As I’ve stated many times before, I tend to immediately have an interest in anything you tell me has a roguelike element. At this point, in my mind, that opens the door to an experience that can be both familiar and surprising, with the promise that while each run may have shared elements that they can still feel distinctive and fulfilling to tackle again and again. Of course, not everything works out that way, and you can get titles like Forrader Hero.

Nailing down its genre precisely may be a bit tricky, as it’s obviously driven by strategy, and happens to be turn-based, but its style is one I can’t say I’ve run into before. You’ll play by pretty carefully moving forward, never able to go back, picking up buffs, hoping to avoid traps, and fighting a variety of enemies. As you go you’ll acquire new skills periodically in a roguelike fashion, picking your perk which can be new skills, passive enhancements, or upgrades. You’ll need to choose wisely, also being mindful of your character’s class and how best to compliment it, because if you aren’t careful and hit a bad run of moves you’ll find your armor and health can be depleted quickly, bringing your run to an end.

While it has strengths, it’s also absolutely a bit hamstrung by some serious weaknesses as well. The first is that the game did a pretty awful job of clearly explaining the rules for movement and it took me a while to simply understand them through brute force. Up and down movement is only earned by moving forward, so you’ll need to learn to plan accordingly, using your view of what’s coming to position yourself to avoid nasty situations, particularly traps or enemies that will hit you with status effects that can cripple your run. Another issue I had in a number of cases, was that it was both a challenge to read and properly understand what some of my abilities did, or how best to try to make use of them. They worked well enough to help me knock out enemies before having to wait through their cooldowns, but whether I was using them to their best potential or not I couldn’t always tell.

The most critical issue I had though is that once I locked on to understanding what was going on my run just kept going, and going, and going… and going. I kept thinking as I reached the end of every subsection that I may have finally gotten to a boss that would end the run, or at least change everything up on a new stage with new challenges… but it wasn’t to be. Pacing and hitting the player’s satisfaction button are crucial to a game continuing to pull you back, but in this area Forrader Hero struggled for me. Sure, the promise of trying new classes is at least of some interest, but once you’re on top of the general system for success the act of playing simply feels more like a grind rather than a worthy and engaging challenge.