The Fall of the Dungeon Guardians - dungeon crawler with RTwP combat

[ManuTOO]

Steam Greenlight: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=489556661

https://www.managames.com/DungeonGuardians/




https://af.gog.com/en/game/the_fall_of_the_dungeon_guardians_enhanced_edition?as=1649904300

Spoiler

Hello,

last year you helped me to find a name for my Dungeon Crawler game ( => http://www.rpgcodex.net/forums/index.php?threads/help-me-name-my-dungeon-crawler.92942/ ), and now the game is (nearly) done !

So I put it in Steam Greenlight and it'd be very kind of you to vote for it to help me get it on Steam..!

Here the Greenlight page => http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=489556661 . (EDIT: game is available for sale here => http://store.steampowered.com/app/409450 )


Thanks in advance for your help !

 

[Infinitron]

Grimrock devs getting fed up with the clones: http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=489556661

Juho 16 hours ago
As one of the creators of Legend of Grimrock, I'm a bit disappointed with your game's certain visual similarities with Grimrock. I don't think you stole our models or textures like some other comments say, but they're pretty damn similar to ours. Why have the trouble of recreating the textures when you could've done unique wall sets of your own? I mean, the game looks pretty fine and all, so I'm sure you could've come up with something more personal. At least credit Grimrock as your inspiration in the description

ManuTOO [author] 7 hours ago
@Juho,
for you and for all other people worrying about Grimrock, I just wrote this to explain how it went there : http://www.managames.com/DungeonGuardians/2015/10/06/5-grimrock/ .

Also, as the gameplay is absolutely not inspired from Grimrock, I'd feel strange to cite your game as a source of inspiration... But if you want, we can go on privately (I just sent you a PM on your Forum with my email)

Ok, so the game got a lot of comments about looking too much like Grimrock, even Juho, one of the Grimrock’s creators came to comment on the Greenlight page.

Both games get their main inspiration from Dungeon Master and its grid-based movement, so they ought to look similar.
But I also played Grimrock when it was 1st released back in early 2012 and I really liked its mossy dungeon and asked my environment artist to create an old mossy stone wall set. I didn’t ask him to copy Grimrock’s one, though. If you look in details, you’ll see that nothing is same, but despite that the general impression is similar.

How it came to this result ?

It (almost) started with that :


2nd version of the Old Mossy Dungeon (I don’t have any screenshot of the 1st one! >_< )

For me, it was looking good without being too similar from Grimrock.

Notice how the column, the ceiling and the floor are different from the final version as shown on the 2nd screenshot at top of this post.

The artist refined and changed a few things, little step by little step and delivered the assets. I checked them 1 by 1. Every asset looked different from Grimrock : different shapes for models & textures, different saturations, different colors, different contrasts ; all was good.

Then I set up everything and put all pieces together in the game, and here : “oh jeez!”. It felt similar to Grimrock. I was a bit annoyed, so I went back playing Grimrock, and once in-game, I knew in less than 1 second I wasn’t in mine : although it looked similar, it still didn’t feel the same when playing, so for me it was ok. And it had too, because I was on a super tight budget and couldn’t afford to drop 1 environment.

Moreover, the Old Mossy Dungeon is only 1 environment out of 4, so that’s 25%, and actually even less if you count the little variations (each environment has 2 or 3 variations), so more like 20%. Then you add all the creatures, the visual FX and the GUI, and that’s only 10% of the whole visual a bit too close of Grimrock. You add the gameplay & the controls, and you’re left with 5% of the whole game a bit too similar to Grimrock.

So please stop to complain because I wanted to have green moss on my walls and try to see the game past that..!

I mean except if you think no one should ever be allowed again to do stone walls with moss in a video game, of course !

 

[laclongquan]

It looks good~

 

[Metro]

Grimrock started the genre, duh.

 

[Baptismbyfire]

I don't know, the combat just looks like clickfest?

