about 3 hours to do an all-boss run in the end. At least if you quit the game, you can continue the run. Still, I had my fun with it, so I can recommend it.

List of my unsatisfactory aspects on this game: - Main story: just The Dark Citadel, no chapter II whatsoever. (Due to being newly released maybe, but still not a great start). - Monster spawning: still have bugs on the alpha wolf summoning skill - Player character mechanics: Some class that have an ugly kit (skillset) that are not suitable for early gampelay (really neede that unforgiving replay over and over) - Equipment drop are way too low, all I get is WOOD (stone is scarce btw). And if Im getting one, only the scrappiest one (quite hard to make a meta build for certain class) - That one shadow minion that TOO OVERPOWERED, even the last boss. It can move through terrain, evading almost every hit, and being a killer (in SWARM??) and especially that freaking Wraith that seems deliberately being the most mechanical boss rather to the other bosses. - Issue on gamepad controller which affects the targeting crosshair in the game. - Delayed actions due to over execute skills (not interested in button smashing, huh?) - Upgrading systems both in player character and the town building seems unforgiving due to post lvl.20 cap (you need to go through the NG+ which is just the same).