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  1. #1
    The Lightbringer WarpedAcorn's Avatar
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    [Megathread] Darkest Dungeon

    I did a search and the only thread I saw on this game is an unreplied one from early last year. If I missed a megathread somewhere, please merge.

    I bought and started playing Darkest Dungeon last night. It looked really interesting from the trailer, but I refused to buy any Early Access game...last night I made an exception. The one thing everyone said in every review is "even though its early access there is more content than most finished games". This is true. I spent the entire night playing like a friggin addict. Its rare I lose track of time, but I did during my first session.

    If you are considering picking up this title, I highly suggest you do. The tone and atmosphere of the game are worth it for the experience alone. The core mechanics of the game hinge on the type of player sanity (stress) that make the Lovecraftian universe so endearing. Gameplay is actually extremely simple, but also surprisingly complex. Obviously the game itself is a turn-based dungeon crawler that has a new stylized animation spin on a very old style of game (reminding me of those old first person dungeon games like Wizardry).

    The true highlight for me is also the most frustrating part of the game for me, and that is the Stress. As your heroes adventure they will get more and more stressed out. Some enemy attacks specificaly stress them, meanwhile some actions will cause them to freak. Once they reach their max they get a negative trait and start to freak out...which cascades by freaking the rest of the party out. Eventually you have a group full of insane lunatics all shouting random things (associated with the type of trait they picked up) and sometimes doing specific things you can't control. Sometimes though, they will have a heroic moment and power through the stress to pick up a positive trait, but this is rare.

    While playing, when I was in a dungeon I just wanted to get out and get back to town so I could log off and play something else like Skyrim. But when I got back to town I just wanted to "do one more dungeon". I realized that the dungeons were effectively stressing ME out and had to tip my hat to the game and the developers.

    BTW, after 11 Weeks (basically 11 dungeons) I have lost almost 10 heroes. I've only been doing the basic "green" difficulty dungeons. I haven't even thought about trying a hard one. So don't get attached to anyone. They can die in the blink of an eye.

  2. #2
    syphilis is good.
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  3. #3
    Game looks great but I am so tired of early access...

  4. #4
    I've watched some Let's Plays of this game and I'm very much looking forward to picking it up when my paycheck clears tomorrow. The early gameplay looks more than solid - the chief complaints I'm seeing about the EA is that the endgame is far easier than the early game, and that you can cheese heal your party if you're willing to sit there clicking a whole lot at the end of a battle. But I can live with a long easy endgame and a cheese strategy that I can use or ignore as I choose.

  5. #5
    I like the game but RNG has never been kind to me when playing video games. For instance, I lost a character while playing the tutorial. I then tried playing the first dungeon around 5x and have been only able to clear at most 65-70%~ of it before I had to abandon it.

    The RNG just frustrates me to the point where I don't enjoy playing the game. I learned a couple things about how to handle it but its just sounds too cheesy. I rather just wait until they release the game and see how it goes from there.

  6. #6
    RNG in this game really can make or break it as a whole.

  7. #7
    Pandaren Monk shokter's Avatar
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    Wow. Never heard of this...but looks very promising. Will try hard to wait for a sale (some devs won't put early acc games up for sale ...some will) but may just end up shelling out because this looks interesting.
    "Brevity is...wit"

  8. #8
    The Lightbringer WarpedAcorn's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Howlrunner View Post
    It is pretty much complete with all honesty, and the most complete "Early Access" game I have seen.

    Give it a go, it is one of the best RPG Rogue-Likes I have tried in a long time, and has a lot of great artwork.
    Not to mention a very foreboding narrator.

  9. #9
    Been playing this as well and was blown away. I'm not normally one to go in for early access, but after watching a few let's plays end in horrific rng deathy goodness i had to try it. Zero regrets, money well spent. Great risk reward gameplay for your adventurers first 4 or 5 levels, artwork is eye-catching (Love the Swine-taur), and some good atmospheric music. Also that narrator "Mortality clarified with a single strike!"

  10. #10
    Quote Originally Posted by unholytestament View Post
    Game looks great but I am so tired of early access...
    I can tell you honestly, this game feels more complete than officially released gamed. Perhaps the only changes that might be made are some balancing and features. I have yet to face a noticeable bug.

    As others have said, the RNG can really fuck you (multi crits to the healer ftw). Reminds me a bit of FTL(RNG that is), but the turn-based aspect is prefered to actually think of what the most logical move to make.

    Overall, there is so much I love about this game and hope the same or other developers take the ideas further.

  11. #11
    I saw TB and Dexbonus playing this and it seemed pretty cool. Good art and voice acting. Though I'm not a huge fan of turn-based RPGs anymore.

    But yeah it's getting a lot of play on Twitch if people are interested.

  12. #12
    Pandaren Monk shokter's Avatar
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    After looking at the game a little more I said screw waiting for a sale. OP's Wizardry reference combined with his avatar combined with the game's super confident art style combined with Lovecraftian madness = me anxiously waiting the 30 or so more minutes while this thing downloads so I can stay up all night cursing the RNGods.

