other roguelikes: we're going to put an immense amount of time and effort into creating robust and varied procedurally generated environments brotato: square 😎
@@alt1763 True, they aren't mutually exclusive, but notably I said Classic Roguelike, which alone is far removed from modern Roguelikes. Like, the most roguelike element of it is the random upgrades and permadeath which is a tiny dash of roguelike compared to a classic roguelike. I guess it'd be more considerable as a roguelite, but yeah. Of course, that is not to say it's a negative of the game, as I said, we fuckin ball.
As a concept artist working in AAA, who is now (also) working on solo developing their own project, I found this video invaluable in regards to perspective. You helped me understand things about my approach that I didn't realize. Thank you!
Honestly i think my favourite part of the video was the sheer variety of games you included! The editing and voice over was great, don't get me wrong, but I get so frustrated booting up a video essay like this just to find its filled with the same 3 games. There are a lot of lessons you can learn from the smaller ones too, and im glad that you know that. I also like the fact that even with the huge games that everyone talks about, you go way more in-depth than just the surface like everyone else seems to do. like with enter the gungeon being the game you used as the opener for enemy design! Its such a specific part about a very popular game that most people wouldn't be able to point out and use as an example of how to do things right, but you were able to do that! Things like this is a true mark of a professional and not just some random gamer talking about the same 5 games. It gives actual insight to this topic instead of re-iterating what I already know, ynkow?
I'm actually developing a roguelike right now and this video brought up some very good design tips! Thank you for making it! It has certainly influenced my project!
@@philiphunt-bull5817 haven't burned out yet! I'm super excited about it! Alpha is almost ready, so I can hopefully generate some hype soon! Let me know if you know any communities that would be interested:)
Same here. Also making a game, decided to implement some roguelike elements and boy this helped me not only with the roguelike part but the general objective of the game design I should be looking for
Are you actually developing a roguelike or a roguelite? Please don't be one of those developers that put a giant amount of effort to make a game and then not have any idea what genre it is. For some reason Roguelike is the most affected by this.
yeah like Isaac, Gungeon, Hades, and Risk of Rain footage. Would be a lot better video if he had games like those in the video... Edit: wait this comment was stupid of me... somehow did not read the "only". Ignore this comment
This came up on my feed for some reason and hey these analyses type videos are just my jam. Great voice, background music just fits, passionate yet analytic approach that infects the viewer, and incredibly informative (especially for aspiring game devs). Honestly, I listen to these while doing something else but I somehow kept getting distracted and looking at the video and just appreciating every bit. Definitely subscribing and hoping you get more subs and views (the views rn are criminally low)
Same here man, I think your first points are just describing the type of.vid.... and his.voice which no one can help...... js I would've complimented his tone and articulation or amtg.just staying he has a nice.voice.... like that's nice, hearing that WITH the context that you only listen to these(mainly) is a big difference and makes total sense in the end:) sry not trying to bring any negativity to this awesome positive channel!!
this ain't just a great video, it's one of the most well thought out, researched and informative analyses on game design I've seen to date. I'm seriously impressed by this.
This video single handedly got me playing and addicted to Revita you talked so much about it and I never heard about it prior to this. But I absolutely love the game and it became one of my favorite roguelikes out there
One of the best roguelike videos I have seen so far, great work. Regarding Isaac's level design: I have played way over 1500 hours and still find rooms I have never seen before. For me Isaac is the perfect roguelike when it comes to level design, items and general gameplay elements. I think I will never get bored of it.
Speaking of curses in items, Nethack does some really funny things with cursed items, such as a cursed potion of gain level actually making you go up a level in the dungeon, cursed scrolls of genocide actually create monsters, cursed scrolls of teleportation will levelport you instead of a regular teleport, which is really nice if you have teleport control, etc.
I think one of my favorite types of items has to be ones that make things that are otherwise worthless or just bad, and makes them good. As you said here, the levelport is nice if you have teleport control.
I'm surprised someone brought up Nethack seeing the focus of the video. What I also love of Nethack or other roguelikes more like Rogue, is the survival aspects, meaning you have incentive to use unidentified items or to dip them if really desperate
The real advantage of traditional rougelikes over the modernrun vased twinstick shooters and sidescroller platformers, is that they are filled to the brim with complex interlocking systems. This is allowed by their graphical simplicity and turn based nature, making these interactions much simpler to simulate. I cant see the opportunity to slap people around with the corpse of a gorgon in HADES, to turn them into stone, for example.
As a fan of rougelikes, this is a fun watch. I can't believe how high quality it is but while having such low views. Keep on doing this Pepperhead. I subscribed.
An incredibly helpful, insightful and overall great video! I will definitely subscribe. It was also nice seeing Revita here as well, it is truly a hidden gem of a game.
What a great video. Honestly I have never seen a video on par with the information quality I see in this video. At first I saw 45 minutes and thought, "man this is going to be a while," but after those 45 minutes I realized that it's constantly good information preventing the video from feeling stale. Really well done.
@@PepperHeadGaming I'll try and join in next stream to talk a bit about it. The premise is a rougelike meant for multiplayer, but it's still relatively early in development, there is gameplay, it's just not as fun as I want it to be yet.
Never take this video away! Just in the works of developing a rogue-like, like so many others here (maybe 'cause we thought it'd be an "easy enough" genre to learn dev-stuff on). And just when the mechanics of your game are intriguing enough to YOU to be happy about it, you learn it's pretty boring as a game. :( Then one comes here and thankfully gets delivered! There are deeper mysteries on the genre than one might've thought of, initially. Thank you
I know I'm like a year late but I just wanna mention, there's a game design term for what you're describing with mechanical vs number upgrades. The terms are vertical vs horizontal. A vertical upgrade takes something you have and makes it stronger. Think extra skill points in an RPG, a pom in hades, extra health in isaac or something like that. A horizontal upgrade doesn't just boost numbers, it gives you a new ability. So, a feat in D&D, an aug in Deus Ex, a boon like Support Fire in hades, a new weapon, or something else like that
This is a wonderful video! Roguelike/Lites are one of my top 3 favorite game genres, so it's always nice to see like-minded people talking about something we love. I'm surprised at the lack of a Spelunky(1 or 2) mention, though. It's not my favorite, by any means, but I figured the sheer quantity of hidden content would at the very least earn it a shoutout in the Secrets section of the video :p
Thank you! To be completely honest, I am sad I never got to play much Spelunky especially early in my Roguelike years. I am sure it has many amazing examples of great design but it didn’t feel fair for me to incorporate it without me having many hours in like I did in most of my examples. The game never really clicked with me, but I really wish it did.
My favorite genre! It’s been wild to be a huge fan of this kind of game since the days of early Isaac and now we’re seeing so many AAA games implement entire game modes based on them.
@@Ari-rm9xw games can be a bullet hell and a roguelike, what? Lol by your logic Enter the Gungeon wouldn’t be a roguelike either and that’s literally in the thumbnail of this video
Heat video!!! I was playing this in my background and thought this youtuber would have at least 400k subscribers for the quality of the video. Definitely deserved my subscription
Great video! I love discussions on video game design as you know, particularly the efficiency and simplicity of VFX. Also talking about balance with regards to a genre that has so much randomness is fascinating. Hope this video wasn't so much effort that you can't make more videos like this, I'd love to see deep dives on particular design decisions in games.
dont know why this only barely got recommended to me, but im so glad it did. you can really tell that you love the genre & have spent a lot of time enjoying them critically. not to mention i'm always happy to hear revita/tboi love in a video about roguelikes lmao. great video.
The trick to backpack hero is holding on to multiple items of different major synergies early and then choose one to follow through with depending on what items you find and abandoning the others.
i don’t recall if it was the very first, but it was the game that popularized the procedurally generated permadeath dungeon crawling game loop. the term roguelike started getting slapped on any similar procedurally generated game with permadeath.
Damn, I was convinced you were a 2M subscribers channel or the like because of the quality of this video. Thanks for the video, very informative ! I hope you keep at it
I am honestly so suprised you didn't bring up risk of rain 2 when you were talking about music, the music while fighting mitrix is some of the best music out there
That's some very interesting points! I'm currently making my own roguelite and this vid will definitely help me with tweaking of some gameplay mechanics and design elements. I've played plenty of roguelike/roguelite games myself, but it's always nice to hear what's good and what is not from another person.
I clearly loved the video, as it's in several playlists. Restumbled onto this, and didn't know why it was boring me so much. Voice is great, clearly a channel I like, but all the information sounded basic, I already knew it. And I believe I learned it all from you. I will watch this again...just preferably intentionally.
