I love old-school first-person dungeon crawlers like Dungeon Master and Eye of the Beholder, as they brought a sense of depth to the RPG genre with their first-person perspective well before the age of actual 3D worlds came around. I’m not alone in my love for the genre either, as there’s been numerous homages to those classics over the years, and especially on mobile where the experience works really well on the touchscreen. Games like The Quest series, the Mazes of Karradash series, and QuestLord have all brought that authentic old-school feel to mobile, while games like Legend of Grimrock and The Deep Paths have brought a more modern feel to the genre with fancier visuals. Solo developer Ed Sludden and his studio Switchpilot Games are aiming for something more in the middle with the upcoming release Hag’s Castle. Check out the trailer.
Hag’s Castle uses more modern visuals with 3D character models and more freedom of movement than classic dungeon crawlers, but it still has a bit of old-school flair with its streamlined controls and gameplay. In fact, with its contextual buttons and one-handed controls, it’s geared towards people who might normally be too intimidated to play a more traditional first-person dungeon crawler. You’ll work your way through 25 levels playing as a “Wizard’s lackey" as you attempt to rescue the wizard’s pet dragon Oli from the clutches of the evil witch known as Madam Hag. In addition to Sludden’s programming and design, the music in Hag’s Castle is the work of Graeme Norgate, a Bafta nominated composer who has worked on games like Killer Instinct, Blast Corps, Goldeneye and Perfect Dark. It all sounds quite promising, so look for Hag’s Castle when it launches this coming Monday, July 16th.
