mrimer
Level: Legendary Smitemaster

Rank Points: 5056
Registered: 02-04-2003
IP: Logged

DROD RPG, inspired by "Tower of the Sorcerer", is a game with unique play that is hard to attribute to a particular established gaming genre.

What genre do you think DROD RPG is?

____________________________
Gandalf? Yes... That's what they used to call me.
Gandalf the Grey. That was my name.
I am Gandalf the White.
And I come back to you now at the turn of the tide.

skell
Level: Legendary Smitemaster

Rank Points: 3734
Registered: 12-28-2004
IP: Logged

For the things I have voted for:

It has various equipment and statistics which you can increase, so it clearly fits the RPG bandwagon.

It's definitely a puzzle game because it's completely logical and deterministic, even if you have to make a lot of uninformed decision for the majority of the game, so puzzle.

You crawl through dungeons. It looks like a dungeon crawler if you don't know better. So I'd say it's a reconstruction of dungeon crawlers (I deliberately linked TV Tropes here even though mechanical deconstruction and trope deconstruction aren't exactly the same thing).

Resource management is basically the #1 thing you do in this game, in a completely different way since most resource management are probably tycoons and RTSes.

Order of Operations Optimization Game (OOOG) as funny as it sounds is a perfect description of what you do in this game. You must constantly optimize and reoptimize the order of operations you do. Your operations are resource management here.

Turn-based strategy because the game is, well, turn-based and it has the strategical aspect of making high-level decisions (although the low-level, tactical decision making is more apparent).

For the things I did not vote:

Adventure games are more about perception and making plot-based decisions

Strategy sounds more like your typical Real-time Strategy game to me.

Roguelike, Roguelite, Roguelike-like is... I can see how someone could mistake DROD or DROD RPG for a roguelike game, but then they'd be probably disappointed that it's something completely different. RLs thrive on permadeath, as much random content as possible and generally [url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rogue_(video_game)]Rogue-like gameplay. The only things DROD RPG has in common with Rogue is tile and turn-based movement.

____________________________
My website | Facebook | Twitter

xpym
Level: Delver
Rank Points: 87
Registered: 03-28-2010
IP: Logged

I think that the least misleading description would be "puzzle game with RPG elements", because iterational solving of deterministic problems is most closely associated with puzzle genre. I also want to stress that mentioning roguelike (or variations thereof) is the most misleading thing to do, because the main properties of those games are random level generation and permanent death, both wholly absent from DROD RPG.

---

[Last edited by xpym at 02-09-2016 07:32 PM]

DezzTech
Level: Smiter
Rank Points: 327
Registered: 03-31-2009
IP: Logged

Without inventing some silly new genres (OOOG) that would apply to like 2 games at most, I'd say what xpym said: "puzzle game with RPG elements" is the best way to describe DROD RPG.

Also, PSA: user-defined tags are a thing. That exists. On steam. And you can even add them to games that haven't been released yet that you don't own.
Here's DROD RPG steam page: http://store.steampowered.com/app/351330/

____________________________

lepke1979
Level: Goblin
Rank Points: 21
Registered: 05-04-2015
IP: Logged

While I like OOOG, I think it will cause more confusion than help. Since if another game like that exists, it won't be in big company.

If anything, can include it as a funny end to the description, "You can think of it as an Order of Operations Optimization Game!" I'm sure there is a way to make it sound better, but I don't drink or guess enough to work in marketing.


It's funny though. Thinking about it, this game really does hit a lot of areas.

Tuttle
Level: Smitemaster

Rank Points: 1545
Registered: 02-22-2003
IP: Logged

I think there's a distinction between what the game is, and the flavour around it.

In terms of a game itself, I see it as a puzzle game. You have a bunch of possible actions at each point in time, and all the time you need to think about those actions, and your goal is to find a sequence which gets you to the end of the game (ideally with the best score). Everything else (equipment, stats, dungeon graphics) is just flavour. I like OOOG as a clarifier even if it's not popular (yet), because it emphasises that the focus is on scheduling those actions rather than figuring out what the mechanics are and how to apply them.

By way of close comparison, I tend to think of Hacker Evolution, which is currently tagged as Puzzle, Simulation and Hacking. Mechanically it's the same sort of thing as DROD RPG: you have a bunch of actions which either strengthen you or consume resources, and you need to figure out an order which achieves the level goals and leaves you as well-off as possible. That's the puzzle bit. But the flavour is completely different; you're hacking systems and stealing money and upgrading your computer so you can hack things faster.

Maurog
Level: Smitemaster

Rank Points: 1501
Registered: 09-16-2004
IP: Logged

"Tower of the Sorcerer is really a non-linear puzzle game disguised as an RPG."

And so is DROD RPG, being a TotSlike and all.

____________________________
Slay the living! Raise the dead!
Paint the sky in crimson red!

Kalin
Level: Master Delver

Rank Points: 185
Registered: 01-25-2016
IP: Logged

I haven't installed DROD RPG yet, but from the descriptions it sounds like it has the same basic gameplay as DungeonUp (which I now see is also descended from TotS). I find it interesting that I'm not seeing anyone calling DU an RPG, instead everyone seems to agree on "rogue-like", "strategy", "dungeoncrawl", and "puzzle".

As others have already mentioned, "rogue-like" isn't appropriate for any DROD game, but "puzzle strategy dungeoncrawl" should be accurate. Does anyone use "deterministic" as a tag?

mrimer
Level: Legendary Smitemaster

Rank Points: 5056
Registered: 02-04-2003
IP: Logged

Whoa. It's on sale for 49 cents on Steam today. I'm interested to see how a randomly-generated TotS clone works.

____________________________
Gandalf? Yes... That's what they used to call me.
Gandalf the Grey. That was my name.
I am Gandalf the White.
And I come back to you now at the turn of the tide.

JamesBond007
Level: Delver

Rank Points: 43
Registered: 07-26-2014
IP: Logged

DROD RPG definetely fits as a mix of Puzzle and Dungeon Crawl with resource menagement.

RPG - not a typical one. It has character stats, which also act as resources, but that's it.

The game definetely isn't a roguelike, unless someone will invent a Random Hold Generator.

Jacob
Level: Smitemaster
Rank Points: 3746
Registered: 10-01-2004
IP: Logged

Maybe this question itself is how to sell the game? Use the fact that it's not easily categorised as a plus point. This then avoids the perceived defensiveness that Tim was talking about.

"What is DROD RPG? Is it a puzzle game? An RPG? Adventure game? A dungeon-crawl? Rogue-like? [complete as necessary] Well, DROD RPG is a a mix of all of these, creating a unique puzzling experience..." (or something like that. I guess it's not really unique, given TOTS but you get my point).

On a related note, I'm not into rogue likes, so describing it as such wouldn't have sold the game to me, but might have worked for someone else. So acknowledging its overlaps with other genres might maximise the player base.

____________________________
New to DROD? You may want to read this.
My Holds and Levels:

---

[Last edited by mrimer at 02-12-2016 02:49 AM]