Dungeons? Is it trying to be Dungeon Keeper 3

Quite honestly, I think it is and it doesn’t do a terrible job. The fundamentals of Dungeon Keeper remain, and it’s been made all shiny and pretty.

Bullfrog made Dungeon Keeper and its sequel Dungeon Keeper II sometime in the late nineties, and for its time it was pretty mold-breaking. Rather than playing the bold and dashing hero, entering dark and dangerous places looking for gold and treasure, in Dungeon Keeper you’re cast as the Lord of the dungeon itself. It was up to you to dig out the rooms and passageways, attract the monsters and create the traps that would kill any hero who was  foolish enough to enter.  All rather clever and unique really, it’s a shame that Bullfrog were never able to make Dungeon Keeper 3, I’m sure it would have been pretty special.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XR0wzP5RvwM

Anyway, we have Dungeons now which could probably be considered DK3. There is one fundamental difference between the DK’s and Dungeons. In DK you only had to kill the hero’s or imprison/torture them depending on what you needed. In Dungeons, you actually have to make them happy. By that of course, I don’t mean ensure they live long and fulfilling lives and die happily surrounded by hundreds of grandchildren. You need to make sure the hero’s find treasure, and kill minions to make them confident and their soul gauges full. Then you kill and capture them, it’s a nice touch admittedly. Like giving them everything they want, and then snatching it away.

So what other differences are there? Dungeons works more on the lines of owning territory. In DK you owned the map and could, in most cases, dig out the rooms where you wanted; the only issue was where the gold was. in Dungeons, you can only do things such as place traps, items and pentagrams (the things that summon the monsters) in your own land, although dropping pentagrams increases your land so these have to places strategically.

Other than that there’s really not a lot to say, which is a shame. If it is going to follow in the great traditions of the Dungeon Keeper games, I would love to be able to go on and on about how original and jaw-droppingly addictive this game is. Sorry, it isn’t. At least not for me.

I think, given the choice I’ll carry on playing Dungeon Keeper 2 even if it struggles on the higher resolutions (or even some of the middle ones) If you don’t have any DK’s then it might be worth a look. There’s a free demo to wet your whistle with so you can try before you buy. I’ve linked to it from here…