Well, I'm not much into five stars reviews but this game deserve it from the perspective of a lad who was a young adult when "Le donjon de Naheulbeuk" was released about 20 years ago. I advise this game to teens as it's ludic, and to people who enjoyed the audio series back in the early 2000's. For other people, it's just another turn-based tactical game. The game is loyal to the original material, and I laught during the whole playthrough. They got it right. Then, with a big party composed of dumb adventurers, you clean a dungeon. You just need to know that luck is against you and even if you have 132% of chances to hit, you can make a critical fail. Making combats as epic as in the audio series. Note that hitting an ennemy allow him to make a dodge or parry roll. It's fairly easy in normal except at the beginning. But once you're geared everything is easy. Harder difficulties provide a proper challenge to any player that enjoys it. I'm now looking forward the next game. There's a prophecy ongoing.
Useless DLC. It should have been in the original game or as a free DLC, like some companies do when they release new stuffs but those new stuffs don't weight much in the game. Like MuHA games that offers its DLC and have an interesting starting price. New classes/races/traits/... should never be part of any paying content. Especially when the RP in game isn't that much influenced by your class, race, trait,... Which means there's only a new quest... And background quests are... ridiculous. It's nice to see the intent of making some, but they're useless in the game. It feels like another prologue at the tavern.
The game is pretty interesting. Combat mechanics are easy to catch and give this plateformer a specific taste. Music is cool all the way. Level design is basic and well done as nothing is too hard to catch, movements to go to special areas are not hard to master. Story is childish and basic but it is fine, it's still fun. As an old timer, I'd say that's a perfect game for young players as it is pretty well blended with an okay story that does the job. Maybe it's too short to experience all characters. Because, in your quest, you'll find a lot of companions. And the game is finishable in less than 20 hours. Too bad as almost none of them really have a good story to back them as the game is not long enough to give them more space. I had fun, as much fun as with the Ori serie or Hollow Knight. And that's already a lot for a genre I don't play that much anymore.
While the prologue was very engaging, the game itself is way more than engaging. To me, its only weakness is the "crew combat" system that is not very interesting (however, the caravan one offers pretty interesting way to manage fights). It's basically a turn based system with skills and to me it feels unecessary to have it. Also, I may not have found it already but not being able to have a note system of my own and the ability to mark the map is a bit annoying too, but you can easily cope with. There's a journal with rumors, objectives, tasks,... that does the job pretty well and as the world is changing on a daily basis, marked areas may not be the same if you return there later. As it is clearly written at the beginning, you're in for a lot of text to read. And most of the informations are important, so skipping reading may lead you to death or very prejudicable choices. And I'm fine with it, which explains why I recommend the game to fellow readers. The global lore is pretty nice. The game is hard without being harsh as a roguelike. You can save as much as you want, meaning you can explore the game for more risky options without being punished. Casual players who like reading and exploring, come in. Basically, you are going for some repetitive things while trading, and it'll take a bit of time to do other things like faction quests, harder tasks and companion quests as well as meeting your own goals. As the saying goes, patience is the mother of all virtues, and it matches this game spirit. The "leveling" is really interesting there too. You have "insight" points (as you are a trading explorer), and you need to manage it carefully: either you increase a skill, a trait, an ability,... either you increase the number of companions you can take, either you increase your companions proficiencies,... So you'll need to spend it wisely as you don't get much of them. Overall, that's a success. And I guess replayability is important too.
