Darkest Dungeon

Released on January 18, 2018 for the Nintendo Switch by Merge Games, and developed by Red Hook Studios, Darkest Dungeon is a roguelike dungeon-crawling RPG, featuring a heavy focus on mental health.

"The mind is the darkest dungeon." When I saw the title and description of Red Hook's award-winning RPG, Darkest Dungeon, this phrase came to mind. I googled the quote, thinking maybe somebody famous said it, but turns out it's the invention of my own mind.
Darkest Dungeon is a unique RPG, that factors in its characters stress-levels due to their spelunking into demonous caverns, just as much as their hit points or physical injuries. As I've always been prone to depression and anxiety, the mental health aspect of Darkest Dungeon interested me greatly. I found a used copy at my local Gamestop and dove in.

What's that? Eh, it's just the opening crawl, it's probably not important.

The game's unique, crowquill pen-style graphics and macabre setting immediately stood out. The unseen protagonist's unnamed ancestor announces over the game's intro that he has brought ruin to the family, by digging deep under the family estate, and unleashing some sort of demonic force. It's up to the player to venture home, build up a party of fighters from numerous classes, and banish the demonic hordes by violence. This gothic setting looks like an interactive, pen-drawn cover illustration for Edgar Allan Poe's "Fall of the House of Usher." Enemies are fittingly grotesque, reminiscent of the spawn of some Lovecraftian beast. Indeed, those two classic horror authors weigh heavily on the vibe and atmosphere of this game, and given that those two's work have shaped the majority of my life's artistic interests, that's fine by me.

They even gave me a cameo at the beginning of the game. Thanks, Red Hook!

The game's haunting, at times terrifying soundtrack also thickens Darkest Dungeon's horrific, oppressive atmosphere. The music goes from a medieval, meditative place in the village square where the player plans missions, to bombastic and percussive during a battle, to frantic and manic when the player's party is in dire straits at the depths of a dungeon. However, the game's narrator, Wayne June, is the all-star here. His gruff, muscular voiceover is brilliant. His "BACK TO THE PIT!" when an enemy is vanquished is just as fist-pumping to the extreme as his "The will is broken" is disheartening when a character goes mad.

Though I could have done without his overexcited delivery of, "Look at THESE MUSHROOMS!!! AREN'T THEY GNARLY???!!!"

So the atmosphere, graphics, and sound are exactly where they need to be, but does the gameplay do them justice?
Darkest Dungeon is a game for the meticulous. There are so many things to factor in, that all of the party members' many statuses are tough to see on the Nintendo Switch screen and on a large television. Maneuvering between all of these screens in-between diving into dungeons does not feel intuitive, and takes several hours of exploration to comprehend, let alone master. The protagonist is essentially the player, as they are never shown, and don't have an avatar themselves, only make and command the party as they traverse dungeons, and partake in Darkest Dungeon's thrilling, turn-based fights.

And thrilling, town-based party organization.

The party is made by selecting from groups of aspiring warriors who come through the hub town after every dungeon dive the player makes. There are numerous classes, including staples like hulking warriors, and physically weaker characters who are adept at healing others. Some classes may be more skilled in firing projectiles, while some may have more ability in hand-to-hand combat. It's up to the player to pick four (party members stick around through the game until they are dismissed or deceased), and line them up in a way where each character will be most beneficial (characters fight in a single file line, so you'll want archers in the back, ax men in the front, etc.). The player can also select at least six more characters to keep around the town, which is vital, considering how many of their party members are either killed or rendered useless due to the mental trauma they've received in a recent dungeon visit. A new stagecoach full of hopeful fighters shows up regularly to replace those fighters you've lost, and the fighters who've become mentally ill can be treated in one of the village's numerous locales.

So you got sliced up by a demonic, anthropomorphic fish-creature at the bottom of a pitch-dark, watery pit? Shake it off, you big baby!

The game's hub village includes a tavern and brothel, as well as an abbey and sanitarium. It's up to the player to figure out, based on a character's proclivities, strengths, defects, and afflictions, which costly treatment would best get that character's mental state back to functional. Don't do that, and the player is liable to bring a character into battle who may not only refuse to fight, but may verbally discourage or even physically harm other party members.
The dungeon's themselves, set in various estate locations like a seaside cliff cave, spooky forest, or dank house ruins, have layouts that are randomized on the inside, holding various treasures, traps, and enemies. Fight enough, keep your characters around enough, and you'll slowly begin to level them up to a degree that they can take on the estate's darker horrors. Sometimes, the trauma of their dungeon encounters will even make them stronger. But don't get too attached to any of them.

"Reynauld, the way you bash C'thulu spawn is so endearing, I hope you stay in my party forever." Five minutes later: "Whelp, Reynauld's dead."

Yes, your characters will die. Many of your characters will die. They'll die because of you. You'll forget to bring in enough food or torches, and they'll be too weak and terrified to carry on. They'll become meat for the demonic grinders.
However, they'll also die for reasons completely outside of your power. And here is my problem with the game:
You can build up a character to be the ultimate badass, prepare like an apocalypse-prepper, and master the game's battle systems. Then an enemy surprises your party, your badass character suddenly has a heart attack and dies, and he or she is gone forever. Yes, they are permanently dead (the game autosaves every time anything happens), and nothing you can do will bring them back.

You can plan all you want, but if one of these maggot creatures really wants to suck old Feu's brains out, not much you can do to stop it.

Life is hard. You can plan and prepare for any possibility, and still get killed by a turtle falling from a flying eagle's beak, while you're walking down the street. Even the things we take joy in can break our hearts. My son and I just watched a five-hour, seven-overtime football game, where our team was not only robbed of victory by insanely bad fortune and happenstance, but by the malfeasance of its arbiters, the referees. I do not need my videogames to treat me that way, as well.

I'm already stepping into Giger-esque bear traps on a day-to-day basis, WHY would I want to do the same thing in my videogames?

I've heard people mention Darkest Dungeon affectionately because it incorporates these very elements of real life. I play video games to escape, or least to do things I can't do in my normal, office-sitting life. Let's call it a matter of taste, but after twenty hours of building up a party of ultimate warriors, and having them completely, and permanently annihilated due to factors completely out of my control, I was done with Darkest Dungeon. The back of the box tells you this will happen, and that you will have to find the best ways to react to such unforeseen disasters. I should have paid more attention to this advertisement detail. It's even written on the game's first screen...and it's a bit of a deal-breaker for me. Frankly, it isn't necessary.

Then again, neither was including this picture of a disemboweled whale, so I might be a hypocrite.

When you've finely-tuned every aspect of your RPG so minutely, is random havoc really needed for its success? I didn't even mention that the game's hub also includes locations for character and weapon upgrades, and that they are just as meticulously detailed as every other aspect of the game. There are so many aspects I haven't even mentioned, like the way fallen foes' corpses remain on the battlefield, and sometimes have to be destroyed in order to reach more distant enemies.
This is a strategic RPG player's dream, until all that control proves to be a facade. But dagnabbit, the very tool used to manipulate a video game by the player is called a "controller." I want control over what I am playing. I am fine with dealing with random events, like say, a particularly well-defended room in the 2D action-RPG, Dead Cells, where I have to think of battle tactics on the fly. I am not okay with a game just nuking my progress without giving me a chance to do anything about it.
I can appreciate what Darkest Dungeon is trying to do, and indeed, its myriad strengths are reflected in the score I've given it below. However, despite all of my admiration for its aesthetic, finely-tuned battle system, and general vibe, Darkest Dungeon is just not for me.

SCORE: 8.0/10