Dungeon Rats
October 2021 Update
- Updated localizations.
September 2021 Update
- Localization code and language switching improvements.
Read Before Buying
Lately we’ve been getting a lot of negative reviews from people disappointed with Dungeon Rats because it is just a tactical combat game and lacks the storytelling and quest design we had in The Age of Decadence.
Age of Decadence is a great game, but I just couldn't get into Dungeon Rats. There's almost no story, just fighting, and it's nowhere near as fun as I hoped it'd be.
Not sure why they decided to make the follow up to one of the best crpgs I've ever played a boring and relentless combat slog with almost zero story.
There’s not enough to do outside of combat. Dungeon Rats features no puzzles, no merchants, a minimal number of dialogues, and a extremely slim amount of exploration. I spent 99% of my game time in combat. I never expected the designers to make another Age of Decadence, but I expected to have more things to do and more things to think about outside of combat.
AoD is a good game. This is simply the combat part with maybe a total of 2 a4 with text. There’s nothing new that spice anything up from AoD combat.
Being a massive fan of Age of Decadence I was really hoping this was going to be a good game but to be honest I am disappointed, No character choices no interactions all there is, is fighting which quickly becomes repetitive. You are always outgunned never have enough resources to heal so frankly disappointing.
We waited for a sequel to AoD but got this generic crawler stripped off all features of the previous game.
It's not like Age of Decadence; no charme - only slightly unfair fights and a shallow story.
Disappointing players who bought our game hoping to enjoy it and have a good time is bad enough, but worst of all is to disappoint someone who was previously a fan of our work.
So, first, let’s start with a prominent disclaimer that hopefully will make sure that no one buys Dungeon Rats expecting something more than what it is:
Dungeon Rats offers nothing but tactical combat for people who like tactical combat a lot. If you don’t like tactical combat or if you want more than just combat, I’d suggest skipping this game and buying something else. While we do want to sell more copies, we don't want people disappointed with what they buy.
Second, we want to explain why Dungeon Rats couldn't be a game like The Age of Decadence. Full-scale RPGs like AoD will always be our main focus but they take 4-5 years to make. In-between we’ll have 10-month “windows” while the next game is in pre-production – just enough time to put together a tactical game using the existing systems and assets but not enough time to do anything else. By their very nature, these smaller games, like Dungeon Rats, can't contain the kind of breadth and variety that our larger games like AoD and The New World have.
We made Dungeon Rats in hopes that a game with challenging tactical combat would be interesting enough to stand on its own. Our distant plan is to make a similar, even more tactically deep follow-on to The New World. But if our fans don't like that kind of game, there's no reason to make it.
So, we'd value hearing more from all of you -- those who liked the game, and those who didn't. If it’s not what most people want, then we’ll file it under ‘failed experiment’ and stick with full-scale RPGs from now on. If, however, most players who bought this game did enjoy it and would like to see more of such games in the future, we’d appreciate if you let us know by writing a review, no matter how brief.
Read Before Buying
Lately we’ve been getting a lot of negative reviews from people disappointed with Dungeon Rats because it is just a tactical combat game and lacks the storytelling and quest design we had in The Age of Decadence.
"Age of Decadence is a great game, but I just couldn't get into Dungeon Rats. There's almost no story, just fighting, and it's nowhere near as fun as I hoped it'd be."
“Not sure why they decided to make the follow up to one of the best crpgs I've ever played a boring and relentless combat slog with almost zero story."
“There’s not enough to do outside of combat. Dungeon Rats features no puzzles, no merchants, a minimal number of dialogues, and a extremely slim amount of exploration. I spent 99% of my game time in combat. I never expected the designers to make another Age of Decadence, but I expected to have more things to do and more things to think about outside of combat”.
"AoD is a good game. This is simply the combat part with maybe a total of 2 a4 with text. There’s nothing new that spice anything up from AoD combat."
"Being a massive fan of Age of Decadence I was really hoping this was going to be a good game but to be honest I am disappointed, No character choices no interactions all there is, is fighting which quickly becomes repetitive. You are always outgunned never have enough resources to heal so frankly disappointing."
"We waited for a sequel to AoD but got this generic crawler stripped off all features of the previous game."
“It's not like Age of Decadence; no charme - only slightly unfair fights and a shallow story”.
Disappointing players who bought our game hoping to enjoy it and have a good time is bad enough, but worst of all is to disappoint someone who was previously a fan of our work.
So, first, let’s start with a prominent disclaimer that hopefully will make sure that no one buys Dungeon Rats expecting something more than what it is:
Dungeon Rats offers nothing but tactical combat for people who like tactical combat a lot. If you don’t like tactical combat or if you want more than just combat, I’d suggest skipping this game and buying something else. While we do want to sell more copies, we don't want people disappointed with what they buy.
