Reviews > Dungeon Maker
(PSP) 7.5
July 20, 2007
Out of nowhere, with no fanfare and not much coverage, developer Global A Entertainment has sprung an awesome little trap on me in the form of Dungeon Maker. While playing Dungeon Maker, I found myself basically compelled by the premise while simultaneously amused by the fact that Global A Entertainment got away with forcing me to do my own level design for the game, essentially relieving themselves of a large portion of the job in the name of novel game mechanics.
In Dungeon Maker, Global A Entertainment casts the player as a nameless adventurer who plans to build a dungeon outside of town in order to capture the Wandering Demon. The idea is a little strange, and many of the characters in the town tend to question your sanity at first, which is fun, but they are still pretty cool about selling you the stuff you need to add rooms and decorations to your labyrinth, as well as other items.
Once you've settled into the game, the rhythm follows a simple daily cycle. You wake up every morning with the ability to purchase restocked items from some of the shops, head into the labyrinth, clear out a level or two of monsters, then begin making additions to your latest level. The larger and more well-decorated your dungeon becomes, the higher the level of enemies it attracts. When you're done defeating enemies and adding to your labyrinth, you can head back to town, sell your spoils to bankroll the next day's purchases, and eat a meal to power up some of your attributes. You're only able to enter the dungeon once per day, sparing completists such as myself.
Rather than leveling you up through experience points, the food is the main method of character advancement, forcing you to make gains at a consistent rate. As well, the pacing of your advancement is a result of achieving specific goals, such as building a special room to attract a boss monster, or finding a certain item that only some enemies drop. Once you've completed these tasks, you get the option to buy a set of stairs and move on to the next level of your dungeon, where the construction process begins anew.
Dungeon Maker managed to keep my interest fairly well at first. It plays sort of like a handheld Diablo, minus the named monsters. Strangely, despite the fact that you don't get levels, the enemies do. Unfortunately, you end up fighting those same enemies over and over. As well, many of the characters in town tend to be kind of light on interaction, making a few canned comments, assigning you a find the item quest, and rarely revealing much in the way of story.
In fact, I would say that the game's biggest issue is a lack of character. Very little is revealed about the protagonist at all, and he never directly interacts with others. I can sort of understand that, it's a common approach in video games, but neither does your look change with new armor or helmets, although you can see your shield or weapon. Returning to the same town, speaking to the same people, and encountering very thin story or character development eventually gets a little stale.
That being said, the desire to construct the perfect dungeon kept me interested for quite awhile, a fairly difficult feat to achieve. The cycle of the game paces you fairly well as you enter the dungeon for a finite amount of play, leave, take home your earnings, and rest for the night, restricting you to bite-sized periods of combat, balanced with construction. I ended up drawing up designs while not playing the game as well, something I haven't done since the original Sim City. Overall, Dungeon Maker is a fairly good game.
Visuals – 6.5
Audio – 7
Control - 8
Story – 6
Fun – 8.5
Value –7.5
Style – 8
Overall: 7.5 (Solid)
*Brian Schulman - Associate Editor, GameWad.com
SECOND OPINION: *Eddie R Inzauto - Senior Editor, GameWad.com
I thought Dungeon Maker was a pretty solid little game. I really liked the fact that Global A made something that differs from the norm by actually combining genres to make a hack 'n' slash sim RPG. That's pretty unique.
Nothing felt generic about Dungeon Maker except the actual combat, which was still quite enjoyable, and the dungeon-building aspect appealed to my Sim City and Dungeons and Dragons sensibilities. As for the in-town portion of the game, it serves its purpose well, and does it in a new and interesting way. The entirety of Dungeon Maker flows very well, and as Brian said, creates a rhythm of gameplay that just feels good. Just a single adventure into your dungeon each day is a perfect design for the PSP. It offers bite-sized entertainment and can be popped on and off whenever the player feels like doing some building or killing.
Overall, the game gets my official seal of approval. It is fun, functional and innovative. Works for me.
Overall: 7.5 (Solid)
