The more I think about it, the less I like Brogue. It seems like it should be really good, and it's definitely got the flash, but it still suffers from the design errors that I tend to hate in "classical" roguelikes. Same with dcss. They're both great games, don't get me wrong, just flawed in the end.
I just tried Brogue on the fly in the past, for some reasons i was note very appealed.
Could you explain what you don't like of classical roguelikes?
It's simple really, and the major design flaw is something I fundamentally don't understand. Roguelikes are
supposedly about tactics and strategy. Look a bit deeper and I think it breaks down. If you are good enough to get past maybe level 3 in dcss you hit this coasting period. You really can't die unless you do something stupid, and when you
do die it's because the game got so boring you stopped paying attention. So why are those levels even there? Another thing that annoys me is the heavy chance element. If you look at
http://roguelikedeveloper.blogspot.com/2012/08/first-win.html you will see a very specific example of this. It's that lack of feeling a threat that bothers me. Obviously I'm not going to say that it was no accomplishment to win, it was, but I think those types of circumstances soil the experience a bit.
Now I don't want to be completely negative here, since I
do enjoy playing the classic roguelikes from time to time, but in my mind they completely fail to do what should be the great thing about a roguelike. That's honestly why I wrote my roguelike, because I felt that even the so-called
major roguelikes "got it wrong" in a sense. Obviously spoiler-necessary content is another terrible thing, although it can be fun if you like that sort of thing. Anyway, Epilogue basically cuts out the bs from the roguelike genre. You do not ever coast. The first 3 levels are a bit chill while you build your character (although you can still die if you make mistakes) but after that is the only roguelike I've played where I literally stop and think
every single turn. I think they've talked about that on rlr as being the goal of a roguelike in some respects. Every turn should matter. On the last level I honestly stop and examine my surroundings after every step. The tension is just really that high. And best of all, things are balanced so tightly that you really can't blame the game for your death (although you might if you don't understand the game).