Second, we want to explain why Dungeon Rats couldn't be a game like The Age of Decadence. Full-scale RPGs like AoD will always be our main focus but they take 4-5 years to make. In-between we’ll have 10-month “windows” while the next game is in pre-production – just enough time to put together a tactical game using the existing systems and assets but not enough time to do anything else. By their very nature, these smaller games, like Dungeon Rats, can't contain the kind of breadth and variety that our larger games like AoD and The New World have.
We made Dungeon Rats in hopes that a game with challenging tactical combat would be interesting enough to stand on its own. Our distant plan is to make a similar, even more tactically deep follow-on to The New World. But if our fans don't like that kind of game, there's no reason to make it.
So, we'd value hearing more from all of you -- those who liked the game, and those who didn't. If it’s not what most people want, then we’ll file it under ‘failed experiment’ and stick with full-scale RPGs from now on. If, however, most players who bought this game did enjoy it and would like to see more of such games in the future, we’d appreciate if you let us know by writing a review, no matter how brief.
First Look at Colony Ship's Combat
After nearly 2 years of work we finally have a playable build, which is very exciting. It's very rough, of course, as it's the First Iteration of the game and things will change a lot by the time the game is ready to be released.
Right now you can talk to people, fight, loot bodies, increase skills and equip new gear. The dialogue scripts are working like a charm, so you can go through all the fights and get one of 5 endings of the upcoming combat demo. The AI is doing a pretty good job seeking cover, flanking, and using different attacks, so overall things are moving in the right direction.
I'd say we need 2 months to get the combat system into shape before we start beta-testing, then another month before we release the combat demo and get some feedback.
Anyway, here are some screens (click to expand). Keep in mind, that's it's work in progress, as rough as the very first build can be:
Read Before Buying
Lately we’ve been getting a lot of negative reviews from people disappointed with Dungeon Rats because it is just a tactical combat game and lacks the storytelling and quest design we had in The Age of Decadence.
"Age of Decadence is a great game, but I just couldn't get into Dungeon Rats. There's almost no story, just fighting, and it's nowhere near as fun as I hoped it'd be."
“Not sure why they decided to make the follow up to one of the best crpgs I've ever played a boring and relentless combat slog with almost zero story."
“There’s not enough to do outside of combat. Dungeon Rats features no puzzles, no merchants, a minimal number of dialogues, and a extremely slim amount of exploration. I spent 99% of my game time in combat. I never expected the designers to make another Age of Decadence, but I expected to have more things to do and more things to think about outside of combat”.
"AoD is a good game. This is simply the combat part with maybe a total of 2 a4 with text. There’s nothing new that spice anything up from AoD combat."
"Being a massive fan of Age of Decadence I was really hoping this was going to be a good game but to be honest I am disappointed, No character choices no interactions all there is, is fighting which quickly becomes repetitive. You are always outgunned never have enough resources to heal so frankly disappointing."
"We waited for a sequel to AoD but got this generic crawler stripped off all features of the previous game."
“It's not like Age of Decadence; no charme - only slightly unfair fights and a shallow story”.
Disappointing players who bought our game hoping to enjoy it and have a good time is bad enough, but worst of all is to disappoint someone who was previously a fan of our work.
So, first, let’s start with a prominent disclaimer that hopefully will make sure that no one buys Dungeon Rats expecting something more than what it is:
Dungeon Rats offers nothing but tactical combat for people who like tactical combat a lot. If you don’t like tactical combat or if you want more than just combat, I’d suggest skipping this game and buying something else. While we do want to sell more copies, we don't want people disappointed with what they buy.
Second, we want to explain why Dungeon Rats couldn't be a game like The Age of Decadence. Full-scale RPGs like AoD will always be our main focus but they take 4-5 years to make. In-between we’ll have 10-month “windows” while the next game is in pre-production – just enough time to put together a tactical game using the existing systems and assets but not enough time to do anything else. By their very nature, these smaller games, like Dungeon Rats, can't contain the kind of breadth and variety that our larger games like AoD and The New World have.
We made Dungeon Rats in hopes that a game with challenging tactical combat would be interesting enough to stand on its own. Our distant plan is to make a similar, even more tactically deep follow-on to The New World. But if our fans don't like that kind of game, there's no reason to make it.
So, we'd value hearing more from all of you -- those who liked the game, and those who didn't. If it’s not what most people want, then we’ll file it under ‘failed experiment’ and stick with full-scale RPGs from now on. If, however, most players who bought this game did enjoy it and would like to see more of such games in the future, we’d appreciate if you let us know by writing a review, no matter how brief.
