Frenzy1
Level: Goblin
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Registered: 12-16-2006
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I recently gave me son access to my Steam account and he was asking if I knew any good puzzle games, so I looked over the list and didn't see anything special but remembered loving drod. I downloaded King Dugan's Dungeon free version yesterday as I remember playing through the entire thing back in the day, but I know it's a bit unforgiving with no rewind feature and opaque slimes and the graphics aren't as good as the newer games.

So I bought Gunthro and the Epic Blunder today (I've never played it), and installed all of my old Smitemaster's Selections.

Do you recommend starting with Gunthro or Journey to Rooted Hold (I don't have access to King Dugan's Dungeon on Steam).

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[Last edited by Frenzy1 at 06-04-2021 02:39 PM]

mauvebutterfly
Level: Smitemaster

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I tried going with King Dugan's Dungeon first and didn't really enjoy it. Gave up after a few levels.

Since DROD was reviewed so highly I decided to give it another try and went with Gunthro and the Epic Blunder. Much better place to start in my opinion. The story and presentation gives it more momentum right from the start, and it actually feels like a puzzle game, unlike the early KDD/JtRH stuff that mostly feels like a turn-based hack and slash experience for the first few levels.

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Pinnacle
Level: Smitemaster

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At this point King Dugan's Dungeon is mostly a historical curiosity rather than a starting point. It was first, but the difficulty curve is all over the place, has a few highly questionable levels (13 and 15 stand out) and almost no story to speak of with the exception of a tiny bit of lore given in the ending. GatEB is a much better starting point, then JtRH after, which directly leads into TCB and TSS.

Smitemaster's Selections tend to be much more difficult than the main holds, so while they can be played in release order alongside the main holds, it's recommended to hold off until you're more experienced to tackle them.

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Once (adv.): Enough.
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t_z
Level: Delver

Rank Points: 34
Registered: 06-15-2006
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I’d recommend playing the games in chronological order, which is also in order of increasing difficulty, according to the Caravel website:

1. GatEB (DROD 4, prequel to KDD; Difficulty 1/5)
2. KDD (Original game, redone in DROD 2 engine; Difficulty 2/5)
3. JtRH (DROD 2; Difficulty 3/5)
4. TCB (DROD 3; Difficulty 4/5)
5. TSS (DROD 5; Difficulty 4/5)

GatEB was specifically designed for newcomers to the franchise. I don’t recall any major spoilers story-wise by playing it first. Experienced DROD players will find it pretty easy, but it’s still fun.

The updated version of KDD is well worth playing IMO. A few parts of JtRH story will also make more sense if you’ve completed KDD.

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[Last edited by t_z at 06-07-2021 02:27 PM]

Frenzy1
Level: Goblin
Rank Points: 19
Registered: 12-16-2006
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Thanks! I've already put 9 hours into GATEB and am really enjoying it. I actually didn't like TCB as much as KDD and JTRH and barely played it as I thought there was too much story, but I think GATEB balanced story/gameplay perfectly.

t_z
Level: Delver

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Frenzy1 wrote:
I actually didn't like TCB as much as KDD and JTRH and barely played it as I thought there was too much story

TCB is big on story with many cut scenes and also a fair bit of wandering around to find the next “level”. But once you get there, you’ll be in familiar territory as each level presents a series of back-to-back puzzles built with a brand new set of puzzle elements, many of them quite unique.

Overall, TCB is a fantastic game and worth giving a second chance after you’ve played through the others.

navithmastero
Level: Smitemaster

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Although TCB (and TSS) are heavier story wise than the others, they aren't story-heavy as such, it's just that at the start (and at various points throughout the game) there are cut scenes etc. In reality, the puzzles come first in every DROD game, if you really don't care for the story then you can just skip it (press space during a cutscene or speech to skip). Personally, I loved the story but to each their own

As an aside, I actually feel that aspects of GatEB's story integration are the worst of all of the official holds!

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[Last edited by navithmastero at 06-07-2021 05:16 PM]

ErikH2000
Level: Legendary Smitemaster

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As an aside, I actually feel that aspects of GatEB's story integration are the worst of all of the official holds!

I'm curious. Why?

-Erik

____________________________
The Godkiller - Chapter 1 available now on Steam. It's a DROD-like puzzle adventure game.
dev journals | twitch stream | youtube archive (NSFW)

Frenzy1
Level: Goblin
Rank Points: 19
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ErikH2000 wrote:

As an aside, I actually feel that aspects of GatEB's story integration are the worst of all of the official holds!

I'm curious. Why?

-Erik

I actually really liked the story! I liked how it was basically a bunch of side quests to rescue different characters, all with their own puzzles, on the way to completing the main story.

I was a huge fan of Architect's Edition, one of my favorite puzzle games of all time and remember spending months beating it. I also liked JTRH but I feel like having a caravel net membership actually lessened my enjoyment of the games as it trigged some OCD and I spent a lot of time replaying and trying to optimize levels to get #1 scores instead of having fun solving puzzles and trying to complete the game.

As I mentioned previously, TCB started really slowly because there was a lot of story and not a lot of puzzles at the start and it never got me hooked, but I'll give it another shot after GATEB.

