Handheld gaming is more than a compromise of power and portability. Whether it’s the ability to play anywhere, multitask or hold an entire console in your hands, it’s a special experience consoles have never replicated. In a world where high resolutions and teraflops reign supreme, we take a look at a portable relic every month and reflect on what makes it memorable. Be warned, spoilers may occasionally populate these articles.
Rogue Legacyis one of those games where the title might not make sense to the lay person. Someone could think it means Rogue’s Legacy, and it could be about a plethora of hospitalized men who tried getting too handsy with a certain member of theX-Men.Or they might see that and think it’s a game about the Crüxshadows' discography. ADiablo IVplayer will see it and think someone misspelled Rouge Legacy. These are all completely idiotic interpretations ofRogue Legacy.Understanding the meaning of the title isn’t terribly important, but it probably has something to do with the game being a rougelike and familial legacies pass on the money earned by fallen characters.
Review: Rogue Legacy (PS4)
Roguelike-vania
Rogue Legacyis a roguelite metroidvania where players explore a randomly-generated castle. The premise is simple on paper: explore the castle, defeat the boss of each of the four areas and then go defeat the final boss. This task becomes much more difficult when the player’s starting strength is comparable to that of a wet paper cup. Not only that, but this castle is randomly generated, so memorizing the layout of the map isn’t an option unless the player wants to sign over a huge amount of their gold to the architect. Tempting as that may be, gold is the only way the player will ever grow stronger.
When the player dies, which for most of us will be a rather frequent occurrence, especially early on, any gold that was in the fallen hero’s possession can be reinvested into powering up the next generation. There isn’t any traditional leveling up system, but players can purchase stat and equipment upgrades that would benefit their heirs. After each death, the player can choose between three different heirs with different strengths and weaknesses, but as the manor is upgraded, the selection of available heirs can increase to six, leading to a large assortment of multi-generational corpses.
As we’ve learned in middle school biology class, traits of one’s heirs are based on genetics.Rogue Legacydoesn’t get too involved, or involved at all, with using Punnett squares to determine the traits of the available heirs. There are, however, some odd random traits that the playable characters will possess that factor into the game play in interesting ways. An heir could be colorblind, and this doesn’t mean they see shades of red and green as some brown color, it turns the game black and white.
Dwarfism makes the character smaller, which can be an advantage in avoiding attacks or squeezing into small places, or gigantism which offers the reverse of those benefits. ADHD increases character movement speed and far-sighted makes the character and the surrounding area a blur, but the rest of the screen remains crystal clear. Given the randomly-generated nature of the castle, it seems fitting that the characters receive an assortment of random genetic afflictions.
You Only Die Once. And Then Many More Times
People who were introduced to gaming in the past fifteen years or so tend to hold Dark Souls as the measuring stick for highly difficult yet enjoyable games. Those of us that have been in the game much longer tend to think of those unforgiving 8-bit platformers when it comes to generating enough frustration to snap a controller in half. The developers of Rogue Legacy took inspiration from both types of games, creating a 2D platformer that’s meant to be challenging. The difficulty may seem unfair at first, but after enough attempts where the player becomes comfortable with the mechanics and is able to invest in some power ups for their heirs, it becomes much more accessible.
To ensure that the player spends all their money, Charon’s Toll must be paid whenever a new heir wants to enter the castle. This mechanic is designed to prevent the player from hoarding their accumulated wealth and saving up for certain expensive upgrades and also encourages regular progression for the heirs. This can have negative effects once the player unlocks a few upgrades, as each upgrade becomes more expensive whenever one is purchased, and eventually, the player will need a sizable amount of cash to get anything. This can result in deaths where the player may not have enough money to put toward anything, and all that gold will go to Charon with no benefit to the player whatsoever.
Rogue Legacyis a challenging but rewarding title. Indie games and 2D action platforming might not appeal to everyone, butRogue Legacyexcels in its execution, where even gamers who don’t usually consider this type of game their forte will still likely enjoy it. The feedback loop of progressing through the castle, dying and then returning slightly more powerful does feel like progress is constantly being made, even if the map is completely different from before. The ever-changing map along with having to choose a new character each time, often with some sort of unique characteristic, allowsRogue Legacyto constantly feel like a fresh experience even after dozens of attempts.
The difficulty level is on the higher side, but as long as the player is able to collect a decent amount of gold before death they can keep becoming stronger, which makes the game feel difficult but never impossible and brings a great sense of accomplishment when the player finally does make significant process. The gameplay itself is simple, reminiscent of the 2D games that inspired it, but this is an example of how simplicity can bring greatness.
Rogue Legacyis one of my more played Vita titles, but it is also available on iOS, Mac, PC, PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, Switch and Xbox One. A sequel,Rogue Legacy 2, released a couple of years ago that seems like it would appeal to fans of the original. In an age where epic storyline, cinematic cutscenes and complex gameplay are in vogue, as great as those things are, it’s sometimes nice to return to game with simpler mechanics. Rogue Legacy is a prime example of such a thing, as it is one of more rewarding indie games out there.
