Legend of Keepers: Career of a Dungeon Manager - Feel like a dark lord

Roguelike games abound. Traveling through dungeons, random bonuses, permanent character death, and random level generation are still an incomplete list of the genre's must-have elements. There have been just as many variations, including original variations. But there aren't many games where the player is given the opportunity to play not the plucky heroes, but the very evil dragon. "Dragon" in this context is a nickname. "Dragon" can be the Goblin King, the Lich King, any evil in the last resort. Legend of Keepers: Career of a Dungeon Manager, as you might guess from the title, is exactly the kind of roguelike where the player is given tasks inside out: not to valiantly get the treasure, but to fight off annoying light knights; not to avoid hidden traps, but to arrange a treacherous trap; not to slay terrible monsters, but to skillfully manage them, keep them in iron gauntlets, constantly showing leadership qualities. A classic role-playing roguelike inside out. Sounds interesting, but is it fun to play?

Being angry is a job.

Historically, games with a sinister protagonist tend to be comedic. In Overlord we terrorized caricatured helpless peasants with the funny screams of minions, in Evil Geniuses we built secret bases and cosplayed Dr. Evil, in Stubbs the Zombie in Rebel Without a Pulse we fed on human brains. And all this in cartoonish graphics without a hint of seriousness.

Legend of Keepers: Career of a Dungeon Manager starts off with a hiring scene. The Cyclops-HR manager tells us, the evil trainee, how to properly manage our staff and keep the treasure intact. Officially businesslike, we are brought up to speed and wished good luck with our career advancement. The monsters in Legend of Keepers: Career of a Dungeon Manager don't think of themselves as monsters, they think of themselves as honest workers. Their job is to dispose of uninvited heroic guests. At the same time, monsters are in no hurry to attack castles and destroy adventurers. The monsters here depend on the adventurers, because the heroes are the raw material of production for new atrocities. The balance of the world in Legend of Keepers:Career of a Dungeon Manager is built so that brave heroes are always trying to gain glory, dying like flies and villains are just fulfilling their function a priori.

Legend of Keepers: Career of a Dungeon Manager cannot boast of a plot, but it can boast of sparkling humor. Since we will be playing a villain, the authors - Goblinz Studio, had carte blanche to stuff their game with black humor. For example:

The resources are like the artwork: blood, tears, and gold coins. The player gets blood for killing heroes, tears are obtained for intimidating the heroes to a panic flight, and the gold is stolen by blood and sweat. Spend resources will have to mainly on pumping, as in all roguelikes. Battling loser heroes is not the only way to get resources, some goblin in sales can put forward an ingenious working strategy to extract blood and tears directly at the expense of staff. Of course, no pay raise due to overtime is expected...

Managing a monster staff is a separate art form. Minions don't get paid. It's enough that you don't quarter them or feed them to the dogs. But you'll have to reckon with the minions' needs: after each death, the monster gradually burns out on his job. If the next monster burns out, you have to put him on leave. Of course, the vacation is unpaid, but who will do his job? From time to time, monsters can get up to something: have a scuffle over a corporate comb, drink poison, or, what's totally inappropriate; find an adult magazine featuring nasty people during another riot:

Approximately one-third of the gameplay is the uncomplicated management of minions. However, Survival-genre haters can breathe a sigh of relief, the minions are not hungry, thirsty, or sick. The only concern is keeping an eye on their professional burnout, but even that element does not cause a headache. Burnout is implemented in the form of units. For example, the monster in the screenshot above has 5 units of burnout, twice he has already died. Of all the games of this genre, Legend of Keepers: Career of a Dungeon Manager is probably the poorest in mechanics, but also the most forgiving. If in the same Darkest Dungeon one mistake could cost not only a loss, but also an irretrievable loss of precious characters, then in Legend of Keepers: Career of a Dungeon Manager you can make a mistake at least every minute. Speaking of Darkest Dungeon...

Regular Rogue-lite?

If you are familiar with Darkest Dungeon, Legend of Keepers: Career of a Dungeon Manager gameplay will seem more like an addon than a standalone game. In Darkest Dungeon the meta-progression was the construction of the city and increasing the levels of buildings, the construction in Darkest Dungeon is implemented by way of building cities in Heroes of Might and Magic. In Legend of Keepers: Career of a Dungeon Manager meta-progression is implemented without finesse - the classic skill branch:

The meta progression for all six characters is separate. Split experience is the only motivation to spend more time in Legend of Keepers: Career of a Dungeon Manager, as there are no builds, no city building, and no prestige levels.

Sessions don't shine with variety. It is worth looking under the screen of the original idea, immediately comes out sparingly filling the game. We are faced with the usual rogue-lite: the same randomly encountered bonuses:

No matter how you rename it, the choice of three bonuses won't change the essence...
...We still have the same choice of three rewards for the completed level:

...And the same randomly generated dungeon with randomly generated activities:

The originality here is only in the framing and in the humor. In this respect, Goblinz Studio are very good. Let's break down the activity "psychotherapist" - it's a classic +1 to troop morale, but look at the description: Analysis of an employee's state of mind. Conducted by a professional. Just imagine Sauron sitting in a therapist's office complaining about insomnia or lack of appetite. That's what Legend of Keepers: Career of a Dungeon Manager is all about - the puns, the farce, the banter over stereotypes. But this game is not about revolutionary mechanics, perfect balance or terrific story. Speaking of balance...

Bad Rogue-lite

The second observation is that the preparation stage gives only a ghost of variation. The session is divided into six to eight rooms. In some rooms your servants will fight the heroes, in other rooms there will be a trap waiting for the heroes, in others the heroes will be hit by the villain himself. The sequence is regularly shuffled, but it is shuffled without player participation.

Why is random placement bad? Let me give you an example: let's say you spent half the game rolling an elemental resistance reduction trap, but your first room is a battle. Your opponents didn't get a negative effect from the trap, and your whole army is geared specifically for elemental damage; therefore, your army is taking heavy losses due to the game, and not because of your mistake. Also, some heroes may be immune to elemental damage, and one of the playable villains only deals elemental damage. This can be corrected with an amulet, but the right amulet may not fall out by then... the player is once again a prisoner of randomness.

And that's what Legend of Keepers: Career of a Dungeon Manager is all about - the rough balance and lack of variation.

Is Legend of Keepers: Career of a Dungeon Manager worth buying?

At the very least it's worth playing Legend of Keepers: Career of a Dungeon Manager, but not buying it at full price. The game would make a great add-on to the bundle, a good discount purchase, and not a bad entertainment for the evening. However, as a rogue-lite Legend of Keepers: Career of a Dungeon Manager is more of a disappointment than a crush. P.S. "From the Author": Is it just me, or does the soundtrack of Legend of Keepers: Career of a Dungeon Manager sound just like Grimora from Inscryption? Write in the comments to see if I'm imagining it, please.