Zorbus

A traditional roguelike that has no qualms about instagibbing fresh characters, especially when it comes to the more frail builds. It's also one of the few genre entries with proper party members to recruit, though herding them can be a bit of a headache. It's best to not get too attached to any one specific character, whether it's yours or a recruit...

First, it's $3.50 on sale right now, and my coffee this morning cost twice that. Even if you hate it you didn't spend a ton of money on it. A very well-designed traditional roguelike. The pixel graphics are pretty and there are a lot of options during character creation. If you look at the other reviews you'll get a pretty good idea of what the game is like and why people love or hate it. It is punishingly hard and you very much need to (a) use your consumable items, (b) find and recruit allies in the dungeon, (c) run away, and (d) die a lot. I use blink potions a lot, which are basically teleport-away in a bottle. Hiding in a dark corner and healing up is a part of life in this one. It is very random so sometimes you get an incredible "holy bardiche on fire +2" that can smack stuff two squares away, and other times you are fighting with a stick for half the level. Similarly, sometimes you find a panther at the entrance to Level 2 that can leap on you and cuts through plate armor like it's paper, and other times you will beat a horde of garbage enemies that level you up. The main issue is that when you enter a new floor you can't go back up, so you often get trapped by a horde of archers and summons at the start of a new level. While there are items that can help you escape, you are likely going to be wandering blind through a new dungeon and running into lots of bad guys. I assume this gets less bad after about Level 4 of the dungeon, but honestly... I haven't made it that far. I'm going thumbs up because I am having a good time, but it may not be everyone's cup of drain cleaner.

I don't know if I'm unlucky or what, but every time I make it to the second floor I'm killed by either a room full of high level enemies that I can't escape or a single high level enemy that spams spells on me and kills me, usually within a minute of entering. So, I'm leaning towards the game not being very fun or fair if I simply can't get out of the first room on the second floor. I've seen people recommend having companions and... that didn't help the times I've had them. They just get slaughtered by an inescapable room full of high level enemies too. I've only found companions in maybe half the runs I've done as well so I'm not sure, again, if I'm just amazingly unlucky and I'm supposed to be finding companions everywhere or what. Edit: So there's a shop where you can buy and recruit! I had no idea. I stocked up on traps and potions, had two companions, went into the second floor and... got killed by the second floor boss in two or three hits before I could get out of his line of sight. My companions were busy fighting the swarm of crocodiles he summons on top of his overtuned magic shots that never miss and apparently can go through obstacles in his path. This was after nearly dying to multiple Deadly rated enemies that are the only thing that spawn on the second level. There are simply better roguelikes out there that are difficult but fair. I've heard that the early game is rough to get through and that it evens out later, but honestly I'm not sure how it would possibly be worth the trouble.

Cannot really recommend this one. Well- made world with its almost full autonomy, but several critical cons: - lack of balance in everything, including enemies, spells, weapons and areas. Cleaning full 1st floor and dying in the first room of the 2nd is pretty normal here, tho it's critically unclear, what exactly shoud I've done before. - frustration of the game core is bounded with balance, there is no satisfaction of clearing a room/ area/ floor, beacuse you cannot understand your own progress. It's not clear, whether you just killed a boss of your life or it was just a shallow enemy. - not really a problem, but controls are over- sophisticated and utterly weird. Tho most of the actions are binded on mouse clicks and bumping, some of them are arrowkeys and things we do not ever use now WASD or ESDF would be quite more cofmortable). I can't see a reason why not doing things right by default Won't recommend it for most, just in case if you are extremely big fan of Rogue original game, you can try this

Would have a TON more hours if I wasn't always tired. Easily one of the best roguelikes should cost more. Dungeon floors can be infinite if you IGNORE the Zorbus Portal. Still dying to floor 3 you need companions ASAP to survive against groups of enemies unless you fight in a corridor meaning 1v1's.

A really good, neat, and well-designed roguelike. The art style is charming, and the visual clarity is genuinely impressive. This is easily the most readable roguelike I've ever played; it's always obvious what's going on, and you rarely need to read or inspect something in closer detail to understand what just went down. The only real downside is the small variety in builds and playstyles, but you can reasonably get away with a lot (i.e. an Overgod ending with ranged, melee, and magic builds, solo or group based). This game is pretty difficult in a macro-sense, and you can't take any of the fights lightly. Everything in your inventory has a purpose, and I mean everything. Every single arrow, potion, trap, scroll, etc. has to be used in order to survive. You will have a very difficult time if you refuse to strategically place down traps ahead of time, scouting ahead with orbs of scrying or stealth, playing around light sources, and swapping to a ranged weapon with special arrows (e.g. Anchoring, Withering, or otherwise) to afflict specific enemies with the needed status effect(s) to win the fight. If you are up for this style of gameplay, then the game will feel very rewarding and fun. However, due to the lack of variety in builds, Zorbus has a very low replay value for a roguelike. If there were more feats and ways to play the game, then it would be easy to recommend, but as it is, you really have to like the concept to get into it. I do wish you could disable the Finnish flags, though, that really takes me out of the game sometimes.

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