With the runaway success of Vampire Survivors, multiple clones of that game are being released, some of them made due to a legitimate love for the original, but for the most part, it's just studios following the money. Regardless of intent, those clones are at best, decent reimaginings with not much special going for them, and at worst, mockeries, adding copious amounts of grinding and/or predatory monetization systems, thus ruining the low commitment fun of the original. Halls of Torment is the first one I've seen that not only plays great, but also, by incorporating multiple new ideas, feels like a natural evolution of the nascent genre.
This might not be evident at first: like VS, Halls of Torment features quest-based progression: completing certain objectives and milestones during stages is rewarded with unlocks of items, characters and mechanics. However, it starts even slower than its inspiration, and at first, it might feel like it has not much going for it. As new traits, abilities and especially characters are unlocked, the game's unique spark begins to show. There's a great many ways to play the game: each class is unique and encourages -- but doesn't force -- certain choices of skills and traits, all of which feel different from one another.
Halls of Torment seeks to recreate the magic of old-school ARPGs, like the first Diablo games, and this goes further than its amazing recreation of pre-rendered visuals from the time. In fact, a lot of players have left Steam reviews calling HoT "the real Diablo IV", and while it's obviously tongue-in-cheek, it's easy to see how much better HoT is at ticking certain ARPG boxes than that game: it's about making a little guy with relative freedom to build them however one wants, collecting items with unique gimmicks, slaying hordes of demons that culminate in challenging bosses with actual fight mechanics...
It does all that with approachable dual stick controls and intuitive combat mechanics, and most importantly, respecting the players' time: runs last for at most 30 minutes, and completing the game in its current state will take around 20 hours. It's still only about 60% done, though, so if you're the type to binge this sort of game, maybe hold off until it's out of early access to dive in.
This might not be evident at first: like VS, Halls of Torment features quest-based progression: completing certain objectives and milestones during stages is rewarded with unlocks of items, characters and mechanics. However, it starts even slower than its inspiration, and at first, it might feel like it has not much going for it. As new traits, abilities and especially characters are unlocked, the game's unique spark begins to show. There's a great many ways to play the game: each class is unique and encourages -- but doesn't force -- certain choices of skills and traits, all of which feel different from one another.
Halls of Torment seeks to recreate the magic of old-school ARPGs, like the first Diablo games, and this goes further than its amazing recreation of pre-rendered visuals from the time. In fact, a lot of players have left Steam reviews calling HoT "the real Diablo IV", and while it's obviously tongue-in-cheek, it's easy to see how much better HoT is at ticking certain ARPG boxes than that game: it's about making a little guy with relative freedom to build them however one wants, collecting items with unique gimmicks, slaying hordes of demons that culminate in challenging bosses with actual fight mechanics...
It does all that with approachable dual stick controls and intuitive combat mechanics, and most importantly, respecting the players' time: runs last for at most 30 minutes, and completing the game in its current state will take around 20 hours. It's still only about 60% done, though, so if you're the type to binge this sort of game, maybe hold off until it's out of early access to dive in.