Dead Cells is a video game that launched in 2018 and became popular during the last bear market. The only reason I know about it is because it went viral on Twitch.tv and a buddy of mine who streams for a living was playing it. However, I didn't actually buy the game until just recently.
Dead Cells is an (individual) 'indie' game, which means that the company that created it, Motion Twin, is just a small company that doesn't have the resources to create a game with full production values like we see on the mainstream market. Often the only way for indie games to make it is to have compelling art, storyline, and gameplay to make up for a lack of graphics. Dead Cells is a game that does just that. After playing it, it's quite unsurprising that it went viral on the streaming circuit.
It's important to keep tabs on indie games like dead cells because crypto developers also do not have the resources to make fully flushed games that compete with the traditional market. All crypto game developers are also independent, but it's even harder because they all try to incorporate decentralization directly into the game. With no templates in place to guide this kind of product we see how the complexity skyrockets and many foolish decisions get made that create games that aren't particularly fun to play and instead opt to focus on the financial aspect of the thing (thinking Axie Infinity here).
Luckily there is one way to do this without mucking everything up, and that's by creating free-to-play games that are monetized through skins. The most successful game to pull this off first was League of Legends (some people spending thousands of dollars on skins for a game that would otherwise cost $40 given the WEB1 model). In fact, Dead Cells only costs $20 today, and that includes several expansion packs. Currently the standalone game with no DLC only costs $12.50. Pretty good deal considering how good this game is.
All this being said, I'd like to go over all the reasons why I think this is a very well put together game despite the lower production value. I've currently played it for a total of 24 hours according to Steam and have only beat the game on the easiest difficulty setting (it's one of the hardest games out there), but still that's clearly enough to write a detailed report about what makes this one so great.
Genre
To start out the game is a dungeon crawler with a kind of deck-stack RNG element to it. Items that appear in game for use are selected randomly to appear based on which weapons and gear you currently have unlocked. This in combination with some light randomizations on the dungeon creation (using seeds) ensures that no two runs will ever be the same. As more items unlock and more abilities are gained permanently the game begins to evolve after every death in a very interesting way.
Storyline.
The story for Dead Cells is so bizarre. Watching other people play it on Twitch combined with the more pixilated graphics, I had no idea that the main character is actually someone who's been decapitated. Yep, our hero has no head... or perhaps our hero is only a head depending on how you look at it.
When the game starts you are nothing but this seemingly revolting green blob rolling around on the ground. The blob attaches itself to our decapitated hero, and off you go to slay monsters and try to kill the king of the realm. Why are we trying to kill the king? Ah, well, he's kind of a dick, but he's also under a lot of pressure.
The Malaise
The entire kingdom is essentially nothing but a smoldering ruin with a handful of survivors just trying to get by. In fact I'm not sure if there is even a single friendly human NPC in the entire thing. It seems like most people got taken out by this pandemic that seems to turn people into zombies and whatever else. Everyone else lives in fear of the king, who seems to have gone quite mad. In that sense it has an interesting Game of Thrones vibe, and there are many references within the game to all kinds of movies and other video games. Gamers gonna reference.
There are some implications that these inhuman NPCs somehow created you and are helping you on your way. Perhaps this is all a secret war being waged against the stinky humans and you are their secret weapon. It's all very unclear and much of the story is shrouded in mystery.
Personality
The main character blob (who can't die, btw) can't speak, but he does have an internal monologue and can seem to communicate well enough with hand gestures and the like. He seems like a good 'guy'. A bit sarcastic and a troll at times, but seemingly wanting to do the right thing over all. When you 'die', only the body you are in is destroyed, and the game starts over right where you left off at the start of the dungeon as you inhabit another decapitated body (of which the king has provided many). This is an interesting way to explain how he can keep dying and coming back to fight, because he actually never really died in the first place. Even if you beat the game: your body is destroyed and your head-blob makes its way into a water pipe and back down into the sewers to start a new game.
Difficulty levels.
It looks like there are five or six difficultly levels. Every time you beat the current difficulty you get a "boss cell" which unlocks the next difficulty. Certain treasure rooms start unlocking on the harder difficulty (I knew I'd figure out what those doors were for eventually). The game is surprisingly in depth and the new difficulties are challenging and fun as new monsters and abilities are added to the run.
Easy to learn, hard to master.
