Steam’s Early Access not too long ago bought a brand new addition: Guidus Zero, a top-down dungeon crawling roguelike developed by indie South Korean studio Izzle.
The story takes place in a world the place a conflict raged for ages and not using a clear victor. After it ended, the central continent was declared a impartial zone. An enormous sinkhole known as The Scar opened on that continent, and from its depths comes a mysterious substance generally known as Black Blood that spawns corrupted beings. It’s unknown how this sinkhole got here to be, the place the Black Blood is coming from, or what waits in the deepest areas of The Scar. That’s the place you come in.
You’ll be part of a solid of characters in The Scar, touring deeper and deeper beneath the floor whereas dealing with all method of enemies which have been corrupted by the Black Blood. You’ll have a number of completely different controllable characters to select from, every with their very own strengths and talents. There’s real-time motion fight with a little bit of a twist: You and your enemies transfer between tiles on a grid in which you’ll be able to solely navigate in the 4 cardinal instructions.
When an enemy is about to assault, an exclamation mark will seem above their head and the bottom will likely be highlighted exhibiting the place their assault will land. Completely different enemies have completely different assault patterns — some strike straight in entrance of them, some hit a protracted line, and others goal a bigger space of the grid. You’ll face a number of enemies at a time, forcing you to remain in your toes and react shortly to dodge assaults.
Whereas transferring, you may roll to make your self invincible, however every roll consumes stamina. And since you may’t transfer diagonally, you’ll have to be strategic about which course you progress and the way typically you roll. You don’t wish to find yourself trapped between assaults you may’t keep away from.
Fight isn’t all about avoiding harm, although. You want to have the ability to dish it out too, however the way you do this modifications relying on what character you decide. Earlier than every run, you’ll select a personality and their beginning trait. In basic RPG trend, killing enemies beneficial properties expertise, which makes you degree up.
As you degree up, you’ll unlock decisions for talent upgrades which might be distinctive to the trait you picked at first of the run. These will outline the playstyle of that run, so even in the event you play the identical character, runs can play otherwise relying on the beginning trait and upgrades you decide. Your ranges and development alternatives are unique to that run, so once you die, they’ll all reset.
Not all the things will reset, although. Through the course of a run, you’ll come throughout ore veins you may break to acquire stones, which have their very own stats. All of the stones in your bag will add collectively, and reaching sure stat thresholds will give your character buffs. You may equip stones in out there slots, which is able to protect them even after your run ends. Any unequipped stones in your bag when your run ends will likely be transformed into stone fragments, which might function foreign money or be reforged into new stones by an NPC blacksmith.
Throughout every run, you may as well uncover particular rooms with treasure chests the place you’ll find artifacts. They grant distinctive buffs and enhance your skills, and over time can construct up stacks of elemental results. If an artifact reaches 5 stacks, it turns into bonded with a spirit that corresponds to that aspect and permits you to use distinctive elemental assaults and results.
Turning into bonded to Ignis, the hearth spirit, provides you entry to a burn debuff that offers steady harm. Atlen, the water spirit, slows enemies and freezes these with a moist debuff. Rathorus, the lightning spirit, inflicts a shock debuff that offers further harm. Enryl, the wind spirit, will increase your motion velocity and enhances multi-hits with a dash buff. Terrania, the earth spirit, inflicts a petrify debuff that causes fragments to shoot out once you assault petrified enemies.
This all provides as much as a roguelike with a basic “yet another run” feeling. Stones present everlasting development, whereas your decisions for character, beginning trait, and talent upgrades make each run completely different. Should you’re in trying out Guidus Zero, it’s out there now in Early Access on Steam.
They’re celebrating launch by providing a ten% low cost that may final till Dec. 9. Guidus Zero can be contemplating future releases for Xbox and Nintendo Change, however a console launch has not been formally introduced.