Roguelikes are a very niche genre of games. It’s easy to understand why so many are glued to the genre while several others are turned off by their nature. The people who love roguelikes are obviously those searching for infinite hours of play. They want a game which can constantly challenge them in new exciting ways while maintaining core aspects, rules, and mechanics. A game which can use elements of randomization in the right way for the most part. The group that dislike roguelikes are people who easily get fed up with their repetitiveness. They don’t like getting kicked back to square one whenever they die. They don’t like having to adapt new lessons and rules upon each run and would rather wish for consistency. They don’t like losing progress and I can understand. Some roguelikes feel demotivating due to how difficulty is created through randomization. That’s why it’s really hard to create a well balanced roguelike. You need to strike the middle ground between challenge and procedural generation.
Not saying that balance is always needed to make a great roguelike. Some games in the genre encourage players to form broken overpowered builds to face the challenges near the end. Let’s take Risk of Rain 2 for example. Personally I'm not a huge fan of Risk of Rain 2 as I dropped the game quickly compared to other roguelikes, but the design philosophy does make sense. Collect a wide variety of power ups so that they synergize together and cut down boss enemies quickly as they grow in numbers. Another good example of creating overpowered builds would be Inscription or Slay The Spire which are deckbuilder roguelikes. It’s easy to get overwhelmed in these two games, but to face the odds you could attempt to overwhelm the enemy. Forge a deck of cards which can be stacked onto each other and deal truck loads of damage. Roguelikes like these are still pretty fun, because working up to this point of overpowered-ness takes time and sometimes strategy. That is what you want to aim for. Roguelikes that are random, but still give control to the player and show that their skills are what is carrying them.
This design philosophy is especially true when it comes to Curse of The Dead Gods, the most recent title by Passtech Games which came out last year. They are an independent studio made up of experienced developers who have worked within the game industry before. Their first two games were part of a tower defense strategy series known as Space Run, and their previous title was a strategy adventure inspired by the likes of Pikmin known as Masters of Anima. These titles did fairly well, but Curse of The Dead Gods had to be their most ambitious project yet. They wanted to make a game much darker in tone compared to previous studio projects, and had eyes of making a game that wasn’t just another strategy sim. They wanted to make an isometric action game with intense combat, intriguing systems, and visuals which made each swing and hit pack a punch. A game with grueling difficulty and risk-reward progression. So the most likely answer was to develop a roguelike. One game they took heavy inspiration from was Darkest Dungeon, another roguelike with a grim setting and artystle. I’ve played a little bit of Darkest Dungeon and I’m anticipating whether to review it someday, but from what I have experienced it’s easy to understand why Darkest Dungeon is a standout among roguelikes. It’s not just the grim tone, but how the game effectively uses stress as a mechanic. Your characters build stress overtime and when enough is built up then they start to develop certain thinking processes and quirks. It helps flesh out your party for better or worse, and it’s made more effective with the roguelike dungeon crawling elements. Fear of the eldritch horrors you face on your next mission, and worrying if you brought enough supplies and gear to bring your entire team back alive because there’s permadeath. Darkest Dungeon can be frustrating, but that’s part of the experience. Making huge sacrifices so that one day you create a team strong enough to venture through the toughest lair in the game. Hence the title, Darkest Dungeon. Wow, I just gave a mini-review within a review.
Curse of the Dead Gods is taking a lot of influence from Darkest Dungeons and a couple of other successful roguelikes. It wishes to take what made Darkest Dungeon great and translate it into an isometric action setup. It wants to achieve a lot and sets up really high goals for itself, and for the most part Passtech Games achieved this. Curse of The Dead Gods is one of the many indie gems out there. Not only did it achieve the high ambitions it hoped for, but it’s one of the most well designed roguelikes out there. I would even go far to say that it falls within my top five. Sure there are problems, but the product overall is stupendous and that’s why I wanted to talk about it today. Normally I would finish a game before reviewing it, but I’ve clocked in over twenty hours now and have gained enough experience to give you a descriptive take. Today we’ll be talking about why I loved Curse of The Dead Gods and why it deserves your attention. So light a torch, sharpen your machete, and prepare to journey deep into the temple of the dead gods. Those who dreamed of ascension.
