Darkest Dungeon is a grim, unrelenting journey into hell. A fresh take on the dungeon crawling genre which excels in almost every aspect. The gritty art style along with the grim tone of the narrator throughout depicts the nightmarish story perfectly. Each character class is unique in their own way from their quirks, skills, and look. All heroes can be upgraded or provided aid in Hamlet which is home base for your roster. Every useful aspect of Hamlet is upgradable to help heroes with stress, disease, and negative quirks which is crucial as you journey deeper into the dungeon. Each mission your team embarks upon has great rewards that benefit your heroes and Hamlet critically. Mission variety and boss battles keep the game interesting. Each boss battle is distinctive and exciting in its own way. The game is very challenging at times and every hero in your roster is expendable. Darkest Dungeon is unforgiving to simply put it.
However, this is where I am conflicted. I have a love/hate relationship with Darkest Dungeon and this is due to the VERY randomness of the game. Some aspects just don't make any damn sense. For example; many times I have given each party member food to replenish their health and not even a minute later I am notified that they're starving. Percentages shown on enemies seem to be WAY off at times, it can literally feel like almost every turn is 50/50.
This randomness is mostly what makes this game hard, everything is a gamble. It's all about pushing your luck and seeing just how far it can take you. Sometimes this can be a challenge and at times can just be aggravating. Although the risk of a hero’s life can be diminishing to morale there is something that keeps me exploring deeper into the dark dungeon. Overall, I think this game is great and would recommend it to anyone who enjoys dungeon crawlers.