But it just kind of runs contrary to my likes and desires in text based games. It's well made for what it is, which is an old school dungeon crawl based on the gamebook of the same name. I have a deep love for text based games, like Sorcery, Choice of Games, Hosted Games, et al because they can tell interactive stories not particularly otherwise not terribly suited for video games.

But to compare Warlock of Firetop Mountain to Sorcery, as they are both born from the 80s Fighting Fantasy gamebooks is to compare a truly old-school classic to a revamped reimagining. I will say that I've never actually played/read the source material for either of these games. Firetop Mountain maintains the trial and error, random deaths, luck of the dice style of the source book (while also allowing a cheat mode, as if you were reading an actual book that couldn't enforce the rules on you. A nice touch.) Sorcery on the other hand, adopts a "fail forward" style approach where no matter how hard you fuck up, you can still make it to the end. Sorcery is also more of a journey like a modern RPG, with far more character interaction and choices. With all the variables in Sorcery I think it's safe to say that it is a far different product than the 80s gamebook it is based off of. To sum it up, Firetop Mountain feels very much like an old school Sierra point and click game, while Sorcery feels like the LucasArts style point and click game.

The combat in Firetop Mountain is kind of interesting. It's a sort of simultaneous chess game. You attack the spot where you think the enemy is going to move to, or attack the enemy and enter into a contest of skill. Movement happens before attacks. So for example if you move and the enemy attacks where you were standing, they whiff it. If they attack the square you were going to move to, you get hit. The skill contest is quite simple. You have a Skill skill, you roll two six sided dice (d6) and add your Skill to it. Bigger number wins. The only downfall to this combat is that the AI is very very stupid and easy to predict. Also if you are about to die, you can just go to the main menu and you'll restart combat with the health you had before. So literally zero challenge, when it was clear they were trying to make a challenging dungeon crawl.

The atmosphere of the game is very cool. It plays as a pseudo board game, where your player is a pawn and you move through the dungeon, which builds itself around you. It's a really neat effect. As the player moves through the dungeon, they will be asked to make Skill and Luck checks. Unlike in combat, where the player adds their Skill skill to their roll, here the player rolls 2d6 and tries to make it under their Luck or Skill skill. For example, you have a Skill of 11, you roll a 12 on 2d6, you fail. If they rolled an 11 or under, they succeed. It's really amusing for me, as a Pathfinder and 5th edition Dungeons and Dragons player, to be hoping for smaller numbers when rolling dice.

Where the game falls flat, for me, is the replay value. While there are over a dozen characters, each with their own storyline, you are still going into almost the same dungeon, doing mostly the same things. While there is a randomized maze towards the end of the game, and that's kind of neat, the key to the boathouse will always be in the same spot. There's always going to be meat to distract dogs with to the right. There are definitely some randomized loot things, and you will never have the exact same game twice. It is going to be very similar however. The gameplay isn't super great, the story is about as reactive as finessing your way out of a fight (and losing out on Souls, which is the currency you use to unlock new characters) or into more loot and is more just dressing for a dungeon crawl. Which is fine for some people, but I just find it lacking.

Also controller support is trash and the game gets kind of glitchy in the UI even with mouse and keyboard sometimes.

TL; DR: game is alright, dungeon crawl isn't my cup of tea, neat effects, sometimes buggy UI. Game varies it up from one playthrough to the next, but not enough to make it worthwhile with the lacklustre combat.