Read Before Buying
"Age of Decadence is a great game, but I just couldn't get into Dungeon Rats. There's almost no story, just fighting, and it's nowhere near as fun as I hoped it'd be."
“Not sure why they decided to make the follow up to one of the best crpgs I've ever played a boring and relentless combat slog with almost zero story."
“There’s not enough to do outside of combat. Dungeon Rats features no puzzles, no merchants, a minimal number of dialogues, and a extremely slim amount of exploration. I spent 99% of my game time in combat. I never expected the designers to make another Age of Decadence, but I expected to have more things to do and more things to think about outside of combat”.
"AoD is a good game. This is simply the combat part with maybe a total of 2 a4 with text. There’s nothing new that spice anything up from AoD combat."
"Being a massive fan of Age of Decadence I was really hoping this was going to be a good game but to be honest I am disappointed, No character choices no interactions all there is, is fighting which quickly becomes repetitive. You are always outgunned never have enough resources to heal so frankly disappointing."
"We waited for a sequel to AoD but got this generic crawler stripped off all features of the previous game."
“It's not like Age of Decadence; no charme - only slightly unfair fights and a shallow story”.
Disappointing players who bought our game hoping to enjoy it and have a good time is bad enough, but worst of all is to disappoint someone who was previously a fan of our work.
So, first, let’s start with a prominent disclaimer that hopefully will make sure that no one buys Dungeon Rats expecting something more than what it is:
Dungeon Rats offers nothing but tactical combat for people who like tactical combat a lot. If you don’t like tactical combat or if you want more than just combat, I’d suggest skipping this game and buying something else. While we do want to sell more copies, we don't want people disappointed with what they buy.
Second, we want to explain why Dungeon Rats couldn't be a game like The Age of Decadence. Full-scale RPGs like AoD will always be our main focus but they take 4-5 years to make. In-between we’ll have 10-month “windows” while the next game is in pre-production – just enough time to put together a tactical game using the existing systems and assets but not enough time to do anything else. By their very nature, these smaller games, like Dungeon Rats, can't contain the kind of breadth and variety that our larger games like AoD and The New World have.
We made Dungeon Rats in hopes that a game with challenging tactical combat would be interesting enough to stand on its own. Our distant plan is to make a similar, even more tactically deep follow-on to The New World. But if our fans don't like that kind of game, there's no reason to make it.
So, we'd value hearing more from all of you -- those who liked the game, and those who didn't. If it’s not what most people want, then we’ll file it under ‘failed experiment’ and stick with full-scale RPGs from now on. If, however, most players who bought this game did enjoy it and would like to see more of such games in the future, we’d appreciate if you let us know by writing a review, no matter how brief.
Update #3 - French & Polish
As before, we are humbled and very, very grateful for their effort to bring the game to people who wouldn’t be able to play it otherwise. You can change the language in the Options menu (via the Languages drop-down selection).
Update #2
8 new portraits for your character
Improvements
- Added tanning racks to get more leather
- You can select your characters during the placement phase by clicking on the combat queue.
- The Crafting screen now separates schematics by weapon type and armor material and orders them alphabetically.
- You can now select techniques without the required materials, to preview the bonuses.
- You can see the THC, CS and ADC on area of effect attacks.
- You can now change where your character is facing during combat for 1 AP. Left click on the character and hold to choose direction.
- The textbox can be moved and resized.
- You can use the highest Crafting skill from any companion while in camps even if they aren't in your party
- Clicking on Loot All moves to the next body with items.
Changes
- Increased Hieron's block to 4 from 1 and CS to 5 from 4
- Changed Roxana's xbow/throwing to 6/6 from 5/7
- Increased Yngvar's CON by 1, decreased INT by 1, lowered his Axe and Block to 8 from 9.
- Ant chitin armor weighs less and requires less material to craft
- Killing Roxana grants SP.
- Tweaked gorza's (the new hammer) stats.
- Replaced the fight with 5 ants in the deep caves with a wounded scolopendra.
- Doubled the bonus to vsCS from CON.
- Tweaked CS formula calculation for aimed strikes.
- Ranged weapons use perception for aimed arms and legs
- Whirldwind effect for daggers, swords and 1h spears is bleeding instead of knockdown; higher chance to score.
- Constructs are now affected by knockdown, bash, attack and dodge penalties but they are a bit harder to bash or knockdown than human enemies.
Balance
- Base block is increase to 25 from 15.
- Increased chance to fully block attacks.
- Increased regular shields hardness.
- Increased crude shields vsRanged.
- Shields vsRanged no longer added when dodging (it's taken into account if block + vsRanged is higher than dodge).
