Dungeon Rats - first impressions and general feedback

[ZagorTeNej]

We planned it this way long before AoD was released. Our original plan was to develop two different settings with different systems. Fantasy vs sci-fi, single-character vs party-based, focus on melee vs ranged, skill-points vs increase by use, focus on exploration vs working your way up in a faction, feats vs skills' passives, etc.

Any (longterm) plans for AoD sequel? Or maybe even AoD (and DR) remaster in Unreal 4 engine, could that turn profit to partially fund a sequel?

 

[Vault Dweller]

Nothing at the moment. I assume you've seen my posts about a potential sequel as it's a frequently asked question:

The way the game ends, there isn't much room for a direct sequel. So if we stay in business and get to revisit the AoD world, we'll set the sequel on another continent and give you an opportunity to explore the Qantari culture, see how their fared and what they are up to.

You'd join an expedition sent by House Aurelian shortly before the events of the first game. As in AoD, you'd be able to pick from different backgrounds: a praetor representing House Aurelian, a thief chained to the galley, a merchant representing the Commercium and tasked with establishing a trading outpost, a merc hired to protect the expedition (one of many, of course), a Boatmen assigned to the praetor, etc.

Even though the Qantari were eventually defeated, their own land wasn't touched by the war and didn't suffer any devastation. Since they did manage to retain the knowledge and machines, it would be a land ruled by demigods each with his own priesthood, temples, place in the local pantheon, ambitions, scheming n plotting, etc.

One of the Dungeon Rats' endings gives you a glimpse into what the Qantari are up to these days:

... Beyond is a stone platform with a handful of colorfully dressed figures, too engaged in their own affairs to take any notice of you. The platform is the apex of a massive ziggurat, the most prominent of several buildings, their bases awash with hordes of people like islands in a sea. Barely a few meters away, a heavily tattooed man is bound to some kind of machine. He writhes and struggles under the watchful eyes of a priest and his guards, their strange, glowing spears aimed at the prisoner as if expecting him to break free and turn on them at any moment. Below, the rumble of the crowd\'s shuffling and speech subsides to an eerie almost-silence, ten thousand breaths the only sound. At last the captive man lies still, not dead but merely calm, and the priest bends down to inspect his eyes with some tiny device. Satisfied, he straightens up and nods to the guards. Visibly relieved, they lower their spears, the weapons' weird glow subsiding. The priest turns to face the worshipers below and raises his arms with a shout - something like "Ketsal Koatl"- and the nervous hush explodes into exultation and chanting in their foreign tongue. Slowly, the tattooed man rises from the machine, the leather restraints tearing away like paper, and stands. Everywhere, as one, the priest, guards and commoners fall to their knees and lower their foreheads to the ground, awaiting His approval. The altered man's gaze unhurriedly sweeps over his devoted subjects, and he is pleased, until at last his eyes come to rest on you...

AoD sold 120,000 copies which isn't bad for an indie rpg with a limited appeal, but I'm not sure that a sequel will do as well, regardless of its quality. See my posts on sequels:

As you probably noticed a number of indie and not so indie sequels have done very poorly lately, selling anywhere from 10 to 30% of the original title - XCOM2, Banner's Saga 2, Legend of Grimrock 2, Blackguards 2, etc. My explanation of this phenomenon is that unless you have a AAA blockbuster with massive appeal, you don't go for a sequel because it would never sell as much as the original because the public perspective would be "it's more of the same".

