Fans of the rogue-like genre shouldn’t be shocked to learn that you will lose if you choose to play one of these games. You will actually die rather frequently. That, as well as complexity, sandbox gameplay, globe exploration, and a nod to the glory days of gaming, are all part of the appeal. I’ve always had a sweet spot in my heart for challenging dungeon romps because I got my start in dungeon-crawling games like Sword of Fargoal, Temple of Asphai, Gemstone Warrior, and others. Even though I’ve never been really good at them, they bring back pleasant memories. It tickles the nostalgia metre even though it is by default a “tiles” (i.e., gorgeous visuals) game with a choice for old-school ASCII text.
The goal of Ultimate ADOM – Caverns of Chaos is to combine traditional Rogue gameplay with a more casual version of itself. Is it successful? Continue to read our review!
Additionally, the tiles are gorgeous. Sprites tend to have a nearly chibi vibe, which, although not to my taste, is nevertheless charming and unexpectedly detailed. For instance, when I had a gnoll’s arm grafted onto his back by my necromancer, a third arm actually materialised on the gnoll’s sprite. The music is also shockingly good and does justice to the huge dungeon adventure idea. The developers deserve praise for maintaining the theme components.
Contrarily, eye candy isn’t always important. Rogue gameplay’s and world-building are crucial, and they can make or break the experience. On the mechanics front, Team ADOM performed admirably, in my opinion. That is, there are just enough mechanics to be interesting to learn about without being too many or complicated to make something as basic as to-hit or damage figures difficult to comprehend. Additionally, a variety of abilities exist across many categories, however, they often modify the few existing features.
In a similar vein, playstyle possibilities are frequently limited. The usual “bump” fighter types, spell-casting mages, archers, rogues, healers, etc. will undoubtedly be present for players to encounter. Each offers benefits, and some have a higher rate of survival than others. Unsurprisingly, I discovered that my fighter types lasted a lot longer than my mages. However, as my magic users grew stronger, they became much better at dealing with big numbers of people fast with AoE magic. The effects of summoning magic (such as necromancy, etc.) were less predictable because my summons wasn’t intelligent enough to hit the evil people, but they were effective at deterring them. We can’t have everything, thus I would have rather seen more movement abilities, nature-based talents, etc.
I liked the potential of combining and matching skills, which I don’t anticipate seeing in a Rogue-like, despite the frequent, expected cliches. One of my favourite characters thus far was a Chaos Knight who was both mutating and becoming undead (or ChAoS Knight for the initiated) (via necromancy skill points). Similar to this, it is simple to create characters that resemble paladins by choosing healing spells as a fighter, etc. More personalization was available than I anticipated, even though one’s faction and class will define one’s proficiencies and skill point availability.
It may pass for artificial intelligence. The adversary was stubbornly smarter than I wanted it to be at times, and the tutorial pushes the player to capitalise on these instances when they occur. There does seem to be a reasonable (roughly speaking) balance between the likelihood of death and the confidence in continuing forward when combined with a variety of traps, environmental dangers, randomly spawning foes, etc. I’m not sure if it’s to a rogue credit like’s or not, but unlike in other games, I didn’t feel like I was going to die at every turn.
But Ultimate ADOM falls short of its predecessor in terms of worldbuilding.
Ultimate ADOM just has one dungeon, as opposed to the developed world, which includes towns, an overworld, and the typical dungeons. Although it’s a sizable dungeon, it feels like a major potential was lost. In fact, Ultimate ADOM resembles Dungeon Crawl: Stone Soup in many aspects, right down to the sub-dungeons (such as the Kobold Fort) that Stone Soup offers.
Although it has been over 20 years since I played the original ADOM, I’m not a Rogue historian, so I’m not sure which features came first. In contrast, Ultimate ADOM feels like a step down from the awesomeness that ADOM was in this sense. The number of factions battling for the McGuffins at the bottom of the deep hole you’re investigating does seem to help with the world’s modest size, but I hope the developers will eventually expand it.
The final point I wanted to make was that Ultimate ADOM still doesn’t feel completely done. Given that I’ve had a few strange crashes, graphic problems, etc., it needs some refinement. I’m not sure why, but I have the impression that there was some pressure to classify Ultimate ADOM as “completed,” despite the reality that was really witnessed. Maybe there was a mistake. Perhaps it was a financial choice. In either case, the oven time for this bun needs to be increased. Although it is not incapacitating, it is apparent. Caverns of Chaos by Ultimate ADOM is a fun game. The situation could have been better, but it is what it is. It’s worthwhile purchasing if you’re a Rogue enthusiast. When you play Caverns of Chaos, do not — I REPEAT — do not — expect to play the classic ADOM with upgrades. This is a unique game with some well-known thematic components. I would beg the developers to keep up the growth and progress, but I see myself playing anyway.
REVIEW : Climber: Sky is the limit (PC)
