Dungelot: Shattered Lands review

The latest installment in the Dungelot series is finally here, and it's prettier and a lot meaner than its predecessors.

For fans of this series of roguelikes, this should come as wonderful news. Dungelot: Shattered Lands is Dungelot's brand of dungeon-crawling-meets-minesweeper at its best. Dungelot 101

Much like other Dungelot titles, Shattered Lands has you take control of a hero as you dive into dungeons, slaying skeletons, collecting loot, and trying to get as far as possible.

You've got a few spells and pick ups to help you, but between managing your morale, trying to not starve, and the creatures trying to cut you down, you can expect to die and restart... A lot.

Yes, as a roguelike Shattered Lands doesn't afford players the ability to reload saves or continue their progress from a checkpoint. Instead, you'll have to start the uncleared dungeon over from the beginning.

Luckily, there are quite a few things to help make subsequent dungeon runs a little bit easier each time you play.

For example, you can earn coins and purchase loot, some of which can be taken between dungeons. However, most are just consumable items which you can only use in a single dungeon.

You'll also unlock new character classes as you go along which can help mix up the action and grant you the opportunity to settle into your perfect combination of playstyle and ability sets.

This amount of persistence - while sparse - strikes a really excellent balance between keeping players motivated as they repeatedly die and ensuring that the entire game remains challenging and dangerous.

If you're a fan of the previous Dungelots, or roguelikes in general, Shattered Lands is a shining example of taking a genre and streamlining it for mobile.

Although you'll probably be banging your head at the amount of challenge here, Shattered Lands does a fantastic job of reeling you in to play it some more.