Choose wisely, everywhere, at every turn. Or else.
I’ve played a lot of roguelike deckbuilders in my day, yet I haven’t really played anything like Shroom and Gloom before.
The new game from Devolver Digital and Team Lazerbeam launches into Steam early access today, and I’ve been playing it for about a week. It will be immediately familiar to anyone who’s played a game like Slay the Spire, but it really twists the formula into something new and challenging.
The most noticeable difference in Shroom and Gloom right out of the gate is that it’s played in first-person perspective. You’re tasked with plumbing the depths of a fungus-laden hellscape where mushroom monsters await you, and you have to build out your deck to defend yourself.
That’s where another twist comes in: in Shroom and Gloom, you’re building two decks throughout any given run. One is meant for battles, and the other is used at rest areas in between fights, where every move you make and the decision-making at every turn make this particular deckbuilder feel fun, challenging, and different all at the same time.
Your battling deck has cards you’re likely used to if you’ve played another similar game in the genre: attacks, buffs and debuffs, cards that give you health-replenishing food when used to defeat enemies, etc. But at the same time, you’re building out a deck to use at camps in between your stressful battles that can easily snowball if you’re not careful.
At these camps, you can rest to restore health, but an ever-present Gloom creeps up on you. The longer you rest, the more Gloom builds up, and the more damage you take if you continue to rest before heading out again for your next fight. All the while, you use different cards to unlock chests you find, or light braziers or torches to build Warmth and fight off the Gloom to lessen the damage you’re dealt, or dig holes to find new cards to add to your collection.
There’s a lot of give and take at each interaction, whether you’re in battle or at camp, but the latter is where Shroom and Gloom feel special. Like in battle, you’re limited by the energy you have, so everything you play is a tough choice. Do you use a card to light a brazier to fight off Gloom and rest, or do you use all your energy to break a lock on a chest and then unlock the next door to keep going?
سەرچاوەی فەرمی بە زمانی ئینگلیزی: https://www.destructoid.com/shroom-and-gloom-impressions-hands-on/
