Arboria

Arboria
N/A
Metacritic
80
Steam
73.031
xDR
Our rating is calculated based on the reviews and popularity of the game.
Price
$19.99
Release date
9 September 2021
Developers
Publishers
Steam reviews score
Total
80 (478 votes)

Fight, die, and fight again in this dark fantasy trollz-like roguelite. As a Yotun troll warrior, descend into the ever-changing, creepy dungeons of Durnar. Use a variety of Symbiotic Weapons and Bio-Mutations to slay enemies and heal The Father Tree.

Show detailed description

Arboria system requirements

Minimum:

  • Requires a 64-bit processor and operating system
  • OS: Windows 7 / 8 / 10
  • Processor: Intel Core i3 3.2 GHz, AMD Phenom II X4 955 - 4 Core, 3.2 GHz
  • Memory: 8 GB RAM GB RAM
  • Graphics: Radeon R9 280 or Nvidia GeForce GTX 660
  • DirectX: Version 11
  • Storage: 17 GB available space
  • Sound Card: DirectX compatible
Similar games
Archtower
Archtower

Action, Adventure, Indie, RPG, Early Access

xDr: 64.50
Dreamscaper
Dreamscaper

Action, Adventure, Indie, RPG

$19.99 xDr: 83.89
Popularity
Reviews
Write a new review
RaptorGundam
RaptorGundam

Underrated. Deserves a lot more attention. It's a Souls-Like AND Rogue-Like !

I'll admit, I torrented this game at first.
But I chose to buy it because it deserves support.
And you should support the devs too. It truly deserves a LOT more attention.

Chalkless
Chalkless

All in all it's a well built classic rouge-like. The story picks up after the first boss, so give it a chance. Huge selection of weapons, but a lot of them feel very samey. Graphics are deceptively resource intensive.

R3TR0MAX
R3TR0MAX

So I bought this game, was excited by the set up and kinda game it was but then I could not stop asking "when is the tutorial over?" because I WANTED THAT F#$%ING NAVI FAIRY THING TO GET OUT OF MY FACE.

Upon realising it'd always be following me being a very distracting presence. I could not settle into the gameplay at all despite how appealing it was.

null
null

TLDR:
I can't give it praise for anything other than art style and MAYBE lore. Roguelite progression is boring and combat is just okay (later it turns tedious due to how spongy enemies get). Replayability isn't great.

Before trusting positive ratings of this game keep in mind it takes 6-16 hours (6 on lucky run) to clear this game and achievements show only 2% of people beat it. Only 0.6% beat New Game+ (story ends at new game++). Most people don't know what they are recommending.

Visuals(8/10)

It's one of few visually distinct games. As you may see from videos and screenshots colors are contrasting and art style is vivid. Characters and environments are thematically distinct. The game world in general looks unique.

There are 2 reasons I'm not giving it 10/10 for style

    • Visual clutter that such a blend of colors (and contrasting glows/accents) creates.
    • Diminished threat visibility. Due to pretty much every color of the palette being used in the environment dangerous stuff often blends in with environment. Again, gameplay suffers for it.

Combat(6/10)

At a glance It's a generic, but decent action combat system, with only real difference being random weapons/abilities. Sadly, nothing in particular about it stands out and the weapons/abilities don't do enough in making runs feel different.

Weapon combat:

    • Dodge attack
    • Attack 2-5 times (consistent amount depending on weapon and attack type)
    • Repeat

No it's not like other games because rhythm doesn't change. There are 2 things that can break that rhythm and those are more enemies (you have to avoid more) or abilities (ranging from 100% useless to OP).

There are some gimmicks in game that are meant to break it up, but they don't.

Combat difficulty comes from sheer numbers of enemies and game doing very little to help you see all the enemies (or attacks coming from off screen). In fact last boss is insanely easy to read, BUT it has a huge healthbar (~10min fight) and you get attacked from 2 sides.

Elemental attacks
The game features elemental system (effects and weaknesses), which you must exploit or the game becomes a lot more difficult (higher chances to get and stay surrounded). I liked elemental effects (like dark triggers explosions, bio reduces armor, etc), because they are creative and actually add to the combat, but I hate this elemental weakness system.

Avoiding the fact you don't get to choose what to use, in order to control element of your weapon (which is random and often non-existent) you need to grind until you find blueprints for that particular weapon (i.e. using a weapon you don't have blueprints for gives you a handicap). Also elemental weakness sequence makes no sense:

Dark->Fire->Cold->Shock->Bio(green)->Dark (Dark beats fire and so on..).

New Game+
Exactly the same thing, but enemies deal a lot more damage and soak A LOT of damage, so you will get surrounded and killed by random off-screen attack. I haven't reached the last boss, but 2nd and 3rd to last bosses (which took maybe 4 minutes each in previous runs) took about 20 minutes each.

Abilities can be decent in first playthrough, as they can either kill or greatly damage most normal enemies. Taking a hit to cast them was worth it. In NG+ they only get you killed, as you need to cast about 10 of them to kill anything and you are defenseless while casting.

Permanent progression (roguelite)(4/10)

The way permanent upgrade currencies are handled is quite nice (clear-based currency to unlock NPCs and grind-based currency to upgrade stuff NPCs offer), but upgrades themselves are just boring. Here's a few

    • 1 more weapon/ability/consumable slot (initially you get to equip only 1 of each). To be clear it is ONLY useful to swap into weapons with different elements to exploit enemy weaknesses.
    • Ability to scrap weapons/abilities.
    • More options from pre-run vendors.
    • Marginally more powerful options from pre-run vendors.
    • 5% chance a pre-run item will have elemental effect attached already.
    • 0.2 mana regen.
    • +2 base stat. It is useful early on, but not that much seeing you can reach ~100 by the end of the game.

No permanent upgrades change anything about how you play the game. All they do is let you skip early levels easier. Oh and did I mention you consistently get weaker relative to enemies you're fighting (even with upgrades)?

Lack of polish

Non-game breaking stuff that annoyed me.

    • "Press any key to continue" after most loading screens. WHY?
    • About half of currency you earn comes from manually destroying crystals... This is a wastes time and adds nothing to the game.
    • Most environments that look like obstacles are destructible, using attacks or just dodge rolls. Some aren't and you will absolutely get stuck on those.
    • Camera and lock-on feature give a fairly poor visibility for a game where you constantly get attacked from all directions.

      • Lock-on is mandatory. You cannot play without it due to most weapons having narrow attack angle and pushing you into some direction, often bypassing enemies.
      • Lock-on gets lost when when moving behind objects OR when enemy moves away too far. 2 common enemy types feature a super long dash that breaks lock quite consistently.
      • Lock-on does not switch targets when enemy is too close, a little too far to the side or behind you.
      • Camera gets boxed in in cramped rooms, as it comes close to character making it impossible to see.
      • Camera not offering enough visibility for combat where you can get attacked from any direction.
      • Lock-on (and how clunky it feels) maes limited camera visibility much worse.

    • UI design is not intuitive in many places. The UI structure with multiple layered tabs, non-descriptive names like "Tad da bat" for weapon shop and awkward controls give UI a learning curve of its own. This game doesn't offer anything new or complex, there's no reason for UI to be so complicated. 1 upgrade UI is outright impossible to reach unless you have pending upgrades.
    • Crashes. Luckily the game saves after completing each stage, I the crashes I had only cost me about 20 minutes.

Verdict

It doesn't shine at anything other than visuals. It has a few good ideas (even implemented well), but their success is diminished by poorly executed combat.

rgilsoul
rgilsoul

At first I thought the game was a little clunky, but I got used to it. The combat became fun after a while, and I enjoyed the ambiance of the environment.

Jesus Listens....'tO sLaYeR!'
Jesus Listens…

Get rid of the lame wasps and replace with like plant zombies or something.

xeggx5
xeggx5

This could be a good game with some updates, but I can't recommend it now.

