Minimal Dungeon RPG

I have been replaying old apps I hadn't seen in a while, and also shopping the Play Store for a new RPG that has any kind of actual character, and it has been enlightening.  Hundreds of these games apps are out now, all so similar and so bland, just click things to get points and items and coins, upgrade the things, fight the things to get more things.  I don't ever feel like I'm in a location or part of a story or campaign, not the way you would walk into a town in a classic RPG and meet all the shopkeepers and stay at the different inns and hear about powerful wizards up in the mountains or when the next pirate ship is docking.  Sure, the numbers are so much bigger than they were when we were tossing out own d20s around and maybe doing 2d6 of damage.  Now, your imaginary little people can do hundreds or thousands of points of damage, and heal 75 hp per second, or whatever the heck is going on.  But bigger numbers don't make it more exciting or feel more immediate.  That's just the endless droning of clicks for increasingly smaller mental rewards.

So why not abstract it back down to just the numbers?  That's what Minimal Dungeon RPG does.  

Each map is a small collection of rectangles with words on them, maybe 8 to 10 boxes per encounter area.  Those areas are connected by doors and there's a mini map showing how they're joined.  You click on Explore or Stone (with a pickaxe), Wood (with an axe) or River (with a fishing rod) to find things.  You get xp and when you level up you can add points to your HP, ATK (attack bonus) or DEF (defense bonus).  Other than that, your stats are: AP for action points (it costs about 8 AP to click a box) and RES for restoration speed.

There are sometimes dark spaces you can unlock with a torch or actual silver or gold locks that need a matching key.  There can be entrances to sub-levels, and of course there are red boxes with the usual types of monsters to fight.  The monsters are very generic, weasels and rats and bats and slimes, but the names do get fairly creative.  There are some buffs or debuffs you might get from clicking boxes or during fights -- as usual, if there's a stat in a game, there's some spell or buff to tweak it.

The levels are designed very well, and you can almost always find your way past the obstacles, sometimes by sidetracking and exploring other levels to find the healing Herbs or Pools so you can run to them when needed.  Some boxes just give funny messages when you click them, and a few of them ask for simple quests or items.

To me, the Items are the weak part of the game, since there are really only four of them: armor, ring, sword and boots.  These have a fair range of bonuses, all the usual ones from Dodge %, Critical Chance %, and so on.  As you go to higher levels you find items with higher levels and higher bonuses, and that is all.  I guess it wouldn't matter if you had a sword with Critical Chance +5% or a bow with the same effect.  But more variety would be appreciated for atmosphere.  Your character (such as it is) has no spells or special abilities, so that's a bit limiting.

Still, with the simple plan and basic tools, the developers put together a fun package.  Each new level feels like it has a theme and some objectives.

Once you get to level 7, you have a camp which links to many important things.  The Story space continues the main story (such as it is), but the Dreamland space lets you spend shards to play an encounter area with the level of your choice.  A level 3 shard generates a level 30 area.  Level 4 gives level 35, and so on.  So if you get stuck in the Story with a monster a little too tough for you, hop out and play through some shards to level up and go try that challenge again.

It's a bit odd, but most of the rewards you get are fruits.  You gather these and make offerings at Altars to boost your stats -- a higher tier offering gives more boosts.  

There's one little Garden space where you can plant seeds to grow some of your own plants.  The Materials space gives you a map full of wood, stone and rivers to get resources from, and the Shard Shop where you can buy shards of various levels if you have enough coins.

This game never tries to sell you anything.  You can watch a video if you want to unlock a box here and there, otherwise, you can get gems for about 7 cents each or pay $4.99 (currently says 50% off) to hide adds forever.

I like this game, it is a fine little set of challenges.  It doesn't pretend to be fancy or brag about its retro graphics (I'm sooo tired of those), or suggest dueling against other players (not my thing), or pretend you're building an empire (you're not).  Poke around, see what I can find, just barely defeat each boss, and wonder what the next levels will look like.  I do wish it had some limited-use items or spells for variety.  I spell or scroll to uncover all blocks on a level would be a nice bonus, or an item buff to stop a foe from healing for 10 seconds could make all the difference in a fight.  There are a lot of things the developers can still explore or expand.