    This alternate trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wjiBB3nBR-w so dope.
    Last edited by shokter; 2015-02-13 at 07:31 AM.
    "Brevity is...wit"

  13. #13
    The Lightbringer WarpedAcorn's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by shokter View Post
    After looking at the game a little more I said screw waiting for a sale. OP's Wizardry reference combined with his avatar combined with the game's super confident art style combined with Lovecraftian madness = me anxiously waiting the 30 or so more minutes while this thing downloads so I can stay up all night cursing the RNGods.

    This alternate trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wjiBB3nBR-w so dope.


    Haha, hope you enjoy it! I think its really catching on. One of the guys at work has a relative that is all into it right now. I missed out playing it myself last night due to PC upgrade downtime, but I'm definitely cracking out this weekend. I gotta get the Guild and Blacksmith upgraded. I think those are the ones that are holding me back right now.

  14. #14
    The Lightbringer WarpedAcorn's Avatar
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    I actually started over this weekend and got a bit further than originally. My "A" Team is level 3, so they are taking on the Yellow-Level tasks now and I am also seeing that you might actually need to cycle in newer Heroes a bit earlier since Higher Level heroes refuse to do low level missions. I was thinking originally I would stick a level 3 with the level 0's to help them move along.

    I also found a new favorite class, the Hellion. I've only seen her pop up once so I'm thinking Darkest Dungeon has certain champions set to "Rare". She is an absolute powerhouse and currently neck and neck competing for MVP along with my Highwayman.

    So after playing this for a good 10 hours I have to say that I feel the difficulty is on par with Dark Souls. At first the game is super hard, but as you slowly learn the mechanics and nuances the game gets easier and easier. However, like Dark Souls, overconfidence is your ultimate downfall. Get cocky and you will get put in the ground.

    Right now I will say the biggest complaint I have has to do with class balance. I'm finding certain classes to be WAY more useful than others. The ones that could seriously use some buffing would be Jester, Grave Robber, and Plague Doctor. Right now I have no reason to bring them in at all. Also, the Crusader and Leper could both do with some retooling. Right now their skills are WAY too similar to the point of being almost interchangeable. As a healer, the Vestal is in a really good place and has a great variety of skills. Similarly, I think the Highwayman, Hellion, and Bounty Hunter are all balanced very well. I'm looking forward to some of the other classes that haven't been released yet as well, and seeing how they fit in.

  15. #15
    Well, my biggest complaint is with the scaling. It really breaks around the 3-4 resolve-level, at which point you can min-max just a tiny bit to give your guys 33%+ crit. I have my highwayman loaded up with +ranged damage and +crit buffs/gear to the point where he almost half the time crits up to three targets for 30+ damage. He also never misses.

    Meanwhile, the rest of my party is just focused on keeping everyone at 100% health, mostly by stunning all the enemies. They added a stacking stun resist buff to the game recently, but I find that I only need 1-2 turns to eliminate everything anyway, so it doesn't really matter much.

    My second biggest problem is with the RNG. My team is literally invincible... 99% of the time. Then that 1% of the time that giant skeleton champion crits my entire team for 20+ damage two turns in a row and my entire, previously unflappable party suddenly goes insane from the stress. The game has some issues where the difficulty fluctuates from ridiculously easy to almost impossible, against the same enemies, with the same party members, in the blink of an eye.

    For the first 3 or so levels, I thought the game was great. After that it gets a bit dull. There's no variation to the gameplay, you gain no new abilities from leveling up your characters, and the game gets far too easy.
    "Quack, quack, Mr. Bond."

  16. #16
    The Lightbringer WarpedAcorn's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Simulacrum View Post
    For the first 3 or so levels, I thought the game was great. After that it gets a bit dull. There's no variation to the gameplay, you gain no new abilities from leveling up your characters, and the game gets far too easy.
    That was something I was thinking about, and one thing I changed in my mentality during my 2nd game. The goal really seems to be about building up the town, not the heroes. Right now there is nothing preventing you from picking up a level 0 Crusader and just upgrading all his Attacks, Armor, and Weapons before he even steps into a dungeon. The only thing that really happens during level ups are picking up new quirks which, thanks to the Sanitarium, can be molded to be purely positive.

    But again, I have to keep in mind this is an early access game. Not only can things changes, things will change. Just gotta hope they listen to the suggestions.

  17. #17
    Deleted
    this game is excellent even if it is a bit frustrating at a time.

  18. #18
    By far, one of the best early access games Ive ever played. Dont let that stop you if you like challenging, rogue like games. Its a gem, and lot of fun.

  19. #19
    You guys will hate me for saying this but I'd love this game for iPhone/iPad/android.
    Quote Originally Posted by High Overlord Saurfang
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  20. #20
    Quote Originally Posted by unholytestament View Post
    Game looks great but I am so tired of early access...
    I totally get where you're coming from but as people like TB have said, this game went on to EA in a state that if it was released it would be considered good and wouldn't feel short-changed so the EA is just to add even more content and sort out bugs and whatnot. That's really how it should be done, far too many completely broken games and way, way too many that go up and just never end up feeling complete.

    - - - Updated - - -

    Quote Originally Posted by Flaks View Post
    You guys will hate me for saying this but I'd love this game for iPhone/iPad/android.
    Don't know why anyone would, this game could do very well with a mobile version. The gameplay itself is basically tailor-made for an easy transition and would be quite fun with a touch-screen interface.

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