Skip to main content

Descent: Legends of the Dark

Played solo or co-op, Descent: Legends of the Dark is an enjoyable, if repetitive, dungeon crawling experience.
Descent: Legends of the Dark Game Cover
88%Game Brain Score
Most mentioned positive aspects:story, music
Most mentioned negative aspects:gameplay, grinding
92% User Score Based on 108 reviews
Critic Score 70%Based on 1 reviews

Platforms

PCMac OSWindows
Descent: Legends of the Dark Game Cover

About Descent: Legends of the Dark

Descent: Legends of the Dark is a single player and multiplayer tactical role playing game with a fantasy theme. It was developed by Fantasy Flight Games and was released on August 6, 2021. It received mostly positive reviews from critics and very positive reviews from players.

To play the Descent: Legends of the Dark board game, one player must download the free Descent: Legends of the Dark app on a compatible device. This companion app determines the setup of each quest, tracks your party’s inventory, skills, progress, and resolves combat while telling a narrative story.

Skip Games Like Descent: Legends of the Dark

Games Like Descent: Legends of the Dark

Looking for games like Descent: Legends of the Dark? Here are top tactical role playing recommendations with a fantasy focus, selected from player-similarity data — start with The Lord of the Rings: Journeys in Middle-earth, Mansions of Madness or Sunderfolk.

The Lord of the Rings: Journeys in Middle-earth Image
Games like The Lord of the Rings: Journeys in Middle-earth
Mansions of Madness Image
Games like Mansions of Madness
Sunderfolk Image
Games like Sunderfolk
Gloomhaven Image
Games like Gloomhaven
Descent: Road to Legend Image
Games like Descent: Road to Legend
Demeo x Dungeons & Dragons: Battlemarked Image
Games like Demeo x Dungeons & Dragons: Battlemarked
For The King Image
Games like For The King
Spirit Island Image
Games like Spirit Island
Demeo Image
Games like Demeo
Tales from Candlekeep: Tomb of Annihilation Image
Games like Tales from Candlekeep: Tomb of Annihilation
Skip User Reviews

Reviews

92%Audience ScoreBased on 108 reviews
story6 positive mentions
gameplay3 negative mentions

  • The companion app is well-designed and enhances the gameplay by handling bookkeeping, game flow, and dungeon master roles, making sessions smoother and more immersive.
  • The game offers a rich, cooperative dungeon crawling experience with high-quality miniatures, engaging crafting systems, and strategic combat that appeals to both solo and multiplayer groups.
  • The modular 3D terrain and interactive environment add a strong visual and tactical element, supporting a variety of play styles and providing a highly replayable campaign with meaningful choices.
  • The lack of voice acting and some low-quality art and narrative elements reduce immersion and can make the story feel tedious during group play.
  • The app does not support cloud saves, requiring manual backup of save files, and some users experience technical issues and crashes, which affects convenience and reliability.
  • Game length and set-up can be time-consuming, and some players find the gameplay grindy or overly reliant on repetitive combat and terrain building, leading to mixed opinions about pacing and engagement.
  • story

    37 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
    16% positive mentions, 76% neutral mentions, 8% negative mentions

    The story is highly praised for its immersive, evolving narrative driven by player decisions and well-integrated app support, offering varied main and side quests that impact gameplay. While some find the story somewhat linear or simplistic, most appreciate its depth, the "fail forward" mechanic, and how player choices meaningfully influence missions and outcomes. Overall, the story enhances engagement and replayability, especially as players progress beyond initial missions.

    • “Another mention about Descent is that failure isn't the end - the story will evolve and change based on your successes and failures, and any loot you may have missed can eventually be purchased from the store for in-game gold that you will acquire through missions.”
    • “At first, we thought these were completely arbitrary, however we quickly learned that the decisions your group and character makes will actually have a direct effect on both the current, and future missions.”
    • “The app drives the action and story while providing a great visual backdrop to the table and helps with the immersion into the world, especially in between missions.”
    • “The story was written by a 12 year old who watches too much TikTok.”
    • “Silly story.”
    • “Story that is on rails.”
  • gameplay

    6 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
    33% positive mentions, 17% neutral mentions, 50% negative mentions

    The gameplay offers a balanced mix of strategic mechanics like card flipping and dice rolling, providing depth without excessive complexity. While some find it engaging and well-integrated with the physical components, others feel it can be repetitive and overly focused on terrain building. Overall, it is functional and enhances the story, though opinions on its pacing and complexity vary.

    • “Loving the story and gameplay!”
    • “Gameplay is pretty good and the app works well.”
    • “It's a tedious linear moneygrab with way too much terrain building, repetitive combat and mediocre gameplay.”
    • “The gameplay mechanics (flipping cards strategically, rolling dice, etc.) have the right amount of depth and allow each character to show their characteristics and personality without becoming unnecessarily complex.”
    • “The gameplay mechanics (flipping cards strategically, rolling dice, etc.) have the right amount of depth and allow each character to show their characteristics and personality without becoming unnecessarily complex.”
  • music

    2 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
    50% positive mentions, 50% neutral mentions, 0% negative mentions

    The in-game music was often turned off by players in favor of their own selections, suggesting it was not a standout feature. Overall, the game's audio elements, including voice acting and music, were considered adequately handled but not particularly memorable.

    • “Voice acting, nice art, music, resource management etc. handled for you.”
  • grinding

    1 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
    0% positive mentions, 0% neutral mentions, 100% negative mentions

    The grinding in the game is widely seen as tedious and repetitive, involving excessive terrain building and combat that contribute to a monotonous and unengaging gameplay experience.

    • “It's a tedious linear moneygrab with way too much terrain building, repetitive combat and mediocre gameplay.”
Skip Critic Reviews
Skip Game Offers

Buy Descent: Legends of the Dark

Play Times

31h Median play time
23h Average play time
5-40h Spent by most gamers
*Based on 2 analyzed playthroughs
Skip Videos

Videos

Skip FAQs

Frequently Asked Questions

Descent: Legends of the Dark is a tactical role playing game with fantasy theme. Common tags for Descent: Legends of the Dark include free to play, co-op campaign, 3D, narrative, tabletop and others.

Descent: Legends of the Dark is available on PC, Mac OS and Windows.

On average players spend around 23 hours playing Descent: Legends of the Dark.

Descent: Legends of the Dark was released on August 6, 2021.

Descent: Legends of the Dark was developed by Fantasy Flight Games.

Descent: Legends of the Dark has received mostly positive reviews from players and mostly positive reviews from critics. Most players liked Descent: Legends of the Dark for its story but disliked it for its gameplay.

Descent: Legends of the Dark is a single player game with multiplayer and local co-op support.

Similar games include The Lord of the Rings: Journeys in Middle-earth, Mansions of Madness, Sunderfolk, Gloomhaven, Descent: Road to Legend and others.