After releasing on Wii U and 3DS, Quest of Dungeons has found its way to the Nintendo Switch. Learn more about it in our Quest of Dungeons review!

 

Quest of Dungeons is a roguelike turn-based dungeon crawler with a 16-bit look that has is available on Nintendo Switch. An evil lord has, as evil lords do, stolen all the light, so you, as the hero, must dive into its lair to defeat him once and for all. To do this, you will select from the available character classes so that you can make the most of their attacks an abilities to defeat the onslaught of enemies out to get you, as you make the most of the loot that you collect to stay alive.

The four available character classes are the Warrior who specializes in swords and is ideal for hand-to-hand combat: the Wizard who is not one for traditional weapons, favoring powerful magic and spells; the Assassin who is great at attacking from a distance; and the Shaman who is not a strong fighter but who can make up for that by using the spells that can give it the advantage over unsuspecting enemies who are in for quite the surprise. Before selecting your character, you can press the X button to change the difficulty setting, choosing between Easy, Normal, Hard, and Hell.

 

As for the game’s controls, you move around with the left analog stick or the D-Pad and can use your weapon to attack by pressing the A button. The B button is for your ability attack, and you can pick up items and use them with the Y button from your inventory, which can be opened with the X button. You can show status effects with the L button and can cycle between the available enemies by pressing the ZL or ZR buttons so that you can target them in a more efficient way before they end up overwhelming you.

The game can feel a bit hard at times for those new to the genre, but the good news is that since this is a turn-based experience, as long as you don’t move, attack, or use one of your abilities, then enemies won’t move, attack, or use one of their abilities, so you can take your time to evaluate the situation at hand so that you can understand what the best course of action is so that you can take care of the enemies as you grab all the loot you can carry to maximize your odds of survival.

This being a roguelike means that every run you do will be different, so while in subsequent runs you’ll learn what to expect from each enemy type you’ve already encountered, the layout of each area will be different, as will be the enemy placement and the loot that you will find. Once you die, it’s game over, and you’ll lose all of your progress since this is a roguelike of the permadeath variety – there is no escaping death and after a game over you will need to start all over again from scratch.

 

As you defeat enemies, you will gain experience points which will fill up the orange experience bar at the upper left of the screen – right above your health bar. Once you’ve earned enough experience and fill up the orange bar, you will level up, which will increase your stats and health so that you can take on the lower levels of each dungeon. You will also collect gold from defeated enemies or from the barrels, tables, statues and other monuments you destroy, and you can use this to buy items from the merchants you will find during your quest. Their wares are usually of a rather high price, but they can be the difference between survival and defeat.

The Nintendo Switch version, when compared to the previous Nintendo Wii U and Nintendo 3DS, does have some new things and some advantages. Right from the start, and due to the console’s nature, you can play the game at home or on the go, which combines the best of both worlds from previous versions. You also get a new mansion to explore which features a new theme and sprites, which will, in turn, benefit the custom mode of the game in which you can set up a game just the way you like it, and the extra mansion adds some extra variety on top.

Quest of Dungeons is a fun 16-bit infused roguelike turn-based dungeon crawler that feels right at home on the Nintendo Switch. It features a good difficulty curve and gameplay mechanics that are easy to understand, as well as four difficulty settings so that players of all skill levels can dive in. Due to its procedurally generated roguelike nature, you could spend dozens of hours playing the game and still not have experienced everything it has to offer, making this an easy game to recommend at its budget $8.99 price.

Disclaimer
This Quest of Dungeons review is based on a Nintendo Switch copy provided by Upfall Studios.