When you first start playing Dead Cells, it seems so easy. In fact, it is VERY easy, until it's not. Dead Cells might be the perfect example of making a game FEEL very easy when in reality it is quite difficult. There are many mechanics in the game that make killing the enemy quite simple, but if they hit you back and you start taking damage it can be a problem. If you run out of HP you "die" and have to start over, which actually isn't that big of a deal because the starting levels can be fun to speed run.
Mechanics
There are several combinations of innovative mechanics that make Dead Cells a very fun game to play. When you first start out you have no idea what enemies do and what the dangers are, but this is offset by how powerful you are. With a good weapon and a few powerups, killing enemies in one hit is not out of the question. Even if you don't kill them in one hit, doing a lot of damage triggers the "Breach" mechanic.
Breach
Breach is a really cool part of the game wherein if you do enough damage to a baddie in a short amount of time they become overwhelmed by you and temporarily stunned. When this happens the mob has become breached, and simply continuing to attack it will more often than not lead to a swift victory in which you've taken no damage.
This is a great mechanic because in so many other games a mob would be at like 1% life and just about to die, and then they get their swing off less than a second before dying, which is extremely annoying and frustrating. Dead Cells takes the frustration out of the game and constantly reminds you that when you die, it's basically your fault. Again, the game isn't 'hard' so much as it is challenging and engaging, which sounds simple but is a very difficult and important thing to accomplish.
Bonus Treasure Rooms
If you can manage to kill 30 minions in a row on the first level without taking any damage (60 on 2nd), you'll be privy to enter a treasure room that usually has a good item waiting for you. Out of 30 runs, I've probably only done this like 5 times, but again the game makes us realize that it's our own fault. There's no reason to take damage on the first level as it's pretty easy and all the threats are known, and yet somehow those hits just have a way of sneaking through the defense even though we know they are coming.
In the early game there is also a speed run bonus for beating the first level in 2 minutes and the second level in 8 minutes, which is very easy to accomplish but almost never worth it because of all the weapons and powerups you miss out on by not fully completing the dungeon.
Speed buff
Speaking of running to the end, it's often more worth it to stop and kill stuff even if you're speed-running. This is another cool mechanic in Dead Cells that I haven't seen in other games. Killing mobs within 8 seconds reapplies a stacking speed buff that will make you faster as long as you are killing something every 8 seconds. This 8 seconds can be increased with items and other upgrades, making speed running while actually playing the game much more viable, which again is how it should be.
Cursed Chests
Cursed Chests usually drop a powerup, an item, and some gold. The item often gets recycled for gold but sometimes you get lucky. Gold itself is kind of useful, but with the way I play I don't usually run out (so I'm probably doing it wrong). However, the powerup is always worth it because it scales to the very end of the game and is a critical part of any build.
The problem is when you open the cursed chest, you get the worst debuff imaginable: angering the gods. A little skull pops up above your head and the number "10". Every time you kill a baddie, the 10 gets reduced by one. The curse does not end until the counter hits zero.
So what's so bad about being cursed? Oh no big deal, only that if you get hit one single time by anything you die instantly no matter what. lol. I've been killed by these chests several times now, and I feel like such an idiot every time my run is over simply because I got greedy. However I simply can't seem to turn down the opportunity, and have only opted not to open a cursed chest one or two times when I REALLY didn't want to die because I really liked the build I had at the time and didn't want to lose it and start all over. That being said I've died in other very stupid ways with great builds that I really liked and was slightly annoyed by my own incompetence.
Tech Tree and Builds
There isn't a tech tree in Dead Cells like other RPGs and dungeon crawlers because each run is very short. It only takes an hour or two for an entire run (depending on how careful/slow you are). If you were speed-running a low difficulty you could probably do it in 20 minutes. When the run is over you lose everything and basically have to start over or win and move on to the next difficulty, which is basically just starting over again as well. However, much like a tech tree, there are three distinct classes of items and weapons.
Brutality * Survival * Tactics
Every item in the game is in one of these three classes.
- Brutality is color coded RED.
- Survival is color coded GREEN.
- Tactics is color coded PURPLE.
- Colorless is a versatile/random affix that can scale with any build.
When you find a powerup in a dungeon you have to select which class of items you want to upgrade. As a new player, it's very tempting to just pick whatever items you are carrying at the time. This is especially true because you get a big HP bonus with diminishing returns, so if you spread out your upgrades to all three trees you can use basically any item you find AND you get a huge HP bonus.
