Roguelike ?

[horlaci]

I haven't played too much, (lvl 15, 4 hrs) but I find the roguelike nature of the game a bit lacking.
For me, roguelike means that You get a tiny, but permanent upgrade after each run. (If You succeeded enough)
So with each run, You can be sure, that the next run You'll get a tiny bit further.

Of course, no upgrade if You fail in the first 30 seconds, but You get the idea....

Now in this game, the only roguelike nature is tha badges. And its VERY rare for that.
Also, discovering new equipment and perks to "appear in the shop" sounds good, but in reality they are very rare too.

So, If I can have a suggestion to future content, I would definitely strengthen the roguelike aspect.

Cheers.

[horlaci]

At which level am I supposed to be successful on the second map? :D
Level 17, and get completely obliterated every time. Not even the slightest chance....

[Lemonade]

That's not what roguelike means, but yes i agree the meta progression could be a lot more rewarding like how Enter the Gungeon did theirs.

[horlaci]

How should I interpret "roguelike" then, and what does it mean for this game specifically?

[Goolies]

To improve your runs, try investing on badges that give you more survivability, such as exohearts. Remember to use the environment to your advantage, flip tables, hide behind rocks. Each enemy has a pattern and trajectory you can pick up on fairly quickly.

On another note, I think the term roguelike has been muddled a lot over the years.

I would categorize this game as an action roguelite rather than roguelike.

Roguelites have metaprogression as you mentioned. Each time you die, you are able to upgrade or improve some aspect to give you a bit more survivability or power. In the case for Tombstar, it would be the badge system and unlocks from leveling.

A roguelike would mean that each time you die, you start over. No improvements, no upgrades, just a better understanding of the game mechanics and enemies. A game I would consider a proper roguelike that is recent would be Jupiter Hell.

[Tyrian Mollusk]

Originally posted by horlaci:

How should I interpret "roguelike" then, and what does it mean for this game specifically?

"Roguelike" is an unfortunate term widely misused. "Roguelike" is a genre of games actually LIKE Rogue, a turn-based tile-based dungeon crawler with a full reset on death (ie, no metaprogression). It's a niche genre but it has players and developers and we really should not use their word for games that don't fit their genre.

A "roguelite" is a fuzzy umbrella label for games across a variety of genres that draw ideas from roguelikes, mainly procedural generation and a run-reset play model. Most roguelites are not at all like Rogue, and clearly don't fit into that turn-based genre. Roguelites often--but not necessarily--have some kind of cross-run "meta" progression. Metaprogression is a very popular feature so you see it a lot across roguelites, which gets some people thinking it's necessary, but it isn't (come on over to r/roguelites and read the sidebar). Just being an action game is more than enough to put something outside the roguelike genre and into roguelite space.

Unfortunately, roguelites kind of exploded in a very uncontrolled fashion and of course people didn't know to plan out future labeling for our convenience, so as often happens when a small genre gets overwhelmed by a more popular genre, a lot of people never payed much attention to actual roguelikes and we got a lot of blurring we're still trying to clean up.

Fortunately, the situation is actually quite simple: everyone should just use "roguelite" when they are talking about these games unless they know they are talking about something in the roguelike genre. Not sure? "Roguelite". Easy.

But when you see someone say roguelike, even a game dev, your first assumption is usually "they mean roguelite". Hades devs not giving a crap about harm done compared to it sounding cute to say "god-like rogue-like" certainly didn't help. Sadly, Steam tags are no different, but you can see "roguelite" is within 30 games of "roguelike", so we've almost got things on the right side.

If roguelite players work together and just say "roguelite" (and flag the "roguelike" tag when it's on an action game) we can make this whole thing easier for new people to figure out.

Anyway, TombStar is a roguelite, not a roguelike, and while you may prefer different kinds of metaprogression, there are many ways to do cross-run progression and TombStar has chosen a perfectly valid one that suits certain players who want very limited stat advancement from investing time playing, but cross-run progression adding things to unlock and find in future runs (Risk of Rain 2, Gungeon, and Isaac are other such roguelites, so we can't make like TombStar has gone out on a limb here). Your three badges will get you some power upgrades over time, but you don't just get stronger every run, and are meant to succeed mainly on your own grit, rather than from the game boosting you. Many people actually dislike games getting easier as you play them, even if it is also an undeniably popular feature. You can't have every roguelite can't be precisely what every roguelite player wants, there are just too many different ways.

