I've mentioned my love for Rogue like ASCII text role playing adventure games in the past. While Nethack used to be my flavor of choice, I've basically given up on it. Due to the development of other games in the same sort of style however, I haven't been left high and dry.

Nethack is too complicated for it's own good. It's hard, rewarding if you can do well, and as deep as a game featuring ASCII characters can be, but also at the same time cheap. There were far too many ways to die, and I never felt I was getting far enough into the world to explore the more interesting things, only replaying the first few levels where I would keep getting slaughtered. Had I been able to see more I probably would have been playing it for quite some time.

Going in the opposite direction is the DOOM: Roguelike game. As the game implies, it's a melding of a first person shooter and an Roguelike random dungeon game. The core game mechanics have been simplified. Equipping a gun is as easy as pressing it's corresponding number in the classic DOOM game. Firing is auto aimed well, and the levels are of a fixed sized for simplicity.

There are even sounds and music for the DOOM monsters (!). This means you'll be able to see a ASCII character on screen, but hear the corresponding monster growling from your speakers. You'll fear the brown letter "i" like never before when an imp tears at your flesh. This game feels faster, and easier to get into, but deaths are quick as the wide open areas allow monsters to quickly overwhelm the puny weapons you acquire at the beginning.

Striking a nice balance from the harder Nethack to the simplier yet faster DOOM: Roguelike is IVAN. The name is short for a Latin phrase meaning "The road to a violent death". This is more than true, as this is the first Roguelike to include a system for dismembering you poor little character. It has simple tile/sprite graphics, with a detailed system to tell you the status of each of your body parts built into the GUI. This allows you to see what you are wielding, and how your limbs are doing.

IVAN is simplified compared to Nethack, but still retains some of the interesting ways you see a violent end. I have a surprisingly long list of all the different ways I've met my end, and I always fire up the game and try again. It's only in beta at the moment so it should improve, but I've been playing it non-stop whenever I sit down in front of the computer.

The magic system, the items, and the GUI make the game far less of a hassle to play. That means it is more fun overall while still keeping the "one more time, I'm sure I'll get farther before I die next time" sort of feel these games need to be addicting. I'm sure I've only seen a small fraction of the game so far, but I keep pushing a little farther each day and have discovered a different facet of the game each time. I walk away from each death learning something that will let me get to a new place to be killed in a new way. It's only depressing if you expect to win each time. Expecting to lose and just seeing how you're death will come, either by misplaced step on a land mine or a slow bout of leprosy is all the fun.