One Way Heroics

A fantastic game bite-sized roguelike for those who can exercise a little bit of patience.

The difficulty scales well, so it works both as a single-serving distraction and as an extended campaign to unlock all of the secrets.

While ugly and unforgiving, One Way Heroics is nonetheless an enjoyable, addictive and innovative take on the crowded roguelike genre.

Another great roguelike that stands up to even the best of them like FTL and Rogue Legacy, only this time with a style like the snes era JRPGS of old, and with a unique side scrolling darkness of doom that keeps you moving from left to right or else you get eaten up by it if you take too long messing around in one of the mini dungeons, or get stuck inbetween too many mountains or bodies of water, I particularly like this one because of the nostalgic music that comes with it, it truely sounds like something out of a Chrono Trigger or a FF5 For less than $3 this game can give you many hours of replayability, and even has a little online feature that lets you see other players progress in the randomly generated world you are in (did i mention its randomly generated?) and if someone dies their ghost can end up in your world and theyll drop one of the items they had on them for you A really good game for the price, i wish more rogue likes were in the japanese style, i love it

It presents itself as a cheap, shallow, casual, story-less, old school, rogue like, JRPG experience with some replay-ability due to seeds, death, and # of turn constraints, exploration, difficulty level, and unlocks. Everything started changing about 10 minutes into the game. First! It went from being shallow and simple to being real deep and the transition was beautifully done. The mechanics are much deeper than meets the eye! Some people won't beat it on the first try and even those who beat it will find many reasons to replay the game from a different perspective and then you will notice something. Second! Then after a few runs, you'll start seeing hidden story elements in this story-less JRPG. You found the rabbit hole but little did you know, there is more than just that one rabbit hole. As you spend even more time chasing the plot, you'll notice even more secrets. Third! You don't want me spoiling these secrets for you. Get the game. The entertainment it provides is worth more than the asking price. And when you're done with it, and agree with this, go buy another copy and throw it at a friend. By the way : For those who are terrible at games and fear the roguelike element. You don't have to start from scratch. You simply get more points if you do start from scratch. The points are spendable for unlocks, but they don't buy power.

Last Played: June 2014 PROS: +Unique idea +Progression is satisfying +RPG that does not require grinding CONS: -Mechanics unexplained –Progression is harder than it should be –Luck plays too large a role REVIEW: I picked this up during a Steam sale for US$0.87 which in my mind was an acceptable risk for a small game with a novel idea. This game doesn’t bother to explain itself, so I will note that this is a turn-based RPG which favors strong items (good ones can carry over from play to play to a limited extent) since your stats will reset to level 0 on each play. Customization is offered by equipping unique items and choosing new perks at game start-all of which means that this game is like no other that I know of (which isn’t entirely good). Given that getting further is so difficult (as measured in game km from start) when you actually get further it feels pretty rewarding, and with the right luck (and to a lesser extent, strategy) this can happen as early as 30 mins of replays into the game. Which brings us around to our cons: progression is nearly impossible until you understand the game mechanics, some of which are unexplained until you meet a (randomly generated) NPC, though this may not actually clarify some of the more obscure components. This means that some parts of the game may not make any sense until you have died 2 dozen times or more (there is still at least one mechanic that I don’t understand). This makes the game unfairly hard since the early portion is a guessing game to get at the strategy/luck meat below. Speaking of luck, it is much too important in this game. If you discover a good weapon early on, you can get very far, allowing you to find even better weapons and unlock permanently enhancing perks and such. If you have the misfortune to find a common item in a rare chest or encounter a monster so strong it shouldn’t appear for another few hundred km, that’s just too bad (and for insult-to-injury a very early death will net you no points to put toward permanent enhancements). The best strategies can be foiled too easily by the randomness of this game (which is why roguelikes in general get a bad rap). Anyway, I DO find it fun, and I think I got a good deal on it, but whether it is worth the US$2.50 asking price is something you’ll have to decide for yourself.

It took me a few times to actually play the game. At first glance, the game was kind ugly looking and the game played a bit... chunky. However, after reading several reviews I tried the game again. This time i sort of knew what you were supposed to do and it became a lot more fun. The game is quite deep and there are many ways to play. Tons of different items, all sorts of easter eggs that make the game much more interesting than it seems at first. The game actually works well with many options. However, roguelike games are usually insanely difficult. This game isn't. In fact, it's incredibly easy. Way too easy. Even though there are many options available, there is no need for any of it. I just picked some class, grabbed some stats and went on. You can talk to people, you can fight mini-bosses, open up castles, buy stuff, but none of it is even remotely needed. I just walked forward, killed some dudes, didn't bother with anything, 20 minutes later I got to the final boss (like, what?) killed it in a few hits (although I did activate an ability or two) and that... was it. The game was over. Expecting the actual game to... become deeper, like binding of isaac, it turned out that was it. That was pretty much all the game had to offer. I tried it again with another character, which was also very easy. Then I tried the game mode for people who looked for a challenge, which was even easier than the previous mode, because the end boss arrived much sooner so in a few minutes that one was finished. Now, if you're the type of person who likes the content this game has. Who likes the funny conversations with people, the hidden parts of the story, the easter eggs and the unique way this game really is, then this game is the game for you. But, if you like to be challenged then you shouldn't bother because this is more of a casual game than a rogue-like, despite the random elements.

Pros: Different characters to play as. The fairy telling you what you did wrong when you fail is pretty cool. Cons: Each playthrough is too similar. Gameplay is not that interesting. Not enough randomness.