Story
We are given very little to work with, but the premise for Curse of The Dead Gods is that years ago there lived three beings who were revered as gods. They possessed incredible strength and surrounding tribes worshiped them for the gifts they offered in return. As they grew older their powers began to dwindle, but they locked themselves up within a mysterious temple to prevent those who are incapable from harnessing their powers. The temple is filled with deadly traps, monsters they conjured up to eliminate unwanted trespassers, and rooms continuously shifting around to hopefully confuse any adventurer. Those who dare to venture through the temple are to never be let out and inflicted with numerous curses, but it is said that if someone were to brave the corruption and reach the end then they may gain the power of the dead gods.
We cut to the present where the entrance to the temple is being opened once again. A lone adventurer slowly enters the temple and entrance seals itself off once again. He carries with him a machete, a revolver, and a torch to light up the darkness within the temple. He seems to be quite skilled as his age shows that this probably isn’t the first expedition he has been on. The raider moves further into the temple as the only way out has been blocked off and soon stumbles upon a gigantic doorway possessing a purple devilish glow. The doorway leads to the only way forward, but when he touches the doorway the purple glow begins to swarm his right arm. The dead gods know that he is trespassing upon the temple and mark him with a cursed arm. Overtime, corruption will flood his veins and the pain will lead to his untimely deaths. The curse of the dead gods has been placed upon him and every time he dies he is taken back to the doorway he touched. He works past the curses though because he has a much deeper goal in mind. With his wit and strength, the raider will make his way through the shifting temple. Battle the monsters and claim whatever reward lies at the end.
Gameplay
Curse of the Dead Gods has some of the most masterfully designed dungeon crawling action I’ve seen since Hades which is convenient to say, because this game follows a similar format to Hades and blends it together with some soulslike elements. Originally when I saw footage for this game I defined it as mainly a roguelike, but then a lot of soulslike players began telling me it was a soulslike and when I checked the Steam page it was surprisingly listed as one. It was hard to believe, but through time I began to understand where they were coming from. So not only do we have a game trying to take Darkest Dungeon ad convert it into an action game, but another title that attempts to imitate Dark Souls. For the most part though it handles it really well. There’s a lot of systems in between combat that makes you question if you charge head first into a fight and why it may or may not be best to do so.
For starters let’s just talk about the combat itself. You carry three weapons at a time and they all have their own attributes and attack speeds. You have your main weapon which is easy to swing and chain long combos with, and a secondary weapon which offers another form of light attacks and can be chained into a combo with your main weapon. For example, let’s say I’m carrying a machete and a pistol. Rather than chain the three hit combo which the machete has I can instead fire the pistol as my third hit and it will trigger an attack which blast enemies up close and quickly dodge backwards. You can mix and match all sorts of weapons together, so different playstyles are encouraged. Your third weapon is a two handed heavy damage dealer which is good for easily staggering foes and knocking their health off quickly, but it consumes lots of stamina and leaves you heavily exposed. You're probably wondering how stamina works in this game? Rather than have a rectangular bar like your standard soulslike you instead have these squares. A total of five of them to be exact. Depending on what weapon you use these squares will drain with combos. A three hit machete combo will use one square, but a three hit combo with a heavy weapon like a hammer or staff will use three stamina squares. At least there is some consistency of what you can do all at once. The only action that doesn’t consume stamina is deflecting. By deflecting an enemy attack at the right time you can parry their blow and leave them weakened for a short amount of time. Dealing more damage as their guard is down. It’s easy to tell when to parry as enemies always flash before activating an attack that can be parried, and while dodge rolling is an option it does consume stamina and makes it harder to follow up attacks. Enemies come in a variety of flavors and they’ll do whatever they can to cut you down. You have archers which attack you from afar, eagles which zoom in close to your position, slugs which can explode poisonous gas, these heavy units which stomp you into the ground, literal babies which teleport and release electricity, and so much more. Certain enemy types are designated to one of three regions of the game, so at least they never appear in an absurd combination. Occasionally enemies will drop new gear and now we’ll dive into this game’s loot system and how it handles it.