Good:
- Excellent world building and art

Issues:
- First runs are not fun because things like secondary weapon/mutation/usable slots and alternative attacks are not unlocked
- The first boss is way too long. It is easy if you have a good run, but just isn't enjoyable. I exploit a bug to win faster and it still takes too long.
- Every enemy takes too long to kill. This makes runs feel like a slog. And encourages cheese strategies that aren't fun.
- Too many enemies to fight at once. The devs recommend pulling enemies away to fight them 1v1. However, this doesn't encourage a fun play style.
- Most level up mods suck. They are often specific to items you may not have, give boost that are way too small to matter, or aren't understandable.
- Needs a gamma setting
- Cut scenes take too long to skip (should be double button press, not a hold)
- Weapons take too long to unlock. I've played for 25 hours and still haven't unlocked 3 or 4.

Siesla
Siesla

Very good rougelite, plenty of variety in weapons, mutagens (powers) and elemental chart adds some further strategy to combat.

Atmosphere and general tone is unique and doesn't take itself too seriously.

Main criticisms I have is that its can be easy to get caught on corners and stuck in terrain, ruining runs. One instance i remember of this was climbing some stairs on floor 3 of biome 1 and getting stuck between the stairs going up and a rock outcropping next to it after falling into it. Had to commit suicide by enemy to reset the run.

Also it's a minor gripe and i don't know if its an intended design but after loading is done upon game start up, it'd be nice if the game transitioned to the main menu without the sound effect you'd get when your char falls down to the next waiting room.

It'd be nice as well if they could finish implementing/fixing keyboard + controller support. I like to play with controller with this game and I noticed the game gets confused with cursor navigation on the item screen as well as options screen. I'm forced to use keyboard + mouse to navigate and use said screens to combine items and exit relevant menu's then go back to using controller to continue playing.

Also encountered 2 bugs so far since playing.

1) Spamming teleport mutagen causes character to be covered by a pulsing fleshy effect like the effect on item drops.
2) I'm not sure how to exactly replicate it but there was a few instances where the camera was pushed up against the wall and i guess it got too close to the character, since it caused my character to go invisible. Great for an advantage my character was no longer blocking my view but not an intended play style i'd assume.

Apart from these 2 bugs, the game plays very well with all settings turned to high and most effects enabled.

Recommended if you're in a mood for a roguelite, plenty of things to unlock and see.

Cwun
Cwun

Quirky art style and humor that won't be for everyone.

Underneath the quirkiness is a very solid roguelite. The game opens up a lot more than you would think initially. Fair price for a fun experience.

Yoma
Yoma

My experience so far is based on clearing NG and NG+, I'm currently gunning for NG++. I would rate it 4/5 till I figure out how NG++ can be cleared as it seems impossible atm and its really pissing me off that I wont get to know the full story.

Story: Short, interesting and simple.

Weapons: All the weapons have a unique play style perhaps to cater to a wider audience but imo only a 2 or 3 weapons are viable to clear the game especially at the deeper levels and higher difficulty modes.

Skills: Same as the above, only 2 skills I would really use as the monsters at the lower level start to overwhelm. Other skills have longer delays which would allow an enemy to hit u while charging it up. The game encourages movement and quick reactions.

Mods: After mixing and matching several mods, I've found that a certain mod combo overpowers the rest in terms of damage added, hp sustain, utility sustain and overall tankiness allowing for a more in your face kind of play style. The caster mods feel good at early levels but drop off severely starting from NG+.

The grind: I managed to push till NG++ by grinding and maxing out the available upgrades and even then had to try a few times before I cleared NG+. The grind overall was enjoyable, a good balance for casual to experienced players.

TLDR: Unique weapons, variety of playstyles, short interesting story which has so far kept me intrigued to continue pushing the end. If you enjoy grindy games u would enjoy this one.

Xewmath
Xewmath

Super good. A few bugs but not game breaking. Overall a rogue like souls game with a unique story and art style. Weird and I love it.

iminapickleisme
iminapickleisme

Never tried this type of game before, so that having been said. Its amazing. Death is not welcome but is part of progressing at the same time. Can be frustrating at times getting stuck somewhere's unable to get out of the spot you dashed into getting veri crystals, but other than small things like that it's a great game to get lost in.

Sifted
Sifted

It's great but too many cutscenes.
Please add an auto skip option.

Nebula
Nebula

A quirky roguelite with its own unique look and identity. Its dark damp and ugly and the game expresses this vibe really well. It has moments of comedy and it doesn't take itself too seriously, stoner trollz ...what else is there to say?

The gameplay loop is addictive the battles are fast paced and also surprisingly strategic, I cant help but draw comparisons to Nioh. 80hrs played so far and I still haven't completed it, not because the difficulty is unfair but because of how much I enjoy exploring the game and its mechanics. This is a glimpse of what I think the future may hold for the genre, a possible blueprint for AAA studios to follow.

Swigs
Swigs

I'm loving it more and more as I play it. There are so many interesting facets and things to unlock

Xangi
Xangi

UPDATE 10/5/2021
------------------
Well, I said I'd change it and I will. The patch dropped today and despite it breaking DS4Windows compatibility on my machine it's otherwise what was advertised. Changelog was not simply 1 line, thank god, and addressed a few other complaints I had. Got all the way to the bottom of the last area now that you can actually see a bit through the disruptor effects and was disappointed to find that the boss there was a DPS check (died after 20 minutes of fighting him to an offscreen attack, had barely whittled down half his HP). Left a bad taste in my mouth but whatever.

So here's the deal: Arboria is a pretty good game. Plays well, controls are passable with a few issues in the menus (mainly the d-pad changing floors but also being used for adjusting amounts in some parts) and in game (camera lockon switching just doesn't work sometimes), good graphics and an interesting graphical style, and a decent sense of progression though sometimes it's quite artificial as roguelites tend to be with the real changes just being bigger numbers. The game can be a bit buggy but the major issues have been stamped out. Overall I'd recommend this game for the price to anybody who's a fan of dungeon crawling and weird creative worlds.

What don't I like? Helheim mostly. Spoilers here so you know the drill.
Helheim, the last area of the game, is pretty much a techbase filled with robots. This is fine, but the area introduces a totally pointless "alert level" mechanic that I feel takes away from the experience because it's virtually impossible to keep low due to it rising as you break the power boxes which function as locks for the elevator to the next level. As it rises, enemies get stronger and stuff and eventually they send a big mech after you, oh and tons more traps activate in the halls. Cool I guess, except since there's no real way to avoid being at or above yellow alert that doesn't involve grinding stupid terminals that require fighting more incredibly dangerous enemies, you'll never notice the difference.

Helheim's enemies are also absurdly tanky, all but requiring armor penetration to deal with sanely. They also feature some enemies which can effectively oneshot you with shotgun projectile spam, enemies with gigantic CC AoE attacks, and enemies that can spawn disruptor fields which obscure your vision (not as badly as before but still bad) and disable your abilities. The boss of the area, Jormund and ???, is an Orenstein/Smough style dual boss fight where it's virtually impossible to avoid getting offscreened with lasers because of a lack of obstructions in the arena. These bosses also have INSANE amounts of HP so I really don't know exactly how you're supposed to beat them without just grinding to get better gear and getting a god roll on your stuff. Maybe the damage carries over between runs? I doubt it but that would at least make sense. I'll adjust this section if it turns out I'm just stupid and missed a key mechanic. (Update: I beat him, damage doesn't carry over. Took 20 minutes of stabbing with a lance and bongo chugging. Near-zero challenge if you have a tank build.)

Some of these problems also exist for the third area, Mutantz Zone, but are more easily mitigated due to massive Veri gain from simply running a few floors of that zone allowing you to upgrade key town vendors quickly. No such luck for Helheim.