Now, let's be optimistic and assume that the breakdown goes something like that (based on the reviews and impressions):

- core supporters - 25% - love it, want more
- core haters - 10% - fucking hate it, will never buy another ITS game again
- kinda liked it - 50% - liked it but ... This "but" ranges from minor to major issues
- meh - 15% - played for a couple of hours and moved on, no strong emotions, no urge to play more

So if we make AoD 2, we get the core supporters and some % of the kinda liked it camp. We'll also get some new players, probably no more than 20%. So our best case scenario is selling 3/4 of what AoD sold, worst case - less than half. Thus moving to a brand new setting with different systems but the same core design is the safest bet even though it looks like the riskiest.
...
Back in June:

Original vs sequel:

Legend of Grimrock: 936,949 vs 246,684
Blackguards: 471,616 vs 178,528
XCOM: 3,304,215 vs 823,999
Shadowrun: 723,457 vs 613,408 vs 188,034 (arguably Hong Kong was the best iteration but few people cared at this point)
The Banner Saga: 592,139 vs 43,826

Success of the first game often fools developers into thinking that they can do even better or at least as good with a second 'bigger and better' game, but it's rarely the case. The only exceptions to the rule are games that offer building, sandbox, and well-executed killing loop activities that people never seem to be tired of. Darkest Dungeon is a fucking monster but I bet if they go for a sequel it will sell less than a third of the original.

 

[Fenix]

A schizophrenic one

He is not a schizo, I rememebr his story, just a guy with a bad luck, like many here.

armed with faith and potent prayers fueled by that faith but full of doubts that can be exploited

That resemble me Cabinet of Thoughts from NTwtF somehow, right?

derived stats like Faith and Sanity

In Infra Arcana (roguelike) Sanity is a resource that being spent during exploration, like if you lose you sanity completely - you lose the game, and you get shock as you see various creatures of horror, and spent time on level.

magic would play a large role: prayers, words in God's own language, signs, magic circles & pentagrams, rituals, spells and incantations.

Something like that was in Serpent in the Staglands, interesting concept, expand, cool.

Me like, me want more.

 

[Vault Dweller]

armed with faith and potent prayers fueled by that faith but full of doubts that can be exploited

That resemble me Cabinet of Thoughts from NTwtF somehow, right?

There won't be any internal dialogues or struggles, if that's what you mean. Essentially, Faith is a stat that can be raised only via hard choices. It will play two roles: used in dialogues in faith-checks allowing you to resist temptation and perform various actions (command in God's names, make the sign of the cross, bless, etc) and power up your prayers (not as mana but as modifiers). Without faith your prayers are nothing but words, with high Faith you will speak with God's own voice.

 

[Fenix]

It was more about that part - "full of doubts that can be exploited" and I mean not inner dialogs but another part that ideas once equipped start to grow and develop, only about doubts.

 

[Vault Dweller]

Exploited by the forces of darkness in conversations and events.

 

[Jrpgfan]

A schizophrenic one

He is not a schizo, I rememebr his story, just a guy with a bad luck, like many here.

Everyone has got their own problems, mate. I have my own problems, but do you see me making threads about how wireframe graphics are superior to everything else?

 

[Fenix]

You are right, but that bringsa little diversity, if it's kept under control.

 

[Polydeuces]

We planned it this way long before AoD was released. Our original plan was to develop two different settings with different systems. Fantasy vs sci-fi, single-character vs party-based, focus on melee vs ranged, skill-points vs increase by use, focus on exploration vs working your way up in a faction, feats vs skills' passives, etc.

That was the plan all along? That is really interesting to know. You're making yourself one of the most well-rounded RPG designers in the industry by going for such polar opposites right from the start! If I recall correctly, you've already talked a bit about the setting of a tentative game project after The New World. Do you already have ideas what you'd like to do with game mechanics there?

http://www.irontowerstudio.com/forum/index.php/topic,7208.0.html

I love the 19th century's Gothic novels like The Manuscript Found in Saragossa or Melmoth the Wanderer. Love the idea of proper magic, witches being dangerous, Lucifer as active player, corrupting souls and commanding agents, the Christian faith being a shield against darkness, which is everywhere, the Spanish Inquisition fighting the good fight, cursed places abandoned for a reason, forbidden knowledge, supernatural creatures, that sort of things. Needless to say it would make a great setting, but how do we get there?

