Are you a mans or a dungeonmans?
Lend me your ears for another tale of a former AAA workhorse who packed his bags his and moved onto the rich, fertile lands of independent development. Jim Shepard, whose resume includes time spent at studios such as Raven Software, Gearbox, and BioWare, has been slowly working on another pet project over the past few years: Dungeonmans.
Dungeonmans is a roguelike from a man who knows his way around a tabletop RPG. Aside from the usual roguelike trappings — permadeath, loot collection, etc. — there is an Academy that you can stock and expand with artifacts and texts you discover during your travels. Should you die and be forced to start with a new character, you will be able to use the resources of the Academy to gain an edge, allowing for expedited progression rather that having to climb back up from the bottom rung after each failure.
There is a pretty beefy demo that you can download here, but in order to get that little extra push to finish the game, Shepard set up a Kickstarter. I’m a little late learning about this, so there are only three days remaining until donations close, though it looks like the $35K goal should easily be met. And while you’re at it, vote for the game on Steam Greenlight too.
Oh, yeah! I almost forgot to mention that the soundtrack is being composed by OverClocked ReMixer Andrew “zircon” Aversa, who co-directed the recent Final Fantasy VI arrange album Balance and Ruin. Enjoy the following samples of his Dungeonmans work:
Dungeonmans: The Heroic Adventure Roguelike [Kickstarter]