Rogue Quest: The Vault of the Lost Tyrant Review

Screenshot from Rogue Quest: Vault of the Lost Tyrant
That's a fast toy

  • Reviewed by: Mark Goninon
  • Developer: ExperaGameStudio
  • Publisher: Eli Daddio
  • Release Date: 25 Oct 2017
  • Time played: 1.3 hours

What is it

ExperaGameStudio are an Italian game studio that have developed games for the past few years, mainly free ones for websites such as Kongregate and Newsgrounds. In 2016, ExperaGameStudio released the point ‘n' click adventure A Tale of Caos on Steam. 72% of the 22 Steam User Reviews were positive giving it a Steam Rating of "Mostly Positive".

Rogue Quest: The Vault of the Lost Tyrant, also a point ‘n' click adventure, was released in 2017 but didn't fare as well as A Tale of Caos: it currently holds a Steam Rating of "Mixed" based on 64% of the 17 Steam User Reviews being positive.

In Rogue Quest: The Vault of the Lost Tyrant you play the role of a rogue named Cassandra Nech. Your goal is to try and recover the treasure of a long-forgotten warlord known as the Sea Tyrant. Things don't go to plan though and soon it's a matter of life and death as you try to figure out a way to escape the Sea Tyrant's underground complex.

How I got it

I had some Steam credit at Christmas time and so I decided to purchase a few games such as Rocket League, Steel Division: Normandy 44, To the Moon, A Bird Story and Finding Paradise. I still had a couple of dollars left though so I decided to get a couple of very cheap games, namely Simple Light Cycles and this game, Rogue Quest: The Vault of the Lost Tyrant. I've always had a soft-spot for retro point ‘n' click adventures which is why Rogue Quest has been sitting on my wishlist for quite some time. I finally got a chance to play it when I discovered that the game is relatively short in duration, at least according to HowLongToBeat.com: they claim it only takes 48 minutes to complete the game.

Screenshot from Rogue Quest: The Vault of the Lost Tyrant
Dat breathing animation

What I like:


Captivating story

The story isn't going to be winning any Booker Prizes but the world is captivating enough that I'd very much like to see a sequel.

Retro graphics

I find the retro pixelart graphics commonplace in 90s point ‘n' click adventures strangely appealing.

Music

Music in the game is surprisingly good, especially when you consider it's all based off free resources. Having said that though, we're talking about Kevin Macleod here who has released over 2,000 pieces of music under the Creative Commons Licence. A particular favourite of mine is this one below called "Nonstop":



Logical puzzles

Unlike many early adventure games developed by Sierra and Lucasarts, the puzzles in this game can easily be solved with a little common sense. I did get stuck at one point in the game but it was only because I misinterpreted some clues. And if all else fails…

The game has an in-built help system

If you ever feel like you're stuck, the game thankfully has an in-built help system which was awfully considerate of the developers to include.

Steam Achievements

The game comes with 7 Steam Achievements you can aim for. There are no Steam Trading Cards.

Screenshot from Rogue Quest: The Vault of the Lost Tyrant
Yes... duck tape

What I dislike:


Some text lost in translation

Sometimes it feels like the translation to English could've been less sloppy.

Weird idle animation

While most of the animations in the game are fine, I find the idle animation for Cassandra a bit off-putting: it seems like she's really struggling to breathe.

Short and incomplete

The game took me a bit over an hour to complete and then that was it: game over. Also, the game only has a handful of rooms you can visit so it again feels small because there aren't many places you can go.

I believe this is meant to be the first episode with more episodes to follow but sadly, considering this game was released in 2017 and with no further communications from the developer, it seems unlikely a second episode will ever see the light of day.

Score – 7/10 (Good)

A very short but enjoyable retro, point ‘n' click adventure where you play the female equivalent of Indiana Jones. While I do have a couple of minor gripes with respect to the English translation and the animations, I'd still like to see another episode made for this game. Sadly, this doesn't look like it's going to occur any time soon (at least on Steam anyway).

Is the game worth $5.95 AUD?: No, but only because it doesn't seem like the overarching story is ever going to be finished as this game feels like a first episode for what should've been a longer adventure. If there was a guarantee for more episodes in the pipeline, then the answer would be "yes".

If you like this game, you might like…

[ LINK: Official Rogue Quest Website ]

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