I start with the main character, a monk, perhaps, armed with faith and potent prayers fueled by that faith but full of doubts that can be exploited. Basically, a character development fork: a man of God bringing light into darkness or an occultist who abandoned God's light, trading it for forbidden knowledge. Both character types would communicate with powerful demons - dukes of Hell and such, but in different ways. As you can see, now we're defining the setting, both mechanics and "lore":

- to start with, the demons and most "magic-users" can't be killed, they are far too powerful; you can only bargain, protect yourself, play them against each other, maybe banish from your presence to piss them off even more; thus the focus isn't on demon slaying but surviving in a dangerous world most people are unaware of.
- you use combat (or speech/stealth) against the human minions or human enemies standing in your way, like the Inquisition if you turn to the Dark Side.
- such a setting would be perfect for relics, both Holy and Unholy.
- skills like languages (reading ancient books, communicating with demons, etc) and rituals (from exorcism to summoning), derived stats like Faith and Sanity, etc.
- magic would play a large role: prayers, words in God's own language, signs, magic circles & pentagrams, rituals, spells and incantations. You'd acquire them from archives, NPCs, rituals, etc. Too much "hands-on" Occult knowledge would weaken your Faith and thus the power of your prayers and Holy relics, just like too much Faith would weaken your dark rituals and incantations (i.e. it will be hard to play a hybrid).

Now that we have some gameplay basics, it's time to figure out how such a tale would start and end as these two story points would define the rest. The ending would give us both the direction and options on how to get there. The start of the game would set up the tone and introduce the first choice. Etc.
...

Such a game would be perfect for a class-based system, word-based magic (like runes but with words, you learn new words rather than spells and string them together), gain new abilities via rituals rather than level ups, kinda like Bloodlines where you discover that there is a whole different world (of darkness), flintlocks and melee, single-character with summoned allies (animated suits of armor, raised dead, lesser demons, etc).

Is this a hint towards a WIP game?

 

[Vault Dweller]

Not a hint. Most likely it's our third full-scale project IF the colony ship game sells as much as AoD. At least that's what I'm working on when I have free time.

 

[Polydeuces]

Excuse me, it seems I have to spread the word of Iron Tower among my pals.

 

[Old One]

The WIP is obviously a console-based open world action RPG with dragons and vampires.

 

[SausageInYourFace]

I was in the mood for tactic games lately so I finished this over the last few days.

Just a few quick impressions, lets start with the negatives. First of all I was pretty disappointed by the almost non-existent story. I know this is supposed to be a small game finished in a short amount of time but even in my combat games I would like to have a little bit of story, personality to the NPCs, interesting events happening that make the combat a little more meaningful. Would been cost much more time to give a little personality to NPC by having dialogues or comments before fights, or a little more story to battles other than "There are some worms. Fight." "There are some ants. Fight." ?

The straightfowardness can also be seen as a strenght, at least you progress from fight to fight pretty directly and I guess no story is better than a shitty one and focus is better than unnecessary nonsense. I liked this much better than Blackguards for example, even though that also had a fun combat system.

Some parts of the gameplay are the kind of stuff that seems like a minor issue in the beginning but when you have several of those they pile up and become really tedious in the long run. Like..
-having to scroll through the clunky inventory to apply poision all the time
-to have the already clunky inventory clutter up with crazy amounts of stuff that you can not tell apart (am I applying this poison to piercing steel arrows now or is that iron?)
-what is the purpose of the weight limit, really? Put thing in stash, put other thing back in stash, take out next thing. Thats not fun.
-that there is no way to quickly compare inventory items to equipped ones
-that I have to constantly dismiss and replace party members to do things. Couldn't the highest alchemy or crafting skill not at least apply at the home base independent of actual party members?
-maybe I am just too hasty but several times I crafted things I did not mean to craft and wasted resources. I think its because the crafting defaults to the best available resource? Not sure about this

Considering how important (and how much fun, in theory) preparation is in this game that lead to an unfun amount of time fucking around with the inventory, dismissing and replacing party member and dealing with the UI.

However, there was one thing that I absolutely loved about this game and that was the difficulty and related to that, the pacing and the balancing.

