Dungeon Keeper

 iOS
User Score
0.3

Overwhelming dislike- based on 624 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 13 out of 624
  2. Mixed: 7 out of 624
  3. Negative: 604 out of 624
Buy Now
Stream On

Review this game

  1. Your Score
    0 out of 10
    Rate this:
    • 10
    • 9
    • 8
    • 7
    • 6
    • 5
    • 4
    • 3
    • 2
    • 1
    • 0
    • 0
  1. Submit
  2. Check Spelling
view
per page
  1. Palkowski
    Mar 4, 2014
    10
    My favourite game on iOS. Very good graphics and sound. Gameplay is very addicting. I recommend this game for everybody. It is that FUN! Greetings form Lithuana!
  2. TheTinyMan
    Feb 19, 2014
    9
    So I was a huge fan of the older games. And the Internet is going to hate me for this - but I think I actually like the mobile game better than the originals. And I haven't dedicated a cent to it.

    The first thing to realize is that THIS IS NOT THE SAME GENRE AS THE OLD DUNGEON KEEPER GAMES. This is a mobile game built for short interactions. When I played Dungeon Keeper back in the    So I was a huge fan of the older games. And the Internet is going to hate me for this - but I think I actually like the mobile game better than the originals. And I haven't dedicated a cent to it.

    The first thing to realize is that THIS IS NOT THE SAME GENRE AS THE OLD DUNGEON KEEPER GAMES. This is a mobile game built for short interactions. When I played Dungeon Keeper back in the day, I basically just built huge rooms, learned how to get the Horned Reaper, and dropped my entire army on the heads of invaders and watched them win. (granted, I was a young kid at the time, and may not have grasped the complexities.)

    In this game, I find myself paying careful attention to the layout of my dungeon. This is for two reasons, One - I need it to be laid out well in order to deter and defeat intruders. Two - time is a resource I need to manage. And this, I think, is where people get hung up.

    There's a really good game here. Prioritizing which room to build or upgrade, picking which units to buy (by the way, I'm pretty sure producing a viable army after a major defeat is MUCH QUICKER in this game than in the classics), even engaging with my guild is a question of strategy, priority, and resource management.

    But time is a resource in this game. In most games, time is *just* an observation of your consumption of the product. In this game, it is itself a commodity, and I need to make strategic decisions about it. Kind of like I do in Starcraft, only they're bigger chunks of time. All the claims I've heard of people taking 24 hours to mine out a single block sound to me like an abject refusal to consider your time tactically. I've never mined out a 24 hour block. I only mine out 4 hour blocks when my imps are bored and have nothing else to do. Normally, when I'm mining, I'm just mining the 3 second blocks, which are by FAR the most common ones. With the speed bonus from beating my imps, my imps are mining at about the speed that I'm tapping if I have two of them freed up for digging.

    To me, the expected interactivity in this game isn't "pay to play" - it's "pay to skip the game." Or "pay to compete even if you suck." Yes, if you're drawing from an infinite cash reserve, you will have advantages over other players - but I haven't seen a single opponent that's made me think, "this guy is way stronger than me," AND, "this guy has sunk a lot of money into the game." I don't know if that's a feature of the game's matchmaking, or simply a difference in who's spending the money. But getting a really good advantage, mining through a perimeter of the 24 hour squares, costs so much money I can't imagine anyone ever accomplishing it with money instead of time. Just for digging.

    I've been trying to find a play-in-short-bursts game that could hold me for more than two or three days, and Dungeon Keeper is the first one to achieve that. With features like refilling dug out passages (using the easy to dig through dirt, not restoring what as once there) and moving rooms around, I'd say that the game does credit to its genre and to the IP. But I can understand how everyone hates the genre-hop - I felt the same way when Warcraft tried to emulate EverQuest and left its RTS roots.

    Of course, my opinion wasn't the majority then, either. :-)    … Expand
  3. versutus
    Dec 6, 2014
    10
    Don't listen to those "core gamer" cry babies (they clearly don't core gamers, just cry babies). If you love Clash of Clans, you will love this one too. This game (despite those negative reviews) is not about microtransaction, you can be good without paying a dime. But ofc if you could spend some dollars/euro/"whatever your currency is" on it, it will be easier for you. I'm playing itDon't listen to those "core gamer" cry babies (they clearly don't core gamers, just cry babies). If you love Clash of Clans, you will love this one too. This game (despite those negative reviews) is not about microtransaction, you can be good without paying a dime. But ofc if you could spend some dollars/euro/"whatever your currency is" on it, it will be easier for you. I'm playing it since launch, I never payed for it, and the game is still fun for me. :-) Cheers!… Expand
  4. mmagic
    May 2, 2014
    9
    Right now this is my favorite game on Android. I'm an old gamer that enjoyed a lot the entire series DK1 and DK2.
    The mobile version is a disappointing in the sense that it lost the feeling of being bad and the fast peace game play. But I ignore those 2 points and focus on what the game offers.
    I can see that the fast peace game-play is still there when I do raids. The strategy aspect    Right now this is my favorite game on Android. I'm an old gamer that enjoyed a lot the entire series DK1 and DK2.
    The mobile version is a disappointing in the sense that it lost the feeling of being bad and the fast peace game play. But I ignore those 2 points and focus on what the game offers.

