Game of the Month #97 (February 2023) - Crypt of the NecroDancer

Crypt of the NecroDancer is a hardcore roguelike rhythm game. Can you survive this deadly dungeon of dance, slay the NecroDancer, and recapture your still beating heart? Or will you be a slave to the rhythm for all eternity?

When focusing on the main objectives, Crypt of the NecroDancer is about 14½ Hours in length. If you're a gamer that strives to see all aspects of the game, you are likely to spend around 47½ Hours to obtain 100% completion.

So happy this finally won the poll! Except that I now need to find something else to nominate every month

I had started this game back in 2019 but didn't put too much time into it. So I decided to delete that old saved progress and start from scratch today. Played about an hour and a half, and I'm definitely having fun. Completed the first two zones, so I'd say I'm making good progress. Was able to buy a bunch of upgrades too, so runs generally go smoothly once I get set up with gear

However, my mind can't really comprehend everything that is happening in real time. Maintaining the rhythm requires most of my concentration, so I get blindsided by enemies a lot. And when I try to think how to fight them properly, I usually end up missing beats and getting hit anyways. Also, there are a couple of floors that I just can't figure out the music rhythm that the game wants me to use. I've never been musically gifted in any way, shape or form, so it could be entirely my own fault and not the game's, though.

I'm hoping that I get more used to the game with practice, and that the enemy patterns get so ingrained in my head that I don't need to actively think how to defeat them and can fully concentrate in the music.

Also, does anyone else also think that taking the trapdoors is almost always a BAD idea? You get thrown into that small room with a bunch of tough monsters that skipping the last floor boss doesn't seem like a good option at all

had a quick little play session this evening - lots of practice needed! - but I do enjoy the "bard mode" as a way to get used to the timings without too much penalty - also a good way to get used to how some of the enemies work, especially the bosses

totally agree with folks here who like the larger weapons - I think my fav so far is the spear for that extra reach - sure makes things a bit easier to hit them from 2 squares away instead of 1 😉

and am very happy to be enjoying the default music as well - when you get into the flow, it really feels good

If it wasn't for Bard, I would not have completed this game. As I suck at rhythm games, that one character singlehandedly transformed the game for me from unplayable to decently enjoyable.

I started the game last night and I really don't know what to make of it personally. I think the general gameplay is fun, and the way rhythm is baked into the game is pretty great, but it just didn't seem to click for me. I'm going to give this game another few shots before I decide whether I want to retire it or not.

Got to the credits yesterday! I've marked it as completed here, but I may go back and keep doing some runs and doing some ""post-game"" stuff, but I definitely need some time to rest from this. Didn't notice until I was done, but this was a very draining game for me. I'm very bad with music and rhythm in general, so I had to spend a lot of mental energy to actually keep to the beat and think what I should be doing at all times.

Did all my runs with only Cadence and haven't messed really with any of the alternate characters. Overall I liked the game and I'm glad I finally got to play it.

Also I did manage to find an exploit while practicing the final boss fight in the lobby. In case anyone wants to know what it was that made the final push of the game much less frustrating, here it is (contains spoilers about lobby unlockables): It's about that room in the lobby where you can buy items to start the next run with, that you can normally only buy from a selection of 3. You can buy whatever you want, and then you need to enter one of the boss practice rooms. When you come back to the lobby you will still have all the ones you bought for the next run, and a new set of 3 will appear. With that you can save many diamonds and start one run fully geared up basically

I'm going to give this one a go. I retired it a few years back because I'm rubbish at rhythm and music games, but giving it another shot will count towards the 2023 Gaming Challenge. I'll see how it goes!

I'm happy that this finally won. I had played this around 2014 a bunch and liked it a lot but never actually beaten it. I've been waiting for it to win GOTM so I had another excuse to give it a second shot.
I put my first hour in today, starting with a fresh save file. I've only been able to beat the first floor so far, with the Reaper character.
It's a damn tricky game but it's such a great execution of this concept. I really like the visual design and love all the different items, abilities and enemies using the rhythm. It's one of those games that are super satisfying if you do well.

- Matt

Looks great and fun. I want to play this game later. Even for 15 minutes of playing my fingers are pressing the letters and don't want to lose the beat. It's addicting.