Also, as I mentioned in the first review the Toughness weapons are trash. Every single one is simply too slow to be worth using for their damage output. This is so bad that, with a full Toughness build, you can generally achieve higher DPS just using one of the faster focus weapons because more hits per second = more elemental damage per second = more damage per second. That's not even considering mods which add flat damage to your weapon regardless of type. I would really like to see the weapon balance addressed in the future because right now the balance is pretty much Focus > Strength >>>>> Toughness for all builds. Strength weapons are also not that great, but they're at least usable.

So anyways, despite that it's still a good game. Full disclosure, I got this for about $19CDN + Tax (thank you government I sure like paying taxes while jobless from your policies) and of that around $8 was from my steam wallet which I gained through selling tons of old cards. I think the game was worth what I paid, and I would buy it at full price out of pocket if it were within my means. Your experience may vary, obviously, so make sure to watch plenty of gameplay and read reviews. Do note that many videos don't even go past the first 6 levels, and there are 22 levels in the game divided into 4 zones (including boss levels), so if you're worried about only fighting bugs for 20 hours rest assured there's more than that.
------------------
ORIGINAL REVIEW BELOW, UNCHANGED
------------------
I like this game. It's an interesting mix of third person action combat and roguelite mechanics. It doesn't play that much like souls once you get past the initial similarities, which is a good thing in my opinion. Even though the weapon balance is kind of bad (Toughness weapons are near-universally garbage) it's still fun to play through and even the last area (Helheim) which is a bit janky isn't that bad.

So why the negative review? The publisher, All In! Games, has such an ass-backwards QA process that it has taken nearly THREE WEEKS for the developer to push a one-line hotfix to a day one issue which prevents players from finding armor blueprints. Literally an entire vendor is effectively useless and many upgrades are pointless because of this. The devs knew about the issue early, had a fix ready, and it's been in "bureaucracy" limbo ever since. This hotfix doesn't even address some of the myriad of other issues that have been reported, it is LITERALLY just one line to fix the armor bug (source: https://imgur.com/a/EVrkPXL from the discord). This is not acceptable business practice and I would go so far as to say that they are basically sabotaging the game by doing this.

At this point I cannot recommend the game because it is very buggy and, unlike most indie/early access games, the timetable on which it may be polished and fixed up looks to be so long that I'll be in a nursing home by the time it happens.

tl;dr Good game, bad Publisher. Get on sale and expect bugs. Review will change once fixes to the armor issue and general polish is applied.

UPDATE (10/1/2021):
https://imgur.com/a/QYeupHS
AIG Community manager says the patch is bigger (contradicts dev). Also pretty much says "This is normal don't worry about it". Doesn't attempt to excuse the horrendous patch times. Who's telling the truth? You tell me.

UPDATE 2 (10/1/2021):
https://imgur.com/a/OYRodS8
Notice how the developer dances around the "One line of code" issue and never actually says the change wasn't just one line. Yes, one line of code triggers a new build, that doesn't mean the change is substantial or that it requires three weeks to test. Considering that this message came about 90 minutes after the publisher's community manager made the last post, I'd say this is an attempt at quick backtracking to preserve one's job.

Why not just show us the changelog? Why can't we know WHEN the patch is coming? Why the lack of transparency? Why can't AIG seem to afford a QA department that is capable of testing games quickly and effectively if they need to do it for such small changes?

sharang2
sharang2

pretty good, occasional cringe

TWITCH/defsam
TWITCH/defsam

This is a Hidden Gem.

Rougelike with some dark souls elements.
This is like risk of rain 2 but different themes. More levels.
Less RNG as you can craft.

If you are into the genre of rouge-like, you will love this. I am addicted to it and it's my go-to game in the past 2 weeks.

rollins720
rollins720

It's fun times, just needs a few bug patches.

Faust
Faust

Hades like, in 3D. This is the first 3D action roguelike that I really enjoy, Tons of content, crazy replayability.

Definitely My top favorite game this year.

Yeat Enthusiast
Yeat Enthusiast

A lot of the games crazy bugs have been ironed out. Though there are still some minor bugs and issues. It is really grindy and sometimes feels unrewarding. However when you get a good run, man is it satisfying to get extremely far. But I have gotten trolled (no pun intended) by a room completely covered in rotating blade traps on a god run. All in all fun game just really time consuming.

V
V

it took me like 30 minutes of gameplay to realize that to go to the next floor i have to get right on top of a switch that won't have a gui displayed to use the thing until your balls are right on top of it

i then proceeded to have two chests in a row spawn items on top of traps so i couldn't actually pick them up without dying

Lettuce
Lettuce

good game give it a shot worth the moeny fs.

Sir Hanselot
Sir Hanselot

The more I play it, the more i liked it! Awesome game!

Devils Ronin
Devils Ronin

Honestly just an all around awesome and fun, but frustrating game. If you are willing to put time and bust ass you will really enjoy this game.

ShoyuMyChasyu
ShoyuMyChasyu

I feel like I've just been put through a long con for this game. The beginning its great, things are new and exciting, but then it quickly becomes sour and stagnant. Up until NG+, the game is okay. Things are still wonky like getting NG level loot near the end of NG+ which never feels good. When you reach NG++ that's when I feel like things take a turn for the worst. I won't spoil it in in case anyone reading cares but I will say that after reaching that point, there is very little to compel me to go through another run. The weapons are kinda meh with only a few types that are really worth using, the mutations or spells are meh since you can go through a whole run without even touching them, and the last boss I basically was spamming potions and my other buffs since they would replenish themselves every 15 secs. Overall I am finding a hard time to believe that this game is out of Early Access or if the devs themselves even play the game. Every good idea in this game sadly gets overshadowed by multiple glaring, ass backwards, who even does these kinds of things ideas. I guess the devs can get kudos points for that, 1 step forward and a full on sprint backwards 10 steps. Hopefully they can turn things around but I'm not much of a optimist these days.

Mdage
Mdage

Uninspired and bland.
I like the genre, and this is an ugly game with bad UI and annoying dialog you are forced to skip. Every. Single Mission. The enemy variety is extremely low. The elemental variations are near meaningless and I had 5 runs down before I saw anything other than fire or ice so I don't know if its meant to be that way or just really unbalanced in its 'randomness'.

The runs are long and boring. You will easily kill 50 of the same type of creature within the first two levels, yet they still soak enough hits to force you to spend time dodging, thus prolonging the 'omg i have to kill another fxekin fly again' pain that is this game.

All of the text and vocals being written with a Jamacian accent is just sad- and you smoke 'herbs' to heal. Real original folks. It could have been a great game but you made it a lame repetitive joke that falls flat. Well done.

Noitamina_san
Noitamina_san

I really wanted to like this game and it can be fun once you got a little into it. BUT there are too many mechanics that just make the game unrewarding to play and once you reached NG+ it just feels like a pile of unfinished garbage. The way they just went with the cheap a** old Blizzard [like diablo 3( bigger numbers = more fun, and no new mechanics)] is already a bad way to design anything, but then with a more broad choice of items to drop, you get less and less mods to design your own builds and it just feels random, since u mostly get Mutations and a variety of Symbionts.
Literally just a grind to get nothing, but the same u already played through, but way less player choice. NICE!

VenoNat
VenoNat

games great, lots of replay value (especially for $20) and the game is just oozing with personality...
but its hard to want to recommend this game due to the extreme difficulty spike that suddenly hits you like the great wall of china in the final area. every enemy is an extreme damage-sponge that deals huge damage in return, and as if that wasnt bad enough, they decided to add not ONE, but TWO new mechanics that are solely designed to make the area harder: 1) an alarm level (think the police stars from GTA) that can only be reduced by finding random events on the map that require you to defeat a mob of MORE ENEMIES. 2) a lock system for the elevator to the next level so that you can't just bypass enemies like you could in literally 90% of the game!

