The year in roguelikes: Was 2011 the best year yet for the dungeon crawl?
Adam Smith of Rock, Paper, Shotgun accounted for his year playing roguelikes, the cultish dungeon-crawling genre that is still going strong 30 years after the original Rogue. Unlike commercial games, rougelikes are tweaked and updated incrementally over many years, so Smith’s end of the year list is really more of a Who’s Who in the roguelike scene. Nevertheless, it makes for one of the more interesting year-end write-ups thus far.
It’s been a fantastic year for Roguelikes, with continued development of the stalwarts and plenty of releases that have toyed with the formula, sometimes reshaping it until it’s almost unrecognizable. I’ve even managed to have great roiling arguments with people about whether certain games should be called Roguelikes or not. That led to Roguelikelikes, which I am simple enough of mind to be pleased about. I also love that people care so much about these permutations of a thirty one year old game that they are willing to bicker about them with strangers.
If you have even a fleeting interest in roguelikes, I highly recommend checking it out.
-Jason Johnson