Different weapons and relics can be dropped by enemies and they’ll all have different rarity types. Rarer weapons and relics tend to be more powerful than their common types. However, a majority of roguelikes suffer from the same problem with their loot systems. Sometimes the player will get some gear they are willing to use and sometimes they will get something they won’t want entirely. This is especially bad when they go through a grueling option challenge hoping to get some gear that will help them with the rest of their run only to discover it’s something that is utterly useless to their build. Hades solved this problem pretty well by offering three options whenever you touch a god’s boon or ability upgrade, and Dead Cells moderately did it well by offering gold by scrapping weapons and gear. Curse of The Dead Gods offers a more moderate approach. If you find a piece of gear you don’t want then you can exchange it for one of numerous blessings from the gods. Sometimes it will be gold, but other times it can be more than just that. You may recover health, gain a stat bonus or Divine Favor, or remove some of the Corruption you have built up. You have the opportunity to exchange valuable gear for something else you could possibly want.
Everytime you pass through a door or get hit by a certain enemy, your Corruption meter builds up. It can be brought down by exchanging certain pieces of equipment, but when it builds up enough then your character gains a Curse. These Curses inflict specific quirks onto your character and cannot be lifted until you defeat a boss enemy. You can have a total of five Curses during a run with the fifth Curse being the most deadly of them all. The fifth Curse drains your health until you are left with nothing but one health point. It’s a system that makes you play carefully around enemies who can inflict corruption, but when the fifth Curse activates it will make the player work against the clock. However, these Curses don’t just lead to downsides. While some Curses place limits onto your character they can also offer benefits. A risk-reward system. You may get a Curse which decreases the amount of health loss when taking damage, but each hit will make you lose some of your gold. A Curse which limits the amount of relics you can carry, but gives you more Divine Favors to use. A Curse which increases your movement and attack speed, but increases the amount of damage taken from attacks. It is encouraged to get rid of some Curses as quickly as possible, but some of them can offer huge benefits during runs. There’s another system which ties into Corruption. Some rooms will have altars waiting at the end and you can use the gold you’ve accumulated to purchase gear and upgrades. If you don’t have enough gold then you can offer blood instead which inflicts corruption. Another risk-reward system.
The final aspect I want to explain is preparations before another journey into the temple starts. Curse of The Dead Gods follows a mission select structure similar to Children of Morta which was another roguelike I’ve played. The way it works is that there are three regions each for one of the three dead gods. The first is a flaming gauntlet, the second is an electric powered facility, and the third is a cavern filled with poisonous overgrowth. You start off with three easy levels containing one layer. A layer being compiled of several rooms. After beating a level you gain an Emblem and soon you’ll unlock harder levels. These harder levels contain an extra layer on top of the one you ventured through before. The goal is to beat the third hardest level of each region. Defeat the three champions of the dead gods and unlock the final level of the temple. A few resources are kept from each run. Mainly crystal skulls and jade rings. These can be spent to unlock new perks, upgrades, and weapons. Three different perks can be equipped before a run and they can make some runs more trivial. More useful perks cost for crystal skulls, but saving up for them is worth it. From the perk which restores health from beating bosses and elites, to the perk which gives you an extra stat point whenever you clear a room without taking damage. The altars within the preparation room can be repaired to offer different loadouts for future runs, and the likeness of rarer weapons can be increased. Jade rings are mainly used to purchase new weapons which can spawn during future runs. Some weapons are really cool, but you may not want to unlock numerous of them as they’ll decrease the chance of a weapon you want popping up. That’s why you can't ban certain weapons from appearing in the temple again and repurchase them later when you think it is right. There’s a lot more going with Curse of The Dead Gods than you thought, but hopefully you can defeat the champions of the gods and claim the powers that lie at the end.
Thoughts
Curse of The Dead Gods is one of the hardest recommendations I have given in a while. It’s an excellent game and whatever flaws that hold it down are outweighed by what is done tremendously, but I do want to mention this game may not be for everyone as it has a pretty steep difficulty curve. However, difficulty has never bothered me in the past especially since I just released a long Elden Ring essay and the difficulty is a key aspect to a majority of roguelikes. That good old gameplay loop of try, die, die several times more, and eventually get good enough to one shot everything in your path.
