I chose to play my first game as Bhima the kshatriya. Some person named sevak (no capital S; is this a title or a proper name?) was there, but just wandered around as I killed my first few cultists head on. Hearing "the sounds of fighting", I turn a corner only to see a naga standing over sevak's corpse. It's clever how you display the enemies' facing with colour. It was very suspenseful to hide behind a corner hoping to flank attack the naga. Sadly, my strategy didn't work, and I proceeded to join sevak on the floor. My next guy, Jagganath the shikari, lasted a bit longer, but was finally clawed down by a tiger in a doorway. It seems wiser to rely more on stealth (close the door right on the tiger's snout, and explore elsewhere first). I'll have to try it out a bit more to get the proper feel, but some first impressions, at least ...
Setting: Yes, love it! My attention was already caught with "that Islamic Roguelike", and I heartfully approve of this, as well
The execution is schematic, without feeling too exotistic, and the ingame dictionary is a boon. For a larger scale game with a greater amount of obscure terms, I think giving items extended descriptions would work. I haven't yet played as a brahmin or indeed seen much of the game, but looking forward to it.
"x" command: Now I have to choose a coordinate and press Enter to see what's at that point. In many (most?) RLs, when you move the Look-cursor, a message describing what you're currently pointing at, scrolls in the message area (optionally, press Enter for an extended description). This traditional approach I find less bulky. If you want to further develop the game, I'd also root for some kind of autotargeting for missiles (even if just remembering your previous target).
Numpad: I'm on a laptop, so relying on the numpad is a slight hassle. Vi keys are good to have implemented, but not my personal favourite. I find accessing diagonals with the regular 1-9 keys surprisingly comfortable in eg. ADOM. There's also some who allow Shift+arrow key to rotate the direction 45°.
Explicit facing: This is always difficult to get right, but I have an inclination for games with this feature. The big problem is that moving around takes more key strokes than what feels "economical". Turning takes no game time. I don't know how I feel about that – it leaves you pressing even more redundant keys to orient yourself, for one thing. If it would cost a (half/whole) turn to rotate, you'd be less inclined to waste a key stroke. That would also mean that attacking from behind would be even more of an advantage, for good or bad.
It may be that explicit facing and the tight tactical playstyle that follows, is better for a rather more unicursal dungeon, where you rely less on exploration and try to get straight to the nitty-gritty of tactical encounters. Though you'd need pygame installed, you might find a slight interest in
a tiny game/test I made, where I think it works ok with explicit facing on a hex grid [sic], though the levels are extremely simplistic.
Anyway, I came for the setting, like a fly to the honey pot, and I'll definitely give it a few more tries to see what might still be hidden in the dungeons of Rasatala.
As always,
Minotauros
