The great triumph of Deep Rock Galactic turns the drudgery into something exciting, repeatable, and fun. You work for a company that cares more about smaller profits than your survival. They are sent into dark caves to chop small amounts of minerals. And your rewards are small compared to the risk you face when facing massive alien bugs starving for your meat. However, as a steadfast space dwarf who does what he does best, you will have a great time as the game’s systems manage to turn that work into something magical.
An important reason for this is the intelligently structured approach to cooperative play. Deep Rock Galactic can be played solo with the help of an AI drone to aid your mining efforts, but it’s deeply less entertaining. The game is best when a whole team of four miners work together, ideally with a full distribution of the classes available. Fortunately, a fast and responsive backend allows meetings to be joined or hosted quickly so that good grouping is possible even when your friends are not around.
The four classes are well balanced and play well together and complement each other. The Scout’s speed, flare gun, and grappling hook get him where he needs to be quickly. The drill’s tunneling abilities speed any endeavor or escape, and its flamethrower is a boon in controlling the crowd. The archer’s weapons hold the line in every fight, and his zip lines make team navigation manageable. And the engineer’s platform creation enables the mining of places that otherwise seem impossible to reach, even when his automatic towers help hold certain control zones. Taken together, everyone adds something invaluable to the group, and I’ve enjoyed my time with everyone.
With each mining run, your space mining crew will be sent into the depths of a mineral-rich giant of a planet that also happens to be overrun by hostile alien bugs. Sometimes you’re just there to collect a certain type of rock, but other goals keep things interesting, from eliminating particularly nasty enemies to retrieving the goods left by a previous mining crew that didn’t make it. Secondary goals give an interesting risk-reward dynamic that increases time and risk in depth, but with significant increases in your payout. And as you climb the ladder of the more difficult missions, there are other secrets to uncover, from hidden cosmetics in long-lost, collapsed caves to challenging “machine events” that involve particularly challenging exchanges. With a pickaxe in hand, there’s a satisfying balance in any mission between figuring out how to reach that elevated gold vein and shifting gears to fend off a horde of attackers. Battles are intense and challenging and require constant teamwork.
Regardless of this, the procedurally generated cave systems are fascinating and extensive. The game encourages a focus on discovery and exploration – the mapping and targeting markers are limited. This is often a lot of fun, and leads to exciting moments when you break through a wall of dirt to find a massive crystalline chamber right behind it. However, focusing on freeform hiking can sometimes lead to a feeling of aimlessness. Likewise, the game uses a lot of light as the dwarves send out rechargeable flares (or the scout’s prolonged shots) to scout the area. But the prevailing feeling of oppressive darkness can wear off over time, and the changing light sources make it easy to get lost.
In between shifts, there are some fun throw-ins in your time back on the space rig, especially if you share them with others. You update a beer brewing license with newly discovered materials and get nudged before a number of goofy effects take over, like catching fire or changing your size. Some drinks can even offer a buff for the next mission. You have a place to dance a dwarf jig to the nearby jukebox and a button to turn off gravity in the station for a while. Or how about you just kick a few barrels around? It’s all frivolous and amusing.
This space station is also the place where you will gradually upgrade your miner’s equipment as he climbs through the levels. Consistent play leads to a number of benefits, but most of them have little effect on your chances of success. Each class has a few unlockable weapons and a number of upgrades to armor and the rest of your arsenal. However, many of the major upgrades are purchased in the early hours of the morning and the focus is shifting to a very slow cosmetic unlock path. After a while, I wanted more useful options and adjustments; The game requires hours of investment to get your look exactly the way you want it, and more gameplay-affecting upgrades would have been appreciated. You eventually open up “Promotion” which adds some new advanced missions and some additional upgrade options. That being said, the leveling curve is relatively flat and characters of different levels can generally play well with each other except for the toughest settings.
Aside from minor arguments about progress or navigational frustration, Deep Rock Galactic is consistently a great time and very repeatable. The dwarfs grumble and yell at each other, complain about their lot, but happily approach every new challenge with dogged determinism. It’s hugely rewarding when your entire team empties themselves into a new cave and then immediately gets to work cleaning up stones and insects alike. Even transferred from its popularization in Tolkien or Snow White and into a dark corner of space, the essence of the dwarf fantasy is abundantly realized here and always makes me smile. Bring some friends, a handy pickaxe, and a contentious attitude and you’ll smile too.
