Book Of Demons Review

The Basics

In a far off land lies a church, and under that church lies a massive dungeon. Adventurers travel from far and wide to delve into the depths, but few if any survive and return, and those who do return are never the same. Pick up your weapon, abandon all hope, and enter.

Story & Flow

Book of Demons is in a fantastically rendered cardboard cutout style, giving this game it's own unique charm and appeal. It reminds me of a Dungeons and Dragons campaign in how everything is set up, from the style of graphics to the NPCs. The voice-acting is very well done, with each character having fully voiced lines of dialogue. The music is atmospheric and well suited to the setting.

Book of Demons is an interesting combination of card based skills, dungeon crawling, roguelike, and RTS. You can set the difficulty of each 'session' to how you like it, with short battles with less rewards, or longer battles with a higher chance of more epic loot. There is also Casual mode, which is for a more easy experience, Normal mode, which is the standard difficulty and is less forgiving in fights, and then there's Roguelike Mode, where everything from the enemies to the loot is random. The healing areas are less kind and the bosses hit harder.

You have your characters, The Fighter, Rogue, and Wizard, each with a starting line-up of abilities. Each of them have their own unique play styles, which is surprising, considering the combat in the game could easily be boiled down to click on enemies and use skills as needed. However this doesn't make the game easy, as ranged enemies can easily kill you if you stand still, and swarms of smaller enemies can rush you; if you aren't ready for them, you will die.

Combat is made up of three kinds of cards. Consumables like potions, bombs, and traps can be stockpiled until needed, and refilled either from pick ups in the dungeon or in the town. There are also green artifact equipment cards that can grant passive bonuses at the cost of a permanent reduction in magic points, and blue spell cards that can be cast by using your magic pool. You start with three open slots for any configuration of cards, however you can unlock more slots as you progress.

The only issue I have with the combat is that sometimes it can feel very stiff. You click on your enemies to deal extra damage, and if there are enemies clumped together you'll dish out meager damage overall and then you get rushed and die in the end. Ranged combat is also iffy due to hallways, and it's easy to die when you are trying to run from an archer and are stuck on a singular path that you can't deviate from.

In the town there are several people who can help you. The Sage can unlock card slots for you, as well as give you information on the enemies you've faced in the past. The Fortune Teller can restock your consumable cards, and upgrade and fuse runes. The Healer can heal your damage and restore your magic points for a price. And the Barmaid can give you prizes for returning alive from the dungeons.