 

[Dorateen]

That frame from the trailer, when it reads "Assemble Your Party", with the 6 portraits lined up three on each side... for a fleeting moment, gave off Wizardry-like vibes.

Well, Grimrock clone or not, I'll up-vote this. It's got active pause. The world needs more Dungeon Guardians.

 

[Excidium II]

Blows my mind that people spend so many man hours creating something as banal as a grimrock clone. Like holy shit mang.

Do these things even sell?

 

[Eyeball]

Grimrock devs have some fucking nerve.

 

[Mortmal]

Those grimrock dev comments makes me laugh, they could send royalties to the the maker of dungeon master instead as they stole all the mechanisms from it.They are probably butthurt grimrock 2 is not selling.

Blows my mind that people spend so many man hours creating something as banal as a grimrock clone. Like holy shit mang.

Do these things even sell?

150K sales on grimrock 2 so no its not selling that much anymore. A turn based blobber like elminage, who score 5/5 stars on our prestigious neighbor rpgwatch only gather 7K sales. Working on an indie PC turn based blobber is like comminting financial suicide.

 

[ManuTOO]

Baptismbyfire,
actually, the game is intended to be played with the auto-pause, but I feel like it's super not fun to watch someone pausing the game every 2 seconds, so I just did a video with a lower difficulty level and not used the auto-pause.
So when you play, usually, you'll have to check stuff & think, it's not Diablo...

Excidium II,
my game is already selling a bit while still not being officially finished (it misses 1 class) & with no visibility except the Greenlight campaign, so it ain't too bad...
I won't end rich especially if the game doesn't go on Steam, though ; but it's a work of passion, money is just a bonus to then spend more time on my passion !

 

[ManuTOO]

Thanks to everybody who voted, the game got Greenlit in 1 week !

You can buy the game from here : http://www.managames.com/DungeonGuardians/buy-the-game/

Or wait a few weeks to buy it on Steam.

I just created a 2nd gameplay video to show what the game looks like when using the Active Pause, which is the usual thing to do when playing the game :

 

[Dorateen]

Works for me.

 

[animlboogy]

That Grimrock butthurt... when you clone a game like they did, you lose the right to accuse anyone else of ripping off anything from you unless they literally lift your assets. I guess they're in panic mode trying to blame Grimrock 2's poor sales on whatever they can.

The popularity of the original must've gotten to their heads and they forgot where they came from, I guess.

 

[vonAchdorf]

I'm not the biggest fan of the MMO style action bars, but if it doesn't result from an MMO style combat design, it's tolerable.

 

[Aenra]

To be fair, Grimrock devs may or may not be butthurt, may or may not themselves own (or should have owned) royalties to the original Dungeon Masters, depends on the viewpoint as it's legally moot.
(although Foucault and 'Death of the Author' does come to mind)

To be equally fair however, you sir are a cheeky cunt ^^
- You drew inspiration from something and asked others to imitate it, proceeded to using it all fine and dandy without ever paying a tribute, if only in reference
- When inevitably the complaints came up, you exploited them by re-posting too for extra visibility. And free of charge at that
- Sticking to said same cunt-a-licious modus operandi, i now see you have also 'leeched' World of Warcraft window frames and icons. Even those few icons that do not scream WoW (and to me they do) are an obvious re-working of Blizzard originals. Won't even comment further on the window frames, self evident

I don't know how your game plays, but you do have some nerve. Your fellow butthurt Grimrock devs, they stated their inspirations clearly and from the start. And they surely did not rip off the work of others in such a blatant way.

 

[Shammy]

The skill icons seem to give off a different vibe than the game itself, almost to the point of clashing with the tone. Are those the final icons?

 

[getter77]

I suppose time will reveal all when the time comes for the fully complete Steam release with everything ostensibly polished and situated---if it ultimately rings hollow, it will be quickly forgotten to the void given the prevalence of DM and Grimrock outright as standard indicators. Here's hoping it actually turns out to be a solidly different take on the lot of it!

