Game Reviews

Pug's Quest - It's a dog's life, and apparently a dog's life takes place in dungeons

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iOS
| Pug's Quest
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Pug's Quest - It's a dog's life, and apparently a dog's life takes place in dungeons
|
iOS
| Pug's Quest

Pug's Quest, as you might expect from the title, is a game about a pug going on a quest. It's a cute pudgy little dog, and unfortunately you're going to kill it many, many times.

Because this is a roguelike. A thin-ish, mobile roguelike, but one that's a surprising amount of fun. It doesn't do much to shake up the genre, but it does have a dog in it, and dogs are pretty cool.

Plus the game throws in new ideas on a regular basis, and with the levels being randomly generated, you're always facing a new challenge every time you start to play.

Another mobile roguelike, 'ey?

It is, yes, and if you're a bit dulled to that idea, then there's not much here that you're going to enjoy.

The chunky pixel graphics are in place, and there's a similar lack of depth that you'll find in most examples of the genre.

But at the same time this is a highly polished presentation, with some decent ideas popping around under your fingers.

You're controlling a dog, sliding your finger around to send it left, right, up, and down. The aim of the game is getting through a series of traps, scoring points, and staying alive for as long as you can.

The game is split up into floors. Finish three of these and you'll move on to the next stage. You get three lives, and losing one sends you back to the start of the floor you're on. Lose them all and it's game over.

There are spinning blades, disappearing blocks, patrolling monsters, and all manner of other hazards blocking your way. And all you have to protect yourself is your ability to move.

You need to time your dashes, figure out which is the best way to go, and try and grab bones to earn yourself some more points as well.

I'm getting a standard-but-fun sense from this

That's about right, yeah. Pushing the little dog around is an awful lot of fun, and the level of challenge means that you feel pretty good when you manage to get to the exit.

But at the same time, despite the doggy lick of polish, you're not doing anything that you haven't done before. If that isn't going to a problem, then by all means pick it up and have a crack.

As roguelikes go, this is a perfectly enjoyable addition to a genre that's seen a burst of new options in the last few months.

Pug's Quest - It's a dog's life, and apparently a dog's life takes place in dungeons

Pug's Quest has a nice layer of polish in top of some mechanics that we've seen quite a lot recently
Score
Harry Slater
Harry Slater
Harry used to be really good at Snake on the Nokia 5110. Apparently though, digital snake wrangling isn't a proper job, so now he writes words about games instead.