[horlaci]

Thank You!

[TinyPixxels]

Hey folks! Thanks for all this feedback! One of the things we're working on with our first big update is making the meta progression faster, with more content coming then at a later date! We'll make sure to put out a news post when it goes live, then let us know how you find it!!

[Tyrian Mollusk]

What happens to our existing xp/level? Will you convert total earned XP to the corresponding new level, or keep us the same level we're at before the update?

[horlaci]

Now 10 hours, lvl 30.
Never got to the end of 3rd map, in most runs can't get through the 2nd.
I can't imagine ever finishing a successful run. :)
I'm not a pro gamer.

I still like it though.

[.VM8RA]

Roguelike is actually the purer form, what you are referring to is "roguelite"

A true Roguelike doesn't have meta progression. All you take into the next run, is experience from the previous one.

Roguelite games have meta progression where every run you are stronger based on things you picked up from the previous run, and or unlock at a hub world.

I happen to really like Roguelite games, the sense of progression that is mixed in with the run formula etc is perfect. It can also be adapated into so many genres of games, this style of game has really made the indie space a lot more varied and vibrant.

Not to say true Roguelikes are not great as well though, games like Noita are very popular.

Roguelites are definitely more common (post rogue legacy) however.

EDIT: Ok I see this subject has already been discussed. I should really read more of the comments before posting, ha ha.

[Tyrian Mollusk]

Originally posted by .VM8RA:

A true Roguelike doesn't have meta progression. All you take into the next run, is experience from the previous one.
Roguelite games have meta progression where every run you are stronger based on things you picked up from the previous run, and or unlock at a hub world.

This is not the distinction. Roguelikes are a genre of games actually like Rogue, ie turn-based dungeon crawlers without cross-run progression. Roguelites use roguelike elements/ideas without being restricted to that genre. "Roguelite" actually covers a whole host of genres: platformers, top-down shooters, card games, groups turn-based strategy games, jrpg-style side-vs-side battles, racing games, etc. These things are just not like Rogue.

People often assume metaprogression is the distinction because most new games are roguelites and most new games have metaprogression (and because "roguelike" gets thrown around so much by people unconcerned with the distinction between them, making people naturally try to fabricate a distinction). The problem there (aside from blithely tromping all over players of actual roguelikes and treating them as insignificant because their games are less popular) is that trying to make the distinction about metaprogression is not a simple concept everyone agrees on applying.

There are a lot of kinds of metaprogression, and people want a lot of different things from metaprogression. You have obvious strength increases like stat metaprogression, subtle strength increases like gun/upgrade unlock metaprogression (and most games with this do make you stronger on average, just not obviously stronger--you look the same but you do start in a stronger position), play scope increases like character ability and zone unlock metaprogression, difficulty increases like enemy/boss unlock metaprogression, etc. Noita does have metaprogression, via spell unlocks.

Where's the line to put games on one side or the other? We're a long way from "has metaprogression" being a functional community distinction, and it's just not worth worrying about distinguishing as far as what overall label we use, because most everything that comes out has some kind of metaprogression. Devs want their game to sell and the market demands progression.

So we roguelite players don't need to take "roguelike" away from its players and the games that forged these ideas just to have a self-contradictory label for an ill-defined subset with ever decreasing market presence. We can simply call them all roguelites, and help nudge "roguelikes" back to being what they are.

[.VM8RA]

Originally posted by Tyrian Mollusk:

Originally posted by .VM8RA:

A true Roguelike doesn't have meta progression. All you take into the next run, is experience from the previous one.
Roguelite games have meta progression where every run you are stronger based on things you picked up from the previous run, and or unlock at a hub world.

This is not the distinction. Roguelikes are a genre of games actually like Rogue, ie turn-based dungeon crawlers without cross-run progression. Roguelites use roguelike elements/ideas without being restricted to that genre. "Roguelite" actually covers a whole host of genres: platformers, top-down shooters, card games, groups turn-based strategy games, jrpg-style side-vs-side battles, racing games, etc. These things are just not like Rogue.