Basically, the game is a lot of fun but it's practically impossible to finish unless you're Gaming Jesus.

liathwulf
liathwulf

this is a super fun game if you like action rougelikes. It's got a good gameplay loop, you expand your little troll village, and some cool crafting. weapons feel interesting to learn the hang of, and there's a cool strategic aspect every run of the element system, as each element has special effects and matchups with enemies. you can combine elemental stones with your weapons during runs when you find them, or you can just hope to get lucky.

the aesthetic is super intruiging, you'll either like it or not. I like to play attractive characters in most of the games but there's a creepy pans labrynth and yet comedic consistency with the rastafarian theme going on and the creepy trippy caves.

honestly they could use some more variety in the enemy and floors on earlier levels to make them more interesting, especially early on when you might be repeating them a lot. there are a couple bugs, but the game is very early in development. seriously, it's great. if you want an action roguelike, this is totally a steal for twenty bucks.

Kaylia - The Cookie Thief.
Kaylia - The C…

The idea of this is good, the keys tho, react like a mofo.. so its not worth it, also the damn creatures is ugly af.. pty them mostly.. if u want something like this, go D3: RoS

Gam3rX{{WaR}}
Gam3rX{{WaR}}

Fun game for the price. Has a ton of potential. Wish i had more time to play it more.

DUCC
DUCC

fucking amazing, i honestly just want them to keep adding to the game and working on it. It is really one the most fun games I have played, it's a lot better than a lot of the stuff that has been coming out

Auphorion the Duck 🦆
Auphorion the Duck 🦆

It's a fun, rogue like 3D game, centered around melee primarily, but with abilities that complement the gameplay and really help switch it up. It borrows a bit of mechanics from some other games, like dark souls - and has 3 different movement setups; light/medium/heavy, where dodging and rolling is slower or not able to be done as often with the heavier variant of armor.

The three "builds" are separated into Toughness, Strength, and Focus. Toughness is intended to be the tankiest, and features disgustingly slow weapons that tend to have enormous reach. It tends to require the usage of heavy armor for stability to stop enemy attacks from interrupting yours (it's really bad when your very slow/high damage attack isn't able to connect / keeps getting stopped).

Strength appears to be focused on stunlocking enemies, but I can't speak much to this as I haven't done a lot with it. There are some pretty fun interactions to be had, and it's between the slowness of toughness builds and the speed of focus builds. Some weapons have charge up attacks which are (in some cases literally) like swatting a wasp out of the air, then smashing it to death.

Focus tends to be centered on the use of abilities (called 'mutations' in game), however to balance the weapons, it seems like the mana return on attacks was lowered for focus weapons. Unfortunately, this means that there are some cases where weapons from other classes may be more effective at regenerating mana until you have certain focus mods.

Unfortunately, the game does have a slew of bugs - I'm not sure if the developers are even still working on the game to be honest, but most of the bug I found were able to be either worked around or avoided. It seems like there are optimization issues, and potentially resource management; I've found that a straight run tends to crash at the third major section of the game, but if I have restarted the game and/or exited to the main menu, it tends to be more stable; same thing for when I start getting frame loss. The issues tend to be more severe the further in the game one is, with the most notable frame drops seeming to come from upgraded consumables, but definitely not limited to them.

The idea of the game is basically: You're a Troll, gathering a resource called "Veri" for the "Godz". Similar to Hades, it doesn't seem like you're supposed to be able to beat the game in one go (but it may be possible). The intent is that you heal the father tree roots that are sick, and spend Veri you collect to get upgrades. Somewhat unfortunately, the developers forced a progression slow-down; you have to upgrade the slots you have available, and the amount of veri that can be stored in each slot. It's actually quite annoying, because you tend to need to decide between your current run progression and overall progression / quality of your next life. If you clear out everything for Veri, chances are you're going to get a higher tier of gear that you want to upgrade quality on, or very importantly, change the element on, and you won't be able to do so.

As you progress further, it seems like it would be less of a problem, but the reality is that if everything is fully upgraded, the later sections of the game can produce more Veri than can be held in every inventory slot with maximized capacity.

As I'm writing this review, the limited inventory system doesn't seem particularly good nor fun in reflection. Besides slowing down progression, I don't think an unlimited inventory would change much in the game - if you could have mods and essences not take up space, it would save one from wasting time deciding to do certain things or not, and you'd be much more free to do what you want when you want.

On the topic of mods, the game has a positive and negative at the same time - you can roll the mods by applying essences to them (normal ones only). For some reason the mods quality can't be upgraded like armor and weapons with super essences. You cannot 'undo' or 'rollback' a mod, and you can also roll a mod you already have in your inventory, or even currently applied to your character. There is also no system to list out mods you've discovered or seen at all, and as you improve in the game, you'd obviously like to go for certain ones, so it does leave a bit of a hole in the gameplay that could've been improved a great deal. Still, the option to re-roll the mods is a nice feature, it just depends on you applying the right type of essence and knowing what result(s) you'll get from them.

The progression system is a mixed bag overall; you unlock "elevator shafts" using batteries as you descend (you get a battery from all bosses, at stages 3, 5, and big boss fights), and upgrade the equipment you start with; this tends to mean that after you've played a bit, you have way overpowered gear for the lower level stuff, and it gets a bit grindy - it feels like you can't really skip that part, because on visits to the same areas again, tree roots you healed may be "cursed" - you can take the curse on yourself, and kill 15 enemies to clear it, and get 3 essences and a mod drop when you clear the curse. The mod is purple quality - the highest quality, and it feels necessary to be able to have a good run to have those mods. If you have enough mods, you need more essences, and the enemy's element plays into the issue of demand for essences you have; if there are ice element enemies that are weak to fire, then you'd be applying a fire essence to weapons, and potentially armor (to get halfed elemental damage from ice). Unfortunately, this means that you have one less essence to use on re-rolling mods. Fire essences tend to roll mods into melee-weapon related rolls. Ice tends to roll into ability based mods (mutations), purple tends to be related to consumables, lightning tends to be related to dashing and dodging, and bio (green) tends to be related to life/tankiness.

In general, I find that fire essences are in high demand - they tend to be needed for toughness, strength, and focus builds to get some extra damage or resource regeneration. Add in that you're gambling on getting the mod (or mods) you want, and... you can be very short on certain essences. There are certainly some solutions - try to roll for things in other elements, or just pick up weapons with the right elements on them, but you'll be missing something; if you pick up any weapon with the right element, you'll lose out on gaining proficiency with a weapon that would be better for the build you have, and end up training a weapon that won't be able to hit as high damage. In the end, if your build has 75%+ into one stat, a unique weapon missing the final upgrade can hit similar numbers to a weapon that had the final upgrade, but was for a different stat (so roughly 3-5 levels of upgrades).

Overall, the game is fun, but it could definitely use some love from the developers in the form of bug fixes, fixes of actual typos which were not done on purpose due to the player character being a troll, and some improvements that should've honestly been caught in play-testing. If you're looking for a roguelite 3D game, this game fits that niche well - it definitely isn't a perfect game, but it's enjoyable and I found it to be worth it.

Bleach
Bleach

There a number of problems with this game, but the plethora of bugs is the worst. Attacks swing right through enemies, items that can't be picked up, softlock due to overlapping interactions, getting stuck on terrain, items being consumed but not happening, getting stuck in the dodge roll animation, the list goes on and on. Some of these are minor annoyances, but others have ended runs for me.

Although there are some fun ideas in play, issues aside from bugs continue to hold them back. It's deeply repetitive and severely lacking in enemy variety. The balance between the types of weapons is very poor with some of them being almost unusable in comparison to those with better movesets. Disabling sprint when you enter combat is foolish and frustrating. I wish I could enjoy the good parts of this game, but they are far too burdened by its shortcomings.

