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[nenjin]

Nice review. Sounds almost like the goal is to keep heroes "entertained" via your Dungeon rather than rushing out to kill them as soon as they arrive. Your minions almost sound like cannon fodder.

[Neonivek]

Nice review. Sounds almost like the goal is to keep heroes "entertained" via your Dungeon rather than rushing out to kill them as soon as they arrive. Your minions almost sound like cannon fodder.

Makes me wish someone would make a Dungeon Tycoon.

[Viken]

There has been talk of a Hell Tycoon game, but over the years I've given up on it myself. >.>'

[nenjin]

They pretty much already made one. Afterlife. Haven't played it? Shame on you. (Although it's closer to a Hell Sim than a Hell Tycoon.)

On Dungeons:
http://gamescom.gamespot.com/story/6274181/dungeons-impressions

http://gameinformer.com/b/news/archive/2010/08/19/drain-heroes-souls-in-kalypso-s-dungeons.aspx

http://www.bit-tech.net/gaming/pc/2010/08/19/dungeons-preview/1

At this point I feel like this thread has the wrong name. This is turning out to be much different than dungeon keeper.

So here's how this works:

Heroes enter the dungeon with no soul energy.

They have needs.

Fulfilling these needs increases their soul energy.

When their soul energy is high enough, THEN you send your baddies or yourself after them to capture them for harvesting.

It sounds like a tough balancing act. You have to provide heroes with...

-Gold to fill their pockets. This means you have to build treasuries for the express purpose of them getting gold. (I assume you fill them with gold taken from slain adventurers.)

-Objects and rooms of interest to satisfy their individual needs. (Libraries for wizards, ect...)

-And monsters to kill to satisfy their blood lust.

It sounds like a very delicate balancing act. As one review put it, too many monsters/gold or objects of interest too early, and heroes become overly satisfied and wander too deeply into your dungeon, or they get slaughtered before they've built up enough soul energy. It's not clear whether they pack up and try to leave your dungeon, ala Evil Genius agents.

So it sounds like Dungeons will require a totally different mindset than DKII, both for playing AND for dungeon design. What I like is this basically will ask you to design CLASSIC dungeons, both from a good guy and a bad buy perspective. From the good guy perspective, you want a dungeon that "fun", interesting, not too challenging, but distracts and entertains heroes so they avoid your critically important areas. From the bad guy perspective, your dungeon has to be both offensive and defensive, and how it's designed, a lot like Evil Genius, will have a huge impact on how the game plays out. It should be confusing for heroes, but streamlined for your own needs. I really hope they think this one through and give us the right tools to control dungeon access.

Even as the game slips farther and farther from DKII, I don't find myself less interested. The margin for error (i.e. this shit isn't fun) is slowly ramping up, but so is the potential for a new take on an old classic that really invigorates the whole dungeon sim genre. Because as has been said by a lot of people here, DKII definitely has some dead end game play. Dungeons seems like it's got way more focus as far as what the whole game is about.

[Viken]

Nenjin, your links aren't working. All three say that the page isn't there or that an error has occured.

[Zangi]

So... basically, this isn't a successor to DKI and DKII...


Its a dungeon tycoon game.  Where you build attractions for heroes,dungeon crawlers and adventurerscustomers to play 'loot-the-treasure' and 'whack the goblins'?

But... being the dungeon manager, for some odd reasondue to the union strike by certified soul collectors, you have to personally go and collect the souls from the customers by smashing their heads in?

Then somewhere inbetween you also fight a secret corporate war with other tycoons?

[nenjin]

Fix't.

That's a pretty brutal interpretation Zangi I think it all works, even though the model is kind of obvious. Why I need heroes to be happy before I kill them is beyond me, maybe that's more "evil"....but it's an excuse to make a dungeon that is kind of like a classic D&D dungeon, with monster lairs full of treasure and doodads and hoohahs for heroes to look at.

[Neonivek]

I would have done a Dungeon Tycoon where you try to balance what gold heros take from you with the amount you get from looting their brains out.

I mean in Dungeons and dragons heros have enough equipment on them at high levels that if they sold it they could buy a small town.

[Viken]

I think its a bloody brilliant idea. Instead of being a rip-off of DK1 and 2, which were undoubtly awesome, they have captured the essense of it and instead created their own brand of thing, with alot more customization and abilities. XD Makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside. Haha.

But yes, you do get to build your own dungeon, fill it with things that'll both keep the heroes happy and excited to explore, and then when they're ripe for the picking, either kill them outright before they can explore too far, or capture them and put them into a prison to be tortured to drain every drop of their Soul Energy from them; which can then be used to add more stuff to the dungeon. Awesome-sauce. XD

[Ioric Kittencuddler]

I still think it would be cooler to be able to turn them to your side.  They're basically trying to do something extremely generic from the opposite point of view, but it's still generic.  Dungeon Keeper was about being evil and winning.  This entertain and slaughter concept seems more like being a sadistic DM with no imagination.  Sure it'll be fun for a while but I don't see it lasting.

[nenjin]

It sounds cool, but I'm having my reservations already. If you need gold in addition to soul energy to build structures and other things...that's a lot of drains on a resource that will be constantly floating.

It already sounds like heroes will dip out of your coffers, or that you have to hold some gold in trust just for them to loot. I'm asking the devs if heroes ever try to leave the dungeon, because if those guys are actually trying to steal your gold, and not just using the gold to tell them where to walk around....then you've got an economy that's subject to a lot of change, and to possibly going into a downward spiral.

Likewise, I'm nervous that monsters seem more like they're there for happiness than defense, and that actually defending the dungeon is on your Dungeon Lord. They talk about throwing too many monsters at the heroes, which makes sense....but it's not clear how they spawn, or how you get them, or how you actually use them for defense.

It sounds pretty dynamic and cool on paper, but how fun vs. how frustrating it is also sounds like a concern. Will this be one of those games where people can't take it at their own speed, because they're always under the gun for resources and such? If all I need to do to take this game at my speed is not build stuff...I'm 100% sold. If I have hordes of heroes storming down my dungeon because I'm trying to take my time, not so much.

The reason for all this hand wringing on my part is that, with such a beefed up commander character that is supposed to get tons of abilities, heroes actually seem like a threat at some point. Again, when your resource chain is trying to kill you, depending on the mechanics that determine how strong they get and when, it could make for a frustrating SIM experience.

[Saint]

I'm getting that  feeling about this game now.

[nenjin]

I'm trying to fight it, as I think it's just getting attached to the idea of DK premuaturely. It's not really fair to Realmforge. Some people aren't into Tycoon games and that's understandable though. The fact the economy is so emphasized in this game is going to be a turn off for some.

But I think there's still a lot to like, just from a flavor perspective and the fact that, hey, someone actually made another Dungeon game of any kind!

(I originally wrote "Dungeon Tycoon" there, but isn't labeling new games as other games really where the disappointment starts?)

[Viken]

Yea, waving around the Dungeon Keeper or Dungeon Tycoon gemerick is a little like labling a Porche(sp?) a Firebird.  Its unfair to both the devs and the original creators of the game concepts.  It's totally cool, and if it does have that DK2 feel while also excelling as a Tycoon game, I think alot of people will be hyped.

[Captain Alchatron]

The game just sounds bizarre now.  It doesn't much sound like you get to choose anything but the placement of prestige doodads.  Sounds a lot like The Movies only without the movies... :p