More updates to come
Ten years and several dozen more updates later, KeeperRL has just hit 1.0.
KeeperRL is a “dungeon simulator with roguelike and RPG elements”. Like its obvious inspiration, you’re an evil wizard, and like both its obvious inspirations, you’re directing a growing troop of minions to dig wider and deeper underground, lay traps, and await assault by your enemies. You can also venture beyond the confines of your own dungeon home to lay waste to innocents around the world, or switch roles and play an adventurer invading the dungeons of other players, with turn-based tactical combat.
All of which sounds swell to me. “Sounds” because, although I’ve played just a tiny touch of KeeperRL, that was a decade ago, and I remember it not.
Dungeon Keeper and Dwarf Fortress have a lot in common, but are very different in other, key ways. KeeperRL’sSteam pagedescribes it as being “simulated on a very detailed level”, for example, with granular wounding, fire that spreads, and a rich variety of “items, spells, attributes and special attacks.” It lays no claim to simulating the inner worlds of its minions, and so I suspect your orcs and men will not be taking to a fey mood and demanding materials for great works of art. You probably know yourself whether that’s a disappointment or a relief.
It’s quite a good time to be a Dungeon Keeper fan, given an open source remake KeeperFxjust hit version 1.0 after 15 yearsof development.
KeeperRL will continue to receive balance patches and fixes post-release, as well as a 1.1 update to add “more content and gameplay that didn’t make it to the 1.0, including another playable keeper faction”,according to its developer.
If you want to buy it now, it’s £11.61/$15/€12.59.