As an avid roguelike gamer, and one who has seen many videos on this topic by much bigger channels. This video I feel does the best at really capturing what makes a roguelike-lite great. I never see channels use games that arent that popular when talking about this particular dungeon. Plus the way you explain replayability with items/upgrades that are impactful in terms of how you play not how effective you are at playing really hit the nail on the head. Consider me a fan!
Sometimes a video is so good that I instantly subscribe, uncaring to even look if im interested in other videos. This is one of those videos. This is a super helpful masterpiece and I'm taking notes 📝 🥰
I'm mostly writing this comment for myself on what I think good rougelike game design is. 1. Everything should have variety. A rougelike is a genre that you're supposed to play dozens of times over. If the game doesn't have variety you're very quickly going to notice because we evolved to recognize patterns; Because the game is designed to be played over and over again you're going to see the patterns more often than a game of a different genre. A good rougelike should have variety in everything. A good rougelike should have variety in: Enemies; Bosses; Items; Builds; Characters/weapons; Levels/Stages. Because if there isn't enough variety in these things, the game will become stale quick. 2. The game should be skill based. In my opinion a good game is one where you can kill the final boss with nothing but the starting weapon if you're good enough (I don't like Slay the Spire, or most turn based things because of this). In other words if you lose it should always be your fault. 3. The game shouldn't be easy. Just because you can defeat the final boss with the starting weapon doesn't mean that it should be easy. Personally I like overcoming a difficult challenge, because I used my knowledge and skills to be able to overcome said challenge. I think that a rougelike should be very difficult to beat on your first try, but it should technically still be possible. That's all I think is needed for an ok rougelike. It isn't necessary for a rougelike to do any of the following to be good, but it does make them significantly better in my opinion. For bonus points the game should: 1. Make every item useful in some way. I think that every item should be usable in every build. Some items should obviously be better in some builds than others, but I think that the item should still be somewhat usable in build that the item isn't good in. 2. Make it possible to absolutely obliterate the game's difficulty (if you know how). It's just fun to have a run so powerful that the game has no chance of defeating you. I think that if you know enough about the game and how certain things work, you should be able to obliterate anything because you're both lucky and knowledgeable enough. 3. Encourage and reward risky behavior. I think that any game that encourages you to be risky is an interesting game. Any game that can cause you to have a short term risk, while giving you a long term benefit is a really cool idea because it forces the dilemma of: Are the short term drawbacks worth the long term benefits. 4. Have a bunch of items that synergize with other items. By making items have unique combinations, you can increase the replayability of a game because you want to see all the ways an item interacts with other items. An example of a game that does everything mentioned correctly is: The Binding of Isaac. The Binding of Isaac is a game that: Has a ton of variety in everything; Is skill based and possible to win any run; Is difficult (and only gets worse depending on how much you've done); Makes even the worst items usable in every build; Allows you to make build so broken that the game might die before you do; Has multiple special rooms that encourage you to make risky plays; Has almost every item synergize in some way with another item.
Amazing video!! this perfectly sums up my love of all rougelikes/lites i’ve played in an individual level. also i’m so glad you mentioned dungreed, it’s such an unknown game but it’s honestly such a work of art. dungreed was the game which made me fall in love with rougelikes/lites
Please consider liking the video. It’s free and helps out the channel! And if you are a big fan of the genre, check out our ROGUELIKE TIER LIST where we rank over 80 different roguelikes: ua-cam.com/video/5k_-k4X90ao/v-deo.html Have a great day!
Ehhhhhhh I think this video is.gonna blow you up guy ;) I really loved it you did a great job, and it's a needed video You clearly have just the right.experience to comment on this and yeah I loved your commentary and your opinion and idea or take😅❤ So yeah consider me a new pepperhead(heeeh?😮 idea?😂) But yah I'm supporting you however possible going forward 🫡🫡best of luck!!!! I'm watching!! 😎 😅
So much of this was like, well I knew most of this but I didn't KNOWW most of this, ykno what I mean?? Explained what us, as players, KNOW but never put thought into or really,well, realize!😅
Thank you! We livestreamed the tier list a couple weeks ago but have since unlisted and are in the final touches making it a full video. Keep an eye out! We will have it out very very soon.
Great video!! I've played about 80% of the games you've talked about and share your opinions on just about everything discussed here. ...a few things, though... 1. The thing everyone overlooks about what makes or breaks a rogue like is readability. With so many build options, synergies, stats and unique terminology - readability is paramount. Most games will fill the UI with icons and provide several screens showing stats and figures to accomplish this. The quality of these UIs makes a huge impact on how well players are able to understand their build and the impact of new items. 2. You briefly mentioned Skul: The hero slayer (as well as including the soundtrack for much longer) - this rogue like is extremely underrated imo. Largely for all the reasons you've outlined, but also it's very unique synergy system.
Okay so I might be late to the party, plus the fact that I just discover your channel with this video, but I want to thank you for it I'm planning to make my own game, a roguelite that is only at the state of concept, but I didn't even know how the game should be, what are the feelings that the player should feel. There are also many points that I haven't thought about, but you gave me a direction and a bunch of ideas with your points and your impressions. That's a HUGE help, really. So yeah, thank you a lot Also, I don't know if someone already told you that in the comments, but for the audio part, I feel like it's in pair with the VFX. If we're talking about the OST, it needs to give a certain vibe for the game. It might also but a good storyteller if the visuals can't express it, and vice-versa. But if we're talking about the sound effects, it needs to tell how the player should feel about certain details. For example, something strong and heavy that is used if the player gets hit expresses the importance of health in this game, it expresses the necessity for the player to avoid getting hit at all cost. But if it's something lighter and less threatening that is used, it shows that the player don't have to mind about it, that he can easily can health back And to show the complementary between VFX and audio : In Dead Cells and some other games you have shown in your video, when the player has low health, the screen gets its border filled with red (VFX), but for the player to actually gets reminded of the border, the beatings of a heart is played in background. It's something unpleasant, associated with the red, so the player knows that they need health That's just my opinion about it, I'm pretty sure I'm wrong somewhere, but for having played a lot of games, mostly roguelikes but also other kind of games, that's what I'm thinking
This is a really good analysis about Roguelikes. I can tell a lot of passion went into this video, and honestly It's probably the best I've seen tackling this topic. Great Job, wondering what else you have in store.
Had this popup in my recomendations and of course seeing Revita in there had me even more excited. That aside, genuinly excellent analysis and definitely something I'll keep referencing going forward! =D
Thanks a lot Ben! I’m glad you enjoyed it. I’ve been a big fan of Revita for a while now, grinding that 100% achievement on stream and am even planning on making a video reviewing the game with a focus on design and balance in the near future. Would love to talk about a lot of balance and gameplay aspects with you if ever given the chance. Looking forward to the next big update! ;)
7,6k followers?! Dude it was a great video with quite deep deconstruction of such a big amount of games. I will gladly keep that video in mind to show it to junior designers! Thank you and keep doing such an interesting content! Worth every minute fr
Definitely my favourite roguelite is Brutal Orchestra. It has turned based combat system with twist I have never seen in a vidya before. It challenges the player to gather pigments while in a fight, which are obrained by attacking an enemy. But the type of it depends on a health bar color of the said enemy. It will (almost) always give you two pigments, which you can use to take actions, wince every character in this game needs specific combinations of them in order to make a move. But you shall not have more than 10 at once (excluding pigment generator), because it will cause demage to all party. In this game you can see every enemies moves before their turn, so you need to act accordingly. It challenges the player to be more strategic than random. This game is rather hard, but very fair, since the player has every piece of information he needs in order to make right moves, so when you die it is 99% your own fault. It is very difficult to describe and I do not think I did a justice to this unique type of combat here, so please check it out yourself. It is one of the Best games I have ever encountered
Backpack Hero's synergy type adds a great deal of decision making and risk vs reward. I've played the game a lot on the hard modes where you get even less, worse items, and I kinda enjoy fighting with the loot system.