SGM
SGM

I really like this game, I always talked about how cool it would be for a dark souls rogue-like dungeon. Well here it is.

ghijaholic
ghijaholic

fun game, overcomes its few flaws

Paranoid Schizophrenic
Paranoid Schiz…

This is a fantastic game that requires a bit of polish but not much. The gameplay loop is fun and the weapons + mutations are immensely satisfying. The main problem with the game is its frequent bugs paired with occasional crashes. Its a bit frustrating to spend a time on a stage only to roll and have your character be physically stuck so you can't move meaning you have to restart from the last elevator room. Or when you are combining essence with mods to try and get a specific mod and the game crashes after you get it. These things majorly hinder my enjoyment of the game but the moments the game isn't crashing or bugging are some of the best action roguelites have to offer. I also have full faith the devs will iron all these things out in due time as they seem to be hard at work with patches and updates. Highly recommended.

ephemeral
ephemeral

Maybe what you see first is ugly aliens also it's nasty fat fairy. But after you explored every inches of dungeon, kicked tons of freaks's asses, smoked lot of bongos. Then look! they're still ugly af

Zeluvius
Zeluvius

Fantastic game, difficulty is good, and combat is crunchy. Gets real tricky once you put on difficulty mods. Highly reccomend.

SNIPER B.O.S.C.O.
SNIPER B.O.S.C.O.

this game is a roguelike soulslike. it's very traditionally roguelike in one sense where all the action is focused around this one big dungeon, you go down floors, the environments and enemies change along the way, etc. but it employs the 'rogue legacy' school of metaprogression, although less egregiously than rogue legacy does. The amount of directly increasing your stats via currency is limited, its more focused on increasing the array of starter items you can go into the dungeon with.

You play as a series (or just one if you're super good at the game) of alien-plant-troll creatures called Jotunz, and as the name suggests you're part of a tribe with a nordic-inspired mythology. Although one of the merchants is a rasta, one is australian, apparently accents are just an individual thing on this planet. You're all spawned from one big sentient father tree, so its kind of like if Avatar was about fucked up jim henson troll people.

The combat is soulslike, so its easy to pick up if you're familiar with the genre. like in the souls games your weapon determines your moveset, but in this game weapons are called 'symbionts' and are basically limb mutations your troll can swap between. that occupies your right hand (and right shoulder buttons), and then the left hand has 'mutations', which are a grab bag of everything that isn't weapons. Initially boring stuff like 'a shield' or 'a gun', you eventually get some which are wacky stuff like telekinesis for throwing enemies around, or summoning massive stone spikes to impale people. I should note pretty early on that there is a huge shitload of stuff in this game. Like i've got a ton of hours in it but i've not made it out of the second major biome yet.

They really do a lot with the fact that it's kind of a science fantasy setting, so it's rare that you get a new weapon and it's 'just' a new moveset. almost everything has some kind of gimmick to it, like the halberd hand that actually grows and gets a longer range as you hit stuff with it, then shrinks down when you're idle, or the sword where you can tap the attack button as you're swinging to make it hit harder. even the starter weapon (the axe) has a mechanic where the charged up heavy attack sets it aflame, then the light attack combo gives a stacking attack speed buff.

something that's a really nice detail is that instead of weapons just ambiently increasingly in quality (there are rarity levels which give extra lil bonuses, but you get the ability to upgrade item rarity pretty early), each tier of weapon is made of different materials, and so every weapon has a ton of different looks depending on the material its made of. like a macuahuitl made of scrap looks a lot different to one made of bone.

another nice bit of attention to detail is that there's an elemental system, and every monster comes in different elementally aligned forms, and they all have very distinct looks rather than just being palette swaps. like the ice ones are all craggy, the dark aligned ones are slender and tentacled, that type of thing. you can use elemental essences you find around to apply elemental alignment to your own weapons and mutations, and for the mutations the effects of the mutation will actually change with the element instead of just gaining typed damage. Like the ice-aligned shockwave fist will leave behind a sphere of cold that slows stuff down, whereas the shock one will arc between targets.

I think the weakest point of the game is the [s]rasta troll[/s] fact the first dungeon biome is the most boring. it's a cave and the enemies are bugs. as you progress through the first biome it gets more visually interesting (troll village ruins and such start popping up), but the game doesnt get super visually interesting until the second biome, which is composed of aztec style ruins populated by some kind of lizardfolk tech cargo cult. I've not gotten past this biome yet but even that has a lot of progression in its visuals from floor to floor, so you do always feel like you're progressing deeper and deeper.

I dont want to go on forever forever about this game but i do like it a lot. in style terms it reminds me of old games like Sacrifice and Abe's Oddyssey, or jim henson movies like The Dark Crystal. the trolls are goofy, but there's a narrative going on around them and the planet's exploitation by some variety of high tech aliens at some point in the past. It has a lot of weird touches, like the fairy who follows you around gets fatter and fatter as you collect the tiberium crystals that are the meta currency, then pukes them up in liquid form into a machine between floors. Or when you die, she pulls off your trolls head and carries it back up to the surface, where depending on how well your run went your trolls head gets preserved in a hall of fame of troll heads in jars.

I really hate the rasta troll, but this game has an absurd amount of content and is very well put together with a charming aesthetic. It has enough stuff in it where it feels like a Dead Cells or something that's had 3 years of early access, but as far as I can tell it came out of nowhere. If you like souls games and you like roguelikes it is worth sticking out the first biome to get to the meat of the potato on this one.

LORD ADEEM
LORD ADEEM

Surprisingly fun!

-Fun combat
-Variety of weapons
-Awesome roguelite elements
-Descent progression and upgrades
-Great value

Harambe
Harambe

Playing Arboria is really scraping the bottom of the soulslike barrel. Combat is slow, janky, and boring. Rooms are randomly generated, and 90% empty space. So it feels like half the game is spent walking through uninspired trash. Go play Remnant or Dark Souls or Metroid Dread!

Koasis
Koasis

Enjoyable and fun, yet punishing. - a bit too janky IMO but still fun to play.

weed.vegeta
weed.vegeta

Played many more hours of this game over the course of it's early access on a friends computer. All i can say is it does so many fun, original and interesting things in its gameplay and visual design that its worth your time and money if you like Rogue-likes and souls/from softwear.

It takes a while to get off the ground with some needlessly grindy progression unlocks (it'll take 4-5 good runs just to unlock the entire basic arsenal and inventory slots of your character) but once you get past that wall and get the hang of it's gameplay loop it butterrrrrrrr.

knightwolf57
knightwolf57

The games art design looks great, and has a addictive game-play loop. Although it does have some stuttering and lag problems, but I don't know if that's my computer(it is a bit old) or if it is something in game.

Zarakc
Zarakc

Enjoyed this game a fair deal so far, still need to get through to the end, but felt that I've seen a good representation of the game thus far.

Different weapons, different powers, different elements for both and more. There's a nice humor to the game along with unlockable traits for your trolls, somewhat like Rogue Legacy, but more reigned in traits from my experience. The customization of your level ups and abilities allow for a good variety, focus more on weapon attacks or your spells, unlock the ability to have two of each, and more that you'll find out as you progress.

It's also got a Twitch integration system which can let your friends/viewers help/harm you.

Overall, I'd say grab it if you're interested in the 3D action combat style of games combined with the progression systems. It's got a variety of choices in character building, progression, saw references to New Game+ in-game, varying difficulties for better rewards. Also if you want your friends to likely ruin your attempts, that'd be a good metric too if you're keen for it.

There seems to be some cutscenes that might be missing sound and there were some graphical bugs when I played that were fixed, so the game seems to be getting the attention it needs.

Ashirogi Muto
Ashirogi Muto

Feels very clunky. Low frame rate. Poor action response. Feels like its something out of the early 2000's. The potential is there but it was not what I expected it to be.

Unforgiven Light
Unforgiven Light

Arboria is like a rough cut gem hidden among the rougelites and souls-like games.

Proostie
Proostie

Great roguelite that offers dozens of hours of replayability.

hasimmardin
hasimmardin

I have been enjoying the game a lot and I am likely to keep playing some more. Building your avatar is fun, and with the correct mods and weapons you can become very op (and yet still die). I guess, my most favorite aspect of the game is how each run is exciting due to discovering new synergies between certain mods, weapons and mutations. Well done by the team. I also love the risk/reward consideration and how you sometimes have to let go of certain things on the map if you are low on HP or healing items.

