4/5 ★ – Itsgrimsby's review of Dicey Dungeons.

Dicey Dungeons is exactly my type of game; it’s a turn based rogue like that requires tactical planning, and has different characters that feel drastically different to each other. However, it’s overall a fairly more shallow experience than some of its competitors. The first thing that really stands out about this game are the six different playable characters. You start out as the Warrior, who introduces you to the way the game works (with different abilities that are fuelled by randomly rolled die). Then you move onto the Thief and Inventor who play similarly but with abilities that allow for more creative ways to play the game. Finally you unlock the Robot, Witch, and Jester; who completely change the way the game is played while still keeping the same luck infused turn based combat and familiar enemies and rules. I think five of these are really fun to play as (if a little easy to win with once you’ve got them figured out) and then there’s the Witch, a character who is so difficult to me that she made me consider reviewing this game half a star lower. I’ve completed three of her episodes but still find myself bashing my head against the remaining few, I’d guess that over half my time in this game has been spent failing these three episodes! I’d almost rather the other characters be slightly more challenging so as to not create such a huge difficulty spike. This does bring me to the next thing I like about this game. The episodes. Each character has six episodes and they all follow the same pattern - Introduction, New Rules x2, Elimination Round (same as before but harder), Parallel Universe (new equipment and all status effects function differently), and Bonus Round (elimination round but with random rules on top. Out of these the real fun is in the creative episodes 2 and 3. Each is designed to change up the character in a way that forces you to think differently about the way you’ve played so far. The episodes are a blessing and a curse for the game. It gives a greater sense of progression in the game overall - I feel close to actually beating it and being able to move on once I’ve completed all 36 episodes. But I also feel no desire to replay a completed episode, and I know that once I’ve beat all of the episodes I’ll be done with the game. Compared to its competitors; like top of the genre Slay the Spire, which I could play endlessly and keep wanting more, it’s a shame that the game lacks any more depth. (Though it is a good thing for my ever growing backlog…) The platinum trophy is a decent one overall; there’s fun miscellaneous trophies which require some pre planning to get a build that will allow you to achieve them (such as building up a shield of 40+ and then following that up with a specific ability that allows you to convert that into attack damage to deal a crippling blow to any enemy in the game). The only thing that’s keeping me from it now is that pesky Witch. Speaking of, I’d better get back to it…