Wow that was a good video, great editing and background footage, amazing voice and pacing, really enjoyed the structure, made it easy to follow and very digestible, I felt like I learnt a lot
Top notch content, thanks for this! :) I was a wee bit sad that Noita only received a few seconds of gameplay clip and no mention in the video, because I think there are some very interesting lessons to learn from its design. So in case anyone would not be familiar with that game, I'd share a few remarks and takeaways "in a nutshell": - The game gives minimum instructions to the player since the very beginning of the first run, but relies on hints and suggestions to guide the player. Gameplay ultimately progresses vertically, from top down, and starts at the entrance of a cave leading to a mine, to the right. Design exploits our age-old habit of the left-to-right directional 2d platformer flow (like e.g. in Super Mario) to traverse the level, but nothing prevents the player to start going the opposite direction at the start instead. Later, the player might figure out ways to bypass natural obstacles on the levels and even leave the intended gameplay path entirely, discovering hidden surprises. Discovery and surprises are strong mechanics in Noita. - The entire game boils down to risk and reward management. Players can progress slower and safer, discovering more resources that make further gameplay easier, or quicker but riskier, leaving the player with less resources as they go further in the game with its increasing difficulty. This pairs well with the fact that everything can kill the player, partly because every pixel is physically simulated. And players will discover many many ways to end a run with accidental deaths caused by hubris. - Noita has a unique psychedelic jazz vibe, and the soundtrack contributes massively to building this quirky and enjoyable ambience. - The entire game feels like a large sandbox after completing it once with the intended way, with a "natural ending", because (mainly through its online community) the player can learn that there are other ways to complete a run. Noita is full of undocumented secrets and mechanics to be discovered, and the many esoteric source material (alcmehy, hermeticism) in the game just adds to the mystical vibe. It feels very rewarding to discover these. (And, after years of its release, there are still 2 secrets/puzzles in the game that were found, but were not solved yet by the community!) I had my first win after 60 hours of gameplay, but after more than 600 hours, I still feel that Noita has a lot of replayability. I would really like to see a study video by someone on that game's design.
Unpopular opinion but a lot of the things that you said in the diversity segment i feel fits with Hades, the bosses never changing makes each run feel the same, having a very limited selection of weapons, idk i just feel like every run is the same in hades, where as Isaac the start and end of a run are so incredibly different its crazy
I love your synergy part of the video about you talking about how frustrating is that certain items cannot be use in the built because, Isaac plays with that in various characters like the lost or blue baby, because them don’t have normal life so when you encounter items of life up they are almost useless with them and that adds to the difficulty, and I love that in the case of the lost, because you don’t have life you gain other things like flying to compensate for the shrinking pull of items that are useful for you in the room
honestly amazing video took alot of what I see and think about the genre and expressed it better than I ever could I would honestly love to see if you had any views on rougelite deckbuilders as they tend to struggle with similar but different issues.
So, I noticed that most of the Roguelikes/lites you mentioned in the video are of the action style. But what are your thoughts regarding mechanics more Traditional RPG style Roguelikes, such as Caves of Qud?
Indeed, as I briefly noted at the begging of the video, I do focus on action based Roguelikes/lites. Today I wish I made that a bit more clear before releasing this video. In all honesty, I haven’t played as many traditional Roguelikes, maybe 7-8 (which is a much smaller sample). While I do really respect and appreciate the design behind this genre, it isn’t as appealing to me and it’s also not being designed as much in this day and age which therefore makes it a bit less interesting to analyze. From the ones I’ve played, I do enjoy them! There aren’t as "pickup and play" friendly as most Roguelites and I’d say they tend to be more complex which can be a pro or a con depending on what you’re looking for.
YO dude, great vid ! Finally saw a vid bout Dungreed ! I have played about 600h of this game since it released, whilst the scripted sets are as you say, well done, beating any late game boss almost requires a set with a legendary weapon sadly… the few runs were I have beaten some of the secret bosses are with sets ou in runs with 2-4 great legendary items (which are only about half of them), so late game runs are really repetitive because you want some legendaries in almost any build (for exemple the healing one or passives like the dice), whilst you have lots of skills to unlock, the one that lets you keep a single item after a run feels way toooo important if you want a consistent chance to win… Though I have always been a fan of roguelikes, I just haven’t been able to pin down what feels great in them, this vid has been a game changer for me ! Keep the great vids going !
Great vid! One aspect I really adore like in TBoI or RAD is how the char's appearance permuates with it's abbilities (tumors, wings, little mini thems following...). And midigating health is a strange one: Eden streakers don't seem to lose any, but in Blazing Beaks f.e. one needs to sacrifice health to find secret rooms. Risk/reward as you stated, but also push your luck... Atomicrops? Has been heroes? Fights in tight spaces? Keep it up and I'll keep watching and playing;o) Will there be a sequel for non-fighting-centered ones like Loot be a lucklad?
37:30 This reminds me of Holocure. In Holocure, you're limited to 5 different weapons + your base weapon. The thing is, there is a system known as collabs. If you have the right weapons at max level, you get to fuse them together, creating a whole new weapon and allowing you to pick up another weapon. For example, you can fuse an axe that spins around you with a lava bucket that leaves lava puddles on the ground. The resulting weapon is bunch of comets that will do tons of damage and leave large areas of damage on the floor.
I am a big fan of roguelikes / roguelites and always had big interest in game dev - your video is really well made and doubles as a great resource for game design! Definitely subscribed 😁
Thanks to the popularity of Binding of Isaac, the roguelike genre definition has been subverted to mean anything with procedural generation, for which the term roguelite was coined. Roguelike literally means “like Rogue”, which none of these games resemble in any way. Action roguelike is a contradiction of terms, as roguelikes are turn-based by definition with rare exceptions like FTL that allow for pausing at any time that simulate turns. It would be akin to using FPS to label a top down shooter, despite the genre literally meaning “first person shooter.” It still bothers me that people misuse use this genre label as it dilutes the searchability of actual roguelike games that I am interested in finding, but don’t care of the twitch-reflexes style of roguelite. Honestly it’s why I clicked this video, I wouldn’t have if I had known it was going to be entirely featuring Binding of Isaac-likes. Either use the term roguelite, procedural death labyrinth, or something more appropriate please and stop the continued dilution of the genre. Doomlike evolved into FPS over time, action/reflex games need to relinquish the roguelike label similarly as it simply does not apply.
I just came across your rank list of best designed roguelikes and you explain things so well and articulate the fine points that I've always enjoyed about these games and some really good points that I've never even thought about. So now just watching your other videos as well! Good job mate :) Especially right now it's more than interesting, since I'm working on my own Roguelike Dungeon Crawler with a synergy twist with RPG like stats and weapon combos, so will be bingewatching your videos to see if I get any new good ideas to implement or to scratch if they seem like too much!
Thing about scourgebringer for me, is that it's really hard, and it's not that long even if you 100%. So I'm not effected by the things you had problems with. I actually had much bigger problem with 100%ing hades, the full completion content went on for bit too long and every run started feeling boring
I 'm only 7 minutes in but i'm SO GLAD you are metioning Wizard Of Legend. That is such a fantastic game, it's so underrated. Especially if you can get someone for couch co op.
Great video! Though I'd like to propose to differate "survivor-likes" from the rogue-like genre; with both an item-pool much more limited than that of most rogue-likes and the common ability to reroll items it's usually very easy to home into the ever same builds every run, combined with that enemy spawns tend to be more often than not scripted, the charm randomness quickly vanishes. Furthermore with synergies mostly falling into either the minor synergies or scripted synergies and already a large chunk of the long term appeal of the more rogue-likes is gone. As such they need a bit of a different focus to be engaging for a greater amount of time, but let's not get too deep into that, or at least not for now.
You'd be right to do so, these games are Run and Guns, a genre entirely different from Roguelike that permadeath is also a staple of (permadeath =/= roguelike). Run and Guns are about shooting down horses of enemies and usually lack the procedural generation or limited resources that are staples of the roguelike genre (far more so than permadeath).
There exists simultanously two definitions for roguelite and I feel like the one you are using is more wrong. nethack, rogue and caves of qud are all kind of similar and different to games you are implying as roguelikes the other definition is very spectrum. Personally Risk of Rain 2 for me was about persistent progress that made the game easier, but other people probably played it differently and would argue otherwise
What a great video! You discussed a lot of parts of roguelikes that I’ve never seen anyone discuss - like the nature of items! I really like how you broke down the elements of roguelikes, and am thrilled that you went into such detail. You have earned my subscribe for sure!
Hello pepperhead, i am not going to argue with you about the definition of the roguelike genre or anything, instead i request you to make a video for traditional roguelikes, why?, Because i been searching for a new one to play but everytime i do hundreds of non traditional roguelike videos and lists come up instead Please make a traditional roguelike video
Rougelikes had become one of my personal favorites for the last few years mainly due to how many ways you can make the same thing but different twists. Sure, you may get a game that's more or less the same but there are definitely some unique ones: Hades has more depth in its story telling then other leading Rougelikes. Enter the Gungeon gives you a lot of crazy over the top firearms to mess with. Skul the Hero Slayer has a wide assortment of skulls with different weapons and powers. And Cult of the Lamb has a very nice blend of base and time management to go along with generated dungeon design. That game has become my second favorite Rougelike in the genre as my 700+ hour playtime can attest.
