Vampire Survivors

This week we cover the platformer built off a 2010 Newgrounds flash game Lucky Tower Ultimate and add it to the tier list. Impressive how Studio Seufz was able to convert what was essentially a joke into a fully fleshed out roguelite!Join the RoguePod LiteCast Discord! https://discord.gg/EEwq9VGGKbOn this episode we discuss our time playing Lucky Tower Ultimate, where the premise is that you die fast and often with lots of goofy traps. We were inspired to play this one after seeing someone reference it as "Spelunky-inspired". There isn't too much Spelunky in this game beyond lots of instant kills, but there is plenty of interesting gameplay buried under the newgrounds-era humor here.We've played a lot of roguelites at this point and we were both impressed with how original LTU is. Even the health and loot system that was at first a little off-putting (you lose teeth for health, and you can hold one thing in each hand with some awkward shuffling back and forth) is really not like any other game out there. There's a really interesting metagame layered on top of this goofy platformer and it was a fun one to get into.This game would work well for folks who don't mind instakills and who like figuring out how traps work through trial and error. If that doesn't appeal to you I'd skip this one, but if it does it's a good one!Join the RoguePod LiteCast patreon for monthly bonus episodes! https://www.patreon.com/roguepod Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week we cover the goofy plinko-style roguelite Nubby's Number Factory and add it to the tier list. We poke around MogDogBlog and relish being done with Survivors September!Join the RoguePod LiteCast Discord! https://discord.gg/EEwq9VGGKbOn this episode we dive deep into Nubby's Number Factory, a cleverly made plinko-style game in an early 2000's flash wrapper. There's some clever mechanics under the hood here, like pegs scaling numerically and items/perks combining to legitimately make some cool builds.Nubby's isn't the deepest game but it is good, simple fun. It embodies a lot of the things we really love about this genre: a tight core gameplay loop with replayability coming from unique builds that let you feel smart when you crack them. Each run feels a bit long and the metagame didn't entirely click with either of us but we both had a good time pushing for a W and for a game like this, that is plenty good enough.Join the RoguePod LiteCast patreon for monthly bonus episodes! https://www.patreon.com/roguepod Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Reflections, learnings, and complaints about two years of running our roguelite podcastJoin the RoguePod LiteCast Discord! https://discord.gg/EEwq9VGGKbJoin the RoguePod LiteCast patreon for monthly bonus episodes! https://www.patreon.com/roguepod Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week we cover the action RPG platformer Vagante and add it to the Ultimate Roguelite Tier List. Is Vagante a hidden gem or a wanna be Spelunky-like?Join the RoguePod LiteCast Discord! https://discord.gg/EEwq9VGGKbDanny and David discuss Nuke Nine's sole release, Vagante. True to its influences, it draws from Spelunky and traditional roguelikes such as DCSS. Covering Vagante was a breath of fresh air after covering so many games that lack meaningful procedural generation and/or run-to-run variance. Vagante is a truly punishing game, with many insta death scenarios that many players find themselves disliking. Danny and David barely scratch the surface of the amount of depth present, but make sure to cover important things like all of the game's classes.Join the RoguePod LiteCast patreon for monthly bonus episodes! https://www.patreon.com/roguepod Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week we cover the 2023 Diablo-inspired survivors-like Halls of Torment and add it to the tier list. The final game in Survivors September! Are we too harsh on it because we're just sick of playing survivors-likes? Maybe!Join the RoguePod LiteCast Discord! https://discord.gg/EEwq9VGGKbOn this episode we try to parse the differences in core gameplay loop between our third survivors-like this month. We did both enjoy that HoT gives you some different enemy patterns rather than the slow approach from all corners of the screen, plus the bosses and elite fights are much more bullet-hell feeling and require some actual gameplay. Plus the item system is a bit neat, makes it feel extraction-shooter adjacent, though for all the talk about the game being Diablo-inspired we found the loot to be pretty underwhelming.There are definitely things to like in this game and it's clear why folks who really like survivors-likes click with this one: the sheer number of achievements / quests alone could give the motivated player a lot of reasons to keep at it. For us that are less motivated by achievements, after finishing the five base halls we found ourselves not really sure what we were playing for. The user-applied difficulty modifiers seemed like a circular grind to just allow you to get items to allow you to keep grinding. That loop feels totally fine in some games but we bumped on it hard here.Join the RoguePod LiteCast patreon for monthly bonus episodes! https://www.patreon.com/roguepod Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week we’re continuing Survivors September with the mining spin-off Deep Rock Galactic: Survivor and adding it to the ultimate roguelite tier list!Join the RoguePod LiteCast Discord! https://discord.gg/EEwq9VGGKbCheck out the full tier list at roguepod.show!Join the RoguePod LiteCast patreon for monthly bonus episodes! https://www.patreon.com/roguepod Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week we’re playing the game that spawned an entire subgenre (for better or for worse) Vampire Survivors, and adding it to the ultimate roguelite tier listThe podcast/article that I referenced with Matteo Sapio, the chief strategy officer at Poncle - https://www.thegamebusiness.com/p/the-vampire-survivors-developer-isJoin the RoguePod LiteCast Discord! https://discord.gg/EEwq9VGGKbCheck out the full tier list at roguepod.show!Join the RoguePod LiteCast patreon for monthly bonus episodes! https://www.patreon.com/roguepod Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Sorry for the delay on this one, got some logistics mixed up and then nobody was in town to publish. This week we play one of the heavy hitters, the foundational action platformer Dead Cells and add it to the ultimate roguelite tier list!Please fill out the listener feedback survey to help us make the podcast better - https://forms.gle/Wqiao5narTMChSFr5Join the RoguePod LiteCast Discord! https://discord.gg/EEwq9VGGKbCheck out the full tier list at roguepod.show!Join the RoguePod LiteCast patreon for monthly bonus episodes! https://www.patreon.com/roguepod Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week we play the new biological twin stick shooter Pathogenic and add it to the ultimate roguelite tier list!Please fill out the listener feedback survey to help us make the podcast better - https://forms.gle/Wqiao5narTMChSFr5Join the RoguePod LiteCast Discord! https://discord.gg/EEwq9VGGKbCheck out the full tier list at roguepod.show!Join the RoguePod LiteCast patreon for monthly bonus episodes! https://www.patreon.com/roguepod Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week we play the evolutionary survivors-lite Everything is Crab and add it to the ultimate roguelite tier list!Please fill out the listener feedback survey to help us make the podcast better - https://forms.gle/Wqiao5narTMChSFr5Join the RoguePod LiteCast Discord! https://discord.gg/EEwq9VGGKbCheck out the full tier list at roguepod.show!Join the RoguePod LiteCast patreon for monthly bonus episodes! https://www.patreon.com/roguepod Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.