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[Del_Duio]

I tried the demo, and the game's pretty cool.

Couple things though: Are there only 3 playable classes in this? (Elsewhere it says 6 playable classes are in the demo). Also when you die, is there an option to go back to the menu screen and choose another class because I can't find it.

[eobet]

The game is played entirely with one mouse button, I dev on a Mac, so to have only one action require the use of the right mouse button would be a bit odd. Move-to-pick-up action would be easy to add for stacked items, the issue is mainly with lone items on a space. I considered having single items still pop up in a stack same as multiple items, but it looked odd and unnecessary above an empty space. It was one of those dev choices where it may not be perfect, but of the methods I tried it seemed the best. I could maybe have got it to work eventually but sometimes you've got to go with what you've got.

Ok, I must admit that because the game doesn't consist of many 1-tile wide corridors, I overlooked the case where you'd actually want to stop moving on the tile of the item. I've only played for an hour or two, but the overwhelming majority of my clicks are either on monsters, doors I want to open... or items I want to pick up.

So, new proposal then: Hold down shift to enable the move-to-pick-up? (Same as temporarily enabling the display of shortcut keys, I know.)

Also, you develop on the Mac, yet it doesn't use the fullscreen feature of Lion and can't do a 3X on a standard 1440x900 display? *cough* No, sorry, I'm just ribbing you.

I've played some more now (unlocked a new class, yay) and it's an absolutely fab game. With just a little UI polish it's absolutely Humble Bundle or Steam quality and you should definitely put it on the Mac App store! 

EDIT: Just have to ask one more question... the spinning effect of poison is very nice, but it makes me wonder how confusion looks… shouldn't poison be a dripping effect? But I haven't seen confusion yet, so maybe it's not in the game (but I hope it is, because monsters beating on monsters is very entertaining).

[Oddball]

I heard that fullscreen in Lion is handled differently. I'm still running Snow Leopard here. And yes 1440x900 should be enough room to allow a 3x window, not sure why it's not.

I don't think the HIB guys will be all that interested and Steam have already knocked it back. I might try them again if the game manages to pick up a bit of a favourable groundswell.

Sorry to disappoint, but confusion was cut from the final game. Originally it was going to be a side effect of psychic damage, then it got bumped to a scroll/potion curse, but I wasn't really 'feeling it' so I shelved it.
I'm glad you gave it a second chance, and I hope you can come to love the game foibles.

EDIT
@Del_Duio: Sorry I missed your question there. The other three characters unlock depending on how many times you die. The final game has 32 characters which unlock the more you die.

[oyog]

So good.

This is Desktop Dungeons addicting.

Guh! So many fantastic games to buy!  I'm puttin' this on my list, right under Bastion and Dear Esther.

[eobet]

Ok, gameplay question:

Playing a melee class, quite often monsters refuse to engage you, resulting in everyone skipping turns indefinitely... most roguelikes don't have this problem, because even if you are a melee class you can often throw/shoot/discharge something at them.

But how do you get around that in this game? Is it by design that you need to get hit first when playing as a melee class?

Also... I'm afraid to ask... but it would be good to get a move-to-attack command for melee as well...

[Caran Elmoth]

Playing a melee class, quite often monsters refuse to engage you, resulting in everyone skipping turns indefinitely... most roguelikes don't have this problem, because even if you are a melee class you can often throw/shoot/discharge something at them.

Personally, my favourite class is the Dwarven Warrior. I use the secondary weapon slot to carry a (less effective) ranged weapon, just to handle the case you've described before.

[Oddball]

I've seen a few tactics employed to combat the not taking the first hit issue. Firstly I should point out that it's only the smarter monsters that don't want to take the first hit, so you can keep that in mind when figuring out which baddies will hold off.

Caran's tactic above is a good one in general, I'll often keep a different weapon type in the backup slot. After a monster has been hit at range they will often close fully to avoid being picked off at a distance.

Another one I've seen is, if there is a convenient wall nearby run behind it and wait for them to come round after you. If you are out of sight they'll run round the corner after you not realising you've stopped to ambush them.

[eobet]

I didn't know about the secondary weapon, but when I tried it, I discovered that it takes a turn to switch so when you do, the enemies close in and hits you, so that doesn't work.

Running around a corner, however, did seem to work.

EDIT: Ah, saw the comment about when hit once, they close in even if you switch back... so secondary weapons when the distance is great, and run around a corner when distance is close... got it!

[Dragonmaw]

Did Steam reject it because you couldn't incorporate Steam API into the game, or because it wasn't notable enough? Because they host a lot of games which aren't really notable.

[Oddball]

Steam integration wouldn't be much of a problem, so I can only assume it was the latter. It was in beta when I showed it to them and it took them about an hour to email me back saying they didn't want it. I'm guessing they took one look at it and decided it wasn't right for them. It's tough, but it's their prerogative I guess.

[KomradeJack]

Steam integration wouldn't be much of a problem, so I can only assume it was the latter. It was in beta when I showed it to them and it took them about an hour to email me back saying they didn't want it. I'm guessing they took one look at it and decided it wasn't right for them. It's tough, but it's their prerogative I guess.

Perhaps you should have done it in Flash and gotten a toddler to make the art for it.  Then they would have probably accepted it.

[eigenbom]

Hey cool, I'll check this out when I'm on my other comp!

[Oddball]

HSL is now on Desura and indievania for people who prefer those outlets.

[Yodhe]

Well done, looks lovely, and I hope your game's reception exceeds your expectations.

[Dragonmaw]

Moving to Announcements.