A bit of browsing around the Android app store reveals the existence of Mighty Dungeons, a “fan-made dungeon crawler crossover between old-school boardgames like Heroquest, Warhammer Quests and good oldies like Diablo I and DungeonMaster.”

Created by Laylio Games, Mighty Dungeons has been out since at least February, but hey–it’s new to me! I haven’t found a plot premise anywhere online, but we do get this description:

Wander evil-packed dungeons and battle golems, demons and other soul-less creatures with dozen of hours of gameplay through 3 campaigns, 6 heroes, a plethora of weapons, armors, potions and magic spells at your disposal.

Here’s a trailer showing off the aforementioned dungeon crawling goodness:

Personally, I’m rather fond of the way a grave–complete with wooden cross–drops from the top of the screen onto a slain monster. It’s rather comical.

Mighty Dungeons is a simple turn-based affair where you control only a single character. There doesn’t seem to be any character creation, merely selection from a roster of pre-built characters. In order to maintain variety, the creator invites people to visit his website and “submit creatures, quests and complete boards” for inclusion of future releases of the game.

Mighty Dungeons is available for Android on Google Play and iOS on the Apple app store, each for $1.99. (There is also apparently a Windows version in the works, if the game’s Greenlight page is to be believed.)

There is a free demo on Android if you want to give Mighty Dungeons a try before plunking down your $2.

Nick Branstator of indie development studio 10 x 10 Room writes in to tell me about Conclave, a “browser-based RPG designed to evoke the spirit of tabletop roleplaying games.”

The devs describe Conclave like so:

Playable solo or co-op, synchronously or asynchronously, and delivered in pure HTML5 so as to be maximally compatible with all sorts of browsers (iOS included), Conclave is highly flexible about how and when you play.

If that’s confusing, this trailer should clear things up a bit:

Conclave currently has one campaign–Legacy of the Dweller:

The story begins in the Conclave, a realm where the races of the Kin have gathered after the long Age of Retreat. In “Legacy of the Dweller”, its people have ceased to dream; the search for a cause will lead to the discovery of new threats to the existence of the Conclave, as well as the legacy of an ageless, forgotten power.

As you can probably tell from the trailer above, Conclave is top-down and turn-based. Character creation is a matter of choosing from five races and five archetypes (read: classes), which determine your starting traits, skills, and abilities. You can then gradually shape your character into something more unique as you level. Branstator explains:

As you gain levels you have the opportunity to choose additional abilities for your character as well as improve your traits.  The abilities you choose from are unlocked by a mix of level, archetype, trait scores, and other abilities you’ve already selected.  The result is considerably more freeform than a skill tree.

Somewhat similarly to Larian Studios’ upcoming title Divinity: Original Sin, Conclave allows the players to make collective decisions about what to do when the story branches. Although Conclave is designed for cooperative multiplayer, you can comfortably play single-player as well if you don’t have a bunch of friends waiting in the wings to adventure with you. Per the devs:

Every combat is sensitive to the number of characters in the party.  The number, level, and placement of your foes can all depend on the number of characters present; we use different variables in different combats to create a balanced but flavorful experience.

Conclave is out now and playable in-browser. You can play 10 of the game’s current 25 quests free of charge; $19 will grant you access to the rest, as well as the ability to respec your characters, maintain up to 10 active characters, and level your characters up to level 10. You can also gift other people the game at a discounted price of $15.

Steven Peeler writes in to announce Drox Operative: Invasion of the Ancients, an expansion he’s working on for Drox Operative (previously covered here) that will add a variety of new races to the game.

The premise:

Before the Drox ruled the galaxy, before they were even sentient, there were older races now known as the Ancients. Using their Operatives, the Drox crushed and enslaved most of these races. The rest fled known space. When the Drox turned on their own Operatives, the Drox were utterly destroyed. Newer races emerged and thrived in the power void, never knowing the menace waited. Seizing their chance, the Ancients are invading to take their rightful place in the galaxy, as rulers! Thirsting for revenge, the Ancients can’t harm the extinct Drox, but they can crush the next best thing, the Drox Operatives.

The Ancient enemies are back! Can you defend the Drox Operative Guild and younger races against the Invasion of the Ancients?

Peeler writes that Invasion of the Ancients is planned to release on Windows and Mac in third quarter 2013.

I was curious to see what Phil Hamilton had gotten up to with his latest release, Skyborn (previously covered here), and so I did what I often do in these circumstances: I went ahead and checked the game out while recording my first impressions. The result? See for yourself!

In short: I found the first 45 minutes enjoyable. The writing is improved from his prior work, the sound design is superb, there are a lot of really nice custom graphics, and Hamilton’s kept most of the clever design features that I enjoyed in Deadly Sin 2. (There’s even a bit of Jane Austen-style romantic tension going on between Claret and Mr. Chesterford!)

All in all, I suspect that we may have a very good indie jRPG on our hands here. There’s no way to tell for sure without playing beyond the beginning, of course–but as of right now, all signs point to “excellent.”

You can nab Skyborn for $14.95 direct from the developer, or try the free demo.

While we’re on the subject of games that I should’ve posted about last year, Dancing Dragon (previously Deadly Sin Studios) came out with a really nice-looking jRPG called Skyborn last spring. (If “Deadly Sin Studios” sounds familiar, it might be because the developer is the same fellow behind the Deadly Sin series, one Phillip Hamilton–you can read my review of Deadly Sin 2 here).

Anyway, Skyborn! The premise is decidedly steampunkish in nature:

Life under the rule of the winged Skyborn race isn’t so bad for Claret Spencer, the star mechanic of an independent repair shop. She can patch up just about anything…but when a certain cravat-wearing customer turns her life upside-down, she finds herself pulled into an epic, city-wide conflict that’s going to take a lot more than elbow grease to fix!

