Roguelikes have seemingly been in a state of constant flux since they hit the mainstream. Because the genre focuses on gameplay tropes rather than specific mechanics, it can cover a wide spectrum of gameplay styles and pick up new tricks along the way. That's how things go from the relatively straightforward and arcadey Binding of Isaac and Dungeons of Dredmor to story-driven affairs like Hades and Humble Games and Twice Different's newest genre offering, Ring of Pain. Instead of designing for endless runs, Ring of Pain has a specific structure in mind that's only enhanced by the terrifying unknown inherent in procedural generation.
Players awaken as an amnesiac in some sort of nest, a bird-like creature named Owl looming overhead. Over the course of many runs, players can converse with Owl as well as a second entity lurking in the shadows. Both characters speak in riddles, leaving much of the game's setting and storyline wrapped in mystery for most of its runtime. Despite that, the world of Ring of Pain comes to life through the games striking visuals. Even as static images on cards, the terrifying creatures in every dungeon feel both alive and extremely threatening.
Ring of Pain relies on the same card game swipe mechanics as Reigns, only with a much more complicated combat system. Players find cards that give armor, weapons, and spellbooks, but attacking a monster is as simple as clicking on it and exchanging blows. The complication comes in the titular Ring, which forces players to deal with the two closest cards on any given turn. If an exit is all the way in the back of the circle, players will have to either fight through every monster in their path or attempt to stealth past them, and the right answer often depends on what items show up along the way.
That may be one of the problems with how Ring of Pain plays out in the long run. While there are a decent number of items to discover along the way, many of the rarer and more powerful pieces of equipment are locked behind steep requirements that most players won't be able to achieve. Not only does this cut the variety of each run down significantly, but it also makes it hard to create synergy between items in any given build. This doesn't impede the story progress all that much, and players can still get pretty far without the more interesting upgrades. However, it does make for many runs where players will simply look at stat boosts and pick whatever makes the numbers higher, and the fact that this isn't significantly punished makes the game's mechanical design feel lesser as a result.
Stepping beyond high-minded game theory, the action from run to run is satisfying enough to keep people playing. It doesn't take long to rank up in power and plow through early enemies, although there are some unlucky runs where the power-ups don't come and the rats get the chance to devour a wayward wanderer. Learning the ins and outs of the numerous bonus rooms can be fun, although it's just as easy to skip over them considering that a few have a very high chance of defeat. Even with the repetition, there's ample motivation in making progress and getting closer to unraveling Ring of Pain's inherent mysteries, as well as discovering more of the ghoulish enemy designs.
There's certainly room for improvement in Ring of Pain, but what is here is an intriguing step forward for the genre that's just in time to celebrate the Halloween season. With a few content updates and a rebalance that lets players experience more of the game's arsenal more consistently, this could be a real contender. As it stands, it's an engaging mystery waiting to be solved, a gameplay loop that's perfect for shorter play sessions interspersed with more in-depth dungeon dives done elsewhere.
Ring of Pain is available on PC and Nintendo Switch. A Steam code was provided to ScreenRant by Humble Games for the purposes of this review.