GROGPOD Roguelike Podcast

Roguelites belong to the Nords! This week we return to tower defense rogue land with Nordhold: the vaguely Viking-themed tower defense roguelite featuring tower synergy systems, work placement econometrics, and decisions about whether or not to sacrifice them to demonic gods. If careful optimization of numbers and slowly checking off metaprogression boxes is your thing, then Nordhold has got it in spades! We even have towers that shoot ravens at people, what more could you ask for here???







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01:13 - Game Stats
02:24 - One Sentence Description
4:53 - Viking Tutorial Walkthrough
8:28 - Resource Economy
10:24 - Meta Progression Treadmill
15:24 - Rogue Tower Comparison: Limited vs. Open Tower Selection Debate
19:23 - Oracle Choices: 5-Wave Passive Modifiers
21:56 - Banner System & Tower Fusions
31:49 - Hero System
54:45 - Cosmetic Glory Shop
1:04:36 - Rankings & Final Thoughts
1:10:52 - Similar Games & Show Wind Down

Next episode: Coal LLC

Contact us at grogpodzone@gmail.com!

https://grogpod.zone

Intro music: GROGPOD Theme 2 by Balatro composer LouisF - https://louisfmusic.com/

Outro music: Nordhold OST - Viking Layers 6

A dark presence surrounds you, whispering promises of stolen power! Our episode 100 mega special concludes with a mega special game in the traditional roguelike sphere: Brogue! Developed by a lawyer, Brian Walker sought to rewrite the state of roguelikes in 2009 from bloated checkbox-ticking, weeks-long RPG length games and bring the genre back to its coffee break length roots. Careful streamlining of systems, UI polish, graphical effects, and a much smaller monster pool make Brogue one of the most readily accessible roguelikes of the modern era. My, what a yummy mango!







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01:11 - Game Stats
06:15 - One Sentence Description
10:17 - Brian the Dev’s thoughts on Rogue vs Angband vs Nethack
16:38 - Modernized Design Philosophy
31:58 - Character As Items Design
37:18 - Lumen Stones: Optional Hard Mode & Going Beyond Floor 25
41:30 - Brogue as a First ASCII Game?
51:02 - ASCII Sprites
53:24 - Monster Roster: Dragons, Liches, Jellies & Hover Flavor Text
56:11 - Emergent Narrative
57:37 - Identification Meta-Game, Percentages & Risk
1:10:50 - Magic System: Staffs, Wands, Charges & Enchantment Synergies
1:16:39 - Brogue Fan Community Correspondence
1:31:09 - Rankings & Final Thoughts (new #1 hidden gem game for the podcast!)
1:43:53 - Similar Games & Show Wind Down

See also:

The Incredible Power of Dijkstra Maps
Brian Walker - Procedural level design in Brogue and beyond
Brian’s thoughts on Rogue vs Angband and Nethack

Next episode: Nordhold

Contact us at grogpodzone@gmail.com!

https://grogpod.zone

Intro music: The Lord of the Chiptunes: The Return of The Chiptune - Minas Tirith

Outro music: Sir Knight Beats - GELATINOUS CUBE (hexcore)

What is this new devilry? Part 2 of the GROGPOD100 extravaganza continues, this time with a focus on the first ever rogue-like games ever made! Following the part 1 format, Scott does a brief historical deep dive of the games with some community correspondence, followed by our in-person live first experiences playing these games. We’ll experience why Gandalf had no memory of dungeon floors in Moria, see the first draft of history with Hack, try to rescue our poisoned daughter in Larn, and try to survive longer than 10 turns in the city of Rampart with Omega!







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00:28 - Part 2 intro
02:23 - 1983 Moria
15:42 - Moria correspondence
27:31 - 1984 Hack
38:23 - Hack correspondence
47:31 - 1986 Larn
54:07 - Larn correspondence
58:13 - 1987 Omega
1:12:11 - Omega correspondence
1:14:11 - GROGPOD live first impressions

Mentioned in this episode:

Dungeon Hacks: How NetHack, Angband, and Other Roguelikes Changed the Course of Video Games
Toma’s unedited 15 minute voicemail here
Toma’s 130 traditional roguelike reviews
Rogue Elements
Scott & Dan talking Dwarf Fortress back in 2020

Next episode: EP100 part 3: Brogue CE

Contact us at grogpodzone@gmail.com!

https://grogpod.zone

Intro music: Shiryu - The Lord of the Chiptunes: The Chiptune of the Ring - The Council of Elrond

Outro music: Shiryu - The Bridge of Khazad-dûm

The road to Rogue was paved with ascii, teletype, thousand-pound mainframes, and a hacker spirit only highschoolers and college kids and eminate. For our big 100th episode, we have for you a 3-part deep dive into the games that inspired Rogue, the first TRUE roguelikes, and the crown jewel of ascii games: Brogue. This being part 1, we focus on the biggest computer games of the 1970s and how those shaped the design of Rogue. For each game, Scott briefly talks about how its played and a short bit of history, followed by some community correspondence about the game. Finally we have the pod crew doing a first ever live in-person recording about our experiences playing these games for the first time. So use those podcast desription timestamps to jump around! You feel weak with hunger… a hunger that can only be satisifed by hitting that play button!







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1:00 - Intro to episode 100 parts 1, 2, and 3
05:30 - 1971 Star Trek overview
13:30 - Trek correspondence
20:22 - 1975 pedit5/The Dungeon overview
30:10 - 1976 Colossal Cave Adventure
41:12 - ADVENT correspondence
47:12 - 1980 Rogue
58:52 - Rogue correspondence
1:06:46 - GROGPOD live first impressions

Next episode: EP100 part 2: The First Roguelikes (Moria, Hack, Larn, Omega)

Contact us at grogpodzone@gmail.com!

https://grogpod.zone

Intro music: Star Trek 1969

Outro music: Introduction to the PDP-11

Ball don’t lie! This week we’re dropping into the chasm filled with Arkanoid-inspired enemies in BALL x PIT! The fabled city of Ballbylon has fallen and evil monsters have dragged the metropolis into, you guessed it, a pit! Your quest is to rebuild the city by taking a ramshackle elevator down into the depths, huck balls at the rampaging hordes, and escape with resources you can use to restore the town brick by brick. Sure none of the residents have eyes in their sockets, are largely magical warlock outcasts and fallen kings, and in some cases look like haunted versions of an American Gothic painting, but we will rebuild! And upgrade our infrastructure via as many ping-pong mechanics as possible!







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1:58 - Game stats
3:35 - One sentence description
4:07 - The Fall of Ball-bylon in 46 Seconds
8:46 - Visual Style: Scrolling Enemies, Mobile Game Look & Art
13:49 - Ball System: Build Strategy Synergy
29:06 - Early Game & Metaprogression Treadmill
35:18 - Town Building: RTS Grid Base Builder & Worker Trajectory
43:21 - Character Variety: Turn-Based Mode, Twitch Voting & Unique Gimmicks
52:32 - Narrative Theme: Descending the Pit & Level Progression Arc
55:04 - Town Building x Ball Combat x Sound Design
1:11:22 - How’s it Compare with Vampire Survivors?
1:22:30 - Rankings & final thoughts
1:30:00 - Similar games & show wind down

Next episode: Episode 100 part 1 - Rogue and Its Predecessors

Contact us at grogpodzone@gmail.com!

https://grogpod.zone

Intro music: GROGPOD Theme 2 by Balatro composer LouisF - https://louisfmusic.com/

Outro music: Liminal x Desert - Amos Roddy