Dungeon Runners Review

Gameplay:7

Graphics: 8

Sound: 9

Value: 10

Tilt: 8

The Good: Free! Excellent voice acting though not used enough. Lighthearted attitude makes for some amusing moments.

The Bad: Seeing all the cool gear that you can't use if your not a member can be annoying. Very bland/repetitive quests. Only 3 classes to chose from. Not enough skills.



Dungeon runners is the latest game by NCsoft, the creators of Guild Wars. Setting up a PlayNC account, downloading the client, and then creating a username and password is all it takes to play Dungeon Runners. It is free to play. There is a catch, but we’ll get to that in a bit.

Dungeon Runners is a fantasy based MMO, and it plays like a mix of Guild Wars and Diablo, which is by no means a bad mix, especially for a free game. There is a central town where you can buy gear and meet up with other players to go adventuring with. Then once you are ready, you jump through a portal to get to an instanced dungeon. All of the fighting areas are instanced where it will be just you and your party, much like in Guild Wars. Once in the dungeon, it is a hack and slash dungeon crawl very reminiscent of Diablo, with randomized dungeons and creatures dropping randomized loot everywhere. The lighthearted nature of the game is immediately evident once you get your first few drops with names like "Aggro'd Aluminum Scaled Headgear of the Stunning Penguin" or "Zapped Wooden Militia Crossbow of the Cozy Wasp".

After creating your character, of which you have the choice of Warrior, Ranger, or Mage, you will be dropped into the starter town where there will be a few quests to pick up to send you into the first dungeon right away. After making your way through the dungeon, and doing the quests if you so chose, eventually you will make it through to Townston, which is the main town where you will spend most of your time between dungeon crawls selling gear and training your skills.

As with most MMO’s, the gameplay starts off rather simplistic as you only have 1 or 2 skills to work with. As you level up though it gets a little deeper as you develop more skills, but not many compared to other games out there. You also must assign points to your stats, which you are able to respec at any point for a small fee, which is a nice touch for those that might not like how they set themselves up early on.

Players can go dungeon crawling just to look for loot, or they can take on quests to earn rewards in gold, as well as “King’s Coins” that can be traded to special npc’s for items. There are a large number of quests to endeavor upon, though they are almost all of the “Kill this many of these” or “Collect X of this” types.

The graphics are on the cartoony side and look to have drawn a lot of inspiration from WoW, though not as quite as clean as said role model. Overall the games visual presentation is strong, the environments are interesting and well laid out, and the spell effects are on par with most MMO's out there.

The music is great and does a lot to help submerge you in the atmosphere, whether it’s a slightly melodic forest song with birds and crickets chirping in the backround, or a deep ominous tune, just barely audible along with the echo of your steps and the torches burning along the wall of a dungeon. The voice acting is top notch, and oftentimes hilarious. There are definitely a few voices you will recognize (the voice of Krusty the Klown can be heard from a few NPC’s) and the random dialogue they spit out is rather funny more often than not. Unfortunately the quests and such are not voice acted and are just text, but the voiced greetings and partings are a nice touch and add to the lighthearted feel for the game.

As I said before, Dungeon Runners is free to play, but there is a catch. If you pay a $5 a month fee, you become a “member”, and get to enjoy a few privileges that the free players don’t get. For one you get use of a bank to store items that you don’t want to carry on you. Also you get the use of stackable potions, where as for everyone else, each potion they carry on them takes up 1 slot. The biggest difference between the two are gear. Gear is color coded by rarity, and the 3 highest tiers of gear are reserved exclusively for members. Non-members will be able to see the gear, and even pick it up and sell it to vendors, but it can only be equipped by a member. This can turn into a heartbreaking experience when you find an amazing piece of armor and then see the “Memebers Only” text just below the name.

Dungeon runners is a well presented game that will offer quite a bit of adventure for those who enjoy dungeon crawling and loot gathering. Where as it doesn’t offer much to set it apart from many other games of its type, its lighthearted attitude helps a bit. There’s nothing quite like running through a dungeon wielding your Cardboard Sword of the Monkey and wearing your Aluminum Foil Bracers. It does offer quite a bit considering that it is free to play, as there have been plenty of MMO’s released that offered less and looked worse that were pay. And if it is something that you can really get into, $5 a month isn’t much to ask to enjoy those extra benefits that will help you in your adventures.