Darkest Dungeon reflects that a career spent fighting ungodly monsters in dark places, seeing your friends die and regularly getting horribly wounded is clearly going to take a heavy mental toll.Īs a result of not being the perfect shining ciphers of most other dungeoneering games, my heroes are a pain in the bloody arse. Everyone has a thing, most of them have multiple things, and all of them will develop more things the more times you send them off to fight for you. Another lady likes stealing half the gold for herself. I've got a guy who's a nymphomaniac but is barred from the brothel. I've got a lady on my team who's afraid of both darkness and light. Maybe they freak out if it's too dark, maybe they freak out if it's too light, maybe they're more prone to bleeding, maybe the only way they can de-stress in the town - the base mode between missions - is at the brothel or with self-flagellation.Īll these deficiencies and obsessions combine into characters who are entertainingly awkward to manage. Darkest Dungeon asks for a new level of care for them, however - they'll suffer from mounting stress while out stabbing skeletons and crawling through pitch-black mansions, and if left unchecked this will eventually escalate into major afflictions that will handicap them in battle.Īdd to that each hero's traits, more of which are gained at the end of any dungeon run they survive, which can be beneficial but more often than not make them either vulnerable or a liability. Elevator pitch: XCOM as fantasy RPG, plus a bit of The Sims.ĭarkest Dungeon is about sending a squad of heroes in to do your dirty work for you, growing attached to them as their skills improve (or, at least, as they survive a few dungeon runs) and suffering the requisite heartbreak when they perish on the battlefield. Last year it was Sunless Sea, but this time it's Darkest Dungeon.

Then once in a while one turns up that makes me fall deeply in love with adventuring through deadly places all over again.

You know, Steam is so over-populated with roguelikes and roguelites and roguelikelikes and, indeed, all manner of other games about getting killed and losing everything that I can't help but look upon a new addition to this rogue's gallery with bleary eyes.

Darkest dungeon the leper comic