Crypt of the NecroDancer is a dungeon crawler that asks you to boogie. It shimmied its groovy butt to Steam (out of Early Access) for Windows, Mac, and Linux on April 23rd.
The concept that defines the game is quite a simple one, really. A song plays in each dungeon, one that has a beat, and a beat that you have to move in time with. You jump from tile-to-tile and attack skeletons, and demons, and dragons according to the rhythm. If you should fail to keep up then you’ll lose combos and bonuses.
Essentially, it’s dungeon crawler that asks you to keep moving, and exactly at the times you want to slow proceedings down. The effect of this is that you acquire a reckless abandon that will, more than likely, get you killed a lot. You don’t really have time to plan out strategies in the thick of the battle, so it turns into a game of clutch plays and lucky escapes… and death. You charge in and hope for the best, hoping to conquer the dungeons of dance, in order to steal back your still beating heart.
Key to getting better at Crypt of the NecroDancer is learning how enemies are controlled by the beat. They all have different attack patterns and ranges, so learning upon which beats you can safely move in for an attack makes a big difference – whether you can pull it off is another matter. That’s something you can put to the test yourself.