- Increased base critical rating to 15 per CS point.
- Changed the berserk potion progression (Max is 40/10 from 50/5).
- Doubled the antidote's effect.
- Made the acid vial's effect stronger and available earlier. Now all of them do HP damage. Reduced throwing range. Increased AP.
- Splash Acid adds AoE similar to bombs.
- Increased Hammers' armor damage to 2.
- Increased Swords' bleeding damage to 3.
- Increased Bows' passive chance
New SP System
The new system makes reaching higher levels more costly, but enemies have lower skills, so the investment gives a better pay-off. Intelligence gives much higher rewards than before, and some SP rewards have been increased.
- Intelligence now gives flat bonus points per combat.
- Increased skills costs for levels 5 and higher.
- Increased SP rewards for some fights.
- Lowered the skills of all enemies to match the new gain from the player.
Bomb Changes
- Tweaked bomb critical formula. Center of explosion adds more bonus, but each point of CON over 6 protects more.
- 25 + Center of Explosion Bonus - (Victim CON-6) x25
- Center of explosion adds 50% to CS chance. Distance from center of explosion lowers this value.
- Increased damage and vsDR bonus.
Fixes
- CS facing bonus works correctly now.
- Fixed the chest near the crystal caves' forge.
- Opponents using Throwing weapons use correct APs.
- Mobility bonus is now disabled for knocked down characters.
- Fixed the disappearing construct issue if sent to the forge before activating the ancient facility.
- Scolopendras now have attacks of opportunity.
- Fixed the projectile collision on long bridges.
- Fixed extreme friendly fire with ranged weapons in crowded fights.
- Enemies will not bash creatures that are immune to bash.
- Fixed the issue with the AI and doors.
- Fixed the passable wall in rock bottom.
- Fixed the loop in crevice text interaction.
Languages
We'd like to thank the Russian and Spanish-speaking players who translated all the text and dialogues. We are humbled and very, very grateful for their effort to bring the game to people who wouldn’t be able to play it otherwise. You can change the language in the Options menu (via the Languages drop-down selection).
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Merry Christmas and Happy New Year! Thank you for your patronage. If you're following our next game, don't miss our latest update introducing the first party member and showing two new locations:
http://www.irontowerstudio.com/forum/index.php/topic,7355.0.html
Update #1
It's been 2 weeks since the game was released, so it's time to roll out the first update.
Improvements:
- Added an optional system to highlight enemies, allies, and active characters (see the screen above).
- Bomb explosions have better sounds and visuals.
- Improved models and icons for armor made from creatures' hides
- Hover your mouse over the enemies to see their hit points (among other things)
- Added more info on weapons (type and one-handed or two-handed)
- Added improved help screen (press F1 when playing the game)
- Bows can be decomposed
- Improved collision and visuals of the black scolopendras' nest
- Schematics icon no longer covers the number of items
Balance
- Increased shields' vsRanged by 5.
- Reduced the Constructs' shield vsRanged to 40 (from 50).
- Slightly reduced the Constructs' ranged damage.
- Fixed the lack of "helmets" on the Constructs.
- Liquid Fire's duration reduced from 4 turns to 2.
- Reduced Roxana's skills a bit (Dagger, Xbow and CS) and her starting skill points (20).
- Reduced Hieron's starting skill points to 10, increased Hammer and CS skill by 1.
- Increased mobility bonus to 3 per tile (from 2).
- The Constructs' drop rock oil not per unit killed but her fight.
- Added more sticks and stones to break your bones.
- Tweaked the chest reward after the second fight (new game only).
- Added more wood in the first levels.
- Tweaked stones and javelins stats.
- Lowered heavy throwing items weight.
- Lowered the amount of alchemy ingredients.
- Added a few extra sources of rock oil.
- Slightly lowered spear interrupt chance.
- Spear Interrupts no longer does criticals
- Rebalanced Scaurus' spear and shield, and made them unique instead of crafted.
New Bomb Mechanics:
- Chance to knockdown is now tied to the CS chance and CON (lower for high CON characters, higher for low CON characters). Before it was tile based (100% if you were at the center, half for each tile away).
- The CS bonus is 30% at the center of the explosion and goes down with every tile.
- Added chance to damage armor. Frag bombs increases the chance.
- Criticals increase damage.
Fixes
- Added Shield Bash ability to tower shields
- Fixed the passive bonus info for bows and xbows.
- Fixed camera jumping up and down on character switch
- Fixed potent poison's damage
- Fixed wrong status icon tooltips displayed over portraits
- You can no longer dismiss allies during combat.
- Fixed getting One Man Band instead of Tinman if you won in normal or hard difficulties ironman.