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Starting May 2, Steam launched a new round of "Going Rogue" theme game sales. The game sales on Steam are really one after another, several game festivals are connected like human centipedes, and the last game that just ended was the domestic game exhibition "Dragon Fighting Tiger Fight" with a strong Chinese flavor, and Touch also reported accordingly. The "Born to Die" sale is similar, as the name suggests, most of the games involved are Roguelike and Roguelite games.
The main page is very nice to look at
"Roguelike and Roguelite games" is a lengthy title, but I can't think of a more concise way to express it. As far as I know, the name of this game genre does not have a mature Chinese translation, and the official translation given by Steam is also sandwiched, writing "rogue-like" and "light rogue". I remember Chinese there were people in the game circle called "meat pigeons", but it was just like the sound, in fact, the meaning was a little unclear, and I also felt very awkward and could not be exported. What to call this kind of game has always embarrassed me.
Let's start with the event. There are also games like "Souls" and "Castlevania Galaxy Warriors" for the sale. In my opinion, these games often intersect in the elements of game design, and the styles are sometimes more similar, plus Roguelike and Roguelite, although they have become popular in recent years, are actually still a small category, and there are not many works that can be called famous. The game festival decided to promote games of similar types or composition elements together, which not only enriched the game category, but also solved the trouble of not having enough games.
Making a sale like a hodgepodge is not a problem technically, but how do you introduce a promotional game to players? I think Steam is adamant that "Roguelike and Roguelite are stupid" and used this as a selling point to spend a lot of effort around distinguishing between Roguelike and Roguelite - both on the event page how to distinguish between these two categories of text, and made a popular science video. There are two videos on the main page of the event, one is the two hosts chattering and introducing the two nouns first; in the other video, several anchors spend 2 hours and 55 minutes to tell the history, development and representative works of Rougelike and Roguelite in detail.
I've always had a strong resistance to the strict distinction between "Roguelike and Roguelite." I've spent a lot of time on these kinds of games— or rather, two. For a while, I only had a poor office book on hand, basically unable to run all the games with light and shadow effects and 3D modeling, roguelike and Roguelite games mostly hand-drawn, pixel-style, I stared at these kinds of games to play. I enjoy the fun of this kind of game, and I can't help but mix forums and visit communities, and I often meet people who make a big fuss about the concept of popular roguelike and roguelite. I didn't understand it for a while, I only knew that the two nouns were slightly different, and every time I mentioned this kind of game, I was torn in front of others, and I wasn't sure which word to choose to describe a specific game, and I didn't even have the courage to talk about it.
Isaac's Burnt Offering was one of my first games I ever played and one of my favorites—I'm actually more used to calling it "Isaac's Union."
Of course, after understanding, you will find that the difference between Roguelike and Roguelite is also very simple. If you go back to the source, the original meaning of the word Rogue is "rogue" and "rogue", and it is not directly related to the game category that was later derived. However, in 1980, a game called "Rogue" was released, featuring random generation of map elements and permanent death. This game has achieved certain results, and the brilliant design of the game has also been used by latecomers, and slowly a type of game has been derived, and later people called them Roguelike. This kind of game is fun, because of the randomness, each round is a unique experience, it is easy to keep the player fresh, and the narrative can often play new tricks, but because the design of permanent death is too unfriendly, it has been slowly adjusted in the process of evolution. Roguelite is equivalent to retaining some upgrades and enhancements after the character dies, reducing the difficulty and making the game experience better.
If we really want to follow a strict definition, then almost all Roguelike and Roguelite games are actually Roguelite games now, at least I haven't seen a Roguelike game that really adheres to the law of "permanent death" for a long time.
In the relatively rigorous work of the game media, when writing about the relevant content, I always unconsciously weigh up - which one to write? Roguelite is accurate and impeccable, but Roguelike is a more popular statement, and there are quite a few people around me who have heard of Rogue and Roguelike and don't know Roguelite... Of course, from another point of view, this also reflects the necessity of popular science, players have a correct understanding of these terms, but also to avoid the media, community, social networks on many unnecessary verbal disputes.
Therefore, this Steam activity has a positive significance for the concept of science - understanding the meaning of these terms, and then choosing a suitable title, is better than not knowing anything nonsense, but the problem is that Steam's science in order to show a certain "authority", appears to be "very understandable", in the popular science page also attached to the ultimate invincible pedantic Roguelike category definition. According to the content, this "definition", known as "The Berlin Interpretation", was first published at the International Roguelike Development Conference in 2008, a set of strict design parameters developed by game developers. Only a game that fully satisfies these interpretations can be called roguelike. Specific content includes:
1. Random map generation
2. Permanent death
3. Turn-based combat
4. Grid-guided action
5. Allows multiple solutions to the complexity of the game
6. Non-modalization (all operations can be performed at any time)
7. Resource management
8. Slash and slash combat
Steam said in the introduction that although games are increasingly technically inclined to be made into "Roguelite", there are still some people who use "Roguelike" to refer to these games in general. In order to express disapproval of this practice, some people have made the above strict definition of Roguelike games.
"Although this definition has been controversial from the beginning"
I searched for "2008 International Rogue Development Conference" and "Berlin Interpretation". At this formal-sounding developer conference, the clearest official image material that can actually be found is as follows.
Not only is it not clear to see, but the audio quality is also terrible. The small words at the bottom of the screen are "What is Roguelike?" And "The Birth of the Berlin Interpretation"
Obviously, for Roguelike and Roguelite, the more they try to distinguish between them, the more they get into trouble. Because according to the so-called "official definition", Roguelike is already a retired game type. In fact, Steam's own explanation has already made the reality: Roguelite is a more accurate definition, and Roguelike is a more accepted type generic. If you understand the difference between these nouns, most of the time, there's nothing wrong with choosing Roguelike or Roguelite calling a game of its kind.
Trying to distinguish between Roguelike and Roguelite in particular detail has become a pedantic and boring thing to do – it's useless to figure it out! Again, I'm not against the popular science of related terms, but if you're just a good teacher online, bombastic, drop the book bag, keen to point out that other people's "Roguelike" or "Roguelite" usage is wrong, it is really full of belly culture and nowhere to use.