The Dungeon Beneath the Ancient Gate

Will you find the way through the dark and deadly rooms to open the ancient gate?

Use the arrow keys, numpad, wasd or hjkl keys to move. You can move in four directions, there is no diagonal movement.

Press i to open your inventory.

Press enter to get a list of actions you can perform on objects nearby.

Press x to enter examine mode.

Unfortunately, escape exits the fullscreen mode in most browsers and I have not found a way around this. So if you want to play the game in fullscreen please use backspace to exit from menus.

This is a turn based game and that the dungeon is randomized each time you play the game. Beating the game can be quite tough and it might require several attempts.

Note that it is not an action game, trying to fight your way past monsters will not get you far. Instead, try reading the descriptions of the creatures you encounter. There is often a way to outsmart them by using the surroundings to your favor, or to sneak past them undetected.

Your goal is to get to level five of the dungeon and open the gate.

The rules in this game are based on <tags>. Tags modify the behavior of objects and creatures. Hovering over a tag will show you a description of what it does.

For instance, the <Flammable> tag means that an object can catch on fire. If it does, it gains the <Burning> tag.

How far you can see depends on if a tile is illuminated or not. You can see a lit tile at a distance of 15 tiles, but a dark tile can only be seen from 3 tiles away. The same is true for other creatures. This means that carrying a light source helps you see farther, but it also makes it easier for monsters to spot you.

Many actions in the game will make sounds. The sounds you heard last turn is shown on your character sheet to the right. Monsters will use sound to detect you, so they might notice you because of the sound of your footsteps or the crackling of your torch, even if you are hidden from sight,

A loud enough sound will deafen nearby creatures, making them unable to detect other sounds for a few turns.

Each creature (such as yourself) has 3 attack points and 1 defense point, which can be modified by <tags> on the creature or its equipment.

The chance to damage an opponent in combat is atk/(def + atk), where atk is the attack points of the attacker and def is defense points of the defender. This gives a base chance of 3/4 (75%) to damage a creature when attacking.

Examining a creature will show you its current combat abilities like this:

Def: 1(75%) Atk:4(80%)

Which means that it has 1 defense point and that you have a 75% chance of dealing damage if you attack it. It also has 4 attack points and its chance of damaging you with an attack is 80%.

If a creature takes damage, it gains the <wounded> tag (and its tile is displayed in red). If it takes damage while <wounded>, it becomes <dead>.

Note that there is a very high chance of getting hurt in combat, and trying to fight monsters is often very dangerous.

Made for the 7 day roguelike challenge 2025. This game used the code from my entry last year, "Past Shadows" as a base. All gameplay code, graphics and sound and other content were made 7 days.

Post-jam additions

These fixes were done after the 7 days of the challenge had ended. You can toggle them off if you want to:

• Added in-game sound effects
• Various minor bug fixes