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[Last edited by Frenzy1 at 06-07-2021 07:21 PM]

ErikH2000
Level: Legendary Smitemaster

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Frenzy1 wrote:
As I mentioned previously, TCB started really slowly because there was a lot of story and not a lot of puzzles at the start and it never got me hooked, but I'll give it another shot after GATEB.

Yeah, I'm realizing now that usually any game with story has this pitfall for the designer to avoid - cramming too much story into the beginning. It always feels like you have to establish certain things for the story to work at all. TCB was definitely front-loaded here. TSS had a giant, short spike at the beginning, (particularly if you asked for the "previously on DROD..." option) and then you were definitely solving puzzles.

And also, if you like the initial story a lot in TCB, but not the core gameplay so much - when the puzzles finally come, you might get frustrated and drop the game right there. I'm pretty sure the demo cutoff point at least gave a healthy sampling of puzzles, so it wasn't bait-and-switch.

This love-story-dislike-gameplay pattern came up for me on Ossuary, where I ran up against a wall with the twitchy manipulation of enemies. Still... I love that weird little game.

In The Godkiller I got pretty determined on smoothing this out. I made a spreadsheet and tracked how each type of story characteristic was distributed across the levels.

-Erik

____________________________
The Godkiller - Chapter 1 available now on Steam. It's a DROD-like puzzle adventure game.
dev journals | twitch stream | youtube archive (NSFW)

navithmastero
Level: Smitemaster

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ErikH2000 wrote:

As an aside, I actually feel that aspects of GatEB's story integration are the worst of all of the official holds!

I'm curious. Why?

-Erik

The story I liked - what I (and from what I remember, others) didn't care for the stomping about that was required, although the more open and non-linear approach was a good idea I don't think it was executed particularly well. This hold structure sort of comes from the 'side quest' approach that has been pointed out above. I much preferred how TSS handled things. I'm pretty sure that at some point in a playthrough I sort of got lost running around Glum Cove.

Also the Spider Cave - yuck.

I'm not sure whether these are story integration issues per se, but it's difficult to draw the line exactly where story integration ends and hold structure begins. To be clear, I still enjoyed Gunthro, but it's my least favourite out of the major releases.



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[Last edited by navithmastero at 06-07-2021 07:44 PM]

ErikH2000
Level: Legendary Smitemaster

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navithmastero wrote:
The story I liked - what I (and from what I remember, others) didn't care for the stomping about that was required,

All the empty rooms with nothing in them were my fault.

I think I had just played some Nifflas games where you'd jump through all these empty places and liked them a lot, so that had an influence. In hindsight, it's pretty easy to analyze and see why it works for a Nifflas game (fast movement built into the game, lots of pretty abstract art).

But in the moment, it's kind of tough.

And there's never a lot of time to consider each choice. You can feel the game's release date receding into the future as you revisit what was happily thrown in the "done" pile.

I'm also really impressed with how TSS handled non-linear gameplay and multiple endings. (Claiming zero credit for that, which is why I feel good about showering praise.)

-Erik

____________________________
The Godkiller - Chapter 1 available now on Steam. It's a DROD-like puzzle adventure game.
dev journals | twitch stream | youtube archive (NSFW)

navithmastero
Level: Smitemaster

Rank Points: 596
Registered: 01-03-2012
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ErikH2000 wrote:

navithmastero wrote:
The story I liked - what I (and from what I remember, others) didn't care for the stomping about that was required,

All the empty rooms with nothing in them were my fault.

I think I had just played some Nifflas games where you'd jump through all these empty places and liked them a lot, so that had an influence. In hindsight, it's pretty easy to analyze and see why it works for a Nifflas game (fast movement built into the game, lots of pretty abstract art).

But in the moment, it's kind of tough.

And there's never a lot of time to consider each choice. You can feel the game's release date receding into the future as you revisit what was happily thrown in the "done" pile.

I'm also really impressed with how TSS handled non-linear gameplay and multiple endings. (Claiming zero credit for that, which is why I feel good about showering praise.)

-Erik

I don't think it was a bad idea at all, just that it didn't really 'work' in that form in Gunthro. Since it paved the way for the way TSS handled non-linearity (which is awesome) I can't really blame you too much! Ultimately, I think it's more of a nitpick than anything else and if I'd enjoyed the puzzles a bit more (difficulty level a bit low for my liking, but that's entirely down to personal preference) then I'm sure I wouldn't have minded it

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Illusionist
Level: Master Delver

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I'm not going to be original, and as you can see there is some general consensus.

I kinda started wtih Gunthro, but Journey is also a good place to start, and it's kinda legendary, as many people (including me) really got into DROD series after that one

King Dugan's Dungeon is the first game, and while it also introduces the game, it has much more of slashing the monsters, which also can be fun

City Beneath and Second Sky will be overwhelming both storywise, as well as difficulty and amount of the game objects, so it's better to leave them for later, and in case you don't know you can download the games in Second Sky and thus play it on 5.0 engine, which has an option for unlimited undo and slightly improved graphics - it's much better to play City Beneath and Journey imported in Second Sky

Oh and thanks for reminding me about the Nifflas games!!!!
It's been a while since I've played it!! I should revisit them

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[Last edited by Illusionist at 06-08-2021 04:20 PM]