Now you’ve covered the rogueliTes part, you forgot to put back the rogueliKes you’ve probably cut in your video… So what makes a good roguelike ? Grid based movement and turn based for a start, this doesn’t make them specifically “good” but it makes them being rogueliKes for a start…
yeah this video was filled with everything I espected as the time I clicked on it. Thanks for the new discoveries, I'll probably buy some of the games you presented here
All of the games shown in the video are rougelites. None of them are reminiscent of Rogue. Roguelikes are games like DCSS, Cataclysm: DDA, pixel dungeon, nethack etc. Most of games in the videos have meta progression, like unlocking new items, none of them have grid turn based movement etc.
Great video ! I am surprised that you didn't say much about sound design in roguelikes, especially while showing gameplay from Hades. This game made me understand how important sound design can be in these games, and not only through music and voice acting. Because gameplay is often very fast paced, loots and events are randomized, it's important to be able to quickly feel what's going on and what is available. I think Hades made a terrific job in that regard, because sometimes rooms are big and you don't realize that treasures troves / fishing spots / chaos gates are available. But because all of these have specific sound cues, they get really hard to miss ! And that's just one example of effective use of sound design in roguelikes.
I also love the enemy design part and I also enjoy your view in messiness in a rogue game, I think for small enemies this two elements come hand and hand because when the layout of the level gets so overcrowded you have to pay attention to everything and you can get kill by a simple bullet that is lost in the chaos or a fly, even one as a player have to be careful with this because if you are so overpower you can tell sometimes if the bullet is one that you made of one of the enemies, leaving less reaction time to respond, amazing
What makes a good roguelike? A game that is actually a roguelike (now more commonly known as traditional roguelikes). Nethack, Angband, DoomRL, ToME all fantastic roguelikes that are actually roguelikes. Just my two kopecks on the matter
It’s sad to see these games now having to be called "traditional Roguelikes" with how far the Roguelike definition has come. I do love myself some good old Turn Based Rogue games every now and then.
Great video! I am a big enjoyer of Roguelike/lites myself, but not quite to this extent. I've often wondered what the difference is between the games of this style that I like or don't like, but I could not have summed it up as eloquently as you have. You've given me (and many others) a lot to think about going forward!
The only thing i would've changed in the video is the part where you mentioned rooms being sampled and include Spelunky. Other than that, VERY solid video! Loved every second of it.
Whole video of nothing but roguelites, "I'll now be referring to both genres as roguelikes." Why not "both" as roguelites? What's with the weird attachment to calling them something they're not?
You're part of the 1% that knows the difference. Having two different terms is useless, because the difference is minuscule. Roguelike sounds better so people are just going to call all of them roguelikes.
@@radonbox6569 More people would know the difference if the people who do know weren't using them incorrectly intentionally, usually for "clout" because "roguelikes are difficult games and that makes me a good gamer!"
this is an interesting topic, but when your video starts off talking about rogue likes and literally showing shmups and fps games? seems like lack of basic knowledge so what insight am I supposed to find here
I am working on a roguelike that takes huge inspiration on Archero. I'm still a newb so it isn't working out well but design-wise. This did give me a level up. Thank you!
Please dont mix roguelikes with roguelites its already hard enough to find good roguelikes without having to sift through things barely resembling rogue.
your definition of roguelike/lite is the correct one. the term roguelite was coined by the rogue legacy devs to explain permanent stat progression. everything else is a roguelike. the traditional roguelike (thats what the old school dungeon crawlers are called) fans are a small vocal angry minority. Don't let them bully you.
I love roguelikes, and I think this was a pretty good video. Thank you, I will also be using your recommendations as for my next roguelike Ill be playing.
Wow, FANTASTIC video! I'm currently developing a roguelike myself and you've managed to pinpoint and express with words what I've spent all this time calling "feel". Keep at it! :D
Now I have a much better understanding of synergies in roguelikes, thanks to you. Your refined definitions of minor, major, and scripted synergies provide a structured framework for understanding how different types of synergies impact gameplay: - Minor Synergy involve altering values used by the game, enhancing existing mechanics or characteristics without introducing entirely new ones. They serve to emphasize and fine-tune the player's capabilities without fundamentally changing the gameplay. - Major Synergy alter the mechanics of the game by creating a generic system that connects compatible inputs and outputs, resulting in the generation of new mechanics and behaviors. This type of synergy allows for a more profound transformation of gameplay and offers players the opportunity to experiment with item combinations as a sandbox system, potentially leading to emergent and unexpected results. - Scripted synergies involve altering the game's mechanics through a hardcoded system that connects specific compatible items chosen by the game. While they can produce new mechanics and behaviors or emphasize existing ones, they are more controlled and predefined compared to major synergies.
Great video with a lot of good and interesting points. A lot of examples are presented, proving that you have a lot of experience with roguelikes! Risk vs reward: I’d say you’re onto something when you talk about risk vs reward, but I think I’d try to find a more specific word for it. It’s about tradeoffs - rewards for increased risk. Risk for what? To be set back by losing. One of the major stakes in roguelikes is the time you’ve invested into your run, and potentially putting your stakes at higher risk is exciting - but the idea of the tradeoff is to increase your chance of winning, not to increase your risk of losing. It’s decisionmaking using what knowledge you have, with the excitement of potentially putting your stakes at higher risk. So maybe the word risk management is the right word. Risk management with variables you can’t fully predict. Minor & major synergies: I think you’re also on the money here, but I wonder if not the wording ”general & specific synergies” would be more fitting. Or maybe ”wide and narrow synergies”. Since ”minor and major” kind of implies that a wider synergy HAS to be weaker, and a narrow synergy HAS to be stronger. It might be that it’s usually better to make it that way, but in reality when you play one of these games you might find an item with a narrow synergy with a weak effect. Or maybe a reward for a hard challenge is an item with a wide synergy and a strong effect? To be more specific for those that might take the knowledge of this video to study other games or to make games, I’d specifically use the words ”As a rule of thumb, create wide synergies with weaker effects and narrow synergies with strong effects and find a balance”. Scripted synergies as a word I think is good! I hope this comes across well, this is a very nice video with a lot of effort behind it that hits on a lot of good points, and it got me thinking about these two points previously mentioned. Thank you. 😊
other roguelikes: we're going to put an immense amount of time and effort into creating robust and varied procedurally generated environments
brotato: square 😎
so far removed from classic roguelikes that it's basically a bullethell, but ya' know what, we fuckin ball.
@@thewolfstu bullethell and roguelike aren't mutually exclusive
@@alt1763 True, they aren't mutually exclusive, but notably I said Classic Roguelike, which alone is far removed from modern Roguelikes. Like, the most roguelike element of it is the random upgrades and permadeath which is a tiny dash of roguelike compared to a classic roguelike. I guess it'd be more considerable as a roguelite, but yeah. Of course, that is not to say it's a negative of the game, as I said, we fuckin ball.
@@alt1763roguelike games(games which the genre came from the smilarities to the game rogue. it kind of is mutually exclusive to other genres in a way
Paper planet: circle😎
I love how every video about roguelikes ever uses the risk of rain soundtrack cause its just that good
Theres also a bit of FTL music which i hear in videos every so often
risk of rain is a terrible game LOL the soundtrack is the only good thing about it
@@Seinsmelled Sounds like Skill issue to me. I love RoR
@@Auri-u6q completely untrue but ill let you live in your delusion
@@Seinsmelled it's a subjective topic bro, you not liking it doesn't make it bad lol
We're in the process of making a "Roguelike(like?)" and getting input like this from huge fans of the genre is absolutely invaluable, got a sub here
Roguelike(like?), huh?
You got me interested, what's the name of the game?
Do you mean roguelite?
I think the reason they put a question mark is because they’re not quite sure
As a concept artist working in AAA, who is now (also) working on solo developing their own project, I found this video invaluable in regards to perspective. You helped me understand things about my approach that I didn't realize. Thank you!
Honestly i think my favourite part of the video was the sheer variety of games you included! The editing and voice over was great, don't get me wrong, but I get so frustrated booting up a video essay like this just to find its filled with the same 3 games. There are a lot of lessons you can learn from the smaller ones too, and im glad that you know that.
I also like the fact that even with the huge games that everyone talks about, you go way more in-depth than just the surface like everyone else seems to do. like with enter the gungeon being the game you used as the opener for enemy design! Its such a specific part about a very popular game that most people wouldn't be able to point out and use as an example of how to do things right, but you were able to do that!
Things like this is a true mark of a professional and not just some random gamer talking about the same 5 games. It gives actual insight to this topic instead of re-iterating what I already know, ynkow?
Thank you so much for your kind message! I’m glad you enjoyed the video ;)
@@PepperHeadGaming what game is at the 6:35 mark?
@kikoiekiko7440 Warm Snow ;)
@@PepperHeadGaming thank you
I'm actually developing a roguelike right now and this video brought up some very good design tips! Thank you for making it! It has certainly influenced my project!
Good luck on your project! Make sure not to burn yourself out.
