Rogue-like Reccomendations please

[Ginnel]

I've played Zangband quite a lot and found its artifacts and classes and unique monsters fun, but when I got to lower levels I always always seemed to die.

Someone mentioned Crawl the otherday and I've been thinking about giving it a go, are there any other Rogue like games people would recommend I've heard about Nethack but I've really no clue on anything but Zangband.

I've got an itch to play one of these games so help would be appreciated

 

[XCorvis]

Nethack is a real classic, but it can be kind of jarring to play if you've never played a game composed of ascii characters. The tile sets make it pretty OK tho.

Here's a list of other games.
Roguelike - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[Blackrat]

As already said. NetHack. It's the only real game of that type .
You can get it here: NetHack 3.4.3: Downloads

Then there's ADOM, which is pretty good too. That you can get here: ADOM - Download
I suggest getting DOSBox and run the DOS version. The windows version isn't very stable.

 

[Blackrat]

but when I got to lower levels I always always seemed to die.

This is pretty much the case of all these games. They become extremely hard the lower you descent. Eventually you just die. I have once managed to play NetHack to almost the end, before I died

 

[Gulla]

but when I got to lower levels I always always seemed to die.

Zangband is actually one of the more forgiving of these games, in my experience. It was harder in earlier versions, but I still find that I can win it one out of 4-5 games (provided I follow my strategy and don't get overconfident )

Personally I still like Moria for its clean and simple concept. (Except with a high-score list consisting of 1 winner on top and 30+ level 36-38 "killed by ancient multihued dragon" it says something about how deadly it is. I have only won it 3 times over the soon 20 years I have played it).

OTOH as you seem to like all the weirdness and special items and stuff found in Zangband I would recommend Nethack. It is also full of weird and funny stuff. Just wait 2 weeks to start out. There is no moon tonight and if I remember correctly that gives you (a permanent) -1 luck on all characters started now.

ADOM was also fun, but as many times before I reverted back to Moria and (original 1.43-forg-knows) Angband.

Håkon
Rougelike addict in recovery

 

[kvehmane]

IIRC, in Nethack only Friday 13Th gives this -1 on luck. ...Googling a bit....oh yes!
See this (spoiler): NetHack Time Spoiler

 

[Verdande]

I've really found a lot to love in DoomRL, even though it's a bit lighter than many others out there. I just love that it's quick and easy to get into, and a lot of fun, especially if you still play DOOM. Like me. =)


Also, there's Dwarf Fortress, and if anybody says it's not a roguelike, then they haven't tried Adventure mode. DF is one of the most incredible games in existence, and I'd rank it up there as Number One Game of All Time.

 

[XCorvis]

Also, there's Dwarf Fortress, and if anybody says it's not a roguelike, then they haven't tried Adventure mode. DF is one of the most incredible games in existence, and I'd rank it up there as Number One Game of All Time.

DF has a learning curve 10 times that of Nethack. Maybe adventure mode is easier to figure out, but no game on earth is worth putting that much effort into.

 

[Pinotage]

There are literally hundreds of variants of Angband, Zangband being just one of them. Some of them use different systems, others are harder, others are easier. Some have their own flavor like Zangband (Zelasny Angband) while other such a PernAngband following another theme. Some of them play very differently - Zangband is more involved, but also slightly easier with some combinations (Zombie Warrior springs to mind), whereas Angband is fairly Vanilla and also fairly harder.

Have a look at all the different Angband variants - there's bound to be something there to look at.

Pinotage

 

[Lizard]

ADOM.

The Official Ancient Domains Of Mystery (ADOM) & JADE Homepage