Balatro may have taught us that roguelike mechanics can be applied to any game, but Drop Duchy from French studio Sleepy Mill Studio has managed to surprise us. We're not sure if Drop Duchy will garner as many awards or cash as Balatro, but it's also a very good and highly addictive game that's hard to put down.
| Game | Drop Duchy |
| Genre | puzzle, strategy, roguelike |
| Platforms | Windows |
| Languages | English, Ukrainian |
| Developer | Sleepy Mill Studio |
| Publisher | The Arcade Crew |
| Link | thearcadecrew.com |
The gameplay of Drop Duchy is based on classic Tetris, only a little slower. We throw tetramino figures into a glass, depending on the types of terrain depicted on the tetramino, we get resources for closed lines. With the resources we get, we buy new types of cards and move through the terrain, choosing the next events and path. Classic roguelike! But… Drop Duchy will be like this only for the first few levels.
Once you expand your "deck" and earn a few achievements, you'll gain access to a progression tree where you can unlock new maps, new terrain types, new factions, and... new mechanics! And that's where the game really blossoms and becomes like some kind of weird hybrid of Tetris, classic Carcassonne, and Dorfromantik.
Building cards start to influence each other, depend on the terrain, and card synergy appears. Sometimes you need to build the biggest forest or the longest river (hello Carcassonne: Hunters and Gatherers!), and also connect production and combat buildings to this river, sometimes the biggest city (and this is classic Carcassonne!). At the same time, you need to monitor that, for example, enemy buildings do not affect your territory, do not steal your bonuses, and do not strengthen each other.
Yes, Drop Duchy also has a combat component. In some locations, you play a kind of turn-based Tower Defense on a Tetris field. Having gathered different types of troops from your own military buildings, you must destroy enemy garrisons or take damage to your "castle". Plus, at the end of each act there are boss locations - the Wall, the Citadel and the Dungeon, with their own tricky rules that should not be broken.
And that's not all. As you progress through the upgrade tree, you'll be adding new mechanics to the game. Technologies from universities that give passive bonuses, mercenary mechanics, city and faith mechanics, and expeditions that generally change the gameplay. Sometimes it seems that Drop Duchy has too many different mechanics and possibilities, it's even a little intimidating.
In general, the game has three factions with unique mechanics, buildings, troops, resources for improvements, etc. - Duchy, Republic and Order. Duchy is the simplest, Order is the most complex. The game has 110 different cards, each of which can be improved several times and over 100 challenges (also Steam Achievements), which give stars for opening new cards and mechanics on the progress tree. And there is also a separate test mode, which also needs to be opened.
So you understand, you can get "stuck" in Drop Duchy for a very long time, just like in Balatro. And the game from Sleepy Mill Studio is also incredibly addictive. "One more game and sleep!" is exactly what it's about. So be careful.
Another small plus of the game is the unexpected presence of Ukrainian localization. There are errors here, but not many and they don't seem to affect the gameplay, because the localization coped with the main, accurate explanation of the mechanics and capabilities of the cards.
For another day, Drop Duchy is offered on Steam with a 10% discount for only UAH 292. Pay attention to this game.
