[HN Gopher] Rogule: A dungeon a day keeps the Balrog away
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       Rogule: A dungeon a day keeps the Balrog away
        
       Author : seventyhorses
       Score  : 276 points
       Date   : 2023-03-05 04:13 UTC (18 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (rogule.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (rogule.com)
        
       | someweirdperson wrote:
       | The manual ("?", top left) says "press the . key to rest".
       | 
       | The big dot between the cursor keys doesn't seem to do anything.
       | And on mobile there's no keyboard to push a . key.
        
         | themodelplumber wrote:
         | It's the button in the middle of the graphical arrow buttons.
         | You need to tap it more than once to see your health start to
         | go back up. Similar to other games of the type.
        
       | qbasic_forever wrote:
       | Very cool! I love the use of emoji as icons. I'm surprised more
       | simple games don't make use of them.
        
         | asicsp wrote:
         | I used them for a TUI game. Could've used some Unicode
         | characters too.
        
         | duxup wrote:
         | I've started using them instead of png icons or svgs and so on.
         | They fit in with typical text very nicely.
        
       | singpolyma3 wrote:
       | Is it just me or can you just walk to the exit and win? Maybe
       | today's map was just bad?
        
       | libraryatnight wrote:
       | Well that was charming - we'll see if I remember to come back
       | tomorrow, but I enjoyed that in the moment :)
        
       | [deleted]
        
       | amsterdorn wrote:
       | Well made! Clever to use Twitter as scoreboard, though there
       | should be some key-based method to verify people aren't
       | fabricating their scores :D
        
         | thih9 wrote:
         | Or posting spam / advertising competing games.
         | 
         | I wonder why twitter hasn't explored exclusive hashtag write
         | access, coupled with api, as a business model. Maybe if they
         | were less dev hostile.
        
       | [deleted]
        
       | moconnor wrote:
       | Clojure - cool, I haven't seen this in the wild for ages!
       | 
       | https://github.com/chr15m/rogule.com/tree/master/src/rogule
        
         | benrutter wrote:
         | That is wild! I've always wondered with functional programming
         | what it would actually look like to have a game written in it-
         | guess this is my answer.
        
           | tmountain wrote:
           | For a good look at what game programming can be when you
           | fully abstract side effects away, check this out.
           | 
           | https://github.com/rofrol/elm-games
        
       | pmontra wrote:
       | It's great that it can be played on a phone by touching the arrow
       | buttons.
        
       | Razengan wrote:
       | Love things like this, bookmarked it before I even opened the
       | website.
       | 
       | Just wish there was a dark mode, and that the feedback link had
       | other options besides email.
        
       | kaibee wrote:
       | With the caveat that I do play a good amount of roguelikes, this
       | one was far too easy. It needs better levels. You should add some
       | algorithms that reject bad level generations. This one was
       | beatable by killing the first two monsters and walking to the
       | exit. Try generating levels until you get one where you need a
       | strategy that is not that simple? Idk.
        
         | chrismorgan wrote:
         | You can actually just walk straight to the exit, no need to
         | fight anything.
        
           | n4r9 wrote:
           | Agreed. This isn't quite like the classic roguelike in which
           | it's a struggle to survive and a miracle to win. In fact it
           | may be unrealistic to expect a "daily" game to have that.
           | This is more about getting a high score and sharing with
           | friends how you approached the same dungeon.
        
             | WastingMyTime89 wrote:
             | > This isn't quite like the classic roguelike in which it's
             | a struggle to survive and a miracle to win.
             | 
             | Most classic roguelikes are reasonably easy to win provided
             | you know and follow the obscure, nearly impossible to find
             | by yourself and very rigid optimal way to go. That's why I
             | like to call checkbox ticking games.
        
               | roenxi wrote:
               | You're just playing them wrong. The optimal way to
               | appreciate rougelikes is to spend days reading the source
               | code and constructing a set of spreadsheet models,
               | simulators and research collection of obscure forum
               | posts. Then grind patiently along the extremely boring,
               | very rigid optimal way to go.
               | 
               | No checkboxes ticked.
               | 
               | It is exhilarating.
        
               | pixl97 wrote:
               | Ah, the average Eve player. One day they'll even realize
               | it's a game and not an accounting job
        
               | n4r9 wrote:
               | "Easy" is not the same as "easy after years of practise".
        
             | jackstraw14 wrote:
             | > In fact it may be unrealistic to expect a "daily" game to
             | have that.
             | 
             | Why? Plenty of roguelikes and -lites have daily seeded
             | runs. The genre is pretty much optimal for a "daily"
             | format.
        
               | n4r9 wrote:
               | Apologies, I was being too brusque. I mean that this new
               | "Wordle variant" kind of popular daily game which takes
               | about ten minutes, is easily shared with friends and
               | family, and requires hardly any practice/knowledge, is
               | not that well-suited to rogue-likes. I feel that most
               | people playing Wordle variants enjoy getting a daily
               | sense of accomplishment after 10-15 minutes, from day 1.
               | Perhaps I'm wrong!
        