@@philiphunt-bull5817 haven't burned out yet! I'm super excited about it! Alpha is almost ready, so I can hopefully generate some hype soon! Let me know if you know any communities that would be interested:)
Same here. Also making a game, decided to implement some roguelike elements and boy this helped me not only with the roguelike part but the general objective of the game design I should be looking for
Are you actually developing a roguelike or a roguelite?
Please don't be one of those developers that put a giant amount of effort to make a game and then not have any idea what genre it is. For some reason Roguelike is the most affected by this.
Me too, will be a rogue lite
I like that you do not only cite the most well-known games.
yeah like Isaac, Gungeon, Hades, and Risk of Rain footage. Would be a lot better video if he had games like those in the video...
Edit: wait this comment was stupid of me... somehow did not read the "only". Ignore this comment
He also cited the second most well-known games.
This came up on my feed for some reason and hey these analyses type videos are just my jam. Great voice, background music just fits, passionate yet analytic approach that infects the viewer, and incredibly informative (especially for aspiring game devs). Honestly, I listen to these while doing something else but I somehow kept getting distracted and looking at the video and just appreciating every bit. Definitely subscribing and hoping you get more subs and views (the views rn are criminally low)
Welcome aboard! Thank you for watching! Very excited for what’s to come!
I too was given this by the algorithm in a rare case of it being smart about what I like!
Same here man, I think your first points are just describing the type of.vid.... and his.voice which no one can help...... js I would've complimented his tone and articulation or amtg.just staying he has a nice.voice.... like that's nice, hearing that WITH the context that you only listen to these(mainly) is a big difference and makes total sense in the end:) sry not trying to bring any negativity to this awesome positive channel!!
What a nice comment
"This video popped up in my feed for some reason" *literally gives the reason why*
this ain't just a great video, it's one of the most well thought out, researched and informative analyses on game design I've seen to date. I'm seriously impressed by this.
This video single handedly got me playing and addicted to Revita you talked so much about it and I never heard about it prior to this. But I absolutely love the game and it became one of my favorite roguelikes out there
One of the best roguelike videos I have seen so far, great work.
Regarding Isaac's level design: I have played way over 1500 hours and still find rooms I have never seen before. For me Isaac is the perfect roguelike when it comes to level design, items and general gameplay elements. I think I will never get bored of it.
Speaking of curses in items, Nethack does some really funny things with cursed items, such as a cursed potion of gain level actually making you go up a level in the dungeon, cursed scrolls of genocide actually create monsters, cursed scrolls of teleportation will levelport you instead of a regular teleport, which is really nice if you have teleport control, etc.
I think one of my favorite types of items has to be ones that make things that are otherwise worthless or just bad, and makes them good. As you said here, the levelport is nice if you have teleport control.
I'm surprised someone brought up Nethack seeing the focus of the video.
What I also love of Nethack or other roguelikes more like Rogue, is the survival aspects, meaning you have incentive to use unidentified items or to dip them if really desperate
Nethack is the best roguelike
The real advantage of traditional rougelikes over the modernrun vased twinstick shooters and sidescroller platformers, is that they are filled to the brim with complex interlocking systems. This is allowed by their graphical simplicity and turn based nature, making these interactions much simpler to simulate.
I cant see the opportunity to slap people around with the corpse of a gorgon in HADES, to turn them into stone, for example.
As a fan of rougelikes, this is a fun watch. I can't believe how high quality it is but while having such low views. Keep on doing this Pepperhead. I subscribed.
*roguelikes
An incredibly helpful, insightful and overall great video! I will definitely subscribe. It was also nice seeing Revita here as well, it is truly a hidden gem of a game.
What a great video. Honestly I have never seen a video on par with the information quality I see in this video. At first I saw 45 minutes and thought, "man this is going to be a while," but after those 45 minutes I realized that it's constantly good information preventing the video from feeling stale. Really well done.
Thanks for watching and thanks for stopping by stream! Would love to hear more about your roguelike!
@@PepperHeadGaming I'll try and join in next stream to talk a bit about it. The premise is a rougelike meant for multiplayer, but it's still relatively early in development, there is gameplay, it's just not as fun as I want it to be yet.
Never take this video away!
Just in the works of developing a rogue-like, like so many others here (maybe 'cause we thought it'd be an "easy enough" genre to learn dev-stuff on).
And just when the mechanics of your game are intriguing enough to YOU to be happy about it, you learn it's pretty boring as a game. :(
Then one comes here and thankfully gets delivered! There are deeper mysteries on the genre than one might've thought of, initially.
Thank you
I know I'm like a year late but I just wanna mention, there's a game design term for what you're describing with mechanical vs number upgrades. The terms are vertical vs horizontal. A vertical upgrade takes something you have and makes it stronger. Think extra skill points in an RPG, a pom in hades, extra health in isaac or something like that. A horizontal upgrade doesn't just boost numbers, it gives you a new ability. So, a feat in D&D, an aug in Deus Ex, a boon like Support Fire in hades, a new weapon, or something else like that
This is a wonderful video! Roguelike/Lites are one of my top 3 favorite game genres, so it's always nice to see like-minded people talking about something we love.
I'm surprised at the lack of a Spelunky(1 or 2) mention, though. It's not my favorite, by any means, but I figured the sheer quantity of hidden content would at the very least earn it a shoutout in the Secrets section of the video :p
Thank you! To be completely honest, I am sad I never got to play much Spelunky especially early in my Roguelike years. I am sure it has many amazing examples of great design but it didn’t feel fair for me to incorporate it without me having many hours in like I did in most of my examples. The game never really clicked with me, but I really wish it did.
My favorite genre! It’s been wild to be a huge fan of this kind of game since the days of early Isaac and now we’re seeing so many AAA games implement entire game modes based on them.
Isaac is a bullet hell 🙄
@@Ari-rm9xw games can be a bullet hell and a roguelike, what? Lol by your logic Enter the Gungeon wouldn’t be a roguelike either and that’s literally in the thumbnail of this video
Heat video!!! I was playing this in my background and thought this youtuber would have at least 400k subscribers for the quality of the video. Definitely deserved my subscription
Great video! I love discussions on video game design as you know, particularly the efficiency and simplicity of VFX. Also talking about balance with regards to a genre that has so much randomness is fascinating. Hope this video wasn't so much effort that you can't make more videos like this, I'd love to see deep dives on particular design decisions in games.
More on the way 👀
dont know why this only barely got recommended to me, but im so glad it did. you can really tell that you love the genre & have spent a lot of time enjoying them critically. not to mention i'm always happy to hear revita/tboi love in a video about roguelikes lmao. great video.
The trick to backpack hero is holding on to multiple items of different major synergies early and then choose one to follow through with depending on what items you find and abandoning the others.
This video deserves way more attention. Really well made and incredibly comprehensive. Found a few new games to try.
So was there a game called rogue or what?
Yes there was
And there might have also been a rogue named Lite(s)
YES
Rogue lineage
i don’t recall if it was the very first, but it was the game that popularized the procedurally generated permadeath dungeon crawling game loop. the term roguelike started getting slapped on any similar procedurally generated game with permadeath.
Damn, I was convinced you were a 2M subscribers channel or the like because of the quality of this video. Thanks for the video, very informative ! I hope you keep at it
I am honestly so suprised you didn't bring up risk of rain 2 when you were talking about music, the music while fighting mitrix is some of the best music out there
As someone who is currently working on a board game inspired by all of my favorite roguelikes, this video was RESEARCH!! Subscribed! Fantastic vid!
Glad you enjoyed it! If you’re working on a turn based game, I suggest checking out my video on Deck Building Roguelike Design ;)
@@PepperHeadGaming deal and a half!
That's some very interesting points!
I'm currently making my own roguelite and this vid will definitely help me with tweaking of some gameplay mechanics and design elements.
I've played plenty of roguelike/roguelite games myself, but it's always nice to hear what's good and what is not from another person.
Whats the game called
@@BlackJester57 Roll The Bones, it's up for wishlisting on Steam ^^
I clearly loved the video, as it's in several playlists. Restumbled onto this, and didn't know why it was boring me so much. Voice is great, clearly a channel I like, but all the information sounded basic, I already knew it. And I believe I learned it all from you. I will watch this again...just preferably intentionally.
As an avid roguelike gamer, and one who has seen many videos on this topic by much bigger channels. This video I feel does the best at really capturing what makes a roguelike-lite great. I never see channels use games that arent that popular when talking about this particular dungeon. Plus the way you explain replayability with items/upgrades that are impactful in terms of how you play not how effective you are at playing really hit the nail on the head. Consider me a fan!
Sometimes a video is so good that I instantly subscribe, uncaring to even look if im interested in other videos. This is one of those videos. This is a super helpful masterpiece and I'm taking notes 📝 🥰
I'm mostly writing this comment for myself on what I think good rougelike game design is.
