Rogue Legacy #1 on Steam

[haphazard1]

I don't use a controller for RL1 (all keyboard), so shifting the attack and spell buttons to the mouse is quite a change for me. Necessary so you can do free aiming for some classes, but the change is going to take some getting used to. With quick drop back and rebinding down strike (if they have enabled that, it wasn't at first) that will help a bit. Learning to use the new classes' movement and attack patterns is another layer of adjustment.

I am liking the new game, more for the potential at this point than its current state. I am looking forward to more content.

[Sullla]

I've had the chance to spend about a week with Rogue Legacy 2 at this point and I love what I've seen thus far. My biggest frustration on the first night was the need to unlock the air dash but it's all been great ever since I figured that out. (The other save game files that I've started since then have all unlocked the dash on the first or second character.) I'm still slightly annoyed that there's no double jump in the current build at all, and the challenges required to unlock the runes feel a bit too difficult at the moment, notably harder than the ones in the first game. Everything else in the game thus far has been great though. Having each class use a completely different weapon creates so much more depth and replayability as compared to the original game; a couple quick thoughts on each:

* Knight is the classic Rogue Legacy gameplay, unchanged and still awesome.

* Barbarian plays mostly similar to the Knight but with a slower and "heavier" feel. The axe does huge damage while locking your character in place for about 0.5 seconds. The hit box is enormous as compared to the Knight's sword but you can't move while swinging and that's a big deal! The aerial attack with the axe has a big spinning hitbox at the cost of dealing almost no damage at all, only 1/5th the damage of the ground strike. Barbarians want to maneuver into a position where they can set their feet and swing away; they're pretty bad at trying to fight up in the air. Easy class to learn, unique in its own right, lots of fun to play.

* Hunter is just awesome, quickly becoming my favorite class because it's so different. I bought a new USB controller just for this game so that I could use the analog stick for the 360 degree aiming. The bow has outstanding range and with some practice you can hit targets on the other side of the screen with pinpoint accuracy. Hunters also deal more damage than the basic Knight attack and get a super useful innate ability with the air platform. There are bigtime tradeoffs for these advantages though, in the form of low health and decreased mobility. Shooting the bow also locks the Hunter in place for roughly 0.5 seconds as well and unlike the Barbarian there's no massive hitbox to protect your character while the attack animation plays. The Hunter also gets knocked backwards while firing in midair and it's really easy to shoot yourself into a pit on the knockback when playing the class for the first time. This is a class that emphatically does not want monsters to get up in its face and wants to snipe them from a distance. It's so much fun to pick off your enemies with deadly arrows that I keep coming back to this class again and again. Definitely a higher skillcap than Knight or Barbarian but very rewarding to learn.

* Archmage is the one class that doesn't seem to work right now. Mages get a short range fireball attack that doesn't cost mana and then triple the mana recharge rate of other classes. The big problem at the moment is that they often get stuck with spells that aren't very useful (since non-class spells are randomly assigned to each character) and then their high Intelligence stat isn't doing anything useful. Too often the Archmages that I've tried just end up as crippled melee fighters. I hope that the designers do some more tweaking here to the class for the next major patch. The other three classes are excellent while this one is a bit half-baked.

My only real complaint with the game right now is that it's extremely short. There are only 40 or so levels in total and I think about 8 runes to unlock. I started a new savefile today and I had already cleared the entire dungeon (all monsters slain in all rooms) on a 4000 gold run with my third heir. At that point I'm basically already done with all of the content in this Early Access version - I want to keep going! Give me more stuff to fight! Of course there's the one boss to fight that I was able to show on Livestream last week:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7vwVcpQp-uw

They didn't make this guy easy due to the lack of upgrades available but he's beatable with some practice. I would recommend this game to anyone who liked the original Rogue Legacy, you just might want to wait a while since the current Early Access version is basically a demo. There's not much content available yet.

[Gustaran]

The next update is pushed back to October 27th, but will include 2 new biomes instead of one. For more details see:

https://steamcommunity.com/app/1253920/d...799112143/

[Gold Ergo Sum]

Huge content patch for RL2 out now.

[Sullla]

Third content patch for Rogue Legacy 2 was released today. Here's the patch notes and the teaser video:

https://roguelegacy2.com/patchnotes/v030

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[Gold Ergo Sum]

Thanks for reminding me, I was looking forward to it dropping this month.