My ONLY issue with the game is that inventory management is a little too heart breaking. I am not sure how much veri (game's currency, which takes up inventory space) I had to leave behind on some levels due to carrying mods and elements with me, or vice versa. The thing is, one really wants to hold onto the mods and elements so increase the diversity of your char build options, but the fact that currency takes up inventory space somewhat takes out the fun. I guess, I just personally inventory constraints in video games...

In fact, I wish, developers were to let us carry everything we'd like (including mutations and weapons) to maximize build precision.. In return, all spells/items etc.. can be nerfed. Anyway, fun game. If you like a mix of Diablo, Dark Souls and Slay the Spire, go for this one!

Rub
Rub

It pains me that this game has so little exposure, as it's such a hidden gem. I'm a regular gamer, playing almost every day, and Arboria has been the game in the past half year that has managed to captivate me the most. The gameplay loop is satisfying, the combat is exceptional, and the whole vibe of the game is just right: not too serious but also not tryhard "funny". It is Troll-dark souls poured into a rogue-lite formula topped of with a cast of vendors/NPC's that seem to have come out of a children's story. It feels like a lot of love and long but satisfying workdays have been put into this game, making it generally a joy to play. It's a bit rough around the edges here and there: some bugs, enemies with similair paterns, and bosses whose main challenge is just huge healthpool make you realize this game could have been even better given (I assume) a little more exposure and therefore financial incentive. I really hope this game can serve as a showcase and demo if you will for what the team behind it is capable of, and that in a few years we'll have an "Arboria 2" to please da Godz.

dad
dad

soulslike + risk of rain. really well done, lots of care. enemies are challenging but fair, and the roguelite progression is satisfying.

dad approves.

Nanomachines_Son
Nanomachines_Son

Just now to the 4th area and figured I would finally post a review so far. Love some of the mechanics and the progression system. The meta jokes in game are pretty great. Knowing elemental weaknesses helps a tonne. I absolutely enjoy bashing my head against a wall when I like a game and the general story of it. And this has been a blast so far. Now if only I could figure out how to get through the 4th area for progression. The techno-organic enemies in the prior segment were annoying until adjusted to. But now the threat level mechanic is an extra layer of psychological stress with enemies I've only just encountered. I love roguelikes and roguelites and this one is a banger of a game. this is up there with The Surge and Hellpoint in terms of combat and challenge and I love those games to death so I enjoy this one a-hell-of-a-lot.

Beaker B
Beaker B

I enjoyed this game so much, that i bought a copy for all my gamer buddys and my sister.

Mr. Wingless
Mr. Wingless

It's actually a quite good rogue-like game. Seemed only intriguing at first and after a few games, it's only getting bigger and better, The limited amount of stuff at first might scare you a bit, but don't worry - there's a lot to unlock.

Use lock-on feature. Usually I avoid using lock-on in games, but this one requires it.

Jacob
Jacob

This roguelite game is a gem, don't even think about. Pick it up you won't regret it. It's so fun and addictive and there's abilities you can unlock for your Yotun(Character). You can also level your character to make the playable experience even better. You can kill time with this game for hours it never gets old. There is so much fun to be had with a game like Arboria. It's grindy, challenging, and fun. It's a gem and really deserves more attention to be honest. Highly recommend 9/10

Lord Shaddai
Lord Shaddai

Great game with tons of depth up front. You soon realize that it's a bit harder than it first appears but I look forward to more runs!

Slavko
Slavko

It is definitely a hidden gem. One of the best roguelites in my life. Many interconnected systems, clear and smooth gameplay cycle, ng+ and active content support. Absolutely worth money and time, has a lot of potential.

Pippin Squinch
Pippin Squinch

Crashes completely ruin this game. The further down you go, the bigger the floors get which I like, but when the game crashes you have to re-do the entire floor with a different layout, really kills the mood. There's no rhyme or reason as to the crashes, but it seems to happen only in combat. If it gets fixed I'll happily play more, but it's just proven to happen too often to be worth the hassle.

shuauam0
shuauam0

Dank Souls.

Satisfying weighty combat that allows you to build momentum. Funny. Cool style.

Recommend.

Battle-Brother Sloth
Battle-Brother Sloth

Very cool roguelite, def worth a play

dEAdOnE77
dEAdOnE77

Awsome Roguelite with a good rythem to the combat !
All the systems and the grafics feel realy unique.

Steven Silverheart
Steven Silverheart

UE4 fatal error... CTD. Game is broken for me. Crashes to often.

//Edit

Looking back i was hoping for a patch or some news on the issues with the game.... nope. Game is abandonware now.... Sad. I reallyh liked the premise.

Krevan
Krevan

It's repetitive. REAL repetitive. Doing exceptionally well is not incentivized. You need to do JUST well enough to unlock something, and die. Like, RIGHT THEN. Or you will hit a wall, VERY shortly after this games WANTS you to die. This intentional formula of "Do your best, until we've decided you're done" is NOT helped by the limited types of weapons and abilities available to you.
It's gotten to the point where I've just... Gotten over it. I have no desire to play this "infinitely replayable roguelike" anymore. WAY faster than I should have.

LickenClitz~N~DickenChicz
LickenClitz~N~…

So I Have Been playing For Some Hours Now. Not Going to Lie This Game is Very Inconsistent. As To Character Development. Every Time You Die You Start With A Completely New Useless Creature. Went Threw Multiple Levels Building Up A Creature Just To Start All Over. There is No Information On What Level You Are on, They Speak About Levels of Dungeon An There Being A Elevator To Lower Levels In The Space Between Levels But No Map As To The Final Conquest. Not Saying there Needs To Be A "Final" Anything. Game has A Great Concept But Lacking Definitive Objectives. An Every time I Go Down in The Dungeon Its A Different Lay Out?? So Your Never Starting Where You LeftOff... An in so Fact To YO Feel Like No Progress Is Being Made. An The Grulling Repeating of Having To press F After You Die To Just Get Back In The Action Is Rediclous To Have To Give Veti To Gods An Watch The Same Retarded Sequence Is Stupid, Why AM I Not Just Re spawning At A Teleporter Or Between Levels With A Map Of The Levels You Can Choose To go To. As For Fighting is Fighting Bad For Anyone Else??? Im Standing Next To tHE Creatures An Not Getting Hit Points. Straight Have To Stand infront Of the Creatures With no Space AS the Digital Rendering Mesh Just To Get Hits. An There is Never Any Drop Cache's. No Health Pakcs Or "Praying sticks??". Just A Bunch Of Diving An Dogeing, Not Alot of Action, An When You Do Fight its Trash An You die. Talk About A Dungeon Crawl Its Really Crawling To poick Up ANy Traction At All. i Had Alot of Hope For This Game But Its Not Really Shining As A Fun Game To play, An There is Not Much Story. They Made A Stupid Ass Video For Throwing You down A pit, But Not A Video Sequence When You Get Mutations ANd Gear??? Just A Flop o Here You Go Lets Just Dull Down The Huge Point Of the Game, Being Able To Mutate Your Body??? Wow So Lack Luster. I Hope They Fix or Change These issues Because It Really Makes The Game Undesirable

Mud_096
Mud_096

Game feels like it needs more time in the oven. Feels like it is missing a lot of polish and it does not run very well. I think the worst part are the enemies. Especially at the beginning. The wasps do the same attack and it is pretty annoying to start over and deal with it every time.

The last thing that annoys me is the fairy thing that follows you around everywhere. I wish it could be turned off and that thing not appear until absolutely necessary. I don't like anything about it and you cannot escape from it.

Dan78
Dan78

Nice concept, especially if you like trolls, as I do :D But there are some weird design choices, especially in the combat department. You are supposed to dodge enemy attacks, but stupid auto-camera would often hide the enemies, so that you have to always dash / roll in anticipation of hidden enemies. This also makes many combat features useless, such as combo attacks. How am I supposed to score a combo if I have to dodge always? Better wait for either sale or major rebalancing patch before buying this.