1. Everything should have variety.
A rougelike is a genre that you're supposed to play dozens of times over.
If the game doesn't have variety you're very quickly going to notice because we evolved to recognize patterns;
Because the game is designed to be played over and over again you're going to see the patterns more often than a game of a different genre.
A good rougelike should have variety in everything.
A good rougelike should have variety in:
Enemies;
Bosses;
Items;
Builds;
Characters/weapons;
Levels/Stages.
Because if there isn't enough variety in these things, the game will become stale quick.
2. The game should be skill based.
In my opinion a good game is one where you can kill the final boss with nothing but the starting weapon if you're good enough
(I don't like Slay the Spire, or most turn based things because of this).
In other words if you lose it should always be your fault.
3. The game shouldn't be easy.
Just because you can defeat the final boss with the starting weapon doesn't mean that it should be easy.
Personally I like overcoming a difficult challenge, because I used my knowledge and skills to be able to overcome said challenge.
I think that a rougelike should be very difficult to beat on your first try, but it should technically still be possible.
That's all I think is needed for an ok rougelike.
It isn't necessary for a rougelike to do any of the following to be good, but it does make them significantly better in my opinion.
For bonus points the game should:
1. Make every item useful in some way.
I think that every item should be usable in every build.
Some items should obviously be better in some builds than others, but I think that the item should still be somewhat usable in build that the item isn't good in.
2. Make it possible to absolutely obliterate the game's difficulty
(if you know how).
It's just fun to have a run so powerful that the game has no chance of defeating you.
I think that if you know enough about the game and how certain things work, you should be able to obliterate anything because you're both lucky and knowledgeable enough.
3. Encourage and reward risky behavior.
I think that any game that encourages you to be risky is an interesting game.
Any game that can cause you to have a short term risk, while giving you a long term benefit is a really cool idea because it forces the dilemma of: Are the short term drawbacks worth the long term benefits.
4. Have a bunch of items that synergize with other items.
By making items have unique combinations, you can increase the replayability of a game because you want to see all the ways an item interacts with other items.
An example of a game that does everything mentioned correctly is:
The Binding of Isaac.
The Binding of Isaac is a game that:
Has a ton of variety in everything;
Is skill based and possible to win any run;
Is difficult
(and only gets worse depending on how much you've done);
Makes even the worst items usable in every build;
Allows you to make build so broken that the game might die before you do;
Has multiple special rooms that encourage you to make risky plays;
Has almost every item synergize in some way with another item.
Really good analysis! Well said :D
Amazing video!! this perfectly sums up my love of all rougelikes/lites i’ve played in an individual level. also i’m so glad you mentioned dungreed, it’s such an unknown game but it’s honestly such a work of art. dungreed was the game which made me fall in love with rougelikes/lites
Please consider liking the video. It’s free and helps out the channel! And if you are a big fan of the genre, check out our ROGUELIKE TIER LIST where we rank over 80 different roguelikes: ua-cam.com/video/5k_-k4X90ao/v-deo.html
Have a great day!
Ehhhhhhh I think this video is.gonna blow you up guy ;) I really loved it you did a great job, and it's a needed video
You clearly have just the right.experience to comment on this and yeah I loved your commentary and your opinion and idea or take😅❤
So yeah consider me a new pepperhead(heeeh?😮 idea?😂)
But yah I'm supporting you however possible going forward 🫡🫡best of luck!!!! I'm watching!! 😎 😅
So much of this was like, well I knew most of this but I didn't KNOWW most of this, ykno what I mean??
Explained what us, as players, KNOW but never put thought into or really,well, realize!😅
Liked and subscribed. Great stuff!
hey, love this video and you’re clearly quite knowledgeable about the genre, so where’s the tier list video? I can’t find it on your channel
Thank you! We livestreamed the tier list a couple weeks ago but have since unlisted and are in the final touches making it a full video. Keep an eye out! We will have it out very very soon.
Awesome content Marcy Marc nice to see you’re still a passionate gamer! This is Freddie (Robs little brother) from back in the day.
Great video!! I've played about 80% of the games you've talked about and share your opinions on just about everything discussed here.
...a few things, though...
1. The thing everyone overlooks about what makes or breaks a rogue like is readability. With so many build options, synergies, stats and unique terminology - readability is paramount. Most games will fill the UI with icons and provide several screens showing stats and figures to accomplish this. The quality of these UIs makes a huge impact on how well players are able to understand their build and the impact of new items.
2. You briefly mentioned Skul: The hero slayer (as well as including the soundtrack for much longer) - this rogue like is extremely underrated imo. Largely for all the reasons you've outlined, but also it's very unique synergy system.
Thanks a lot for mentioning Wizard of Legend! It is one of my most favorite games of all time and I feel it doesn’t get the love that it deserves.
You deserve way more subs and views then what you have right now
Always growing! Thank you for watching!
Okay so I might be late to the party, plus the fact that I just discover your channel with this video, but I want to thank you for it
I'm planning to make my own game, a roguelite that is only at the state of concept, but I didn't even know how the game should be, what are the feelings that the player should feel. There are also many points that I haven't thought about, but you gave me a direction and a bunch of ideas with your points and your impressions. That's a HUGE help, really. So yeah, thank you a lot
Also, I don't know if someone already told you that in the comments, but for the audio part, I feel like it's in pair with the VFX.
If we're talking about the OST, it needs to give a certain vibe for the game. It might also but a good storyteller if the visuals can't express it, and vice-versa.
But if we're talking about the sound effects, it needs to tell how the player should feel about certain details.
For example, something strong and heavy that is used if the player gets hit expresses the importance of health in this game, it expresses the necessity for the player to avoid getting hit at all cost. But if it's something lighter and less threatening that is used, it shows that the player don't have to mind about it, that he can easily can health back
And to show the complementary between VFX and audio : In Dead Cells and some other games you have shown in your video, when the player has low health, the screen gets its border filled with red (VFX), but for the player to actually gets reminded of the border, the beatings of a heart is played in background. It's something unpleasant, associated with the red, so the player knows that they need health
That's just my opinion about it, I'm pretty sure I'm wrong somewhere, but for having played a lot of games, mostly roguelikes but also other kind of games, that's what I'm thinking
As a person trying to develop rogue like it was super helpful
Loved the video! And the word Roguelike being made from diffrent letters of roguelike games was a great touch!
i personally like rougelikes more as permadeath and progression based off your own skill feels more rewarding but they are both awesome
*roguelikes
This is a really good analysis about Roguelikes. I can tell a lot of passion went into this video, and honestly It's probably the best I've seen tackling this topic. Great Job, wondering what else you have in store.
Had this popup in my recomendations and of course seeing Revita in there had me even more excited. That aside, genuinly excellent analysis and definitely something I'll keep referencing going forward! =D
Thanks a lot Ben! I’m glad you enjoyed it. I’ve been a big fan of Revita for a while now, grinding that 100% achievement on stream and am even planning on making a video reviewing the game with a focus on design and balance in the near future. Would love to talk about a lot of balance and gameplay aspects with you if ever given the chance. Looking forward to the next big update! ;)
And also huge thanks for sharing the video, it means a lot!!
@@PepperHeadGaming Yeah I'd love to chat! =D
7,6k followers?!
Dude it was a great video with quite deep deconstruction of such a big amount of games. I will gladly keep that video in mind to show it to junior designers!
Thank you and keep doing such an interesting content! Worth every minute fr
Definitely my favourite roguelite is Brutal Orchestra. It has turned based combat system with twist I have never seen in a vidya before. It challenges the player to gather pigments while in a fight, which are obrained by attacking an enemy. But the type of it depends on a health bar color of the said enemy. It will (almost) always give you two pigments, which you can use to take actions, wince every character in this game needs specific combinations of them in order to make a move. But you shall not have more than 10 at once (excluding pigment generator), because it will cause demage to all party. In this game you can see every enemies moves before their turn, so you need to act accordingly. It challenges the player to be more strategic than random. This game is rather hard, but very fair, since the player has every piece of information he needs in order to make right moves, so when you die it is 99% your own fault.
It is very difficult to describe and I do not think I did a justice to this unique type of combat here, so please check it out yourself. It is one of the Best games I have ever encountered
I might have found my favorite channel on UA-cam. I'm gonna definitely watch your 3 hour tier list soon! 😁
Backpack Hero's synergy type adds a great deal of decision making and risk vs reward. I've played the game a lot on the hard modes where you get even less, worse items, and I kinda enjoy fighting with the loot system.
I’m planning and making a roguelike with my friend, this helped a lot thank you🙏 God bless you!!!
This is a great video! I really hope you will do that boss design video you talked about. :)
That’s the plan!
