Dungeon Dilettante
Posts: 1
Joined: Wednesday, 27th February 2013, 06:05
Wednesday, 27th February 2013, 06:15
The Cloud of Bats
I fell in love with roguelikes back in the 90's, starting with Nethack, pounding away on an IBM Selectronic-style mechanical keyboard--which gave an extra feel to a great game. In fifteen years, I've only beat the game a handful of times.
In the last few days, I found Dungeon Crawl. At first, I wasn't sure if it would hold candles to Nethack--you know how it is. After a game or two, I found the similar keyboard shortcuts and similar keyboard action eased me right into place. Then I had the chance to focus on the gameplay itself, the subtle flow of attention that brings me into the story of the game. I've played perhaps 20-30 games, just warming up, getting farther and farther down each time. All the while I've been thinking "I should play another game of Nethack just to compare, because this is really good stuff."
But then, tonight, on a lvl1 DEC, I met the Cloud of Bats.
I saw the long line of doors across one side of a 5x5ish room. Walked all the way around it. Got into the middle of the doors... and thought, "I know this is a bad idea, but I'm going to do it anyway, because I suspect this game has a good trick up its random-number-generator..." and opened the doors.
"You see 10 bats."
I was quickly surrounded, and fled to a corridor to take them one at a time, being picked to death all the while. I arrived with 3 hp, 0 mp, dagger at the ready, 8 bats to kill...
8 dead bats later, alive with only 1 hp remaining after a protracted multi-turn duel with the last of the 10 bats, I knew I'd found a good roguelike again!
Thanks Dungeon Crawl community for all your good works!
In the last few days, I found Dungeon Crawl. At first, I wasn't sure if it would hold candles to Nethack--you know how it is. After a game or two, I found the similar keyboard shortcuts and similar keyboard action eased me right into place. Then I had the chance to focus on the gameplay itself, the subtle flow of attention that brings me into the story of the game. I've played perhaps 20-30 games, just warming up, getting farther and farther down each time. All the while I've been thinking "I should play another game of Nethack just to compare, because this is really good stuff."
But then, tonight, on a lvl1 DEC, I met the Cloud of Bats.
I saw the long line of doors across one side of a 5x5ish room. Walked all the way around it. Got into the middle of the doors... and thought, "I know this is a bad idea, but I'm going to do it anyway, because I suspect this game has a good trick up its random-number-generator..." and opened the doors.
"You see 10 bats."
I was quickly surrounded, and fled to a corridor to take them one at a time, being picked to death all the while. I arrived with 3 hp, 0 mp, dagger at the ready, 8 bats to kill...
8 dead bats later, alive with only 1 hp remaining after a protracted multi-turn duel with the last of the 10 bats, I knew I'd found a good roguelike again!
Thanks Dungeon Crawl community for all your good works!