Sproggiwood
I originally heard about Sproggiwood from the guys over on the Video Games Hot Dog podcast and added it my wishlist. A recent sale added it my library. And then it quite rudely jumped the queue when it came time to play an "s" game even though I had plans to play STALKER...
Sproggiwood is a rogue-like in the old turn based style. You move around a grid, each step or attack you make counts as your turn then each enemy moves or attacks. It's one part tactical combat, 1 part puzzle. You start each of the randomly generated dungeon areas at level 1 and as you play you level up gaining and improving special abilities. You play as 1 of 6 different classes (that unlock as work through the story) each with their own powers. You also find 1 shot items to use such as fancy spell scrolls that add to your tool set.
At the end of each dungeon you return to your village (either successfully or not if you died) and can spend any gold you have earned to give your characters new items or improve the building in your village, which give your global bonuses to all your characters.
At it's core the game play is a standard feedback loop for this type of game (maybe a little less punishing than most but their are some higher difficulty setting if you are so masochistically inclined). The game has a odd but cute art style that I really like and the humorous story is quirky in just the right way.
Unfortunately I can't recommend Sproggiwood. At the start it seems quite good, but then you quickly get to the grind for gold to buy the improvements and items you need to progress. And then you realize Sproggiwood does the one thing a game can do that I find unforgivable - it does not respect the player's time. The huge heaps of gold required to purchase the armor, weapons, scrolls, potions is ridiculous compared to the amount brought in by any single run of a dungeon. Easily 5-10 runs to buy a single item. And then each item is specific to a certain character - want armor on a different character? Better get in there cause that's a couple of more hours grinding the same dungeon. It's even worse for upgrading your village's buildings - the price of each upgrade cumulatively gets higher.
It wouldn't be so bad if the amount of gold received from the latest dungeons was greater than the earlier ones - inspiring you to push on to new challenges for greater rewards - but they only give a little more reward for much higher challenges. While the new tactical/puzzle elements are fun in their own right - repeating them over and over just becomes tedious.
What could have been a fun mid-length, but creatively challenging game instead is just a tedious grind-fest. It's well liked by others (Very Positive rating on Steam) but it just does not do it for me. I might return to complete it with some cheats to get past the grind and see where the story goes but after the 6 or so hours I played the game play really began to bore me.
Comments
Post a Comment