 

[ManuTOO]

Shammy,
yes, it's the final icons. It's stock icons, so I didn't have much choice on their style...

getter77,
I think the trailer, the 2 gameplay videos, the screenshots & the long description on the Greelight page give a fair idea of what is the game.
Everything shown is final (I may tune & polish a thing or 2, though), so if you like what you see, you might like the game, if not, then you might not...
If you're not sure, I'll try to get some reviews in the incoming weeks so it may help to understand the game better...

 

[octavius]

Those grimrock dev comments makes me laugh, they could send royalties to the the maker of dungeon master instead as they stole all the mechanisms from it.They are probably butthurt grimrock 2 is not selling.

Well, they did revitalize a genre that had been dead nearly 20 years, with new high res graphics, so they do have a point IMO.
I wouldn't be surprised if some of the Grimrock cloners haven't even heard about DM, EoB and Lands of Lore.

 

[Whiran]

To be fair, Grimrock devs may or may not be butthurt, may or may not themselves own (or should have owned) royalties to the original Dungeon Masters, depends on the viewpoint as it's legally moot.
(although Foucault and 'Death of the Author' does come to mind)

To be equally fair however, you sir are a cheeky cunt ^^

Who are you writing to?

And why would the Grimrock devs own royalties to Dungeon Masters? Do they own the Intellectual Property for Dungeon Master? Nothing in the background info that I can find about Almost Human suggests that they own the IP for Dungeon Master.

Please address people and use quotes properly 'cause I don't believe I am a cheeky cunt. I may be. I suppose it'd depend on the context here.

 

[Outlander]

Autism

He's probably addressing the OP. The whole Dungeon Master stuff is sarcasm in response at Grimrock devs' butthurt about some other dev using their 'style'.

Also this is funny:

 

[Aenra]

Whiran you are not a cheeky cunt.
What you are is a fucking retard; the post was addressed to the OP, it just incorporated the comments of others (because they too were ludicrous, albeit on topic). It is very easy to tell too, one must simply not be a retard. The objective (this is grammar 101 by the way) of most verbs in it appears to be the game developer of the OP. Are you that developer? No, ergo the post is not about you. Idiot.

 

[Whiran]

Whiran you are not a cheeky cunt.
What you are is a fucking retard; the post was addressed to the OP, it just incorporated the comments of others (because they too were ludicrous, albeit on topic). It is very easy to tell too, one must simply not be a retard. The objective (this is grammar 101 by the way) of most verbs in it appears to be the game developer of the OP. Are you that developer? No, ergo the post is not about you. Idiot.

I like your abrasive tone. Well done.

Now, what did you mean by the devs of Grimrock owning royalties for Dungeon Master?

 

[getter77]

ManuTOO

Well, in a case like this, I view the launch and post-release period as the absolute most important thing---none can argue with as polished a launch as possible and post-release support changelogs speak for your project's intent and integrity louder than just about everything else in the long run. I strongly implore you to polish to the utmost anything and everything that is in your relative power to do so to get the launch right alongside the months ahead of it---Grimrock (2) just kind of landed, got some mild fix patching, then rotted fast from stagnation as the project's vigor just seemed to outright dissipate versus the lucky break the first game enjoyed rejuvenating the scene compared to what it had been.

 

[Mustawd]

OP, game looks good. I'll buy once it release on Steam. It's not turn-based, but as close as it gets with pause function.

In terms of being Grimrock clone...are you guys fucking dense? Seriously.

Since when do the Grimrock devs have ownership over RT blobber games with high def graphics? FFS, it's a dungeon. How many different ways can you make stone walls look without some similarities? Besides, the UI is clearly different (actually I'd say inferior to LoG), as is the premise and the pause mechanic.

The devs from almost Human need to get over other DM-with-good-gFX type games coming out. Competition is inevitable. It's called business. Plus, I'd rather have a LoG clone with a pause function anyhow.