Hey, folks! Happy Labor Day! If you have the day off, I hope you celebrated by ignoring emails from work asking if you had just a minute - just a quick second! - to fix something. If you’re on month four of a strike like me, I hope you celebrated by seeing what else mixes well with Top Ramen. Frozen vegetables, eggs; the possibilities are absolutely finite.
Also, I’ll bring this up again, but the latest chapter of my free visual novel / game I’ve been writing for Storyloom, “Xylox Tonight!” is now out. It’s been fun messing with this program. I’ve got a couple chapters left and then I’ll wrap it up, I promise.
But whether you’re working today, off work, or can’t work due to studio executives breaking their own profitable business model, have I got a $5 Monday game for you:
Okay, okay, okay, so you’re probably getting some Diablo vibes, and that’s exactly what they’re going for. Which we like. All of us talked and we love it. This is a roguelike action game, which basically describes every game in existence at the moment. This plays a bit like Vampire Survivors if you’ve played that. And by “a bit” I mean, it plays exactly like Vampire Survivors.
You haven’t played Vampire Survivors? That’s alright. But, hey, another fun one! Essentially you’re a little character running around a board repeatedly and automatically using your weapon in whatever direction you’re facing. By using the two gamepad sticks (or keyboard and whatever), you can move your character and direct your attacks as waves of enemies come after you. As you kill more bad guys, you level up and get extra abilities, etc, etc, and so on and so forth.
And since this is a roguelike, it happens in about 30 minutes if you live. Whatever happens, you don’t really need to play more than 30 minutes at a time. Complete experience. My ass is knee deep in at least three RPGs in which 30 minutes is just figuring out where the fuck I’m going.
So, no, Halls of Torment isn’t the most original game in the world. But it recreates the look and feel of the original Diablo without requiring the time commitment. I know that itself even this isn’t wholly original - Vampire Survivors tried its best to look like Castlevania. Everyone wants to look like someone else. I spent years wishing I looked like Trent Reznor because of an offhand comment made by a crush in high school.
That all said, the game is fun. It’s well put together, it does feel like an old ‘90s action RPG, and it’s $5. Remember that one part of this: It’s only $5. And it’s still in Early Access which means they’re hopefully going to keep adding content to the game as they continue, you know, making it.
Don’t get me wrong: This game isn’t as deep as Diablo, even the first one. But the Halls of Torment does have that illustrious replay value. You can unlock more levels and character classes and, if you pull it off, save exactly one piece of equipment from the last run. That you then have to buy from a jerk anyway.
Is Halls of Torment the best game ever? No, it’s $5. Is Halls of Torment as good as Vampire Survivors, which was less than $5? No, but it’s still $5. Is Halls of Torment a game that costs $5? Yes. That’s an important factor.
But if you want a twin stick lite RPG that takes 30 minutes to play whether you win or lose, Halls of Torment ain’t too bad.
And it’s $5.