Monsters' Den: Book of Dread

SHORT REVIEW This game is a relatively simple tactical dungeon crawler. I believe this was a development of an early browser based game featuring updated graphics, refined systems, and multiple game play modes designed for long-term replay ability. The emphasis is on a simple but compelling game play loop focussed on tactical battles and incremental character progression. PLOT: The plot is pretty minimal to be honest but that's to be expected with this style of game. COMBAT: Simple point and click system but does the job. GRAPHICS & SOUND: The sound and graphics are pretty basic but more than adequate for the game. The user interface is nice and clear which and is something some far more expensive games could learn from. REPLAY VALUE: Good. There are enough game play modes and different styles to have a few games but its more of a “filler” game to play between something more substantial than a game to plough many hours into. In the end the fact that its procedurally generated dungeon levels does mean it can get a little stale in the long run. ISSUES AND BUGS: The game runs “straight out of the box” and appears to be bug free. ACHIEVEMENTS AND TRADING CARDS: Full integration with the Steam platform. (I believe the steam achievements were a later addition after launch though which may explain the very low completion rates even on the very simple achievements.) VALUE FOR MONEY: Excellent because its very cheap to start with. Even so its still a “wait for a discount in a sale” game as, at that point, it is literally pennies. LONG REVIEW This game is a relatively simple tactical dungeon crawler and the emphasis is on a simple but compelling game play loop focussed on tactical battles and incremental character progression. The progression is one thing this game does very well. The incremental increases in your abilities as you clear each floor combined with finding (or in rare cases buying) improved equipment is very well balanced with the increased challenge of the game. This game seems to remain very well balanced throughout and avoids the problem some games have where the end game is either a walkover or utter purgatory due to a badly balanced progression between the player and the game. There are two structured campaigns each with a unique boss monster at the end. Once completed both games can be continued in an “endless” mode. There is also a gauntlet mode which is a set of characters of a moderate level which you equip from a selection of items in the shop and then fight a continuous battle with waves of monsters directly after one another to see how long you can survive until the inevitable happens. It should be noted the waves are fixed and after the 20th wave they repeat with the same set of monsters again only tougher this time.