Trapezohedron
2007
People call this game a quasi-roguelike, and even on the Roguelike Reddit community, this is almost always never referred to as a real roguelike.
I find that an oddity, given that the gameplay, barring its slice-of-life additions, vastly resembles contemporaries like NetHack and its core inspiration, ADoM.
In any case, don't let those people fool you, this game is as much a Roguelike as the ancient contemporaries are, if you cared about the Berlin Interpretation anyway.
But I digress, you're here for a summary.
Elona is a quirky Japanese roguelike with an emphasis on the slice of life aspects of gameplay, and can feel rather unfinished if you're playing on the Vanilla version.
On the onset of the game, you're already provided a brief tutorial on basic controls that encourages you to eat something. There's a corpse of a beggar somewhere, so your natural inclination is to eat him, right? The game mocks you for this, but it also provides a handy warning that you'll encounter weird things as you go.
The game is particularly grindy, and if you're lost, it's very easy to lose stats and hard to gain them back. Many players give up on the game thanks to this fact. If you last long enough though, you'll end up owning a castle, have a bunch of storage spaces, and even sell goods as well as have a farm to grow plants in. Said locations are areas you can decorate, and adventurers come and go to visit you. You can also marry your pet, which is a choice of a dog, a bear, and a... little girl.
Yeah, the game is weird and in today's climes highly-questionable. Actually, you can marry both characters of your gender and in fact, marry abominations like a Shub-Niggurath which is a random enemy here.
For whatever reason, the game landed on a winning formula, and as such, it has a following on both EN and JP communities, with the JP community developing 2 branches of a variant, which includes: Elona+ and Elona OOMSESTepNC.
Elona+ is the quirkier, yet more-straightforward of the two. The game attempts to provide proper progression, but it doubles down on weird things, such as adding a peeing mechanic and getting characters or yourself wet with pee. Then you die thanks to being wet doubling the amount of damage you get from lightning.
Elona OOMSESTepNC is the other variant that's popular in EN side. This is actually just a mod-mod of a mod-mod, but is most often recommended everywhere for those not wanting to play Plus thanks to better English support and tons of quality of life features in it.
Omake Overhaul Modify Sukutu Edition South Tyris Step Nasuko Custom as it is known when you expand the abbreviation excels in doing what the Omake variants did: expanding existing features and making the whole existing experience more hollistic.
The lategame of this variant gets ridiculous, when attaining 2000 stat (where there is a cap) is just a mere pebble of progress in the game, you know that the game gets incredibly ridiculous with its Disgaea-tier power levels.
In order to beat its endgame, you will quite literally have to become a God ingame, which translates to infinite wishes and armor that grants you invulnerability, which will not save you in the final dungeon given certain enemies can bypass it.
All in all, Elona is a wonderful roguelike if you're not offended by the weirder things in Japan and are willing to put in the time to learn the system and its meta. As a classic roguelike, doing about anything requires multiple keypresses.
I find that an oddity, given that the gameplay, barring its slice-of-life additions, vastly resembles contemporaries like NetHack and its core inspiration, ADoM.
In any case, don't let those people fool you, this game is as much a Roguelike as the ancient contemporaries are, if you cared about the Berlin Interpretation anyway.
But I digress, you're here for a summary.
Elona is a quirky Japanese roguelike with an emphasis on the slice of life aspects of gameplay, and can feel rather unfinished if you're playing on the Vanilla version.
On the onset of the game, you're already provided a brief tutorial on basic controls that encourages you to eat something. There's a corpse of a beggar somewhere, so your natural inclination is to eat him, right? The game mocks you for this, but it also provides a handy warning that you'll encounter weird things as you go.
The game is particularly grindy, and if you're lost, it's very easy to lose stats and hard to gain them back. Many players give up on the game thanks to this fact. If you last long enough though, you'll end up owning a castle, have a bunch of storage spaces, and even sell goods as well as have a farm to grow plants in. Said locations are areas you can decorate, and adventurers come and go to visit you. You can also marry your pet, which is a choice of a dog, a bear, and a... little girl.
Yeah, the game is weird and in today's climes highly-questionable. Actually, you can marry both characters of your gender and in fact, marry abominations like a Shub-Niggurath which is a random enemy here.
For whatever reason, the game landed on a winning formula, and as such, it has a following on both EN and JP communities, with the JP community developing 2 branches of a variant, which includes: Elona+ and Elona OOMSESTepNC.
Elona+ is the quirkier, yet more-straightforward of the two. The game attempts to provide proper progression, but it doubles down on weird things, such as adding a peeing mechanic and getting characters or yourself wet with pee. Then you die thanks to being wet doubling the amount of damage you get from lightning.
Elona OOMSESTepNC is the other variant that's popular in EN side. This is actually just a mod-mod of a mod-mod, but is most often recommended everywhere for those not wanting to play Plus thanks to better English support and tons of quality of life features in it.
Omake Overhaul Modify Sukutu Edition South Tyris Step Nasuko Custom as it is known when you expand the abbreviation excels in doing what the Omake variants did: expanding existing features and making the whole existing experience more hollistic.
The lategame of this variant gets ridiculous, when attaining 2000 stat (where there is a cap) is just a mere pebble of progress in the game, you know that the game gets incredibly ridiculous with its Disgaea-tier power levels.
In order to beat its endgame, you will quite literally have to become a God ingame, which translates to infinite wishes and armor that grants you invulnerability, which will not save you in the final dungeon given certain enemies can bypass it.