Fliptop
Fliptop

Great game to scratch the dark souls itch, I like the visuals and systems.

anxnop
anxnop

the game is good but after one good or(!) bad run, I dont really have the concentration anymore to do well on the next one, then I die quickly and I end up with a bad troll for my next start which is really frustrating. Imo they should redesign this system somehow but I dont know how

Gravv
Gravv

Need more like this game. Great take on Rougelite games.

Magitech1215
Magitech1215

*edit* after playing for a bit longer i cant recommend this game right now as the anti crash auto save can still lose you 10-25 mins on later floors when you crash(sadly its not if you crash its when) ive yet to have a run that hasn't crashed at least once so until either the crashes are less or the auto save is more common (like mayube have it save after any objective e.g root heal ,curse clear or challenge won/lost)

i wont refund this game because it has a lot of potential and charm its just not stable enough yet

this game is disgusting to look at... 10/10

also dark drooch is 100% overpowered use if you want an easy win

Spirit of Madness
Spirit of Madness

Welcome to mysterious and dangerous world of Durnar filled with nasty monsters, legendary treasures, mighty warriors and deadly traps. Experience a life of a Yotun troll warrior whose mission to go deeper and deeper in Durnar, heal father tree’s roots, and send as much veri home as possible and uncover all of Durnar’s many mysteries. Your arsenal will be filled with organic symbiotic weapons, magical organic mutations, armors crafted from hides of great beasts and warriors, mighty ultimate abilities, 5 elemental forces and various grenades, traps, potions and totems to use.

Abra'zil
Abra'zil

Fantastic combination of soulslike + rougelike. Bonus points for very nice and meaty artstyle.

Highly recommended.

ursorlirious
ursorlirious

what i liked

+ fills a gap in rogue-like gameplay with the 3d person melee action combat and it's actually one of the better ones in this bracket. might feel like souls at some point, but there isn't even a stamina bar - so it's much more lenient to play.

+ the combat feels kind of clunky at first, but has a lot of depth to it and is getting more and more fun, if you're getting used to. it's quite challenging and a really enjoyable experience fighting through those terrific dungeons.

+ gameplay loop is working very well despite all minor issues, so you definitely have the "one more run"-feeling.

+ gruesome art style. everything about this game looks displeasing and perilous, i love it. the arborians are disgusting, meaty and uncanny troll abominations and so is like rest of the world. definitely a new flavor and a welcome one as well.

+ almost all builds and weapons felt pretty viable to me, so it's like in most rogue-likes just about getting the broken combos to hit the late game easily or at least not getting screwed over by rng.

+ interesting lore. it isn't too deep, but there are a couple of flavor texts. could be much more in terms of world building, but it's decent enough to appreciate it. most of 'em told through holographic monologues.

what felt debatable to me

~ the favor system to keep the arborian gods amused was odd. it's very punishing to lose their favor and losing it is pretty easily done, if you're messing up a couple of runs (too early). you have to donate them veri (money) based on your last runs income and if you fail one too early, you probably can't offer them anything or nowhere near enough. the drawbacks are for example, your random starting character will be worse for future runs until you earned the god's favor back again. might seem like an interesting feature at first, but it's rather questionable in the long run, in my opinion.

~ weapon, armor and mod diversity isn't too great, but they're at least kinda balanced and got different attack pattern / special attacks.

~ enemy variety could be more diverse as well.

~ there isn't much of a story, but does this matter in rogue-likes anyway? decide for yourself.

~ haven't seen an update or notification for this game since early december 2021. not sure, if the developer is still working on this game.

what i disliked

- balancing feels kinda off in the last zone, enemies being quite spongy and dishing out absurd amounts of damage. until there everything's kinda fine. sadly haven't heard much good about the ng+/ng++ balancing as well, but never made it there myself at this point.

- some bugs here and there, nothing too serious tho. sometimes events won't trigger (actually this happened to me only a couple of times for a specific arena event within the first map and maybe got already fixed.), items glitching with the environment and being unable to loot at all, character getting stuck in odd places and stuff like that. (actually don't know what they've already fixed and what not, because my i played this on release and the first weeks - so keep that in mind, it's not a huge con anyway)

7-8/10, depends on developer activity.

turnerj19
turnerj19

Its good but have to fix the grain of the video.

bernieblack721
bernieblack721

TL;DR Do yourself a favor and don't buy this game. I can't even recommend it on sale. Its repetitive, needlessly and intentionally grindy, and most unfortunate of all, boring. Play for hours, die to some bullshit in the final dungeon, and repeat. Or, just avoid this game.

I wanted to like this game, but the game really seems to not want to be liked. Growing your home base is interesting, the combat is passable, it isn't terrible but the lack luster enemies drag it down. That's about all the good things I can say.

This game is unnecessarily grindy, mostly due to the baffling decision that the currency you collect takes up iventory space, and your inventory is heavily limited when you start. So you spend that currency... so you can collect more currency. Its obvious this decision was just to prolong the game. Its very unrewarding when you're going through a level and you've maxed out what you can collect when just going through a third of the map. Even after unlocking all the spaces, which should be the default in my opinion, you get so much "verri" that you'll max it out even faster. Its just grindy and unrewarding.

There also seems to be some bugs or overlooked reactions. Legendary weapons are cool, but if you get one that requires you to do "root events" to level up in lower levels, its impossible to do if they are no roots. AND, guess what there aren't in the final dungeon? Yeah, goodbye weapon. And I don't know if I'm insanely unlucky, but I suspect the % chance yotun buffs such as "using a brooch has a chance to not use one" or "you have a 25% chance to revive on death per level" don't work. They NEVER activated for me. I doubt I was just that unclucky that the hundreds and hundreds of times I used my brooch it never activated.

On top of that, there are way too many levels. If the enemies were varied, or if the levels ever had a nice mix up, that wouldn't be a complaint. But, by the third dungeon you really, REALLY feel it. For a rogue lite, this is brutal. Hades was good because it knew when to quit. I would say a run of Hades has HALF the levels this game does. And the combat never really changes. Use spell, dodge, attack, heal, attack, so on and so forth. It really makes going back into the fray daunting not because its difficult, but because its just boring.

Finally, fuck the last dungeon. I don't know how else to put it. Just fuck it. Even with the perfect rolls, enemies will melt you off screen in an instant. I honestly couldn't tell what was hitting me half the time. I would just be collecting elemental buffs and there wasn't an enemy or trap on screen. The alarm system is annoying, punishes you for looking for better equipment, and adds more tedium to an already grindy rogue lite. If you don't have the Legendary skill that makes your consumables instant, just reroll. This is the fifth dungeon, with 7-8 levels per dungeon as far as I can tell. There shouldn't be this many instant bullshit deaths this deep in. I could forgive everything else and still feel like this was an okay game if it wasn't this addition. Unfortunately, this with everything else I mentioned just makes me wish I never wasted my time on this game. Hopefully the devs take the criticisms they've been getting and do better next time.

Meticulotron
Meticulotron

I wanted to like this game. I liked the crazy designs and colorful yet grotesque aesthetic.

Much of the game is rather confusing and hard to get a handle on but the worst thing I am experiencing is controls.
About 20% of the time, my character doesn't respond to a sprint or attack commands. He just stands there. I can even repeatedly press attack and he just does nothing, oddly enough I haven't experienced that issue with movement commands.
I thought it might be a fatigue meter but I can't seem to find any indication that's the issue.

I also thought it was odd that I was unable to access the discussions for this game. I don't there there are any.