               | chongli wrote:
               | There's a subgenre of traditional roguelikes known as
               | "coffee break roguelikes". These games are specifically
               | designed to be highly compressed experiences without
               | sacrificing the characteristic difficulty of the genre.
               | They happen to be a perfect fit for this sort of daily
               | game. I'm not aware of any that actually do this though!
               | 
               | The roguelite Spelunky HD has a daily seed with a
               | leaderboard. That game can be finished in 10-15 minutes
               | (if you're really good)!
        
               | n4r9 wrote:
               | Wow, so I was wrong. Thanks for the info!
        
           | ilkke wrote:
           | Hah, I believed the instructions and collected all the
           | mushrooms before exiting.
        
           | Aeolun wrote:
           | Or you can walk up to a random monster and get beaten to hell
           | and back. I dunno, that wasn't exactly a fun experience
           | either.
        
         | duxup wrote:
         | > You should add some algorithms that reject bad level
         | generations.
         | 
         | How big a request is that?
        
       | xwdv wrote:
       | I wish you could come across the graves or dead bodies of other
       | players where they died and perhaps loot items or something.
        
         | guites wrote:
         | This has strong Tibia (the mmo) vibes. Would also love it,
         | although the maps would have to be a bit bigger, or maybe the
         | drop rates smaller.
         | 
         | This would also make it harder for the first adventurers and
         | gradually easier for late comers (more bodies/more loot)
        
       | duxup wrote:
       | I really enjoy the simplicity of the UI and ease of playing.
       | 
       | I wish there was more of this on the web.
        
       | DerSaidin wrote:
       | `Rogule 2023-3-5`
       | 
       | Please zero pad month and day!
        
       | Madmallard wrote:
       | An elaboration on Sokoban with influences from Wordle and other
       | modern micro-content
        
       | boo-ga-ga wrote:
       | Lovely game, great idea! Would like to see more projects like
       | this:)
        
       | OscarCunningham wrote:
       | I've been playing this daily for a while. The issue I've found
       | with it is that your health recharges every 100 steps. This
       | creates a divergence between the fun way to play and the way most
       | likely to win. The optimal strategy is to spend a long time
       | button mashing between enemies, and to run back and forth for
       | ages when facing a powerful enemy. I think it would be better if
       | your health didn't recharge (with the enemies rebalanced to
       | accommodate this). This would force the player to actually make
       | smart decisions.
        
         | yyyk wrote:
         | They could also add a rest button? At least the 'proper' way
         | wouldn't be too annoying then.
        
           | tantalor wrote:
           | There is a rest button!
        
           | safety1st wrote:
           | The proper way would be "hold '.' and pray nothing shows up
           | to one shot you"
        
         | kQq9oHeAz6wLLS wrote:
         | I find self-imposed rules make things like this more fun. Sure,
         | you could run around and get your health back. Or you could
         | tell yourself "that's not fun" and just...don't do it.
        
           | sidlls wrote:
           | If the mechanics are tuned to assume you'll regain health
           | this way, self-imposed rules add a pointless challenge.
           | You're just "gaming" the game in a different way that defeats
           | the purpose.
        
         | NoboruWataya wrote:
         | Isn't this a fairly central mechanic in many of the traditional
         | roguelikes though? I know rogue and nethack both have this and
         | it means that finding a safe place to rest for a while is an
         | important part of your strategy. In nethack at least, there are
         | more, faster enemies and you also have hunger to contend with
         | so trying to rest to recharge your HP isn't an easy or boring
         | way to play.
        
           | OscarCunningham wrote:
           | Sure, but in this version there's no hunger, and you can
           | usually face the monsters one at a time.
        
           | mcphage wrote:
           | > Isn't this a fairly central mechanic in many of the
           | traditional roguelikes though?
           | 
           | It's half of the central mechanic. The other half is hunger--
           | if you starve you die, so you need to keep moving to find
           | food. That forces you to balance between moving too fast (and
           | running out of health) versus moving too slow (and running
           | out of food). If you take away half of that equation, the
           | whole mechanic breaks.
        
         | tigen wrote:
         | Speed (low moves #) to win is an important bragging factor in
         | some roguelike communities. Can be part of the score.
         | 
         | Or try adding a time->danger game mechanic like Spelunky.
        
       | openpaycard wrote:
       | [flagged]
        
       | ocimbote wrote:
       | it's the kind of site I could appreciate notifications from.
       | Especially since it's not demanding my time and attention, and is
       | quite fun and lovely.
       | 
       | Unlike, you know, pretty much every other site.
        
       | leetrout wrote:
       | And a plug for the 7 day rouge like challenge which just started
       | 
       | https://itch.io/jam/7drl-challenge-2023
        
       | saboot wrote:
       | This is the type of thing where I am staying up just to play it
       | again.
       | 
       | I would suggest a simple "how to" pop up, like a question mark
       | button on the side.
        
         | dsr_ wrote:
         | 4 hours later -- I see a question mark button on the upper left
         | side. It shows a very brief but useful set of instructions.
        
           | duxup wrote:
           | This is why I sometimes let support tickets "mature"
           | sometimes ;)
        
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       (page generated 2023-03-05 23:01 UTC)