Unexplored

Unexplored
Stable game
Developer	Ludomotion
Theme	Fantasy
Influences	Brogue
Released	Aug 10, 2016 (0.9.0)
Updated	Feb 22, 2017 (1.0.1)
Licensing	Commercial
P. Language	C#
Platforms	Windows
Interface	Keyboard, Mouse or Gamepad
Game Length	4 hours
	Official site of Unexplored

Description

Unexplored is a action based roguelite developed by Ludomotion. It is heavily inspired on Brogue, but features realtime gameplay and brand new dungeon generation technology.

Gameplay

The basic premise of the game is to entire the Dungeon of Doom, defeat the Dragon at level 20, and escape back up with the Amulet of Yendor. The game has all trappings of a roguelike: dungeon crawling fun, unidentified potions and scrolls and perma-death. It is a roguelite because the gameplay is realtime and there is some minor carry over between runs: gold found in a run can be used to buy extra starting equipment on a next run.

The action based melee combat is unique for this game. You are able to equip two weapons. Or equip only one to wield it a higher effective strength. There are many combinations and different foes require different approaches.

The content generation creates relatively small levels, with many lock-and-key style puzzles. Locks and keys might be locks and keys, but the game also uses special gear such as a grappling hook or a staff of blinking to unlock new parts of the dungeon. Some of these puzzles span multiple dungeon floors.

Finally the game has a lot of feed-forward and foreshadowing, allowing you to prepare and plan ahead.

In the Words Of A Player: What Do You Feel Makes the Game Stand Out?

Misery, one of Unexplored's Early Access players, thought our description didn't do the game justice. So, we asked: "What do you feel makes the game stand out?" We really liked what Misery wrote, so here's a summary:

The Dungeon Generation
It uses a ton of traditional roguelike concepts, but in non-annoying ways. The fact that the game FEELS like a traditional one while still being real-time is a pretty major thing as far as I see it.
The combat is pretty fun. Lots going on there, particularly once things like potions and staves or whatever are thrown into the mix. Feels more tactical than the usual "shoot everything" sort.
Pausing the game. Being able to pause the game and deal with your inventory, use items, and examine things, without actually leaving the game screen, that's a big one. It all really opens up a lot of options for tactical play.
The puzzles feel like the sorts that the old Zelda games used to use. That same satisfaction from that is here overall.
The hub floors (where you can choose different branches of the dungeon to explore) ended up being a great feature.
The huge variety of enemies. Not just bosses, but monsters and traps and all sorts of stuff. I've been constantly impressed by this. Even after so much time with the game there's still plenty I haven't even seen yet.
And of course the whole "lock and key" concept.

Cyclic Dungeon Generation

The content generator of Unexplored uses cycles as its core structure. This creates very different results than the more common branching paths that are the result of adding (generated) room templates to a growing dungeon. The main advantage of cycles is that they can easily express common design patterns human designers would employ when crafting levels. These templates include hidden shortcuts, or dangerous alternative routes. More about the technology can be found in this online article.