I like a good challenge in my games but I do not like unnecessary frustration, so I played on Tough Bastard (normal?) and the game was just about perfect for me. Some fight I managed to master right away, sometimes I had to reload and sometimes I got my ass kicked and try new things and better tactics, which is really how it should be. Games these days are often just too easy and so you are never forced to actually adapt, overthink what you are doing and maybe come up with something better and then succeed with that strategy.

What I specifically loved about this is how the limited resources really force you to overthink your decisions. Instead of having a million potions in you inventory, you always have to consider the next fight and think about how many resources you have left, what you should use now or maybe leave for later. I daresay its probably the best game I have played in that regard, where potions not just pile up in your inventory but actually matter. And where finding an almost broken armor actually matters because thank god, now you have enough steel to make that awesome dagger. So you are constantly making hard decisions about what to craft, and what to use. As said above, unfortunately that important preparation part becomes a bit tedious due to some clunkyness but hey.

By the end game I was running out of healing items and I had to master the last few battles - incidentally the hardest ones - with a less than optimal setup. It balanced out however with all the stuff I saved and so I managed to bomb myself out of the biggest problems or delay advances through fire which gave me time to apply poision generously. Ultimately, I was on my last limp and had to use up almost every resource at my disposal to actually manage to win the last battle and limp out of it victoriously with just two or three survivors. Made it feel much more epic.

All in all, this game was much more addictive than I expected it to be. Despite some mentioned tediousness I ended up playing it several hours every day because the combat was so fun and I always wanted to see what challenge would come up next and if I would be able to master it.

Now that I am familiar with the systems and the combat I feel ready to tackle AoD as well and thats probably where I then will get my story and NPCs from. Looking forward to it, the setting certainly seems interesting enough.

 

[Vault Dweller]

Just a few quick impressions, lets start with the negatives. First of all I was pretty disappointed by the almost non-existent story. I know this is supposed to be a small game finished in a short amount of time but even in my combat games I would like to have a little bit of story, personality to the NPCs, interesting events happening that make the combat a little more meaningful. Would been cost much more time to give a little personality to NPC by having dialogues or comments before fights, or a little more story to battles other than "There are some worms. Fight." "There are some ants. Fight." ?

That's the best we could do in 10 months.

-what is the purpose of the weight limit, really? Put thing in stash, put other thing back in stash, take out next thing. Thats not fun.

Carryover from AoD. Most programming time was spent on the party mechanics.

All in all, this game was much more addictive than I expected it to be. Despite some mentioned tediousness I ended up playing it several hours every day because the combat was so fun and I always wanted to see what challenge would come up next and if I would be able to master it.

Glad you liked it.

 

[Darth Roxor]

Just a few quick impressions, lets start with the negatives. First of all I was pretty disappointed by the almost non-existent story. I know this is supposed to be a small game finished in a short amount of time but even in my combat games I would like to have a little bit of story, personality to the NPCs, interesting events happening that make the combat a little more meaningful. Would been cost much more time to give a little personality to NPC by having dialogues or comments before fights, or a little more story to battles other than "There are some worms. Fight." "There are some ants. Fight." ?

That's the best we could do in 10 minutes.

 

[Diggfinger]

Vault Dweller , Dungeon Rats sells for 6.69EUR on GOG (ordinary price).
What kind of mockery is still - seem to remember it being above 20EUR at some point?

 

[Vault Dweller]

Darth Roxor
Writing different events is easy. Scripting them takes time, especially when this extra time goes on top of a big pile of other tasks.

 

[zool]

Would been cost much more time to give a little personality to NPC by having dialogues or comments before fights, or a little more story to battles other than "There are some worms. Fight." "There are some ants. Fight." ?

Agree 100%, this is my biggest disappointment with the game as I feel it wouldn't have taken a lot of time for Vince to come up with some additional interjections for NPCs - something which would have added a lot to the game I think.

that I have to constantly dismiss and replace party members to do things. Couldn't the highest alchemy or crafting skill not at least apply at the home base independent of actual party members?

