The Problem with Reviewing Roguelikes

i just want to ask you something real quick let's say i played hades for around 15 hours i've unlocked a small chunk of the upgrades stumbled across boons that have barely any idea how it synergizes with my build and managed to down the final boss by some sheer chance and reach the surface for the first time then i review the game saying how the story is the major selling point and that it has really flashy animations but uh the game mechanics are a little complicated eight out of ten is this a valid review let's say i played binding of isaac for around 10 hours using the starter character isaac picking up every item that i have no idea what each do and finally managed down mom for the first time i praised the game for its variety and items but uh the carnal controls are kind of outdated in 2022 it's a little clunky and there's too much rng involved in runs seven out of ten is this a valid review let's say i played slay the spire for around 20 hours playing as ironclad and picking up every card that i think looks cool but have otherwise no idea how they synergize with one another i pick up the corruption card for the first time and realize it's single-handedly carrying me through the game beating the act 3 boss for the first time i put up a review saying how the card approach is very unique in the roguelike genre praising the game for its degree of freedom while building your deck but uh runs take too long and there's too much discrepancy between card quality corruption is clearly the best card in the game eight out of ten is this a valid review today i wanted to cover a topic that's been wing on my mind for a while being a fan of the roguelike genre a specialty of games from this category is in its difficulty design reviewing roguelikes is a little different from other genres if you answered that any of my reviews of the three games i mentioned are invalid why is that to what degree does it make someone qualified to judge a roguelike in its entirety to what degree do you need to have played the games to have an accurate picture of its quality let's take things one step at a time and really step into the unworldly phenomenon that is roblex in a world where the video game medium has been ever growing in popularity it becomes harder and harder for a game to stand out from the rest and thus enter the roguelike genre unlike convention and gaming experiences the player progression of playing a roguelike can feel very different one aspect that the genre boasts that cannot be replicated in other genres is replayability once you die you are kicked all the way back to the beginning spend some points unlocking some upgrades do another run die again but making it a little further this time and repeat while the game is technically you embarking on a run over and over again the sheer amount of variety and randomness can offer hundreds of hours of enjoyment regardless of what game you're playing but here's the thing how long does it take to explore everything a roguelike has in store in order to accurately review a roguelike you would expect that the reviewer would have played the game a fair bit have known pretty much all there is to come up with an accurate judgment that viewers can feel satisfied with should the reviewer take 10 hours 20 hours or 50 hours playing the game now let's be real here a single successful run of any roguelike really shouldn't take that long out of all the ones i've played usually one hour is enough to down the final boss and end your run but sometimes more often than not we see a big disconnect whenever reviewers say one thing yet players of a game says another now this is to no surprise when the reception around a game is different for players that are actively playing it and engaging with the community versus someone that just stumbled across the game on a sale picked it up and tried out for 10 hours no matter what game you play no matter which genre you're either an insider or an outsider however just how long do you need to engage with a game to be considered an insider this question is especially important for roguelikes as there's no definite end to games of this genre they are designed to be played over and over again there will usually be a point in time where you finally get a roguelike understand its mechanics how items interact with one another what the nuances between choosing one item over another are so how long will it take for one to get the game if i beat binding of isaac once but have only unlocked 20 percent of the items and characters yet did i get the game if i beat hades once haven't played with every weapon aspect or keepsakes yet did i get the game if i beat risk of rank 2 once with one character but did not learn anything about obliterating or have played any of the other characters did i get the game so i was on a forum once and someone stated that the tainted lost character in binding of isaac takes at least 150 hours of play time to understand are they right do i really need to spend the time equaling twice the run time of the entirety of breaking bad 40 more hours to beat the entirety of witcher 3 and its dlc's to understand one character from a roguelike no of course not that's stupid in fact if you ask me tainted loss is one of my least favorite characters from the game i mean you literally have no health your run ends the instant you take any form of damage and you are soft coated to not encounter any items that could give you extra lives but i am sure every time i die is tainted lost it must be a skill issue on my end you know i will unironically prefer to do a run with jacob and esau but this is a topic that will be saved for another time my point with all of this is the roguelike genre is one that demands you to understand its mechanics if you wish to master it in a lot of cases yeah you could spend 10 hours grinding out a win not understand anything about the game and move on to the next game on your catalog but to truly become a fan of a roguelike will take patience and time and this is what i really like about the genre all roblox even if they look similar all function fundamentally differently if i'm so good at dead cells hakka might suck at skull the hero slayer they're both metrovania-esque games both platformers and have similar hack and slash combat with many items to synergize your build with the thing is that because the roguelike genre tends to be indie games its mechanic is untainted by the copy and paste gameplay from the so called aaa developers if you play one ubisoft game you pretty much played them all if you're good at fps's you'll probably feel right at home with any call of duty game the thing is that a lot of modern releases these days share this similar formula an impressive open world with nothing to do generic characters and shallow story the same repetitive combat with a linear upgrade system it feels like playing a game i've already played it's time to give me something new with each battlefield game you can literally predict which mechanics will be present in fact you can literally do a checklist of all the features that are missing and you know the game is gonna suck ass anyway so you should probably stop buying them the thing about roguelikes is that you can't predict anything about them even if they have mechanics that feel similar to something you've already seen how long will it take to understand the lore fluidity of the character movements the level layouts and the boss designs this is the reason why i've been so fascinated with roguelikes and why i've been covering content on one for such a long time so to answer the question what is the problem with reviewing roguelikes and for that i can only think of one answer realistically i can only say that it depends all roguelikes are single player games there's really no limit of what you can and can't do like in dark souls there's no such thing as a best and slot item or having a build that can cheese the game the only thing you're limited by is your own knowledge of the game and experience when a reviewer says where a roguelike does and does not do well really take that with a grain of salt roguelikes are not known to have formulaic gameplay you're not supposed to be able to predict the mechanics and progression of any one of them you're not supposed to win the game a hundred percent of the time and you're not supposed to know how long it will take for you to get the game this is a genre that appeals to a specific fan base but it appeals to that fan base very well the thing is that with roguelikes the truth about it is always changing if you ever find yourself unable to beat a roguelike just know that feeling frustrated is all part of the experience thank you for coming to my ted talk and if you'll excuse me i'm gonna go die to millennia for the 420th time

Channel: Pseychie

Views: 262,187

Keywords: dead cells, dead cells guides, dead cells tier list, dead cells gameplay, dead cells 2022, dead cells fatal falls, dead cells 2bc tips, dead cells 5bc, dead cells 2022 gameplay, roguelike, dead cells queen and the sea, dead cells queen sea, dead cells dlc, pseychie, hades, noita, enter the gungeon, binding of isaac

Id: 8pqAbaX9LcA

Length: 8min 45sec (525 seconds)

Published: Thu Apr 14 2022