izigame.me

I'm a fan of the franchise - I own every single title, DLC, etc. of every single title in the Dungeons franchise. After having said that - and adding that I'm also very much enjoying Dungeons 4, more-or-less, I don't think I could or would recommend Dungeons 4 to anyone who has never played Dungeons before. There are just too many little issues that I believe add-up to an mediocre to bad gaming experience (especially for first-time players.) Let's pick on some of the hot-topic problems right-away: graphics, lag, & game performance. When Dungeons 4 pretty much looks and plays like it's on the exact same engine as Dungeons 3, you would expect that Dungeons 4 would, more-or-less, run on the same (or similar) specs as Dungeons 3. Dungeons 4, arguably, needs a computer with twice the performance and capability of Dungeons 3. Honestly, the minimum system requirements really are the minimum - if you want to enjoy Dungeons 4 your system really should be closer to the recommended specs; the more RAM you have the better. (Dungeons titles are always RAM eaters, and 16 IS the minimum for Dungeons 4, in my opinion.) These are problems that Dungeons 3 suffered from too, but it seems amplified in Dungeons 4 (maybe because they are using the same engine.) The UI, interface, and how you interact with the game is clunky and not intuitive (it's even worse if you're very used to previous Dungeons titles and have muscle memory.) It feels like buttons and interface elements aren't where we've spent the last 3 titles learning; things are definitely moved around a bit. Research is like they're trying to reinvent the wheel - there's no "tree", counter-intuitive to what everyone is expecting. You have 4 main categories that have to be leveled-up in-order to upgrade the sub-items (and these items are further gated/blocked by needing a requisite level for the main item for each upgrade); would be more intuitive if the UI had a redesign if they're going to keep it the way it is. As-is, you basically have 4 research items that HAVE to be independently upgraded before you can basically upgrade anything else. Gold mining/income is way too slow and is a huge speed bump to most aspects of gameplay; could benefit from increased rates, otherwise it's a horrible time-gating mechanic to rely on to slow down people rushing through the campaign. Traps cost way too much gold (especially when there's now more emphasis on traps); again gold being the horrible gating mechanic - compared to how easy it is to mass produce the trap-specific currency of toolboxes. Trap diversity is worse (and not nearly as nice) as previous titles. Traps & dungeons still suffer from the same cheese mechanic problem of previous titles - just make a nice, long winding 1 tile wide hallway around the map. Snot AI is horrible compared to previous Dungeons titles - (before you attain the ability for snots to teleport) snots will often get themselves between a hero and an objective and just run back-and-forth doing nothing. It's like the AI is running into an infinite loop and can't decide to just stop (previous titles snots would just stand if unable to reach or do a task.) The snot AI problems probably contribute a bit to Dungeons 4's performance woes. The new snot priority system is counter-intuitive - when you select a priority all the icons and symbols display indicating almost the exact opposite of the priority you've set. It's like they originally meant for it to be an opt-out system but then changed it to an opt-in system but didn't update art assets to reflect the mechanic. The UI has horrible lag issues - buttons needing to be clicked more than once to be responsive; buttons not quite working as expected; the hand of evil picking up the unexpected resource; the hand of evil not dropping or picking up things as quickly; F2 still has the Dungeons 3 lag spike; build/fill tile and demolish don't always respond the first click; etc. There's a long list of the little things I could honestly write a lot about; and they all add up. Honestly, in the current state - Dungeons 4 feels rushed and in Early Access. It is not the title I would recommend to people new to the franchise - Dungeons 3 was marginally better. There's been no graphical improvements; the story is basically a sequel; mechanic and gamplay "improvements" are clunky, counter-intuitive, buggy, laggy, and honestly not polished. It just feels like Dungeons 4 really was shipped with a lot of (necessary) work canceled to meet a release deadline. This game should have been held back for another 6 months. We're the 4th title into the Franchise - Dungeons should be getting better, more polished, and improved - not taking steps backwards. In the current state, Dungeons 4 feels like a 2000s remastered game.