Wasn't this fixed in one of the latest patches (as in now, you don't need to have the actual party member in your party)?

 

[Vault Dweller]

Vault Dweller , Dungeon Rats sells for 6.69EUR on GOG (ordinary price).
What kind of mockery is still - seem to remember it being above 20EUR at some point?

Nope. It was planned as 'under $10' game from day and was priced at $8.99. Of course we sell the most during various sale events so the avg price is about $5. We've earned about 120k (before taxes) for a year of work. Considering that the core team is 5 people, that's not a lot so I think we can file it under 'failed experiment' at this point. Our original plan was to support our full scale RPGs with these tactical spin-offs but it doesn't seem to be working. We can't spend more than 12 months (10 months development, 2 months testing) on these games and we can't do more in 10 months than what we did with Dungeon Rats. Might as well kill this idea and stick with full scale RPGs from now on.

 

[Castozor]

Quoting seems to be broken for me, but I'm sorry to hear that VD. Especially since I enjoyed Dungeon Rats a bit more than AoD. Do you think you can ask more money for it to make it worthwhile, or were full price sales really too disappointing for that?

 

[Vault Dweller]

I don't think we should have priced it higher. I hoped that the low price, especially during the sale events, would make the game more affordable but clearly even when the pricetag is under $5 people hesitate or have no interest in it. AoD always sells more and there wasn't a singe day when DR sold even half as much.

In general, the main criticism seems to be 'it's too difficult on hard and I don't want to play it on easy because I'm great at RPGs' and 'it's not like AoD'. From the negative reviews:

"Not sure why they decided to make the follow up to one of the best crpgs I've ever played a boring and relentless combat slog with almost zero story."

"Age of Decadence is a great game, but I just couldn't get into Dungeon Rats. There's almost no story, just fighting, and it's nowhere near as fun as I hoped it'd be."

"AoD is a good game. This is simply the combat part with maby a total of 2 a4 with text. Theres nothing new that spice anything up from AoD combat."

"Being a massive fan of Age of Decandence I was really hoping this was going to be a good game but to be honest I am disappointed, No character choices no interactions all there is, is fighting which qucikly becomes repetative. You are always outgunned never have enough resources to heal so frankly disappointing. Plus for it is the game is cheap so can forgive it being one dimensional. Can see no replay value whats so ever. I'll give it a 6/10."

"Dungeon Rats, made by the same people that made Age of Decadence, aims at providing AoD fans with a more combat heavy experience. While Dungeon Rats does deliver that in spades and is still accompanied by the low-res charm of its predecessor, the rough edges of its combat system really starts to show without being hidden behind dialogues and a lore-rich universe. It made me realize that the reason AoD was good was because the fights were sparse and sudden, they were brutal yet non-central, even optional part of the AoD experience. Continuous fighting in Dungeon Rats quickly became repetitive and tedious - with many encounters feeling exactly the same - all while enduring its somewhat overturned difficulty - meaning expect only a very specific range of characters to succeed in completing the game, as well as be prepared to endure plenty of reloading, since even at max defense, you are still very vulnerable to just about everything, and many fights are won by narrow margins."

"We waited for a sequel to AoD but got this generic crawler stripped off all features of the previous game."

 

[MediantSamuel]

Perhaps too blunt of a question, but, do you regret Dungeon Rats, Vince?

I thoroughly enjoyed it but I can appreciate the criticisms; even if people seem to be taking it as some sort of true, sprawling sequel to AoD.

 

[Castozor]

Ah so basically these people are bad at the game now that their precious dialogue checks have been removed, and they should rather be playing CYOA's instead of rpg's. Good to know. As for being disappointed it wasn't AoD2 I think the store page was pretty clear so they have no one to blame but themselves.

In all seriousness I'm disappointed that there doesn't seem to be a market for combat-heavy/only games amongst the Iron Tower crowd because that means no more combat spin-offs for me. All the things that these people moan about are what makes me love the game. Little to no story, back to back combat (and the combat is good, not sure why that one guy calls it rough, most likely he sucks at it), punishing difficulty. I 'm thankful you gave us this one spin-off at least.

