Darkest Dungeon is a gothic turn-based RPG about the psychological cost of adventuring. Your ancestor's estate has been hollowed out by something old and patient, and the ragged heroes you recruit to reclaim it will be tested less by the monsters waiting below than by the dark, the hunger and their own unravelling minds.
Reclaim Your Ancestor's Estate
The campaign begins with a ruined hamlet and a coach road that keeps bringing you strangers. You recruit, train and equip a roster of flawed heroes, then send parties of four into twisted forests, forgotten warrens, ruined crypts and the black water of the Cove. Each region has its own monsters, its own hazards and its own way of grinding a party down before the boss ever appears.
The Affliction System
Stress is the resource that really matters. It climbs when the torch burns low, when a critical hit lands, when a trap springs, and when a companion dies in front of your party. Push a hero past breaking point and one of two things happens.
- Affliction
- The hero cracks into paranoia, masochism, irrationality, abusiveness or fear. They ignore your orders, refuse healing, wander out of position and drag the rest of the party's stress up with them.
- Virtue
- Far more rarely, the same pressure produces courage, focus, powerful resolve or vigour. A virtuous hero steadies the party, shrugs off stress and can turn a collapsing expedition back into a victory.
Strategic Turn-Based Combat
Position is everything. Every skill can only be used from certain ranks and can only reach certain targets, so a shuffle, a stun or a well-timed pull can dismantle an enemy formation as effectively as damage. Bleed, blight, marking and guarding all reward players who think two turns ahead, and the difference between a clean fight and a rout is usually a decision made before the first blow.
Sixteen Heroes, None of Them Safe
The Plague Doctor, the Hellion, the Highwayman, the Leper and a dozen more each bring their own skills, quirks and diseases. Camping lets you patch wounds and deliver inspiring speeches on longer expeditions, while the Tavern and the Abbey back in the hamlet are where survivors drink, pray, gamble or brood their stress away. Permadeath applies throughout, so the veteran you have invested weeks in can be gone in a single unlucky round.
A World Drawn in Ink and Shadow
Chris Bourassa's hand-drawn crowquill art style gives the game its unmistakable look, all heavy black lines and sickly colour, and Wayne June's narration threads dry, funereal commentary through every triumph and every disaster. Together they turn a difficult roguelike into something closer to a gothic novel you are slowly losing control of.
The estate has been waiting a long time for someone foolish enough to go back down. Gather your heroes, ration the torches, and see how far into the dark you can lead them before it leads them somewhere else.