People often assume metaprogression is the distinction because most new games are roguelites and most new games have metaprogression (and because "roguelike" gets thrown around so much by people unconcerned with the distinction between them, making people naturally try to fabricate a distinction). The problem there (aside from blithely tromping all over players of actual roguelikes and treating them as insignificant because their games are less popular) is that trying to make the distinction about metaprogression is not a simple concept everyone agrees on applying.

There are a lot of kinds of metaprogression, and people want a lot of different things from metaprogression. You have obvious strength increases like stat metaprogression, subtle strength increases like gun/upgrade unlock metaprogression (and most games with this do make you stronger on average, just not obviously stronger--you look the same but you do start in a stronger position), play scope increases like character ability and zone unlock metaprogression, difficulty increases like enemy/boss unlock metaprogression, etc. Noita does have metaprogression, via spell unlocks.

Where's the line to put games on one side or the other? We're a long way from "has metaprogression" being a functional community distinction, and it's just not worth worrying about distinguishing as far as what overall label we use, because most everything that comes out has some kind of metaprogression. Devs want their game to sell and the market demands progression.

So we roguelite players don't need to take "roguelike" away from its players and the games that forged these ideas just to have a self-contradictory label for an ill-defined subset with ever decreasing market presence. We can simply call them all roguelites, and help nudge "roguelikes" back to being what they are.

Be that as it may, my statement is still true, as old school roguelikes still have the same base design. You have to beat it in one go, or start entirely from the beginning again. (I'm sure there's something in there about procedural generation as well, but this might have been added later. I can't remember if rogue had this or not. I seen a Documentary a few years ago)

[Tyrian Mollusk]

Originally posted by .VM8RA:

Be that as it may, my statement is still true, as old school roguelikes still have the same base design. You have to beat it in one go, or start entirely from the beginning again.

No, it wasn't true because rogueLITES don't need to have metaprogression of any kind to be a roguelite, and there's more to being a roguelike than not having metaprogression. Even if Noita had zero metaprogression, it would in no way be a roguelike, because it's an action game, a platformer, etc. Put Noita next to any actual roguelike and no one would say the two games are in the same genre. They're not.

Yes, procedural generation is a critical facet of roguelikes. It's really the only thing I play roguelites for :)

[.VM8RA]

Originally posted by Tyrian Mollusk:

Originally posted by .VM8RA:

Be that as it may, my statement is still true, as old school roguelikes still have the same base design. You have to beat it in one go, or start entirely from the beginning again.

No, it wasn't true because rogueLITES don't need to have metaprogression of any kind to be a roguelite, and there's more to being a roguelike than not having metaprogression. Even if Noita had zero metaprogression, it would in no way be a roguelike, because it's an action game, a platformer, etc. Put Noita next to any actual roguelike and no one would say the two games are in the same genre. They're not.

Yes, procedural generation is a critical facet of roguelikes. It's really the only thing I play roguelites for :)

the terms have evolved.

[Tyrian Mollusk]

Roguelikes are still a genre with players and developers, and their genre name has not "evolved" to mean entirely different kinds of games, just been misused by people who don't care about the genre or the people interested in it as roguelite popularity overwhelmed the smaller roguelike genre. People didn't know early on they'd be needing to make new labels for forging these new paths, but we don't have to keep propagating that unwitting mistake.

"Roguelite" is our word for our games. It's not a great label, but it's the label we've got, and at least it's a lot better than calling things intentionally NOT like Rogue "roguelikes". That's a silly word for us to want to keep away from the genre it actually describes, and we don't need it. We certainly don't need to keep using it when the only motivation to keep it is brazen disinterest in harming a smaller genre, ie just because we can. If we're already embracing change, we can make that change the simpler, easier, cleaner way that does not marginalize a genre of players and try to force a muddy, useless distinction that will only cause pointless, regrettable strife if people actually start trying to apply it. We can call roguelites roguelites, and let the people who care about roguelikes do their thing. We can make things simpler and better and respect our fellow players in a smaller genre. Just because we can.

We get nothing good from taking "roguelike" for ourselves. Harm is the only consequence of that choice. It's not easier. It's not more peaceful. It's not clearer. It's not more useful. It's not nice.