 

[Fenix]

That's the best we could do in 10 months.

That's what I wanted to answer on SausageInYourFace question.
Btw, do someone know how much money big companiesspent on UI for their AAA-titles? Money and time because time is money.

I think we can file it under 'failed experiment' at this point

It's worked in every other aspect, just not in financial. It encourage people to play AoD.

"Not sure why they decided to make the follow up to one of the best crpgs I've ever played a boring and relentless combat slog with almost zero story."

"Age of Decadence is a great game, but I just couldn't get into Dungeon Rats. There's almost no story, just fighting, and it's nowhere near as fun as I hoped it'd be."

"AoD is a good game. This is simply the combat part with maby a total of 2 a4 with text. Theres nothing new that spice anything up from AoD combat."

"Being a massive fan of Age of Decandence I was really hoping this was going to be a good game but to be honest I am disappointed, No character choices no interactions all there is, is fighting which qucikly becomes repetative. You are always outgunned never have enough resources to heal so frankly disappointing. Plus for it is the game is cheap so can forgive it being one dimensional. Can see no replay value whats so ever. I'll give it a 6/10."

"Dungeon Rats, made by the same people that made Age of Decadence, aims at providing AoD fans with a more combat heavy experience. While Dungeon Rats does deliver that in spades and is still accompanied by the low-res charm of its predecessor, the rough edges of its combat system really starts to show without being hidden behind dialogues and a lore-rich universe. It made me realize that the reason AoD was good was because the fights were sparse and sudden, they were brutal yet non-central, even optional part of the AoD experience. Continuous fighting in Dungeon Rats quickly became repetitive and tedious - with many encounters feeling exactly the same - all while enduring its somewhat overturned difficulty - meaning expect only a very specific range of characters to succeed in completing the game, as well as be prepared to endure plenty of reloading, since even at max defense, you are still very vulnerable to just about everything, and many fights are won by narrow margins."

"We waited for a sequel to AoD but got this generic crawler stripped off all features of the previous game."

You see, the problem with these reviews is they seem to be written by people who don't like anything except RPG and I can bet they think that rpg is a dialogues".
I like RPG and dialogues, but I also like Jagged Alliance or Gollop's X-com.
I think they are new generations of players, that tend to isolate themself in one genre - which is a diagnosis in itself.

Ah so basically these people are bad at the game now that their precious dialogue checks have been removed, and they should rather be playing CYOA's instead of rpg's. Good to know. As for being disappointed it wasn't AoD2 I think the store page was pretty clear so they have no one to blame but themselves.

In all seriousness I'm disappointed that there doesn't seem to be a market for combat-heavy/only games amongst the Iron Tower crowd because that means no more combat spin-offs for me. All the things that these people moan about are what makes me love the game. Little to no story, back to back combat (and the combat is good, not sure why that one guy calls it rough, most likely he sucks at it), punishing difficulty. I 'm thankful you gave us this one spin-off at least.

HUGE YES!

 

[PEACH]

Hearing you view it as a failed experiment is a shame but obviously (and very unfortunately) makes sense if it wasn't financially lucrative at the end of the day.

I fell in love with it after I blind bought it at release knowing nothing of AoD and while I ended up going back to AoD (7 times~) and really enjoying it, there's something so perfect about how to-the-point Dungeon Rats is that still makes it my favourite of the two. I guess I can see why people who expected AoD2 didn't enjoy it but for me the no-nonsense brevity of starting it up and immediately being thrown into a gauntlet of excellent battles with enjoyable character building + resource management without any frills is the biggest appeal.

I also completely disagree with any assertions that there's no replay value. Even just playing at high charisma vs. solo made a huge difference (and I got a real kick out of the ending slide for the high cha playthrough) not to mention all the other build opportunities that change the moment to moment gameplay and long-term-planning drastically.

Really wish we'd get more in the same vein but like Castozor said,

I 'm thankful you gave us this one spin-off at least.