On May 3, 2022, the dungeon crawler “Loot River” (PC, Xbox One, Xbox Series X) was released on Steam and in the Game Pass. A year ago, the basic idea for the game sounded fantastic and a bit crazy: a mix of Diablo’s gameplay, enhanced by the unique mechanics of Tetris. However, in the reviews on Steam, Loot River seems to be falling short.
What kind of game is this?
- “Loot River” was presented at the Summer Game Fest in June 2021 – this is the “replacement E3,” which consists of hours of crazy trailers being shown. Loot River stood out back then with a quirky concept.
- Loot River is essentially a typical “rogue-like” dungeon crawler with procedurally generated dungeons, but as an extra twist, they tossed in “Tetris” into the idea mixer and hit “go.”
- The developer Mirko Straka stated at the Summer Game Fest: “Imagine if Diablo and Tetris had a baby” – that was a strong pitch.
This was how the game was presented a year ago – the segment starts at 2:46:37
The idea was to make a loot game where you can slide the platform you’re moving on to be more flexible.
This apparently worked excellently as the “first pitch of a game” and the idea initially sounded incredibly appealing and exciting: You kill monsters and when they get too close, you can simply slide the platform elsewhere like in Tetris, and the monsters can no longer reach you.
When a 5-minute trailer really becomes a game
This is how it really goes now: The show aired 11 months ago and the Summer Game Fest made potential players curious. Now the game is finally released on Steam. However, the Steam reviews are rather mediocre.
After one day, the game, which costs €22.49, has only 64% positive reviews – these are “mixed reviews,” falling in the range of 3- or 4+.
The game is also available on Xbox Game Pass – so practically anyone who wants to can play it for little money right now.
The testers say:
- “I really want to like the game, but it needs more work.”
- “The game looks nice to watch, and the design of the world is exciting, but unfortunately, it doesn’t do the gameplay any favors.”
- “The lack of a crisp combat system, interesting items, or deep puzzles leaves the game in a very difficult position.”
The “Dark Souls” of Tetris games
What do players who like Loot River say? There are also some who really enjoy the game and are exactly into this crazy combo. One user says:
- “I’ve always been a fan of games that mix different unique mechanics, and Loot River definitely does that – it combines a dungeon rogue-like including puzzles with a souls-like combat system in an interesting dark fantasy world.”
- Another refers to the game as the “Dark Souls of Tetris games.”
- Others are also excited about the crazy genre mix and the challenging difficulty of the game.
At the moment, however, it seems that the general verdict would be: “Great idea, lots of potential, but still lacks content and polish in the mechanics.”
At least we now know how it would look if Diablo and Tetris had a baby: kind of quirky.
For those who want to play a game that is “kind of like Diablo,” we have the correct list on MeinMMO:
Games like Diablo – Who needs Diablo 4? Here are 11 current alternatives
