With The Dungeon of Naheulbeuk: The Amulet of Chaos, Artefacts Studio and Dear Villagers serve up a satirical tactical role-playing game for the PC.
In the beginning, the group of nameless adventurers consisting of a smart-as-nails ranger, a cheeky elf, an omnivorous ogre, an inquisitive mage, a simple-minded barbarian, a grumpy dwarf, and a cowardly thief is still on the search for a legendary statuette. In the dungeons of Naheulbeuk, however, they inadvertently stumble into a show called "The Wheel of Misfortune," where they win a cursed amulet that tears their group apart and turns their original quest planning on its head.
In nine chapters, the group, which can later be expanded to include a paladin, a bard, or a priestess, tries to uncover the secret of the amulet, confront its creator and perhaps capture the coveted statuette after all. The story, which can be narrated by a male or female narrator, lives mainly from its silly events and dialogs. Their quality is largely decent and even depicts various dialects and accents. The frequency of conversations during combat and exploration can also be individually dosed, and annoying characters like elves or dwarves can be muzzled.
Some combat actions, such as the ogre vomiting on enemies, whose victims stagger around in a daze afterward, amuse. The combat system is a grid- and turn-based, in contrast to the free and real-time exploration of the dungeon floors. That is, as soon as you enter an area for which combat is intended, the display switches to a checkerboard-like design that overlays the actual level design.
In the beginning, you can usually position your party members freely in a predefined starting area. Afterward, each member takes his turn according to his courage value - a corresponding overview bar is displayed. When it's your turn, you can either move and then attack or vice versa. You can also choose not to attack and move twice as far or take a special action, such as using an equipped consumable or taking a damage-reducing defensive stance. Alternatively, you can adopt a vigilance stance, which allows automatic opportunity attacks on enemies moving in a given area while it's not your turn.
Conclusion
The Dungeon of Naheulbeuk: The Amulet of Chaos is a good and amusing tactical role-playing game with sometimes delightfully silly events and dialogues, which even come along with mostly decent German dubbing. Annoying characters like the elf can be muted, and a narrator can be hired to read the story. Nevertheless, the humor, which is sometimes colored by dialect and accent, makes you smile again and again, while the character development and equipment offer interesting freedom. Bugs are still not eradicated, but it's a good thing that automatic saves are constantly made to be able to undo such mistakes without much effort. On the other hand, exploring the winding dungeon floors and competing in the quite crunchy round battles, depending on the difficulty level, can fully inspire.
