Dandy Ace Review: Silly and Seriously Fun Spellcasting

Dandy Ace, the sophomore project from Brazilian developer Mad Mimic, is the newest action-roguelike out of publisher Neowiz’s growing stable, joining previous efforts Skul: The Hero Slayer and Metal Unit. Something unites all these games as international efforts from smaller teams that aim to echo the greatest hits in the genre, drawing cues from Dead Cells, Enter the Gungeon, and, with this new release, Hades and the wider Supergiant Games oeuvre.

It’s an easy comparison point when Dandy Ace’s narrator comes to the fore, a cackling ostentatious villain magician named Lele. The titular Dandy Ace is his suave foil, a commercially successful magician in a domino mask who seems equal parts anime fop and Arrested Development’s Gob. Now trapped in Lele’s topsy turvy dungeon world of supernatural cartoon enemies and flamboyant splendor, Dandy Ace needs to use his randomized arsenal of magic spell cards and trinkets to get farther on each run, unlocking perma-upgrades and boons throughout each attempt.

Sure, all of this is stock-standard roguelike stuff by this point, but there are a few smart design choices to pick through. For one, the range of spells in Dandy Ace grows considerably and provides plenty of experimentation opportunities; every single card can be placed in one of four “main” slots as well as one of four “upgrade” slots. Main slots are activatable skills, while upgrade slots add various effects to those skills, including poison, additional projectiles, and a few more esoteric options.

It’s not only fun to play around with these different powers, but they can even be hot-swapped anytime, right on the fly, through a pause menu. This feature alone makes Dandy Ace feel admittedly much too powerful for the normally intense difficulty of its genre, but will scratch the itch of players who love to tinker with loadouts. It also means that certain biomes in the game – each of which come with their own assortment of differentiated baddies – may lend themselves more to one range of spells, and ensures that no one’s ever locked out or hard-committed to one playstyle at any given time.

It’s the type of mechanic which may make more masochistic gamers roll their eyes. Dandy Ace is, overall, a much easier action-roguelike than the norm, though there are plenty of frustrations evident in the frequent combat which contend with that summary. As expected, players are usually locked into specific monster closets as minions spawn at random, and each enemy’s telegraphing of attacks (as well as the protagonist’s hitbox) just never feel precise enough. The visuals, while bright and colorful, also have a generally “flat” quality, which makes the visible noise of most battles with abilities and projectiles firing hard to read, which will lead to surprise damage.

Beyond these mechanics is the game’s very loud and campy personalities, whose mileage will vary with player taste. The voice acting toes the line of boisterous charm and annoyance, with Dandy Ace gormlessly self-back-patting and Lele constantly quoting memes, complaining, or making self-deprecating jokes about the action onscreen. It’s weird, and while not always successful in its humor, it also comes off as well-intentioned, earnest, and kind of cute. Luckily, there’s an option in Dandy Ace's settings to turn off Lele’s nonstop play-by-play narration, yet the game’s essence feels unmistakably emptier without it.

The smooth video game soundtrack probably anchors Dandy Ace’s energy just as much as the voice acting. Much like the visual design, it’s a candy-coated and upbeat affair, full of encouraging synths and thumping bassline loops. It somehow works with every other part of the game’s theming, proof that Mad Mimic was going for a certain tone and presentation that is ultimately cohesive here.

While Dandy Ace comes from a smaller development team, it’s a fun action-roguelike already, with room to possibly grow in post-launch updates. There are elements which certainly need to be updated or retuned - higher-level spells don’t change in appearance with each tier, something which never seems right, and levels are, on the whole, much too long - but the playful spell system, upbeat style, and overall polish definitely make it worth a spin for action-roguelike fans.