Dungeon Twister: dungeon chess

 Dungeon Twister is a dueling game with a minimal impact of randomness. At the start, players place 8 characters and 6 objective cards each on the dungeon tiles, hidden from the enemy. The goal of the game is to be the first to score 5 victory points. Points are usually awarded for killing enemy characters and for getting your characters out of the dungeon — beyond the enemy's starting line.

 A character standing on an adjacent cell with a closed tile can spend an action point to turn it over. New characters and items are placed on the inverted tile. Having turned over a tile, the player decides how to place everything on it (except his items), which is a rather important advantage. Each tile has a cage with a mechanism. The staff on it can spend an action point to turn that tile 90 degrees in the direction indicated by the arrow, or a matching tile with the same number if it's already flipped.

 In the database of both players, the same sets of characters and items, but they are very different and interesting in their own way. For example, a goblin is fast and weak. However, due to his weakness, you get extra software if you bring him out of the dungeon. There is also a wizard: frail, but able to use powerful magical items unavailable to other characters.

 You'd expect a game with secret placement of units, tons of fantasy characters and items, and rooms that rotate as the game progresses to be simple thematic filler. But actually Dungeon Twister has nothing to do with them. This game is closer to chess than Descent.

 When characters meet in battle, players simultaneously play a card from their hand, the value of which is added to the character's base strength. The loser gets a wound. Injured characters become items that can be carried by their teammates, but are essentially useless cargo until they are healed. They cannot attack and have a base strength of 0, although they can defend.

 As for combat cards, you can play as many +0 cards as you like, but cards from +1 to +6 are disposable. Therefore, the battles are quite mind-blowing thanks to the possibility of bluffing and double bluffing. However, even if you have a base power advantage, you can't be sure of victory unless you're willing to say goodbye to your best battle cards. This creates an interesting tense atmosphere and forces you to spend cards carefully.

 Dungeon Twister is an amateur game. It's too slow, too mind-numbing, and too random for most players. Although it is designed thematically, there is neither a plot nor a campaign here, which again can repel many fans of themed games. The drawing also looks outdated.

 In addition, not everyone can imagine in advance what effect the rotation of such a room will have on the game. Lovers of abstracts may not like the combat mechanics or the element of randomness (laid out on open tiles), etc., etc.

 In Dungeon Twister, player skill and experience are very important. An inexperienced player will literally be crushed by an experienced one and probably won't even realize what he did wrong. The developer came up with several options to compensate for this advantage: to give experienced players fewer characters or battle cards (though there are none in the digital version). I think they can even out the balance. The problem is that not all players are happy when they are given a penalty.

 In general, Dungeon Twister will not be suitable for everyone, and those who will find it difficult to find an opponent. This does not mean that the game is bad at all. On the contrary, I think she is wonderful.

 All the characters are well thought out, and the dilemma in the meantime, whether to keep a character on the field to help in combat, or to take him off the field for the sake of the software, is very interesting. So is the tension in combat: you want to both not lose too many battles and keep powerful one-time cards.

 Base Dungeon Twister offers exciting gameplay and high replayability, although it is not without flaws.

 The gameplay is quite slow; seems too slow at times. Sometimes this procrastination is interspersed with bursts of action. Sometimes it feels like a single move can  decide the outcome of the game. This is not entirely true, but if a more experienced player gets involved in a large-scale fight and in a turn deals damage to, say, two enemy characters, and the enemy healer is out of order, then most likely the weaker player will not stand a chance.

 Also, in basic Dungeon Twister, as in chess, players will likely prefer to position each piece the same way with minimal variation. Partly because some starting combinations are clearly better than others, partly because of personal preference. Therefore, games with the same opponent can be quite similar.

 But there is an important element that brings novelty to the game: additions. When the base game was first released, the developer already had many additions planned. Add-ons perfectly expand the game, making it more interesting. In addition to single-character splashes, 6 major additions have been released in each Dungeon Twister: new items, characters, and tiles. They can be played both separately and mixed.

 All the expansions I've played (Prison, P&D, etc.) I like on their own, but they look best when mixed together. You can give each player the same set of characters and items, you can draft, you can choose secretly. I like all the options; although the draft and secret picks can throw off the balance of the game if the players are not of the same experience level, they are very fanciful.

 Unfortunately, the add-ons have a bunch of characters and items that are of interest only in certain, specific combinations. For example, if you secretly choose characters and objects, and one player chooses a bunch of characters tied to the darkness mechanic, and the other does not, it can result in a very slow game. And the sword that kills the dragon is useless if there is no dragon in the party... But still, the additions add a lot of variety to the game and banish the feeling that all the best combinations and debuts have already been calculated. On the other hand, it means that you have to look for add-ons to an old, long-discontinued game, which can present a problem. And if you don't find yourself enough opponents, you probably won't play enough games to need the dops.

 In my opinion, Dungeon Twister needs a new revision, partly because it's a great discontinued game and partly because it couldn't hurt to improve it a bit. Improved art — perhaps in a more playful style. The content is closer to the card Dungeon Twister, where each player has 25 characters and 10 items. This will introduce variety, enable drafts and secret selection of characters and objects, but you will not have to learn many additional rules. It will also remove the problem of poor compatibility of characters and mechanics from different add-ons. Minks or even cardboard boxes of the new edition, I think, are useless; enough tokens and a convenient souvenir. And then an add-on could be released to the new edition with new types of terrain and characters and items to go with the base. I really hope that something similar will work out. Then newcomers will come to Dungeon Twister, and perhaps this will push the developers so much to release more games in this rather popular genre.

 However, Dungeon Twister will always have a small but devoted gaming audience. I don't remember any Dungeon Twister analogue with similar gameplay or feeling from the game. Dueling fairs with fast games and tireless layouts are lacking, as are more thoughtful, less random duels like Dungeon Twister.

 This game has settled into my top 100 and I'm very happy to be able to play the online version because my main live opponent is already tired of our single digit games. If you can get hold of Dungeon Twister or Dungeon Twister Prison on the cheap, I'd recommend doing so—provided you have an opponent who likes thoughtful duels lasting 45-90 (if you think slowly) minutes. Otherwise, it's worth trying before you buy. Most often, it takes two or three games to decide whether you like Dungeon Twister or not.