1st Edition

Exploring Roguelike Games

By John Harris Copyright 2021
    556 Pages 35 B/W Illustrations
    by CRC Press

    556 Pages 35 B/W Illustrations
    by CRC Press

    Since 1980, in-the-know computer gamers have been enthralled by the unpredictable, random, and incredibly deep gameplay of Rogue and those games inspired by it, known to fans as "roguelikes." For decades, this venerable genre was off the radar of most players and developers for a variety of reasons: deceptively simple graphics (often just text characters), high difficulty, and their demand that a player brings more of themselves to the game than your typical AAA title asks. This book covers many of the most prominent titles and explains in great detail what makes them interesting, the ways to get started playing them, the history of the genre, and more. It includes interviews, playthroughs, and hundreds of screenshots. It is a labor of love: if even a fraction of the author’s enthusiasm for these games gets through these pages to you, then you will enjoy it a great deal.

    Key Features:

    • Playing tips and strategy for newcomers to the genre

    • Core roguelikes Rogue, Angband, NetHack, Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup, ADOM, and Brogue
    • The "lost roguelikes" Super Rogue and XRogue, and the early RPG dnd for PLATO systems
    • The Japanese console roguelikes Taloon’s Mystery Dungeon and Shiren the Wanderer
    • Lesser-known but extremely interesting games like Larn, DoomRL, HyperRogue, Incursion, and Dungeon Hack
    • "Rogue-ish" games that blur the edges of the genre, including Spelunky, HyperRogue, ToeJam & Earl, Defense of the Oasis, Out There, and Zelda Randomizer
    • Interviews with such developers as Keith Burgun (100 Rogues and Auro), Rodain Joubert (Desktop Dungeons), Josh Ge (Cogmind), Dr. Thomas Biskup (ADOM), and Robin Bandy (devnull public NetHack tournament)
    • An interview regarding Strange Adventures in Infinite Space
    • Design issues of interest to developers and enthusiasts

    Author Bio:

    John Harris has bumped around the Internet for more than 20 years. In addition to writing the columns @Play and Pixel Journeys for GameSetWatch and developer interviews for Gamasutra, he has spoken at Roguelike Celebration. John Harris has a MA in English Literature from Georgia Southern University.

    1 An Introduction to Some Rogues 1Section I Basics

    2 What the Hell Does Q Do Again? 7

    3 A View of the Field 11

    4 Tips for Travel in Gridland 17

    5  Brought to You Today by the Letter “Q” 23

    6 Check and Mate 27

    Section II Theory

    7 The Berlin Interpretation 37

    8 Roguelikes and OD&D 45

    9 Storytelling, Bah! 49

    10 Pushing the Silver Boulder 51

    11 I Never Meta Rogue I Didn’t Like 57

    Section III NetHack

    12 Giant Eel Stories, Volume 1

    13 Giant Eel Stories, Volume 2 67

    14 Thou Art Early, but We’ll Admit Thee 71

    15 I Believe It Not! 77

    16 How to Win at NetHack 83

    17 Spoiled for Options 95

    18 Hack Hacks 99

    19 A Quick Look at the NetHack Sources 105

    20 Balancing a Game That Looks Balanceless 109

    21 SLASH’EM: NetHack Intensified 113

    22 Ten Years of the dev/null NetHack Tournament, Part 1 119

    23 Ten Years of the dev/null NetHack Tournament, Part 2 123

    Section IV Dungeon Crawl

    25 Crawl: Skills and Advancement 137

    26 Crawl: Skill Overview 143

    27 Crawl: Interesting Class and Race Pairs 153

    28 Crawl: Travel Functions and Play Aids 161

    29 Crawl: Dungeon Sprint 167

    Section V ADOM

    30 ADOM, NetHack with a Goatee 175

    31 Things to Do While Visiting Ancardia 179

    32 Interview: Thomas Biskup on ADOM 183

    Section VI Mystery Dungeon

    33 The Delights of Mystery Dungeon: Shiren the Wanderer 199

    34 Architecture of the Mystery Dungeon 207

    35 Fei’s Problems 213

    36 Taloon’s Mystery Dungeon, in Great Detail 217

    37 A Journey to Table Mountain, Part 1 233

    38 A Journey to Table Mountain, Part 2 243

    39 A Journey to Table Mountain, Part 3 251

    40 A Journey to Table Mountain, Part 4 261

    Section VII Various Roguelikes

    41 Angband: At Last! 277

    42 Cause for Incursion 283

    43 Brogue and the Abandoning of Experience Points 291

    44 HyperRogue 299

    45 Super-Rogue, Banished to the Deeper Dungeons 307

    46 XRogue Has Not Yet Ceased to Be 313

    47 Larn, or, I Hocked the Car to Buy a Lance of Death 325

    48 Hack’s Lost Brother 333

    49 Interview: Keith Burgun on 100 Rogues 339

    50 Interview: Josh Ge on Cogmind 345

    Section VIII Roguelites and Related Games

    51 Pixel Journeys: dnd for PLATO 363

    52 ToeJam & Earl, the Roguelike That’s Not an RPG 371

    53 Interview: Digital Eel on Infinite Space 375

    54 Interview: Rodain Joubert on Desktop Dungeons 385

    55 Spelunky 393

    56 Exploring the Oasis 401

    57 The Rescue of Meta-Zelda 409

    58 Space Peeing Out There 415

    59 Doom, Doom, Doom, Doom 421

    60 DreamForge’s Dungeon Hack 425

    Section VIV Design

    61 The Eight Rules of Roguelike Design 435

    62 Mapping the Infinite Cavern 439

    63 Purposes for Randomization in Game Design 445

    64 Interface Aids and the Strategy Window 451

    65 Modeling Motion on a Dungeon Grid 457

    66 Rogue’s Item ID in Too Much Detail 461

    67 Item Design: Potions and Scrolls 471

    68 Towards Building a Better Dungeon 479

    Section VV Miscellaneous

    69 A Coward Dies a Thousand Deaths, but My Computer, Several Thousand 487

    70 Running Atari ST Rogue in 2016 491

    71 Rogue and Its Inspiration 497

    72 The Rights to Rogue 501

    73 Some Recent Information 505

     

     

    Biography

    John Harris has been bumping around the internet for over 20 years. In addition to writing the columns @Play and Pixel Journeys for GameSetWatch and developer interviews for Gamasutra, he’s spoken at Roguelike Celebration. John Harris has a MA in English Literature from Georgia Southern University.