Wow that was a good video, great editing and background footage, amazing voice and pacing, really enjoyed the structure, made it easy to follow and very digestible, I felt like I learnt a lot
What an amazing video! Really looking forward to the tierlist you teased
Thanks for watching! Us too! The tier list livestream will be THIS Thursday 9/7. Hope to see you there!
Top notch content, thanks for this! :)
I was a wee bit sad that Noita only received a few seconds of gameplay clip and no mention in the video, because I think there are some very interesting lessons to learn from its design. So in case anyone would not be familiar with that game, I'd share a few remarks and takeaways "in a nutshell":
- The game gives minimum instructions to the player since the very beginning of the first run, but relies on hints and suggestions to guide the player. Gameplay ultimately progresses vertically, from top down, and starts at the entrance of a cave leading to a mine, to the right. Design exploits our age-old habit of the left-to-right directional 2d platformer flow (like e.g. in Super Mario) to traverse the level, but nothing prevents the player to start going the opposite direction at the start instead. Later, the player might figure out ways to bypass natural obstacles on the levels and even leave the intended gameplay path entirely, discovering hidden surprises. Discovery and surprises are strong mechanics in Noita.
- The entire game boils down to risk and reward management. Players can progress slower and safer, discovering more resources that make further gameplay easier, or quicker but riskier, leaving the player with less resources as they go further in the game with its increasing difficulty. This pairs well with the fact that everything can kill the player, partly because every pixel is physically simulated. And players will discover many many ways to end a run with accidental deaths caused by hubris.
- Noita has a unique psychedelic jazz vibe, and the soundtrack contributes massively to building this quirky and enjoyable ambience.
- The entire game feels like a large sandbox after completing it once with the intended way, with a "natural ending", because (mainly through its online community) the player can learn that there are other ways to complete a run. Noita is full of undocumented secrets and mechanics to be discovered, and the many esoteric source material (alcmehy, hermeticism) in the game just adds to the mystical vibe. It feels very rewarding to discover these. (And, after years of its release, there are still 2 secrets/puzzles in the game that were found, but were not solved yet by the community!)
I had my first win after 60 hours of gameplay, but after more than 600 hours, I still feel that Noita has a lot of replayability. I would really like to see a study video by someone on that game's design.
Unpopular opinion but a lot of the things that you said in the diversity segment i feel fits with Hades, the bosses never changing makes each run feel the same, having a very limited selection of weapons, idk i just feel like every run is the same in hades, where as Isaac the start and end of a run are so incredibly different its crazy
Nah man your opinion is valid
I love roguelikes! Thank you to the community help me find games I love to this day! You guys are awesome!
A bit sad skul wasn’t talked about a bit more but still an amazing video
Atleast they put the music here
I love your synergy part of the video about you talking about how frustrating is that certain items cannot be use in the built because, Isaac plays with that in various characters like the lost or blue baby, because them don’t have normal life so when you encounter items of life up they are almost useless with them and that adds to the difficulty, and I love that in the case of the lost, because you don’t have life you gain other things like flying to compensate for the shrinking pull of items that are useful for you in the room
honestly amazing video took alot of what I see and think about the genre and expressed it better than I ever could I would honestly love to see if you had any views on rougelite deckbuilders as they tend to struggle with similar but different issues.
Cool to have the list of games showcased. So many games I discovered in this video!
So, I noticed that most of the Roguelikes/lites you mentioned in the video are of the action style. But what are your thoughts regarding mechanics more Traditional RPG style Roguelikes, such as Caves of Qud?
Indeed, as I briefly noted at the begging of the video, I do focus on action based Roguelikes/lites. Today I wish I made that a bit more clear before releasing this video.
In all honesty, I haven’t played as many traditional Roguelikes, maybe 7-8 (which is a much smaller sample). While I do really respect and appreciate the design behind this genre, it isn’t as appealing to me and it’s also not being designed as much in this day and age which therefore makes it a bit less interesting to analyze.
From the ones I’ve played, I do enjoy them! There aren’t as "pickup and play" friendly as most Roguelites and I’d say they tend to be more complex which can be a pro or a con depending on what you’re looking for.
YO dude, great vid ! Finally saw a vid bout Dungreed ! I have played about 600h of this game since it released, whilst the scripted sets are as you say, well done, beating any late game boss almost requires a set with a legendary weapon sadly… the few runs were I have beaten some of the secret bosses are with sets ou in runs with 2-4 great legendary items (which are only about half of them), so late game runs are really repetitive because you want some legendaries in almost any build (for exemple the healing one or passives like the dice), whilst you have lots of skills to unlock, the one that lets you keep a single item after a run feels way toooo important if you want a consistent chance to win… Though I have always been a fan of roguelikes, I just haven’t been able to pin down what feels great in them, this vid has been a game changer for me ! Keep the great vids going !
Great vid! One aspect I really adore like in TBoI or RAD is how the char's appearance permuates with it's abbilities (tumors, wings, little mini thems following...). And midigating health is a strange one: Eden streakers don't seem to lose any, but in Blazing Beaks f.e. one needs to sacrifice health to find secret rooms. Risk/reward as you stated, but also push your luck... Atomicrops? Has been heroes? Fights in tight spaces?
Keep it up and I'll keep watching and playing;o) Will there be a sequel for non-fighting-centered ones like Loot be a lucklad?
Thanks for the kind message! I’m definitely considering making a video on Deck Building Roguelikes next ;)
This video perfectly encompasses why I LOVE this genre so much right now!
37:30 This reminds me of Holocure.
In Holocure, you're limited to 5 different weapons + your base weapon. The thing is, there is a system known as collabs. If you have the right weapons at max level, you get to fuse them together, creating a whole new weapon and allowing you to pick up another weapon.
For example, you can fuse an axe that spins around you with a lava bucket that leaves lava puddles on the ground. The resulting weapon is bunch of comets that will do tons of damage and leave large areas of damage on the floor.
So true. Holocure is a fan game, but at the same time it’s just so solid as a game
I am a big fan of roguelikes / roguelites and always had big interest in game dev - your video is really well made and doubles as a great resource for game design!
Definitely subscribed 😁
Thanks to the popularity of Binding of Isaac, the roguelike genre definition has been subverted to mean anything with procedural generation, for which the term roguelite was coined. Roguelike literally means “like Rogue”, which none of these games resemble in any way. Action roguelike is a contradiction of terms, as roguelikes are turn-based by definition with rare exceptions like FTL that allow for pausing at any time that simulate turns. It would be akin to using FPS to label a top down shooter, despite the genre literally meaning “first person shooter.”
It still bothers me that people misuse use this genre label as it dilutes the searchability of actual roguelike games that I am interested in finding, but don’t care of the twitch-reflexes style of roguelite. Honestly it’s why I clicked this video, I wouldn’t have if I had known it was going to be entirely featuring Binding of Isaac-likes. Either use the term roguelite, procedural death labyrinth, or something more appropriate please and stop the continued dilution of the genre. Doomlike evolved into FPS over time, action/reflex games need to relinquish the roguelike label similarly as it simply does not apply.
I just came across your rank list of best designed roguelikes and you explain things so well and articulate the fine points that I've always enjoyed about these games and some really good points that I've never even thought about. So now just watching your other videos as well! Good job mate :)
Especially right now it's more than interesting, since I'm working on my own Roguelike Dungeon Crawler with a synergy twist with RPG like stats and weapon combos, so will be bingewatching your videos to see if I get any new good ideas to implement or to scratch if they seem like too much!
Thing about scourgebringer for me, is that it's really hard, and it's not that long even if you 100%.
So I'm not effected by the things you had problems with. I actually had much bigger problem with 100%ing hades, the full completion content went on for bit too long and every run started feeling boring
I 'm only 7 minutes in but i'm SO GLAD you are metioning Wizard Of Legend. That is such a fantastic game, it's so underrated. Especially if you can get someone for couch co op.
Great video! Though I'd like to propose to differate "survivor-likes" from the rogue-like genre; with both an item-pool much more limited than that of most rogue-likes and the common ability to reroll items it's usually very easy to home into the ever same builds every run, combined with that enemy spawns tend to be more often than not scripted, the charm randomness quickly vanishes. Furthermore with synergies mostly falling into either the minor synergies or scripted synergies and already a large chunk of the long term appeal of the more rogue-likes is gone. As such they need a bit of a different focus to be engaging for a greater amount of time, but let's not get too deep into that, or at least not for now.
You'd be right to do so, these games are Run and Guns, a genre entirely different from Roguelike that permadeath is also a staple of (permadeath =/= roguelike). Run and Guns are about shooting down horses of enemies and usually lack the procedural generation or limited resources that are staples of the roguelike genre (far more so than permadeath).
Great script, great insights, great video!