However, this is a very subpar way to play. The game is designed so that players are more incentivized to pick one class of items and stick with that class for the entire run. By doing this the amount of damage you can pump out is much higher than it would be otherwise and you'll get farther in the run, even without the extra HP. Doing more damage is far more important, as killing mobs quickly will often lead to a result of taking less or even zero damage.
Brutality
Focus is on pumping out as much damage as possible. DPS is key; kill everything on the screen before they know what hit them. Brutality is a really fun build and probably my favorite option, but I hate to admit that it's probably also the most difficult and often ends in tears due to user error.
Survivability
The one time I won the game I was survivor build, and they are not kidding around with the name. It's simply much easier to stay alive as a survivor. Shields help you take less damage and even cripple enemies that end up attacking you. There's a grenade that freezes all enemies in a huge radius for like 6 seconds (feels like cheating). You can even inject yourself with temporary HP bonuses if you think you're about to take damage (this one is really good vs bosses).
Tactics
Tactics is the ultimate utility build. The emphasis is on killing enemies before they even get the chance to react. Tactics employs long range weapons like bows, throwing knives, and traps. When you first start playing tactics feels like cheating because of how easy it can be to get so many free kills. It might be the best tree on normal difficulty, but it's also the one I've played the least.
Mutations
Every player can choose up to three mutations per run. Mutations are also sorted into (Brutality * Survival * Tactics) and scale accordingly, so while it might seem good to get a mutation that's in another class it won't end up scaling late game. Luckily mutations can be rerolled after every level for a measly 1000 gold.
Mutations are a nice addition because they give you that extra edge you need to survive in the jungle. One brutality mutation I've been getting increase my damage on my first attack against any mob, which is really good for getting through the levels and really bad against bosses. The ability to customize the game and play the way you want to play is very satisfying.
Parry
Parry is another really cool mechanic in Dead Cells. It very much reminds me of parry from Zelda: Breath of the Wild. If timed correctly, a shield can not only deflect all damage coming their way, but also deal damage to the enemy, often stunning them outright killing them. You can also deflect things like bombs/arrows back at the enemies that lobbed them at you.
Again, a really nice thing about parry is that it seems like it should be really easy, but it's totally not. Almost every time an enemy is going to attack you, you get some kind of warning. Normally this warning comes in the form of a yellow "!" above their heads. All you have to do to parry is activate your shield when you see the "!" and more often than not the parry will be successful.
Of course if you mistime it you'll get wacked when you could have just held up the shield without parrying. Blocking with a shield "only" blocks like 75% of the damage, but if you know you're going to get hit or if you just need a panic "oh shit" button it's a great item to have. I've only tried a shield run like once and it did not go well. It takes some practice and my favorite survival build revolves around freezing enemies anyway. Good thing there is a shield that freezes enemies, eh?
Potion flask
For those of us that aren't perfect, we have the potion flask. It takes a second or two to take a sip from the flask, which can make it hard to heal in the middle of combat, but overall this flask is a literal life-saver on many many occasions. It heals for 50% of your max HP and after it's been upgraded can be used multiple times within the same level. At the end of every level there is an intermission point where the flask can be recharged to maximum for the next level (shown above). As you win the game and increase the difficulty, sometimes the distillery that performs this action is broken at certain points that it wasn't on an easier setting.
Again, this all rolls back into the game seeming like it's easy until you "beat" it and realize the game has just started. I beat my game on a fluke because I had really good items and killed the final bosses even though I had never fought them before and had no idea what they did. I haven't even come close to getting back to that point on the new difficulty and I don't have the heart to roll back to "easy" mode.
Speaking of rolling
The movement in the game is very satisfying and fluid. A dodge roll can be used to get behind enemies. During the roll we are immune to most attacks. It feels like cheating, easily dodging everything that comes our way, until one mistake is made and the run comes to an untimely end. Again: easy to learn hard to master.
We can also double jump (jump and then jump again while in the air) and this makes it much easier to move around and avoid danger if we know what we are doing. Again, anytime you die you'll be thinking (I could have EASILY avoided that). I get that feeling on almost every run; that I should have done better.
In the GIF above our hero has the assassin's blade equipped (can tell just from the red-swing animation), which is my favorite weapon thus far. It crits when attacking from the back and does a lot of damage during successful stealth runs.