If there’s any doubt remaining about this game’s steampunk credentials, the trailer should set those to rest:

As you can see, although Phillip has stuck with RPG Maker, he’s livened things up with some very nice custom graphics. There seems to be a “technology versus magic” theme going on here, which reminds me a bit of Arcanum. All in all, I’m looking forward to checking Skyborn out.

As for you, dear reader, you can nab Skyborn for $14.95; there’s also a free 1-hour demo available right here so you can try before you buy. As with all titles forged in the fires of RPG Maker, Skyborn is Windows-only.

A bit of digging around has revealed to me the existence of The Book of Legends, released by the ever-prolific Aldorlea Games sometime last summer. I could have sworn I’d posted about this one already, but some searching around this site reveals that I have not, so here I am making up for lost time.

The premise:

The Demon of Fear, Azutura, is slowly but surely awaking because the world is increasingly being dominated by thieves, rogues and bandits. Indeed – Azutura feeds on people’s fears. The solution is found and crafted by the best alchemists of the realm: a special relic whose vapors will put the Demon in a profound sleep for the next few decades or so.

A notorious traveler gifted with an extraordinary strength, Jordan, is sent to the House of Fear where the Demon lies to do the job. But the very first day of his mission, he is robbed by thieves and loses the precious relic!

The Book of Legends doesn’t take itself too seriously, tone-wise, but it does feature some real role-playing choices. Depending on who you have in your party, you’ll get different perks, exploration options, even options for romance. TBoL features:

• 40+ hours of playtime
• 30+ characters to play
• 125+ spells to cast
• 60+ weapons and 110+ pieces of equipment
• 100+ different enemies
• 300+ areas to explore

Lots of numbers there–but do they reflect a game that’s any good? Well, if Gamezebo and RPGFan‘s reviews are any guide, TBoL is definitely enjoyable. If nothing else, the mere fact that it has 30+ characters with their own unique effects on the game is pretty darn impressive (though it’s not clear how many of those consist of summonable animals).

You can nab the full game for $22.99 direct from the developer; Windows only. If you want to try The Book of Legends out for yourself first, I suggest nabbing the game’s free demo.

Chris Tompkins of Vaultek Studios writes in to announce Stellvia: Rising Wasteland, a post-apocalyptic wRPG very much in the Fallout 2 mold.

Tompkins is quite committed to not revealing any details about the main premise of the game, but I can confirm that it revolves around the fortified town of Stellvia. The apocalypse has occurred. Stellvia is under the sway of mobsters; tribesmen live outside its walls; mutants and raiders roam the wastes; and a mysterious, shadowy faction threatens the wasteland.

From what I can tell, the apocalypse in this game resulted neither from nukes nor environmental destruction, but rather from extreme partisanship. Extrapolated a bit, this could probably explain a fair few things (raiders, mobsters, etc.), but I’m still not clear on how political affiliation causes mutants.

This game bears a lot of gameplay similarities to the original two Fallout titles. Stellvia will be turn-based, with different aiming options in combat; you will create a single character, with the ability to recruit NPCs to your party if you play your cards right; and the game will feature skill points and special abilities that you can distribute upon leveling up. Tompkins states that they are planning some original features as well, including a crafting system.

Here is the game’s current trailer:

Stellvia: Rising Wasteland is still very early in development–an alpha demo is planned for release in 2014, if that’s any indication! Stellvia is intended for eventual release on Windows, with ports to follow, but of course that’s still a long ways off. There is a Kickstarter currently running if you want to help the development along.

Word has it that DFour Games is working on a dungeon crawler with randomized dungeons by the name of Dark Gates.

The premise:

Shadow … it came so suddenly. Fear found his home and pour sadness to peoples hearts. It is a time where peoples forgot how the clear blue sky looks like. Those who did never spoke about it. They feared to offend an evil and mysterious force which found a home in darkness of underground tunnels. Peoples waited for a someone to challenge Dark Gates hidden deep within labyrinth of death.

You control a party of 6 characters in this title based on the board game DeathMaze. According to DFour Games, the main feature of Dark Gates is the dungeon itself. “This is no predefined layout and every time you play, map is always different. Dungeon creates itself as you play. In your quest you will find monsters, magical items, trap, puzzles and treasures.”

Here’s a trailer showing what it looks like as of right now:

Based on that video, I have to imagine that Dark Gates would appeal to anyone who enjoys Monster’s Den–it seems very much in the same vein.

Dark Gates is still in alpha, but it’s available to folks who wish to help alpha fund it. You can snag a copy of the alpha for $9.99 on Desura, for £6.99 on GamersGate, or (for the next two days only) as part of The Hellish Dungeons Bundle. Windows, Mac or Linux.

Legend of Grimrock devs Almost Human report that they have gotten the Linux version of their critically acclaimed dungeon delver up on Steam. ‘Nuff said.

Jon Dibble, the developer behind up-and-coming 2D side-scrolling aRPG Reobirth (previously covered here), writes in to announce the release of a short demo for the game.

Reobirth remains early in development, and so the demo is necessarily rather limited. Dibble states that the demo is essentially a survival minigame:

Armed with your blade and bow and three spells (Dark Hand, Death Ball, Curen), you must fend off hoards of Dark Magic monsters and protect the Golden Hope Relic. See how long you can survive and aim for the high score! Although this demo can be played with a keyboard and a few different controllers have been tested, I highly recommend an Xbox 360 controller – this is the main gamepad used throughout development of Reobirth, taking advantage of rumble/force-feedback and the analog stick.

You can grab the demo right here and give it a try for yourself.