I think the game is very solid so far.  The classes play much more uniquely than before, so I think it may have even more replayability.

[Gold Ergo Sum]

I have now put 10 more hours in RL2 than I did in RL1 in total. If you were a fan of RL1 at all, I think RL2 is worth picking up, even in early access. The game already has more content than RL1 had, and there are still two new biomes, two new bosses, and the final boss, along with additional classes to be added.

The castle progression, character progression (as you earn XP with each class, you get additional stat bonuses, encouraging you to use all the classes), weapons systems and rune systems are deeper and better designed, IMO. The classes are FAR more varied and interesting to play. The Ranger (archer) and Gunslinger are like nothing in RL1. The art-style is lovely. And there is a greater sense of progression, as they added Metroidvania-type Heirlooms that you earn throughout the run to increase your overall skill set, like double jumps, longer and more functional dashes etc., which opens up the way you traverse the maps. They recently added an in-run shopkeeper who will sell you the weapon or class skills of another class, so you can customize your runs even more. You can have a Knight with the Barbarian skill, or a Chef with the Assassin attack. This is fun to mess around with. RL2 also has an in-run relic system that lets you add additional powers and abilities to each run, limited by your health pool and "resolve," which is a new mechanic.

I'm at the point where I've beaten all the bosses currently available and can full clear the castle, so there is not a lot for me to do at the moment, because there is no NG system yet since all the content is not in, but I have already more than gotten my money's worth from this one.

[Sullla]

I'll echo what Gold Ergo Sum posted a few days ago, Rogue Legacy 2 is shaping up to be a fantastic game. The initial Early Access release was basically a demo with only the initial "castle" region to explore. The designers added two additional regions in the last update and now they're up to four in total (out of a planned six). RL2 is already about as large as the original game and there's still a lot of content that they plan to keep adding. My biggest regret at the moment is that I keep playing until my characters are strong enough to clear all four regions and then there's no final boss or New Game Plus content to explore. More please! A couple highlights from this recent update:

* The two new classes are the Assassin and the Gunslinger. The Assassin is similar to the same class from the previous game with the mist form invulnerability making a return. It no longer costs mana and instead goes on a cooldown that requires getting 21 hits on enemies to recharge (or picking up a mana flask with one of the new upgrades). The Assassin's attack is a three-hit dagger slash combo, with the third hit dealing double damage; each hit does low damage individually but landing all three does heavy damage about equal to the Barbarian. Very fun class and seems to be one of the strongest choices at the moment. The Gunslinger is similar to the Ranger with a ranged attack but fires out a stream of bullets instead of a single arrow. If you can hit with all 24 bullets the damage is enormous (and applied very quickly) but of course there's a need to stop and reload the gun afterwards. Gunslingers can also levitate in midair while firing which is also a lot of fun and opens up some different movement options. The individual classes are so much better designed in RL2 as compared to the original game that there's going to be room for a lot of experimentation and replayability.

* The designers reworked some of the more questionable mechanics from the last update. The best change is to the armor mechanic, which previously went down continuously over the course of a run and could never be restored. That wasn't fun at all so they're reworked armor such that it blocks up to 40% of incoming damage. If you have 10 armor and take 10 damage, 4 damage gets blocked and 6 gets through. If you have 10 armor and take 50 damage, it will block up to 10 damage but the remaining 40 damage goes through. Much better stuff and there's a big incentive to stack armor while also an understanding that armor never makes your character invulnerable. The other big system rework is to the relics which now function off something called "resolve"; gaining more resolve allows characters to take relics without suffering a health penalty. There are more relics than ever in this update too with some fun effects. The Architect is also back in this update for those who use it which I never did.

Long story short, this game gets a big recommendation from me even though it's still under development. If you enjoy 2D platformers and/or the roguelike progression system, this is almost certainly going to be worth your time. I'm going to do another test run with the Mage class to see if they fixed its issues (hopefully since the designers realized that spells should scale off the Intelligence stat - they did not previously for no reason!) and then it will be back to waiting again for more updates.

[antisocialmunky]

RL2 team reminds me of Team Cherry's dev strategy with Hollow Knight so they are on a good track to make a great game.

[Gold Ergo Sum]

The new RL2 update drops tomorrow. They are adding a new biome, a new boss, new classes, and a bunch of new game systems and features, including NG+.

Considering how feature rich the game was already, this should be an excellent time to get your feet wet.