I really got in the groove of things (get it?) and put some more time into it this Sunday, reaching the credit roll after the 4th zone using the Reaper character. Felt good, was fun. Total playtime until that point was just a bit under 3hrs.
But I learned that the main character Candace (and two subsequently unlocked characters relating to her) actually have special boss fights at the end, so I decided to do another playthrough with that main character. It's only then that I realized that there are actually cut scenes and a proper plot. lol The Reaper character doesn't have any of that and the boss of the final zone is just a regular random boss. I didn't know all of that though until I talked about the game on the HLTB Discord with Dragonh89.

So, I'm making my way through the game now using the main character and I've beaten zone 1 and 2 already. It's nice that all the unlocked things I bought with the Reaper character are also active for every other character, so I'm not actually starting from zero again.

I'm really enjoying this game and I'm very happy this finally won GOTM, so I finally gave it a second shot. It was already very much worth it.

- Matt

Well, it's taken me a half hour and a few poor runs but I've reached the end of the first zone. Unlocked a few heart upgrades and a few useful items.

I'm still not very good at the game but I love the music, it's got such a great groove to it. I especially like discovering the shopkeepers mid run and having them sing along to the level's theme.

So i decided to try this game out to see what its like,put some custom music on in the options and i gave up after 18 minutes. For me this is unplayable mainly because my attention span does not allow me to focus on one thing at a time and it seems my "rush b" strategy has no effect here for some reason. I can try to play more later but i already not having fun since the game is annoying the hell out of me. In general i hate rhythm games but thought this would be different and so far its average. I dont even match the beat because i just mash keys to go forward or attack since like i already said my attention span is very bad for focusing on two parts of the screen. Kinda wish i could turn of the rhythm part of the game and just play the game without matching the rhythm. Maybe there is a mod for that but as is i am not having fun and its so far very frustrating. I can try later but after circa 2 hours i will retire the game and move on to something else if i dont get better playing it.

Edit: I managed to beat the first Zone with a trebuchet,a gun that shoots and i found a bard character which has no rhythm which is nice,now i think i can just grind until i get the gun and that can maybe get me until the end

I'm going to retire this one again I think. I've done a lot better with it than the first time I tried it, but I've spent the last few days stuck on Zone 4, only reaching the boss twice. I just can't the timing of the music right alongside all the different enemy patterns in this zone.

It's a great game, just sadly not for me.

I'm going to retire this one again I think. I've done a lot better with it than the first time I tried it, but I've spent the last few days stuck on Zone 4, only reaching the boss twice. I just can't the timing of the music right alongside all the different enemy patterns in this zone.

It's a great game, just sadly not for me.

I'm with you about being stuck on Zone 4.
I've spent most of my playtime on that zone with Cadence at this point. It wasn't that big of a problem when I first played through the game with Reaper. lol
I'm pretty sure a few days ago I actually reached the final boss and only had to do one last move to end it but then messed up and died.

I'm still trying though. I really want to finish it. It's so close.

EDIT: I finally beat the game with Cadence a minute ago and actually got the story ending. It's wild to me that it only took me under 3 hours to beat the game with the Reaper character and then 11 additional hours to beat it with the actual story character. I didn't expect it to be that different, especially since by that point I also had unlocked all items and permanent upgrades. But that zone 4 and story boss, man. It's quite something.
Super happy to have beaten this game now. I'm still loving it and I'm gonna keep it installed for whenever I wanna play through it again with another of the many characters. Though I do think I need to take a break from it now. I was grinding that zone 4 quite a lot this last week. lol

- Matt

Hadn't seen the game of the month yet and decided to check it out, not disappointed. This game is a masterpiece and I implore everyone to play it!

welp... just retired this frustrating game - I enjoyed it at first, but then it quickly became a chore and this last time I fired it up, I hated every minute of it.

there's nothing really "wrong" with it, but it's not for me - I'm not a min-max kind of gamer who wanted to bang their head against a wall doing the same thing over and over without any tangible progression (and I found the progression in this game far too slow to be satisfying), so I really didn't enjoy how there are loads of enemies with nothing telling you about their movements/attacks other than trial and error - and I hate trial and error as a game system

so ultimately, while I enjoy the 'concept' of this game, it really had nothing to make me want to keep playing - glad I tried it, but happy to put it down and never see it again =)