CRYPTARK is yet another indie "rogue-lite" that suffers from the issues almost all modern indie games do: bad level design/randomization, forced permadeath, and gamebreaking bugs. I would not recommend this unless, like most games on Steam tagged with Rogue-lite, you are okay with spending $10 on a game you'll become very frustrated with and probably never complete.
The basis of anyCRYPTARK is yet another indie "rogue-lite" that suffers from the issues almost all modern indie games do: bad level design/randomization, forced permadeath, and gamebreaking bugs. I would not recommend this unless, like most games on Steam tagged with Rogue-lite, you are okay with spending $10 on a game you'll become very frustrated with and probably never complete.
The basis of any video game involving moving a character through an environment is good level design. A well crafted map can be the difference between de_dust and well... anything experienced in this game. Level generation in CRYPTARK is a non-sensical, cluttered mess filled with rooms that are empty except for a single enemy, doors that open into solid walls, and rooms with multiple doors but only one locked entrance. Enemies will also ignore these shortcomings and can fly and attack through doors and even some walls, turrets will shoot hitscan lasers from off-screen, and spawners will send armies after you from literally the opposite side of the map. On top of that you have to deal with the visual clutter on the screen from the derelict art style. I understand that these maps are supposed to be on an abandoned, long adrift fleet, but that doesn't mean everything has to be so claustrophobic and visually noisy. I enjoy the tactical challenge presented but you're usually fighting against a bad or cluttered level design rather than a complex or hand-made map.
Of course, being an indie game in 2017 means you have to have permadeath. This makes sense in the "Rogue" game mode provided but there's really no reason to not have a save system in the main Campaign mode. There is clearly some sort of save system in Campaign too because when the game crashed on me it kicked me out of the ship I was in and brought me back to a mission select menu. At this point I'm just going to asssume any indie game that forces permadeath is too lazy to code a save system because there's really no reason for it in Campaign.
You might be thinking "What's wrong? Can't handle permadeath?" I wouldn't mind attempting an Ironman run if the game actually worked properly. I attempted roughly 10 Rogue mode playthroughs and 3 of them ended at the Cryptark because of a game-breaking bug crashing the map. This would kick me out to the main menu and force me to restart the entire run again. I have played and beaten actual rogue-likes before so I find this kind of punishment completely uncalled for in a game mode that is mandatory to unlock the Cryptark Excavation mode.
I feel no desire to continue playing until Rogue mode is playable so I can actually unlock the last game mode. This might be fun for a few hours once you get past the massive learning curve but it's yet another indie rogue-lite that most people won't complete. I personally won't recommend this until they can fix the bugs and prove that the level generation has been improved to look less like a monkey-coded mess.… Expand
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