Cavern (by Sami Sierla) [Universal]

[soulinhki]

Hello,

Just released my first game to the App Store, Cavern.

It's a classic roguelike game similar to Rogue Touch etc, but it's not a port of any existing game, instead built from scratch to the iphone.

Some features:
*Shops to buy equipment and sell treasure
*Three characters to play:
-Fighter : strong melee character.
-Adventurer : specialises in bows.
-Mystic : uses wands and scrolls.
*12 randomly generated dungeons in each game.
*5 Special levels you may end up in.
*Over 35 different monsters.
*Over 100 items to find.

My small website:
http://www.soulinhki.com/cavern/

Any feedback and ideas greatly appreciated!

Regards,
Sami Sierla / Finland

Crude youtube gameplay video:

Low bandwidth Version | Pop Up

[LordGek]

Always happy to see a new Roguelike, I will give it a checking!

[Vovin]

Hi and welcome to the biggest and coolest Appsite on this Planet, Sami!

Your game looks nice and I like the shop-idea!
I'm surely checking it out and will review it on a German website.Good luck with your game. I am always into Rogue-likes.

[CommanderData]

This came as a surprise today... Sami actually posted in my ChronoSoft forums as well to let us know about "Cavern", and the fact that Rogue Touch was an influence on his game (we even got a mention in his credits )!

I'm of the mind that the more roguelikes and dungeon crawlers there are to play, the better off we all are... downloading shortly, hopefully this will be a pleasant surprise. I'll try to post some thoughts on it later tonight

[Asphyxiation]

I might get it. Any impressions?

[LordGek]

Originally Posted by Asphyxiation

I might get it. Any impressions?

Sure, still early in my exploration but I'm liking it so far.

-It starts with a two shop town selling some basic survival items (potions of healing and town portals) as well as some at least basic armaments (weapons and armor).

-It is completely turn-based, ala Rogue touch or Nethack.

-It can be pretty brutal going at first as there is no natural healing (only via your healing potions, no waiting around to heal) and even though the basics in town are pretty cheap, loot seems pretty rare in the first few levels I've seen so far so it isn't like you can really easily stock up on these items.

-The game uses a pretty strict encumbrance system with the inventory so you'll often need to drop some heavier items to pick up new ones (I ended up having to drop off my leather armor so I could pick up a big piece of silver ore).

-While the dungeons are randomly generated for each new game, they remain persistent while playing so if you, as my above example, drop your leather armor on level 2, it will be right where you left it once you make it back to the second level of the dungeon.

-The UI is pretty decent. Mainly touch on the screen and your character will head right to that spot and when it comes to combat you can either walk into beasties like in Rogue Touch or just be adjacent to them and hit the game's attack button (how it works when there are multiple opponents isn't super clear but it seems to just target the one baddy until they are dead and then move onto the next one). This attack button also makes fighting baddies with your bow a breeze as it auto targets and fires at the nearest baddy for you, although not sure if there is a way to override this if you, for example, wanted to instead shoot some other guy in the room.

-There are even some clever little puzzles I'm assuming randomly generated (using levers to get at treasures).

-Lastly but coolest in my book, like a TRUE roguelike, there doesn't appear to be any backing up a save of your character. You can quit and save the game at any point but once you die it is OVER and you get to see your entry in the game's Hall of Fame (some points, your experience level, the level of the dungeon, and what killed you).

[soulinhki]

Thank You LordGek for kind first impressions!

I think most are on point but here's some clarifications:

-It's true that the game is quite hard

-Attack button attacks random closest monster, you can attack any monster by tapping on it but with bow/wand you might "miss" tap and walk instead.

-Game mixes randomly generated content with predefined, switch puzzles mentioned are partly predefined but their appearance is pretty random.

[falloutmike]

Will get once I get more itunes Love roguelike games

[LordGek]

Originally Posted by soulinhki

Thank You LordGek for kind first impressions!

I think most are on point but here's some clarifications:

-It's true that the game is quite hard

-Attack button attacks random closest monster, you can attack any monster by tapping on it but with bow/wand you might "miss" tap and walk instead.

-Game mixes randomly generated content with predefined, switch puzzles mentioned are partly predefined but their appearance is pretty random.

Oh crap weasels, am I right in my painful discovery that I can't save the game to resume later!?

[soulinhki]

You can exit the game at any point and it will be restored next time you return, but there are no save game slots.