DROD RPG: Tendry's Tale
- February 12, 2016
- Caravel Games
Get on Steam"DROD RPG: Tendry's Tale" is a 2D puzzle dungeon crawl game with RPG elements, where players navigate through intricate room layouts to find exits while managing resources, weapons, and armor. The game features hand-crafted levels with deterministic monster battles and custom power-ups, providing a challenging and engaging experience for players. Decision-making is key, as players must choose when to fight enemies and manage their hit points for optimal rewards.
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Reviews
- DROD RPG offers a unique blend of RPG mechanics and puzzle-solving, providing a challenging and satisfying gameplay experience that rewards careful planning and resource management.
- The game features a vast amount of content, including a lengthy main campaign and numerous user-created levels, ensuring high replayability and continuous engagement for puzzle enthusiasts.
- Players appreciate the deterministic nature of the game, where decisions and strategies can be optimized, allowing for a deep and rewarding experience as they learn from previous attempts.
- The game can be frustrating due to its trial-and-error nature, often requiring players to restart from the beginning or previous checkpoints after making poor decisions, which can lead to a sense of deadlock.
- Some players find the lack of clear guidance or clues in navigating levels to be a significant drawback, making it difficult to progress without extensive replays and exploration.
- The voice acting and certain design choices have been criticized for being subpar, detracting from the overall experience despite the game's strong puzzle mechanics.
- gameplay15 mentions
- 20 % positive mentions
- 60 % neutral mentions
- 20 % negative mentions
The gameplay in DROD RPG is characterized by a blend of puzzle-solving and RPG mechanics, requiring players to optimize their choices throughout the game while navigating individual "rooms." Players must strategically manage resources, decide when to engage in combat, and backtrack as needed, which some may find frustrating due to its trial-and-error nature. Overall, the game offers a unique experience that challenges players to think critically and plan their actions carefully, enhanced by a compelling story and soundtrack.
“In Puzzle Quest, you do RPG things using puzzle mechanics.”
“The gameplay experience is further enhanced by an excellent soundtrack and an entertaining story that ties into the greater lore of the DROD world.”
“The gameplay involves figuring out in what order to fight monsters, gain stats, kill bosses, collect resources, and spend keys to ensure that you don't waste enough resources in the long-term to reach the end of the game without getting stuck in an unwinnable position.”
“But that's not the gameplay I was expecting -- to me, trial-and-error is the antithesis of puzzle games and redo-from-start is the antithesis of RPG games.”
“Please note that the gameplay is not like your typical RPG, nor is it all that similar to the other DROD games, although it is still a turn-based game that requires a lot of thinking.”
“The gameplay involves figuring out in what order to fight monsters, gain stats, kill bosses, collect resources, and spend keys to ensure that you don't waste enough resources in the long-term that you're able to reach the end of the game without getting stuck in an unwinnable position.”
- story8 mentions
- 25 % positive mentions
- 38 % neutral mentions
- 38 % negative mentions
The story in this RPG is considered rich for a puzzle game, featuring a deep backstory and engaging voice acting, yet it lacks the complexity and depth typical of traditional RPGs, with few side quests or anecdotes. Familiarity with the DROD universe enhances the experience, but newcomers may feel a bit lost initially. Overall, the narrative complements the gameplay and ties into the broader lore, making it an enjoyable aspect of the game.
“It's a good RPG and a great side story to DROD that shows how things are on the side of one of Beethro's enemies.”
“The gameplay experience is further enhanced by an excellent soundtrack and an entertaining story that ties into the greater lore of the DROD world.”
“This game is story heavy for a puzzle game, but story light for an RPG: there is no complex story to read or numerous anecdotes and side-quests.”
“The story elements are delivered through voice acting and will make you love Tendry for his panache!”
“Storywise, you'll be a little lost if you're not familiar with the DROD universe, but then again, maybe it'll spark your interest and you'll begin the best puzzle game ever made.”
- optimization4 mentions
- 50 % positive mentions
- 0 % neutral mentions
- 50 % negative mentions
Drod RPG is praised for its engaging resource optimization gameplay, where players strategically manage hit points by making decisions on combat, item usage, and power-up collection. While the game lacks animations, the strong voice acting enhances the experience, compensating for this shortcoming.
“Drod RPG is a really fun and unique optimization game.”
“The optimization gameplay involves making decisions about when to fight, when to use keys, when to pick up items and stat-boosting power-ups, and determining the best order to perform these actions (e.g., picking up power-ups before engaging in fights to save hit points).”
“The game is a resource optimization game, where the resource to optimize is your hit points.”
“Thus, the optimization gameplay is making decisions about when to and when not to fight, use keys, pick up items and stat boosting power-ups, and determining a good order to do these actions in (e.g. pick up power-ups before engaging in fights to save HP).”
- replayability4 mentions
- 25 % positive mentions
- 0 % neutral mentions
- 75 % negative mentions
The game offers excellent replayability, featuring a robust base game complemented by a wealth of user-created levels. Players can engage in various strategies to maximize scores, explore secret areas, and experiment with alternate solutions, ensuring a fresh experience with each playthrough.
“There's a lot of replay value in this, as maximizing a score point early in the game will often require a different set of actions than if you're trying to maximize one in the late game.”
“Endless replayability with some absolutely top-notch user-made level sets, as well as a brilliant base game.”
“Replayability (try for a higher score, look for secret areas or alternate solutions, download user-made levels, etc.)”
- humor4 mentions
- 100 % positive mentions
- 0 % neutral mentions
- 0 % negative mentions
The game's humor is highlighted by its quirky character interactions and amusing dialogue, particularly from the main character, Tendry, whose analogies and reactions often elicit laughter. While the voice acting is described as hilariously bad—potentially intentionally so—it ultimately adds to the game's charm and comedic appeal.
“As a fan of the magic tower type genre, I loved the game's interpretation of this format and would recommend it, even if the voice acting is hilariously bad (so bad I can't tell if it was intentional).”
“I also want to mention how funny this game is sometimes.”
“Tendry talks a lot and his quirky analogies and reactions are hilarious.”
- music2 mentions
- 100 % positive mentions
- 0 % neutral mentions
- 0 % negative mentions
The music in the game is highly praised for its original soundtrack, which enhances the gameplay experience and complements the deep backstory and lore of the DROD series. The pleasant interface further contributes to the overall enjoyment of the game's auditory elements.
“This is a numbers game wrapped in a pleasant interface, an original soundtrack, and a deep backstory sprinkled over all the DROD games.”
“The gameplay experience is further enhanced by an excellent soundtrack and an entertaining story that ties into the greater lore of the DROD world.”
- grinding1 mentions
- 0 % positive mentions
- 0 % neutral mentions
- 100 % negative mentions
Players appreciate the grinding aspect of the game, noting that while it involves backtracking to collect health potions, power-ups, and secrets, the well-designed levels and the presence of shortcuts and teleports make the experience enjoyable rather than tedious.