All in all, Elona is a wonderful roguelike if you're not offended by the weirder things in Japan and are willing to put in the time to learn the system and its meta. As a classic roguelike, doing about anything requires multiple keypresses.
2023
Just when you think you've seen all it has to offer, it introduces something new for you to obsess.
The game is grindy as fuck though and offers little to no respite for color-blind players. The latter isn't me but a friend of mine couldn't play it because of how color-reliant fish are.
This game is actually an action RPG. Seriously.
The game is grindy as fuck though and offers little to no respite for color-blind players. The latter isn't me but a friend of mine couldn't play it because of how color-reliant fish are.
This game is actually an action RPG. Seriously.
2014
A great way to play the old Daggerfall. But note that Daggerfall nowadays is unironically a lackluster experience, probably only slightly less painful to play than Starfield.
2021
A glorious return to the franchise's 2D roots, Metroid Dread understands fully how to guide a player without making it seem obvious, and also provide means to sequence-break the game if so-desired. It's no Metroid Zero Mission or Super Metroid, but it's definitely up there.
The parry mechanic from Samus Returns... returns here, but with a way more lenient timing window, so trash mobs won't be demanding your attention left and right.
The EMMI rooms are quite a bit of a pain, however, especially the later ones.
The parry mechanic from Samus Returns... returns here, but with a way more lenient timing window, so trash mobs won't be demanding your attention left and right.
The EMMI rooms are quite a bit of a pain, however, especially the later ones.
2020
This review contains spoilers
The story and by extension its ludonarrative (hah, funny word) integration is what carries this game.
You play as the Son of Hades, not as Hades himself, initially trying to earn your father's approval but later on trying to escape because your father's a bureaucratically-buried asshat.
Things improve later on and the context of the game changes, but you're still trying to escape and fight bosses all the same.
The gameplay is well-balanced and Hades has more to offer later on just when bosses get a bit stale, but you're still fighting the same 4 variants of bosses as you go.
What I'll say is that the gameplay is... inoffensive. Some status effects are virtually identical to each other. Drunk vs. Doom for example, with the former being a fast acting variant of the latter, and the combat being the standard catchy fare of Supergiant games.
If this were any other game I'd rate this a 3.5, but the magical Supergiant touch makes this work, because so much thought was given to integrating the story together with the game, that despite seemingly having an excuse plot, it's not an excuse in the sense that it's bad, but rather it continually justifies in a meaningful way why you keep trying to get out of Hades.
You play as the Son of Hades, not as Hades himself, initially trying to earn your father's approval but later on trying to escape because your father's a bureaucratically-buried asshat.
Things improve later on and the context of the game changes, but you're still trying to escape and fight bosses all the same.
The gameplay is well-balanced and Hades has more to offer later on just when bosses get a bit stale, but you're still fighting the same 4 variants of bosses as you go.
What I'll say is that the gameplay is... inoffensive. Some status effects are virtually identical to each other. Drunk vs. Doom for example, with the former being a fast acting variant of the latter, and the combat being the standard catchy fare of Supergiant games.
If this were any other game I'd rate this a 3.5, but the magical Supergiant touch makes this work, because so much thought was given to integrating the story together with the game, that despite seemingly having an excuse plot, it's not an excuse in the sense that it's bad, but rather it continually justifies in a meaningful way why you keep trying to get out of Hades.
May revisit later. This is basically Dark Days Ahead with a more sensible gameplay loop.
2011
If you're still playing this, you're at the very least playing it with either XRM with TC plots enabled in AP or you're doing Litcube's Universe or its derivative mod-mods.
Reduce 1 star from this rating if playing vanilla, and remove 1 more star from this rating if you dislike economy simulators.
Reduce 1 star from this rating if playing vanilla, and remove 1 more star from this rating if you dislike economy simulators.
2016
This review contains spoilers
SDV 1.5.
Reached the island on year 2. Considering it finished. Art still is an eyesore.
Reached the island on year 2. Considering it finished. Art still is an eyesore.
Delightfully-wonderful VN about a cute android maid that you created using the magical power of Language Learning Models(TM), made by a now-defunct company.
2021
Plot is great. Gameplay can be frustrating. Shelved not because of the game but due to personal circumstances and haven't found an opportunity to go back to it since.
2022
Beautiful text adventure game that evokes Witcher feelings while you're on a task to map the peninsula. As the titular Roadwarden, your task is to actually maintain the roads and keep it safe if possible, or confirm if they should be avoided. You're functionally a Google car trying to map the world for your lords. Despite the mundane task, it's in-universe considered difficult to do, because you are on your lonesome with no one to protect you, and thus successful forays of a Roadwarden yield prestige and income... especially if you have the backing of the Merchant's Guild...
2023
Galaxy on Fire II if it was developed with a better budget. For a looter shooter, it has considerably less options than expected.
Arcade shooter with real world planes and Belkan warcrimes that aren't, all set to the awesome music of progress.
TBD
The less I talk about this game, the better. Both 1 and 2 played, cumulative hours.
2020
The annoying thing about this game is that, if you progress through it normally, it's just a simple if not tough roguelike that will most likely fuck you up with a single pixel of polymorphine.
And for the times you don't? Nobody tells you the game has far more to the map than it seemingly has. The secrets hide away from you. It does not want to be known.
As above, so below.
And for the times you don't? Nobody tells you the game has far more to the map than it seemingly has. The secrets hide away from you. It does not want to be known.
As above, so below.