The game lacks a story or at least some semblance of a story. Whatever story or world building that exists is told through enemy logs and descriptions. I forgot to mention earlier that there is a log and it’s similar to the log in Hades. Defeating an enemy a certain amount of times will expose more about them and where they originate from. It’s nice and there are some interesting descriptions from what I have skimmed over, but the story doesn’t really matter overall. There's no escalating plot or evil that's secretly taking over the real world. You are just a guy plunging a tomb. What the game lacks in story is made up for through gameplay and luckily the game design is great.
Combat is satisfying and the animations for each attack makes it ever so grueling. Each blow packs a punch and you really feel the impact of a blunt weapon being smacked across the face of a monster. The controls are especially tight for this sort of game, and your actions are responsive. Most soulslike games have wind up times for each action, but Curse of The Dead Gods gets things done quickly. The several systems in between fights get you thinking about what you should do. Make sacrifices which can harm your character but nab them some really good gear, or take the slow and careful way through but risk getting pile driven into the ground by future bosses. The game takes place from an isometric view which I'm always a huge fan of. It gives a clear vision of where the player is, what is around them, and any threats that may be lying ahead. The art style is heavily reminiscent of Darkest Dungeon, but it helps as each threat is more detailed and devastating than the last. Sound design is splendid too and helps add to the feel of the game. The game makes really good use of lighting and light as a mechanic. When you are in darkness it’s harder to see what is ahead and enemies deal more damage, but light can be used to reveal damage and sometimes deal more damage depending on what curse you have. The Curse system is well thought out and reminds me of the perk system in Fallout: New Vegas and the risk-reward they offer. Curse of The Dead Gods is a really well made game and stands out in the sea of indie roguelikes, but there are some problems which the game drowns in.
Some weapon types are kind of useless due to the amount of damage they give off, but this is more of a me problem and the type of playstyle I adapt. Usually I go for swift melee weapons or heavy damage dealers like swords, maces, staffs, hammers, and spears. The claws are fine and are the quickest weapon in the game, but they don’t deal as much damage as the other melee weapons and you can lose control easily with each rapid button press. The bows are fine and the bombs are just terrible to use. Secondary weapons can be fun, but it’s easy to forget that you have them. A majority of players will use the basic combos their main weapon has, and if the player does want to deal more damage then most likely they’ll switch to their two handed weapon. The secondary weapon is kind of a waste besides a few occasions. Maybe a pistol to pick off a small chunk of health an enemy has from afar, or this one specific shield which deals damage back to an enemy when parried. Divine Favors, which can be used to switch up the gear offered at an altar, are useless because sometimes they decrease the likelihood of getting gear you want or you’re offered what you want in the first place.
The game has a lock on system, but trust me don’t even use it because a majority of the time enemies appear in groups. It’s actually really easy to get overwhelmed in Curse of The Dead Gods and you’re not offered a wealth of invincibility frames compared to Dark Souls or Hades. Final complaint deals with the difficulty. I just complained that difficulty doesn’t turn me off from a good experience, but with this game the way it changes is not always justified. On harder levels more elite enemies appear, enemies appear in bigger groups, and you are offered less healing stations. The key factor being the amount of times you are allowed to heal. A run can go pretty fine, but there has to be some good method to recover health. Especially during the third floor where rooms become longer and enemies cut your health down easily. The health you regain from offering gear isn’t always enough, and it sucks when the reason you died to a boss was not because you weren’t skilled enough but because you didn’t have enough health to survive more than five attacks and get their attack pattern down. Curse of The Dead Gods also begins to drag out its runtime around the third hardest selection of levels and I’m starting to lose motivation to finish the game. Yet, I continue to keep playing because the core combat is really good and this is one of the most well designed roguelikes since Hades. For me, the fun of it all is enough to keep playing.
Curse of The Dead Gods is a diamond in the rough. It can be unforgiving at times and takes a bit to get used to, but once you fall in there is a lot of enjoyment to be had. It leans more of the side of skill rather than randomness which is great because it means runs aren’t reliant on dice rolls. I recommend Curse of The Dead Gods to the most hardcore of roguelike players, or if you are someone who specifically loves Hades and Dead Cells as much as me then you may want to consider picking this one up. In the end I am going to have to give Curse of The Dead Gods a 9/10 for excellence at best.
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