Dungeon Town is a lewd dungeon crawler about a hero employed to defeat a succubus.
Adult Content?
(F, FxM) sexual content.
Censorship?
No. Woot! Woot!
Hours of Gameplay?
Thirty hours.
Patch Available?
From Kagura Games.
Foreword: published October 7th, 2021
I received a free copy of this game for review purposes — thanks Kagura Games! For the purposes of this review, I will only be discussing the patched game.
Gameplay: published October 7th, 2021 (5/5★)
The name of the game is “grind”; every night, your levels are sucked away by the main antagonist in exchange for loot and sexual content. While she may provide a useful (and fun!) trade, she and her companions are the heralds of an oncoming apocalypse. It’s up to you to power through randomly generated floors and enemies to prepare for the final showdown. You’ll need a mix of combat and sexual prowess to fight (and fuck!) what lies ahead. However, you won’t be able to defeat the succubus on your own; there are ten recruitable heroines with a place in the story (with hours of character building and exposition!) A big part of the game is developing your relationship with the cast; as they open their hearts (or their legs), you’ll progress the story and unlock new skills. Powerful gear are restricted by “fame”, which can only be acquired by completing quests. While completing the main questline provides some fame, you’ll need to grind optional quests to collect more. Chances are, if your weapons and armor are just “good enough”, you won’t make it to the end of the game. There’s a limited number of days to reach the final stretch (and achieve a “good ending”), and the last bosses are stupidly powerful. Considering each playthrough is tens of hours of dialogue and grinding, you don’t want to fuck up.
Dungeons consist of up to thirty floors that are randomized upon re-entry. Each floor is teaming with enemies and loot, but time is money. Every time you pick a fight or use select “skills”, you’ll deplete precious “action points” (or “AP”). When you run out of AP, you’ll lose all navigational assistance and the ability to climb new floors. Killing everything that moves is a great way to complete quests and gain levels, but your main-storyline progression will slow to a crawl. If you spend too much time grinding enemies, you may be forced to take a “bad ending” when you’re unable to reach the end of the game in time. Outside quests or planned “intimacy” events, enemies are generally a waste of AP. I found the ones that I couldn’t avoid provided enough loot and experience points to progress.
Combat is turn-based with an interesting mix of mechanics. Each time a weapon is used, it’s hit rate is decreased as its durability is consumed. Durability is restored by giving your weapons a break by not using them. You’re encouraged to cycle through weapons to preserve their longevity. There are four types of weapons, each suited for a particular class of enemy. For example, axes deal lots of damage, but they leave the user vulnerable to counter attacks. They are suitable for heavily armored foes with low mobility. Before performing an attack, you’re able to see your opponents next attack (and how likely you’ll dodge that attack). As opponents grow stronger, you’ll need to analyze their turns and select the correct weapons to maximize your damage output and mitigate risks.
As long as you have life points (or “LP”), your hit-points (or “HP”) will be restored whenever you sustain lethal damage. The higher your maximum HP, the more you’ll get out of each LP! Life Points are also used to determine the number of orgasms you may have, so it’s really important to have enough before engaging a succubus (and entering sexual combat!) Thankfully, when you run out of LP it’s not “game-over” — you’re simply returned to your home with full HP. However, LP is considerably harder to stock than HP; while hit-points are constantly refilled (and cheap as dirt to restore), LP can only be restored by using rare items or going to bed. It’s better to dodge attacks than risking sustaining a “critical” hit; against similarly-leveled foes, critical hits will surely drain LP.
Each day is separated by three parts; the first two may be used to explore dungeons with a partner; and the last (night time) can be used to explore dungeons on your own. Enemies are stronger at night, but you’re unable to bring help (but you’ll earn more loot!) Quests and dialogue are tied the day and night cycle. While most of them are optional, taking too long to progress the main questline may result in a “bad ending”. If you don’t aggressively pursue the final stretch of the game, chances are you’ll need to take advantage of “NewGame+” to carry over your stats and equipment to a new save. I spent a handful of days not progressing the storyline and I was barely able to beat the game on time (despite investing heavily into my “AP” to climb as many floors each day as possible!)
Sexual Content: published October 7th, 2021 (4/5★)
Each scene is comprised of one base CG with some variations and dialogue. The meat of the sexual content lies in turn-based “combat” scenarios, but I found them more stressful than arousing. By the end of the game, you’ll be more focused on numbers and statistics than anything else. Initiating sex-scenes isn’t unlike normal combat, but with a few extra hoops to jump through. Before using your “sexual techniques” you must “set the mood” by engaging randomly selected dialogue and guessing your opponents’ preferences. Alternatively, most women will allow you to bribe them into allowing sexual techniques! The goal of sex is to reduce your opponent’s “EP” to zero during foreplay, so that she’ll allow you to penetrate her vagina. Once you’re in, no matter what happens the battle is considered won! You may spend LP (or “life points) to prolong the sex-scene by purchasing orgasms. Most of the sex-scenes are between consensual partners, but there are lots of rape scenes (but they are typically reserved as optional, unlockable content).