    I can see that the fast peace game-play is still there when I do raids. The strategy aspect is very important and is found there in the defense of your base, in how you put your dungeon defense, how you trick the minds of other player to chose a certain route which is looking safe but makes them loose their army fast because of well placed traps or tricking their units to walk on long corridors of spikes, or get them in death rooms where cannon, freeze, lightning, burn trap, mushroom and door combine their forces with some attacking rooms and can obliterate and entire army in seconds.

    Doing raids specially involves fast strategic thinking to be able to circumvent traps and to get to the dungeon heart or sometimes just to be happy with plundering as many resources as possible without wining the battle. Sometimes you have to distribute your forces all over the dungeon, sometimes you have too drop all of them at once, sometimes you put some strong units to tank while mags kill without being focused. Sometimes you resurrect and entire army with new skeleton. Sometimes you disable their antiaerian traps with magic to let your ghost get in, disable some freeze traps or shock traps. Sometimes you need to break a few walls with magic.

    Then it's the resource management, which building should I make first? And here is the problem of spending the money because it's true that without spending money the game will take a huge amount of time. But see the bright part! often the best past part of a trip is not to get at the end as fast as possible but to enjoy the great walk and great sights until the end. Strategically planing the building and the feeling of one more day till it end, one more hour.

    Also the social part of having a nice guild can quickly make the game great or ruin it. Also being part of a guild has a lot to do with charity, you help the guild with donations and the guild helps you with support and nice bonuses.

    What I love about the game is that you can concentrate about other activities, you can live your life and dedicate to it as much time as you want and you will be fine without a lot of raids the gold in mines will accumulate during the 8 hours of protection after a lost raid and you will still be able to upgrade things.
    When you have no resources to build just put your imps to dig or build mines and storages which require few resources and a lot of build time.

    I like that EA comes with periodical updates which add new mechanics and now we have even a tournament.    … Expand
  5. shoreline
    May 15, 2014
    10
    This game is great fun if you adjust many of your expectations about the game you're playing. If you don't mind playing a game for a few minutes out of every hour, with mechanics otherwise very similar to dungeon keeper you will enjoy playing this game.

    If you basically wanted to play DK1 or 2 on your phone, or while on public transport, or away from a power source, you will be disappointed.
  6. KBEX
    Jun 23, 2014
    8
    Dungeon Keeper is a great game! Graphics, sound and gameplay are great. And the EA business model in itself is understandable....
    But the speedup prices are about twentyfold of what they should be. I don't object to paying average prices, but the game deserves to have gamers use the cheats and hacks available on the net. Enjoy! ;)
  7. SyndShaw
    May 12, 2017
    10
    After 2017 update, game is worth playing. Never tried it before this update since the reviews where so bad. I don't know if the mechanic changed after the updates, but the building time, cost and microtransactions have uttermost been reduced concidering most of the reviews. Nonetheless I am enjoying to play this gem of a game.

    To bad the scar is to big to restore I am afraid.

Awards & Rankings

1
#1 Most Discussed iOS Game of 2014

Critic Reviews

All reviews »
Metascore
42

Generally unfavorable reviews - based on 22 Critic Reviews

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 3 out of 22
  2. Mixed: 6 out of 22
  3. Negative: 13 out of 22
  1. Gamer.nl
    Feb 19, 2014
    10
    Dungeon Keeper is a new mobile free to play game by EA, and one of the most aggressive games in the genre. It has elements of a game, but these are so well hidden beneath shiny buttons, childish images and tons of tough rock, that it’s better to avoid the dungeon altogether.
    Read full review
  2. SpazioGames
    Feb 17, 2014
    40
    The game is heavily influenced by the in-app purchases, to the point of becoming a pay-to-play title. Don't Play it.
    Read full review
  3. Gamereactor Denmark
    Feb 15, 2014
    10
    Dungeon Keeper is an anti-game. It sucks the joy of gaming out of me and it has no redeeming qualities, not in the slightest. Calling it greedy would be understatement of the year. The already tarnished image of free-to-play could hardly receive a more devastating blow than that which Dungeon Keeper has given it. It eats at my soul every time I play it. And that's why I'll uninstall, nay, banish it from my tablet as soon as I've finished this sentence.
    Read full review
See all critic reviews »