Basileus Juul
Basileus Juul

Addicting gameplay loop but I agree with other reviewers that the game appears to decide up-front whether a given run will be OP, or will be a struggle to get any progress. The scenery is beautiful but not as varied as I had hoped. Menus are also a bit clunky esp. when using a controller. 7/10

Психаря от Лъгът
Психаря от Лъгът

I wanted so bad for this game to be good and thank the Godz it is, because I've been looking for something like this for a while - a fun action RPG/dungeon crawler roguelite that offers quality on demand action. The combat takes a little getting used to but once you get the hang of it, it's very fun, engaging and exciting. It's also a bit slower paced, which is a good thing here, makes fights more tactical and reactionary, it's not Dark Trolls by any means.

While the variety of weapons and abilities isn't that wide, as it all boils down to hitting melee attacks, dodging and using abilities and consumables, the available variety is quite good and fun to play around with. The levels themselves can get a bit same-ish, but each run is still unpredictable enough to stay engaging. Enemies are quite interesting too and the progression system is very unique and very cool.

Also I would like to mention, that the game's visual style is truly unique and the graphics and sound design are surprisingly good. The voice acting is quite well made too. The story also caught me by surprise. It's no Hades, but it's still a fun story about trolls trying to heal their sacred tree and catch one of their own who acquired a fedora and instantly became an atheist and developed daddy issues. Through little titbits and attentions to detail, the game kept me consistently engaged in the lore and immersed in it's unique world.

In short, hop into Arboria and do a little trolling, it's really really fun. Put on a Finntroll album in the background and go fight for glory!

Hazard
Hazard

Cant decide if I love or hate the artstyle, but its unique for sure.

Lacks a bit of polish but gear. abilities and weapons are pretty great which results in diverse enough runs. On top of that has elemental damage types to take into consideration

Progression is meaningful enough and interesting enough to keep me going

Pretty unique to have a 3rd person "Soulslike" game thats in a Rogulite format and does most things fairly well , only real complaint is the annoying flying enemies in first couple of areas are really boring to fight and the game is pretty Janky sometimes

Cthulhu
Cthulhu

super fun game!
very rewarding and love the progression.
also there is this weird floating puking fairy that takes your head.
love it.

Chr0nicxHero
Chr0nicxHero

I have yet to really find out the main point of this game but lately it has pulled me in. Spent quite some time on it yesterday and today grinding out them dungeons!

Chief Bone Daddy
Chief Bone Daddy

Its an incredibly fun souls-like rogue-like with a satisfying progression system and lots of really neat elements.
Why the Negative review then? because the lower into the dungeon you go, the more your system will bug out. After finally making it to the 19th floor after 80 hours of play, my game hit a state where the game was now unplayable. Im very dissappointed i wont be able to finish as i was looking forward to a newgame + or even ++. If they ever get around to optimizing the engine it will be a fantastic game, but right now i would not recommend getting sucked into just to have your game hard walled by bugs once you finally progress to the end

Nyro8421
Nyro8421

I enjoy this game a lot it feels like a fresh take in the souls like and rogue like genres as they have blended the two genres very well. The meta progression is also quite interesting while some are just stat buffs others would be new equipment like the masks. I also enjoy that to unlock to upgrade stages was done with the roots as opposed to veri as it makes you think if you should just jump to a lower level to find more blueprints or start at the top to get a ton a veri but might die before getting to the new blueprints. I find a lot of people iffy on the combat but I like it I find there is enough diversity between weapons mutagens and items to find each run enjoyable.

Tfw the Sauce hits
Tfw the Sauce hits

I really wanted to like this rogue/souls-like game, because I think the combination would fit very well together.

However, as a Soulsborne veteran who tried many other similar games as well, I was only reminded of
Lords of the Fallen
yes, Clunky Souls.

I have to give the game some credit for it's unique world and level design, as well as incorporating the rogue-like mechanics.

But that's sadly where my praise ends.
The combat itself has no impact, there is no hit-feedback, neither for enemies or the player character.
The fighting animations themselves feel weirdly choreographed and seem sometimes misstimed.

Every input has a delay to it, hence the best parallel I can draw is to Lords of the Fallen.
Distance to enemies and when you are able to hit them also is very short, you have to literally be in their face to hit them with any move, even if the weapon arc suggests it would have some reach to it.

All in all, I can't recommend this game to anyone who's looking for a responsive, souls-like game, because for that the combat system here feels way too clunky.

quackyduckerson
quackyduckerson

Just started this game so bear in mind when reading, but so far I've gotten a very positive impression from Arboria.
So I'm gonna preface that this game isnt for everyone, but its a damn good game. There is a level of jank given this is produced by a much smaller studio, but the aesthetic and gamplay creativity put in to Arboria makes it the most unique roguelike you will ever play.

Audio: Audio is surprisingly pretty top notch. Fully voice acted, including lore bits to find. Hits and enemy attacks sound fairly unique and allow for those last-second doges. Ambient music in the dungeon is relaxing and picks up in hectic moments. I also really love some of the environmental sounds that make you really feel like you're in a deep organic cave.

Worldbuilding: Arboria has a decent amount of lore to find through playthroughs and through the hub world. This game shines in creating immersive, grimy environments (much to the success of the game's tone)

Gameplay/combat: This is probably where the game struggles the most, and I assume this is largely due to the smaller nature of the studio. While the combat repertoir is fairly robust (with extensive customization for powers, weapons, etc), hits dont feel very impactful. There is also a general lack of responsiveness to attacking that slightly annoyed me throughout my playthrough. The sheep depth of ability to customize my toolkit though allowed me to overlook this.

Customization: This is where Arboria really shines. There are countless systems in place to make you really feel like you're evolving a lineage of nasty little troll dudes. From getting better stat chances by offering resources to gods, to perk pick ups, to meals, to kitting your weapons and powers with special abilities, there is a massive amount of innovating going on to let the player play the way they want to.

Story: This game is quirky as hell. The overall story is pretty skin deep, but it really doesnt need to be elden ring for what the game is worth. Arboria respects that you're here to jump into the gameplay and figure out story elements along the way. To be fair though, in only half an hour I found a plot twist that had me genuinely surprised. They also give this borderlands-like nihilism in that the main character is highly expendable which is pretty amusing. Characters and merchants are zany and weird, and there is a delightful embrace of everything ugly going on with the aesthetic.

Overall: Arboria is a weird WEIRD game in the best of ways. I think its a diamond in the rough. While it has its technical challenges with combat mechanics that can grate a bit, the sheer density of systems to explore, upgrade and customize is surprising for an indie game. I find myself hard pressed to find roguelite games that genuinely keep me interested, but I can tell Arboria already had its stumpy little troll hands on my attention and I look forward to spending many more hours with these ugly beauties.

Goodpie2
Goodpie2

TLDR: 7/10. Fun combat and customization, but poorly optimized and has fatal bugs.

As much as I enjoy the game, I honestly can't recommend it in its current state with no support. The concept is solid and the combat is a lot of fun, even for someone like me who genuinely doesn't enjoy soulslikes. But there's too many fatal bugs and the optimization is too poor. By all accounts, the end game is virtually unplayable. If this were still being updated and it looked like there was a future for it, I would happily recommend it but as it stands, it's dead in the water.

Still, I personally greatly enjoy it. The combat is fun and engaging, the aesthetics are original and charming, and the theme is new and interesting- there's so few games (or stories, movies, books, cave drawings, interpretive dance... anything, really) that plays with Biopunk themes, and this one does it and does it well. The Trolls are charming and fun, there's loads of customization options and different ways to build your troll, and it's just generally a great little game. If you're willing to tolerate some terminal bugs and the fact that you can't actually *finish* the damned thing, consider picking it up if it's on sale.

Noy The Devil
Noy The Devil

Do not buy this game. I played three runs, and they all ended in crashed upon crashes and lost progress.

wbk
wbk

If Shiny Entertainment had made a Dark Souls rogue-like maybe it would have been something like this. The developers are nuts in a good way, and should be applauded for taking such a creative artistic risk that is the right side of ugly. The combat is decently done, and the world is interesting with a good sense of progression.