On most nights, a succubus will pay you a visit to absorb and barter your levels. While losing levels is detrimental to your overall strength, equipment plays a far bigger role in progression. As long as you’re maintaining high-level gear, losing levels is but an inconvenience. The only time levels really matter is during the end of the game — when they are no longer absorbed, allowing you to gather the strength to defeat the final boss. As the main storyline progresses, you may purchase an wide assortment of “what if” sex-scenes (where the hero fails to save his female companions in time from rape situations). You may also choose to refight any previously encountered succubus, granting access to their respective sex-scene. Each female protagonist has at least one sex-scene, which must be “earned” by developing a relationship with them. Whenever you unsuccessfully flee from an enemy with a partner, you must comfort her with careful dialogue. Over time, they’ll warm up to you — if the story allows, they’ll want more than words.
Story: published October 7th, 2021 (4/5★)
Unsealed by the Succubus, the Demon World consumes Famos Village. Sapping the male population of their “levels” (or semen), the Succubus and her friends have combed through the champions of the Famos region. Even though women-adventurers are unaffected by the succubus, their efforts are futile; she cannot be defeated with magic or weapons. Only a man can defeat a succubus, and Famos is running out of them! The “hero” of the story is a broke mercenary with with a big heart (and a big dick!) His levels “are JUICY and TASTY, and the highest quality”. He’s the only one with the balls to defeat the Succubus — and he’s the only man she wants.
Dungeon Town kicks off with an everyday plot: the big baddie wants to take over the world by releasing monsters, and the hero must defeat them (with sex!) Most of the game is just that — but as the story progresses, you’ll find the plot spiral out of control as new twists and turns are introduced during the climax. Unfortunately, the telegraphing leaves a lot to be desired. I won’t spoil any surprises, but there are big character reveals that aren’t hinted until the very end of the game (making them feel rather ham-fisted.) They aren’t bad twists, but the lack of build-up makes their big reveals less impactful. Maybe if I were to replay the game I’d catch something that I missed, but I don’t have the patience to sit through another thirty hours of gameplay and play “story detective”.
Sound: published October 7th, 2021 (4/5★)
The titlescreen is weirdly quiet. I was expecting some sort of theme song, but instead I got. . . owl sounds? One may argue the nighttime sounds relate to the dream sequences in the game, but ambience isn’t play anywhere else in the game. Each character and explorable region have their own unique tracks. While the soundtrack helps keep audio fresh, you can expect to hear the first few seconds of select tracks too many times. The battle tunes are great, but the boss music is awesome! It does a great job at getting you pumped for difficult battles. There are voiced lines in the game, but I don’t understand a word of Japanese. I’m unable to provide feedback on the delivery, but I didn’t hear any sort of audio distortion or microphone noises. Each partner has an assortment of commentary during exploration and “intimate mode”, but I found it a little annoying since I had no idea what they were saying to me.
Visuals: published October 7th, 2021 (5/5★)
The titlescreen looks great! It’s a animated, dreamy screen featuring a silhouette of the main antagonist. It looks and feels great. I had reservations about the background (a dark, gloomy forest), but after racking my brain it does have some significance to the story; the presence of succubi is enough to seemingly transform day into night. From “System Config”, you may adjust audio and display preferences. In addition, you may remap select controls. I thoroughly enjoyed the overall aesthetic choices for the game; the characters and sprites look great, nearly professional. I thought the enemies were stock, but they were aesthetically pleasing. The user-interface is a delight, sporting easy navigation and lots of colors. However, there are a handful of transitional screens that can’t be skipped that got on my nerves (such as “intimate mode” and “evaluation”). Once you’ve seen then fifty-something times, they get a little old. Select, previously encountered sex-scenes may be reviewed in-game via “Recall Scenes”, but many sex-scenes are locked behind dialogue and gameplay. In other words, sexual content is seldom free to revisit.
Verdict: published October 7th, 2021 (4/5★)
It looks like I’m gonna have to add this game to my list of favorite games from Kagura Games! Dungeon Town is a big game. There’s plenty of time to get invested in the main characters and side plots! Even though I sped through the latter half of the game, it still took me thirty hours to beat. Unfortunately, the gameplay becomes stale after a few hours. At first, I was eager to explore every nook and cranny of every floor. Once I climbed a few hundred samey floors, I rushed to complete to dungeons. The difficulty flips between “too easy” and “grossly unfair” — most foes are push-overs, but even random encounters can one-shot you out of the blue. Some bosses will make you regret all of the grinding you didn’t do. The last string of bosses are a war of attrition and praying for good RNG — but they don’t disappoint! If you’re a collector, you may enjoy filling-out the enemy and item lists (if you can stomach the RNG). Though Dungeon Town has sexual content, I wouldn’t recommend this game to anyone looking to get off. Sex-scenes are few and far between, and they take a lot of work to unlock and revisit. This is a great game for someone that wants a story heavy dungeon crawler that’s just a little lewd. I had a great time with Dungeon Town, and I’m confident to say that you won’t regret paying full price for this game!
