![]() Each descent into the depths will also yield new schematics, which let you unlock relics and potions to help with your evolution into a pickaxe-swinging death machine. This allows you to continually upgrade your mud-covered peasant into a veritable champion of the working-class. With each death, each mistimed jump and miscalculated pickaxe swing, UnderMine will give you the opportunity to get stronger - each time you die you’ll retain some of the gold and all of the Thorium you collected. The game immediately pulled me back to the hub, introduced me to my brand-spanking-new character, Olives, and the cycle continued. More like a golem, really, this rock-pile mimic spelled the unfortunate end for my first peasant, striking a fatal blow and exploding him into little gold chunks reminiscent of Sonic’s rings (I will never forget you, Luope!). With this newfound power, I picked, axed and bombed my way onward, only to be confronted by a boulder that was full of gold and a bad attitude. After swatting them away with the aforementioned pickaxe, I ventured onward to acquire a forgotten ancient relic that blessed my otherwise-mundane peasant with a fearsome power in this case, the ability to have my pickaxe ricochet to every enemy within range when I threw it. I whacked a shiny rock with my pickaxe and lo and behold: I had struck gold! Unfortunately, I wasn’t the only one who realised that - a group of adorable little slime critters called “Pilfers” burrowed out from under the ground to steal anything that I had yet to pick up. My boss, the stuffy Archmage Arkanos, has charged me with a series of mundane tasks: retrieve this, kill that, get a lot of gold… all in a day’s work for a lowborn peasant! With my tasks in mind, I dove down the shaft into the unknown depths below and defeated my first foe, a fearsome blue slime… thing. Each time you descend into the mineshaft, you’ll find gold, which you’ll then use to upgrade your main combat stats, and a rarer special currency called Thorium that you’ll use to purchase new items. The game introduces you to your character, one of the aforementioned commoners, and immediately greets you with a colourful array of market and trader NPCs who introduce its first major mechanic: currency and upgrades. ![]() That’s an apt metaphor for the game itself - you can expect to die a lot, but fortunately you’ve got an endless supply of commoners to send into the meat grinder. UnderMine ’s menu screen features lovingly-detailed pixel art of a never-ending procession of peasants jumping feet first into the depths of a mineshaft. Instead, I want to discuss UnderMine based on its own merits and avoid getting into needless Dark Souls /” Souls -like” comparisons. The genre is so influential - especially in modern indie development - that anyone familiar with the term intuitively knows what to expect and often falls into the trap of comparing new roguelikes to the classics, and that often gets us nowhere despite any similarities it may share, I don’t want to do UnderMine the disservice of comparing it to the rest of the genre. ![]() UnderMine is first and foremost a roguelike, a genre that has become synonymous with games such as The Binding of Isaac or Enter the Gungeon. ![]() It’s the quarantine time-sink I’ve been waiting for, and another example of an early access success. Today we’re looking at UnderMine, the early access title from Derek Johnson and Clint Tasker’s new studio Thorium, and it does inspire awe - UnderMine has seriously impressed me. ![]() There’s something awe-inspiring about the thought of a one- or two-person team creating something masterful from passion and individual skill, in stark contrast to titles that feel as if they’ve been run through a board of businessmen before launch. ![]()
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