OC/DC

Haunted Arcade Game

14.2 hours
6465

Crawl is lots of fun. It's more angled towards multiplayer, and i did play some sessions a while back with friends. This time, for purposes of beating, i just played some some rounds with bots - grinding out unlocks, and doing some trick achievements

The basic idea is an arcade-style action dungeon crawl, where (nearly) everything is controlled by human players. Players are essentially ghosts, who can activate traps in the dungeon, and use pentagrams to summon monsters to fight the sole hero. Landing the killing blow on the hero means you become the new hero, attempting to fight your way to the boss of the dungeon

Defeating your friends' monsters gives XP to both your hero and the monsters, meaning everyone mostly keeps pace with each other. Monsters also have evolution trees, giving their players new strengths and abilities. On the hero's side gold is your friend, buying new weapons, spells, relics, and stat upgrades. The diversity with these items is a lot deeper than it seems at first, with new items being unlocked through successive play sessions

Control-wise, it's kept very simple, following the traditional two-button Nintendo/arcade style - you have movement on the left analog, then one button to attack and one for spells/specials. The special move has a brief cooldown, and the attack has a invisible stamina meter to prevent spamming. As a hero, your first "spell" is a dodge roll, making all the early battles look like beginner Dark Souls PvP (in the fun way)

There's a bit of a learning curve, with the first few sessions being a frantic mash-fest, but with the really low control complexity, you could probably get anyone to enjoy themselves - even successive deaths mean you get to control hulking monstrosities.
The low play commitment of arcade games can cut both ways, making a game that's easy to pick up only slightly less easy to put back down. Tons of fun while it lasts though


stef

oh Crawl! I played that over 6 years ago and forgot all about it! It’s good to know that it still holds up. Not a perfect game but very unique.

OC/DC

“Not perfect but very unique” is a good one-liner for Crawl