Dungeons of Hinterberg is a 3D third-person action / adventure role playing game (RPG). The art style is what I would call “Sunday Comics” in a newspaper. It plays like a Japanese RPG (JRPG) in that a single day in-game consists of three sections: morning, noon, and evening. The morning is usually dialog followed by choosing which area to visit, (which can include visiting dungeons in that region), then time to talk with people, buy and sell equipment, and build relationships. I have never finished a JRPG (Persona 3 and 5 being ones that I spent the most time playing), as they tend to be rather long and can get repetitive. This game, however, is short but still provides a wealth of game mechanics.

Quick Stats

Time Played: 22 hours (some new game +)
Difficulty Played: Normal
Amount Completed: Finished the main game, but did not get all achievements
Platform: Windows PC with an XBOX controller
Plan to 100%: Probably will not

Thoughts

• Time to complete. These days, I do not want to invest 80+ hours into a game, (although I reserve the right to change my mind). Regardless, for me, this game was just the perfect length. It kept things fresh during my playthrough with new skills, equipment, and environments. It never felt that I was “grinding”, (doing the same things over and over again), just to make the game longer and to prepare / upgrade my character for the next big fight. The dungeons and quests are also fairly short, which I enjoy. If I only have an hour to play a game, this one allows me to easily run through a full in-game day or two–meaning completing a dungeon, adjusting my equipment, managing my inventory, and progressing the story–all within my time constraints.
• Environments. There are four main environments to explore along with some smaller side areas, and each area has two main abilities associated with it. For example, in the “snowy” region, you can access a snowboard and shoot a stream of ice water at a distance. In another region you can create a cube of jelly, (useful for reaching high areas, freezing enemies, lifting gates, and blocking things), and shoot an electric sphere. These features are picked for you depending on which region you visit, and the dungeons make use of those specific skills with their puzzle design. Each dungeon in each area also is unique in how it plays and is visually presented. There are levels that feel like Super Mario Galaxy with small “planets” that rotate under you as you walk across them, and gravity-defying rails that you can use your snowboard to ride. Other dungeons may have you exploring a castle, traversing through a mine deep underground on foot and using mine carts, navigating a series of connected tree houses high above the ground, and more.
• Puzzles. While there were some puzzles that took me a little bit (in relative terms) to figure out, most were fairly straightforward. On the other hand, none of the puzzles as I recall relied on what I would label as “unfair” tricks or tedium. While I have played several pure puzzle games as they are things that I enjoy, this game is not one of those and therefore I would not expect the same level of challenge in that area. Since different areas have different skills for you to use, the puzzles in each area are fresh as they heavily incorporate the skills of that area to solve them.
• Equipment and skills. For such a short game, the equipment and customization options have a decent amount of options, (at least as you progress), allowing for different playstyles. In your inventory, you have a sword, various pieces of armor, charms, potions, sword enhancements, and armor upgrades. Each has some sort of limitation such as only having space for a certain amount of charms and each charm taking up a certain amount of space, (a mechanic that gets a little more interesting due to things that you can do to charms about halfway though). Or enchantments may be added to some swords, but each sword has a different number of slots for enchantments, with some swords not allowed to add any. This made it fun to try and figure out where to use my in-game money and collected loot, and which charms and other things to equip in order to design a loadout that fit how I liked to play.
• Combat. I would not call the combat especially challenging, but it is also not brainless button mashing. It does, however, take some time to ramp up in difficulty. This is actually a good fit for me these days. In my younger years, spending a few increasingly frustrating hours replaying the same fight and learning the patterns of the enemies before finally being victorious was a great feeling. At one point in this game I decided to take on a battle that was well over my current level. It was definitely challenging and I died several times before winning, but it was not a several-hour type of thing to do. This is helped by the fact that when respawning, you are placed right next to the battle area. In some games when you fail a fight, you have to start a while back in the level and make it through various challenges until you get to the main event. That lead-up is arguably part of the battle as a whole, but I appreciate in this game that when defeated you restart things right before the scuffle that killed you the last time. In some cases this game can replicate that “climb” by having multiple waves of enemies to defeat in a row, and starting at the first wave if you die. The combat did start to feel a little “more of the same” after a bit with the exception of the handful or so of boss battles. But it, at least for me, did not descend into tedium. The areas in which fights occur are usually a flat and circular, and, at least how I played, mainly meant constant movement and making choices on what to attack and how, then rinse and repeat.
• Art Style and Animations. I really like the idea of playing a video game that looks like a live action movie. But I also really like playing games that do not try to look photorealistic. The art style of this game I really enjoyed especially the use of vibrant colors. The game will also shift perspectives at times to be a more top-down or 2D platformer which I found pretty neat.
• Upgrades / Advancement. I really like how this game handles increasing your “experience”, which includes not only what equipment that you can buy, (given money collected), but also perks you can get from increasing your social status with various people in the game world during the “evening” part of an in-game day. Instead of building up experience points (XP) that when you reach a certain level suddenly provide something like more hit points (damage you can take before dying). Instead, you find a person in the game world that will give you more hit points if you build your friendship level with them. That can be done by choosing to spend an evening hanging out and having a conversation with that character and/or giving them gifts.

Conclusion

I would recommend this game for people like me who are looking for shorter run-times, some complexity in picking equipment and skills without an overwhelming number of options, and combat that does take a little thought, but is not especially brutal. It’s a good length for what I like to play today, has depth to it with equipment and skill choices that are, (in my experience), rare for games this size, and an art style with vivid colors that was pleasing to my eye. The fact that I finished this game and even played some new game+ to pick up some things that I missed during my first playthrough and to see how dialog changed with different choices on my side means that I enjoyed this journey.