There exists simultanously two definitions for roguelite and I feel like the one you are using is more wrong.
nethack, rogue and caves of qud are all kind of similar and different to games you are implying as roguelikes
the other definition is very spectrum. Personally Risk of Rain 2 for me was about persistent progress that made the game easier, but other people probably played it differently and would argue otherwise
What a great video! You discussed a lot of parts of roguelikes that I’ve never seen anyone discuss - like the nature of items! I really like how you broke down the elements of roguelikes, and am thrilled that you went into such detail. You have earned my subscribe for sure!
Hello pepperhead, i am not going to argue with you about the definition of the roguelike genre or anything, instead i request you to make a video for traditional roguelikes, why?, Because i been searching for a new one to play but everytime i do hundreds of non traditional roguelike videos and lists come up instead
Please make a traditional roguelike video
Rougelikes had become one of my personal favorites for the last few years mainly due to how many ways you can make the same thing but different twists. Sure, you may get a game that's more or less the same but there are definitely some unique ones:
Hades has more depth in its story telling then other leading Rougelikes.
Enter the Gungeon gives you a lot of crazy over the top firearms to mess with.
Skul the Hero Slayer has a wide assortment of skulls with different weapons and powers.
And Cult of the Lamb has a very nice blend of base and time management to go along with generated dungeon design. That game has become my second favorite Rougelike in the genre as my 700+ hour playtime can attest.
Now you’ve covered the rogueliTes part, you forgot to put back the rogueliKes you’ve probably cut in your video…
So what makes a good roguelike ? Grid based movement and turn based for a start, this doesn’t make them specifically “good” but it makes them being rogueliKes for a start…
yeah this video was filled with everything I espected as the time I clicked on it. Thanks for the new discoveries, I'll probably buy some of the games you presented here
All of the games shown in the video are rougelites. None of them are reminiscent of Rogue. Roguelikes are games like DCSS, Cataclysm: DDA, pixel dungeon, nethack etc. Most of games in the videos have meta progression, like unlocking new items, none of them have grid turn based movement etc.
I love cataclysm it is so fun, it was the first roguelike I ever played (it was free)
If u want short runs try out rift wizard or rift wizard 2. Really difficult but really fun. And the runs are not gonna be super long
Great video ! I am surprised that you didn't say much about sound design in roguelikes, especially while showing gameplay from Hades. This game made me understand how important sound design can be in these games, and not only through music and voice acting. Because gameplay is often very fast paced, loots and events are randomized, it's important to be able to quickly feel what's going on and what is available. I think Hades made a terrific job in that regard, because sometimes rooms are big and you don't realize that treasures troves / fishing spots / chaos gates are available. But because all of these have specific sound cues, they get really hard to miss ! And that's just one example of effective use of sound design in roguelikes.
"some games may have a heavy focus on gameplay" did chatgpt write this?
I also love the enemy design part and I also enjoy your view in messiness in a rogue game, I think for small enemies this two elements come hand and hand because when the layout of the level gets so overcrowded you have to pay attention to everything and you can get kill by a simple bullet that is lost in the chaos or a fly, even one as a player have to be careful with this because if you are so overpower you can tell sometimes if the bullet is one that you made of one of the enemies, leaving less reaction time to respond, amazing
What makes a good roguelike? A game that is actually a roguelike (now more commonly known as traditional roguelikes). Nethack, Angband, DoomRL, ToME all fantastic roguelikes that are actually roguelikes. Just my two kopecks on the matter
It’s sad to see these games now having to be called "traditional Roguelikes" with how far the Roguelike definition has come. I do love myself some good old Turn Based Rogue games every now and then.
What about cataclysm?
Games and genres evolve and often improving the gameplay etc. So yeah, no sense in being stuck in the past
Great video! I am a big enjoyer of Roguelike/lites myself, but not quite to this extent. I've often wondered what the difference is between the games of this style that I like or don't like, but I could not have summed it up as eloquently as you have. You've given me (and many others) a lot to think about going forward!
If it's in real time, it's not a roguelike. It's annoying because it's erasing actual roguelikes. Everything in this video is just a roguelite.
Yeah old roguelikes is now considered “Traditional roguelikes”
Yup. Most of the games in this video are not even roguelikes. They just have rng elements and permadeath.
The only thing i would've changed in the video is the part where you mentioned rooms being sampled and include Spelunky.
Other than that, VERY solid video! Loved every second of it.
Whole video of nothing but roguelites, "I'll now be referring to both genres as roguelikes." Why not "both" as roguelites? What's with the weird attachment to calling them something they're not?
by what metric does it matter what
You're part of the 1% that knows the difference. Having two different terms is useless, because the difference is minuscule. Roguelike sounds better so people are just going to call all of them roguelikes.
@@radonbox6569 More people would know the difference if the people who do know weren't using them incorrectly intentionally, usually for "clout" because "roguelikes are difficult games and that makes me a good gamer!"
Dude, this video helped me a lot as an indie game dev! Thank you very much :)
this is an interesting topic, but when your video starts off talking about rogue likes and literally showing shmups and fps games? seems like lack of basic knowledge so what insight am I supposed to find here
I am working on a roguelike that takes huge inspiration on Archero. I'm still a newb so it isn't working out well but design-wise. This did give me a level up. Thank you!
Please dont mix roguelikes with roguelites its already hard enough to find good roguelikes without having to sift through things barely resembling rogue.
Thank you for putting the songs you used in the video in the description! There where some bangers I really wanted to check out, and could :D
This video features no roguelikes.
i mean yeah but there's about 5 of those
Noita is included though lol
Noita is included though lol
Yea
No ADOM, no Nethack, no Rouge...
🙄
You have a great way of explaining things! Please keep making videos, you earned a sub :)
your definition of roguelike/lite is the correct one. the term roguelite was coined by the rogue legacy devs to explain permanent stat progression. everything else is a roguelike. the traditional roguelike (thats what the old school dungeon crawlers are called) fans are a small vocal angry minority. Don't let them bully you.
I love roguelikes, and I think this was a pretty good video. Thank you, I will also be using your recommendations as for my next roguelike Ill be playing.
Wow, FANTASTIC video! I'm currently developing a roguelike myself and you've managed to pinpoint and express with words what I've spent all this time calling "feel". Keep at it! :D
Now I have a much better understanding of synergies in roguelikes, thanks to you.
Your refined definitions of minor, major, and scripted synergies provide a structured framework for understanding how different types of synergies impact gameplay:
- Minor Synergy involve altering values used by the game, enhancing existing mechanics or characteristics without introducing entirely new ones. They serve to emphasize and fine-tune the player's capabilities without fundamentally changing the gameplay.
- Major Synergy alter the mechanics of the game by creating a generic system that connects compatible inputs and outputs, resulting in the generation of new mechanics and behaviors. This type of synergy allows for a more profound transformation of gameplay and offers players the opportunity to experiment with item combinations as a sandbox system, potentially leading to emergent and unexpected results.
- Scripted synergies involve altering the game's mechanics through a hardcoded system that connects specific compatible items chosen by the game. While they can produce new mechanics and behaviors or emphasize existing ones, they are more controlled and predefined compared to major synergies.
Great video with a lot of good and interesting points. A lot of examples are presented, proving that you have a lot of experience with roguelikes!
Risk vs reward: I’d say you’re onto something when you talk about risk vs reward, but I think I’d try to find a more specific word for it. It’s about tradeoffs - rewards for increased risk. Risk for what? To be set back by losing. One of the major stakes in roguelikes is the time you’ve invested into your run, and potentially putting your stakes at higher risk is exciting - but the idea of the tradeoff is to increase your chance of winning, not to increase your risk of losing. It’s decisionmaking using what knowledge you have, with the excitement of potentially putting your stakes at higher risk. So maybe the word risk management is the right word. Risk management with variables you can’t fully predict.
Minor & major synergies: I think you’re also on the money here, but I wonder if not the wording ”general & specific synergies” would be more fitting. Or maybe ”wide and narrow synergies”. Since ”minor and major” kind of implies that a wider synergy HAS to be weaker, and a narrow synergy HAS to be stronger. It might be that it’s usually better to make it that way, but in reality when you play one of these games you might find an item with a narrow synergy with a weak effect. Or maybe a reward for a hard challenge is an item with a wide synergy and a strong effect? To be more specific for those that might take the knowledge of this video to study other games or to make games, I’d specifically use the words ”As a rule of thumb, create wide synergies with weaker effects and narrow synergies with strong effects and find a balance”. Scripted synergies as a word I think is good!
I hope this comes across well, this is a very nice video with a lot of effort behind it that hits on a lot of good points, and it got me thinking about these two points previously mentioned. Thank you. 😊
Cool. Great made Roguelike logo 😎