void tRrLM(); //Void Terrarium

I went into Void Terrarium a little apprehensive. With every indie out there scrambling to call their game a "roguelike", and with so many Mystery Dungeon roguelikes on the Nintendo Switch already, it can be difficult to muster up enthusiasm for yet another one. NISA and Furuya Masayuki surprised me, though. From the gentle subversion of the nature of progress in roguelikes, to the razor-focus on a sweet, paternal-style relationship between a robot and his ward, told with minimalistic elegance, Void Terrarium is a mature, different, and interesting take on the genre.

Unlike that other game about the mushroom-y apocalypse, Void Terrarium is an optimistic game despite its dour premise. It isn’t afraid to be funny even in a sad context, and it really clings onto a sense of hope.

It is exceedingly rare to have a video game bring up what essentially amounts to existentialism, and raise questions about a player's own life, all with very little dialogue. The emotional engagement for having the two primary characters not talk was stunning, and the inversion of real life pet toys was an interesting irony this played with very well. The setting, atmosphere, and story, were the high marks of the game, and while the actual dungeon crawling is purely average, having the girl back at home that constantly needed taking care of, added a needed sense of tension. Being able to raise deep concepts about duty, life and entertainment, makes this stand far above many other games.

void tRrLM(); Void Terrarium is a roguelike dungeon-crawler that doesn’t punish the player after a death. Instead, it creates a challenging gameloop in more unique ways revolving around keeping a young girl alive. Each item crafted progresses the narrative as your terrarium becomes the set-piece of all your hard work. Even with a slow and almost confusing beginning, this game really shapes into one of the most accessible roguelikes that I have ever played.