Dungeon crawlers conceptually appeal to me as a genre, but I’ve never quite found one that I’ve entirely clicked with. I’m talking oldschool dungeon crawlers here, where you take each step as it comes. I want to crawl some dungeons! Perhaps just not like that. Hopefully, Dungeon Lurker, with its crunchy dark fantasy pixel art and muddy, deep sound effects, will be able to make the difference.

Where Dungeon Lurker differs from your Wizardrys is that mechanically it looks a lot closer to a beat-em-up. You are a knight-looking fellow that looks ripped straight from the cover art of a ’90s era RPG, equipped with a sword and shield and a handful of spells. Sword slashes look punchy, with just the right amount of hitstop, enemies flying away at the end of a combo, bouncing off of walls, letting you jump up and pick the combo up again. Your shield can be used to defend yourself or bash baddies out of the way. The spells I can’t speak to as much, though the effects on them certainly look potent.

Dungeon Lurker is also a roguelike, I’m just not entirely sure how this manifests. It sounds like you pick up spells and potions along the way, and when on the surface you can upgrade both of these things alongside your equipment and charms. There are “over 30 unique levels to conquer and explore,” all of which are “fully hand crafted,” with no use of procedural generation (or AI).

Underneath it all, there is some kind of secret, for lack of a better word, lurking and waiting to be uncovered, one that’s “connected to your past.” Mine? Ruh roh! A trailer on the game’s Steam page suggests that this is something to do with a dead kid called Mikey and his best friend Gabriel. Can’t say much more than that, because no more than that has been revealed, but you can wishlist the game on Steam to find out more whenever it launches.