Shovel Knight Pocket Dungeon Review

 

Digging in to New Genres-A Shovel Knight Pocket Dungeon Review

Over my years of playing video games I have never shied away from my love for platformers, and, as an extension, of Yacht Club Games for their blockbuster labor of love in Shovel Knight. In my eager wait for the delayed Shovel Knight Dig coming out sometime in the future I decided to check out their most recent title in a puzzle spinoff called Shovel Knight Pocket Dungeon. Does it inspire to the extent of all their prior titles or does it come up a tile short?

Fitting in new mechanics

Shovel Knight Pocket Dungeon is a mash-up of a roguelike game and a typical puzzle game, and it balances the two to some positives and some negatives. On terms of general gameplay, Pocket Dungeon is a falling blocks puzzler akin to a puyo puyo game where you can rack up large chains. It is a bit of a unique take on these titles, but that's about as apt a comparison I can make for it. You'll move around a grid and pick and choose where you attack enemy units all while managing health and active items. 

On one hand, the roguelike elements allow for some variation in between runs. During each session you have a wide variety of characters to play as with their own set of unique abilities, and because this is a shovel knight game you have such a breadth of unique character designs to choose from. This expands into the enemies, as you see all the familiar faces from the campaign with great design that you are used too. In addition to designs, you also can buy from diverse pool of items to aid you on your journey that stack up over time to get you through to an end game run. Unfortunately there aren't as many items as I would hope on display here, meaning that runs can feel a bit same-y over time. There are even a handful of usable equipment items that aren't passive that all come with their own unique interactions, a personal favorite of mine is the time stop and smoke bomb items that prevent you from taking damage for a short while and help you clear out space in a pinch. 

There are even boss fights every couple levels, in which you fight bosses from the main series (including a few new faces) and unlock them to play as after you triumph over them. Just another layer to it all that adds more replayability. The boss fights themself range in quality quite a bit, but none are objectively bad (there are some real gems though that outshine the rest).

On the other hand, I would strongly recommend turning the lives system to infinite instead of the one life you get on default settings. This by all means doesn't oversimplify the game as you can still have your run ended by a screen filling up, but it alleviates some of the one life frustration I had beating the game on that option. I got the true ending using both settings on multiple characters, and I can fully assert that the game is much more enjoyable with lives turned off. I feel that the "you have one chance or you go all the way back" type of gameplay works in some genres, but I felt I had to focus way too hard for what feels like a game not designed for one life runs. You'll really feel the pain of bad RNG over and over again playing with one life, whereas the infinite lives took this feeling away and opened up the playing field for more creative options. 

And so, when you choose to take away what I felt was the game's biggest flaw in a simple toggle, Pocket Dungeon is genuinely a great and polished time waster. It's become a game I keep in a steady rotation and pick up again for a run or two, and without the inconsistencies of only having one life I can really dig in and try to get all those achievements (which are not affected by the lives toggle!).   

While I may have not played a ton, there's also a genre standard vs mode so you can duke it out against friends! Following a recent presentation online ranked play and matchmaking are confirmed so expect to see more content for this title down the line. 

Verdict

In its infinite lives toggle, Shovel Knight Pocket Dungeon is a perfect fit of roguelike and puzzler that still keeps its difficulty without overdoing it. An absolute blast that can contest with the best in the puzzle genre and keeps itself in line with the shovel knight series of pedigree. 

9/10-A Shifting and Shoveling Adventure