Almost forgot about crits
Again, there's just so much to talk about when it comes to Dead Cells. This game has improved so many things in the dungeon crawler experience it's hard to even keep up. Normally in every other RPG type game such as this crit would be a stat that procs randomly. Wow I've been saying proc for so long I forgot what it stands for... Programmed Random Occurrence... thanks Google.
In any case Dead Cells even flips the very concept of random crits on its ear. I've yet to see a crit in this game that was random. Every time we crit in this game it's because we did something the game told us to do. Some weapons will crit if you attack from the back (assassin's blade), some will crit if you attack from the front. There's even a weapon that looks like a king's scepter that will dash you forward and when you hit a mob it launches you into the air, then if you land on the enemy it crits and usually kills them.
There's even a sword made out of light that crits based on how many times you've shot the mob with your laser gun, who's ammo only comes back if you kill stuff with the sword (Hard Light Sword is fun and clearly a reference to Star Wars and the Lightsaber IP drama). Many weapons simply crit on the 2nd or 3rd attack of a combo move, sometimes both. Other weapons still, especially in the survival tree, will crit if the enemy is frozen, stunned, or rooted, as many of the other items within that tree are likely to do just that.
Stacking dots
In many of the other games I've played, dots do not stack. Normally if you have an ability that does 1000 Damage Over Time, reapplying that ability to the same mob has little effect and simply resets the timer back to 10 seconds or whatever duration the DOT spans, which can end up being a bit lack-luster.
In Dead Cell you can stack fire, poison, and bleed dots up to five times. So if you applied 1000/10 DOT once, you can do it again, and again, and again. In fact if you put fire on the ground and a stupid zombie just stands in it he'll basically die for free with very little effort. Items that do this kind of damage are deceptively good, because the DPS appears to be low on paper. Then when you actually use the item in the field it's easy to see why it had to be scaled down that hard.
Dive Attack
Another really satisfying movement ability is the dive attack, also referred to as a ground pound or jump attack. If you hold [down + jump] while in the air, it does the opposite of jump, and hurdles you down to the floor at high speeds. When you land you often deal a good amount of damage and can even breach enemies, stunning them for an easy kill on the next hit.
No falling damage
It's also really nice in this game that falling damage does not exist. Instead if you fall too far and hit the ground you just get stunned for a second or two. This makes it so you'll only take damage if you fall directly into the enemy. On the flip slide if you fall into a bottomless pit you'll take some damage and respawn on the ledge, so it's not a game-ending mistake if that happens like a traditional platform game. Also worth noting that a dive-attack prevents the character from getting stunned after falling too far, instead doing maximum damage to enemies unfortunate enough to get crushed under your boot.
^ Don't read this ^
Simple Frontend >> Complex Backend
Last night I was doing some homework on how the breach mechanic works, and I was shocked that it was actually quite complex. The notes on breach were an entire page long and there is a lot to consider from what weapon you're using to which swing of the combo is landing to what the mob is doing and how much breach resistance they have vs how much breach bonus your weapon has.
In general it seems that slower weapons that hit hard have a higher chance to overwhelm and stun the enemy, which makes sense, as this makes them harder to land without taking damage. If a mechanic like this wasn't done right any bug/exploit could completely break the game and make it way too easy.
This is a great example of how a simple frontend and a basic user experience is very important. Most people don't know or care about what is going on in the background, and they shouldn't have to. This concept is very akin to the whole 'easy to learn hard to master' mantra that makes certain games so deceptively good and challenging at the same time.
Conclusion
I thought this post was going to be short and I'd be scrambling for more things to talk about... and here I am 4000 words in looking for any reason to cut myself off. Wild.
After all this I haven't even talked about 'dead cells', which are the main resource that gets collected every run and used to acquire permanent upgrades that persist from one run to another. Then again, I was trying to focus on what makes Dead Cells unique and interesting, and this mechanic just like like all the other dungeon crawlers out there.
Sooner or later gaming will be the primary catalyst of a crypto bull run. Considering we lack the resources to create full-production games, I believe that paying attention to actions of other provenly competent indie devs will result in massive benefit. There's no need to reinvent the wheel. Just look at a game like Dead Cells. All we have to do is copy a lot of the mechanics that already exist to make a fun and compelling experience.
Compare that to most other crypto games out there and it's not hard to see that copying what others have already done outside of crypto is ten times better than what we see within the current space. Even LEO itself is considering a breakout into the gaming industry sooner or later. Where production value lacks, user experience needs to take the driver's seat.