Video Game / Hero Siege

Hero Siege is an indie action Roguelike by Panic Art Studios.

The Kingdom of Tarethial has been taken over by Damien, the human(ish) son of Satan and his army of monsters. As one of four classes, it falls to you to fight through the kingdom, destroy Damien and his army, and save the land. After multiple updates and patches, there are now seven classes, with an eighth and ninth with DLC: Viking, Pyromancer, Marksman, Nomad, Redneck, Pirate, Necromancer, Samurai and Fallen Paladin (DLC).

That's the general plot, but the core aspect is the gameplay. The game consists of 4 acts, each of which as 5 subareas. In each area, the player must fight through numerous waves of increasingly deadly monsters while also contending with traps and hazards such as spike plates, cannons, and crushing blocks. Once enough waves have been completed, the player must fight a boss before moving on to the next area. Along the way, the player can collect numerous powerups that can greatly enhance their stats and grant them new powers. The game is something of a hybrid of The Binding of Isaac and the Diablo series, minus the room-to-room dungeon crawling and the grand area exploration.

A DLC is being planned for a June 2014 release. This DLC will initially contain a new class and a new Act, but owners of the DLC will reportedly have access to the future acts (8 in total are planned) free of charge. After some difficulty, the DLC was released on July 18, 2014, with the first DLC-exclusive act, the Zen Gardens of Karponia. There is local multiplayer for up to two players with keyboard + controller or controller + controller, and online multiplayer. Improvements are still being made to the multiplayer aspect.

As of May 01, 2015, the second DLC, the Depths of Hell, includes a new act, the Highlands of Tarethial, and a new character class, the Fallen Paladin.

This game provides examples of:

• Action Girl: The Pirate and the Amazon.
• Asian Speekee Engrish: The Samurai, the first DLC class, suffers from this whenever he talks, with lines such as "War is not about who is right, but who is reft" and "True power comes from disciprine."
• Ax-Crazy: The Viking and the Pyromancer both, the former of which likes to talk about sacrificing his enemies and axe-murdering them, while the latter likes to talk about things fire does.
  • For example, a few of the Pyromancer's lines are:
    "The sweet aroma...of burnt flesh."
    "Everyone burns...a little differently."
    "Nothing satisfies like the flames of agony."
• The Berserker: The Viking. He even has a skill named this that makes him attack faster the less health he has.
• Blood Knight: The Viking. Much of his dialogue involves him eagerly anticipating bloodying his axe and sacrificing his enemies to Odin.
• Boss in Mook Clothing: Some enemies you encounter later in the game are bosses scaled down to mook level or are just same sprite, different enemy, usually presented as Elite Mooks.
  • Starting in Act 3, the player will encounter Earth Elementals and Greater Earth Elementals, the mook and Elite Mook version of Gurag, the Act 1 final boss.
  • Dead Brides and Ghost Spouses in Act 3 onward are the mook and Elite Mook versions of Annie and Samara, respectively.
  • Skeleton Mages and Skeleton Archmages in Act 2 onward for Akrea.
  • Nautilus and Nautilus Champions in Act 2 onward for Hololo.
  • Dragon Whelps and Ice Dragon Whelps in Act 2 onward for Hayro.
  • Ent Saplings and Horror Branches in Act 1 onward for Keeper of the Haunted Forest and Kayo the Sapling/Ent.
  • Yetis and Yeti Scavengers in Act 2 onward and Desert Beasts and Grim Wood in Act 4 onward for Kungo.
• Chainsaw Good: The Redneck's weapon of choice.
• Dem Bones: Skeletons are a common enemy.
• Darker and Edgier: The game was already pretty dark what with all the gore, gothic architecture, and demonic imagery, but the Karp of Doom and especially the Depths of Hell DLCs have made the game much darker. Gurag, for example, now looks like he is perpetually vomiting up blood, and Annie somehow got even more deformed and freaky.
• Dark Is Not Evil: Despite his title, the Fallen Paladin is arguably the most heroic class in the game.
• Dark Messiah: Act 6 reveals that Damien really was Satan's son.
• Dishing Out Dirt: Gurag, the end boss of Act 1.
• Elite Mook: More powerful versions of normal enemies will occasionally spawn during a wave.
• Excuse Plot: This demon guy is summoning more demons to take over a kingdom! Go stop him! And you only find this out if you read the game's description on its website or Steam page. There is nothing ingame that tells you just what is going on.
• Giant Space Flea from Nowhere:
  • Anubis, the True Final Boss. Unlike the Big Bad Damien, no pretense is given for his involvement in the plot. Hell, Act 4 in general seems random considering that Act 3 is when you actually kill Damien.
  • And now there's Karp King, the real True Final Boss in Act 5, the Plains of Karponia.
  • And after that, there's Satan, the very real True Final Boss in Act 6, the Highlands of Tarethial.
• The Grim Reaper: Appears as the end boss of Act 2.
• Humanoid Abomination: When you finally confront Damien, he appears to be a normal, glasses wearing mage...until you notice he has no lower body and constantly summons demons to kill you...and then he rips his head off to send it to attack you when he's at half life.
• Joke Weapon:
  • The Flyswatter. Your character even says "Fuck this game..." when you pick it up.
  • While not necessarily Joke Weapons, the "Rusted" relics (Rusted Sword, Rusted Dagger, Rusted Axe, Rusted Armor, and Rusted Ring) give a paltry benefit that is granted to the player far more often with stat-boosting potions and purchasing stat boosts in the shop.
• Judge, Jury, and Executioner: Referenced in those exact words by the Redneck. Presumably, this is how he deems appropriate to operate with the hordes of monsters that are about.
• Kill It with Fire: The entire motif of the Pyromancer, who has purely offensive talents, including throwing meteors (Meteor), throwing a ball of swarming fireballs (Fireswarm), launching a massive burst of powerful fireballs all around him (Fire Nova), raining a hailstorm of fireballs all around him (Armageddon), and summoning a fiery hydra head to spit fireballs at his enemies (Hydra; get the skill high enough and they stick around long enough for him to summon multiple)...all while gleefully spouting various lines about fire and how great it is.
• The Legions of Hell: Many of the enemies, including imps, wendigos, and giant demon worms.
• No-Sell: Before the 1.1.6 patch, certain monsters, mainly elites and bosses, were completely immune to ranged attacks, meaning Marksmen and Pyromancers had to rely on traps to kill them or use the shortranged "puff" of air that accompanies their attacks to damage them. The patch changed this so elites and bosses are simply resistant to ranged attacks rather than completely immune.
  • As of recent update history, Ranged Resistant enemies are once again completely immune to ranged attacks, but only basic ranged attacks. Ranged abilities still murder them pretty soundly. They're still annoying when your attack skills are on cooldown, however.
• Power at a Price: The Damien's Seal artifact greatly increases your attack, but severely lowers your defense. There's actually quite a few relics that amplify one or two of your stats while lowering another, but Damien's Seal is particularly worth mentioning based on its effect: +200 Strength, but -50 Swiftness and Armor.
• Random Event:
  • Occasionally at the beginning of a wave, a statue of either an angel or a demon will appear somewhere on the map. The angel statue either gives you a permanent +2 bonus to random attribute, a temporary +20 bonus to a random attribute, or a relic. The demon statue is risk/reward and can give far better benefits, but at the risk of getting a negative effect instead. It can give you a permanent +4 bonus to a random attribute, a temporary +40 bonus to a random attribute, the opposite of both of the aforementioned, or a very powerful relic.
  • In addition, sometimes a Dungeon or Crypt will spawn. The artifacts that can be found here tend to be more valuable than the ones found after defeating a boss.
  • Sausage volcanoes. Yes, sausage volcanoes. They can randomly spawn at any given time and erupt sausages for five or so seconds, and the sausages explode where they land. Equally deadly to player and enemy alike.
  • Sometimes it'll rain gold coins for you, other times it'll rain balls of green fiery death for no reason.
  • For no explainable reason, enemies will spontaneously burst out of the ground at your feet, causing damage. The enemies can range from the mundane, like dune rats, to champion versions of tougher enemies later in the game, like lightning enhanced Jormungar worms.
• Samurai: The Samurai, naturally. The free outfit that comes with the DLC makes him look more a ninja (and is aptly named "Cyberpunk Ninja").
• Shout-Out: Many. So many.
  • The Marksman's selection quote is a variant of the infamous Arrow to the Knee meme.
  • Finding the Demonic Sheep artifact allows you access to a Secret Sheep Level, a homage to both the Cow Level and Whimsyshire of Diablo.
  • Two Artifacts you can find are Frostmourne and the Twin Blades of Azzimoth.
  • The Pyromancer's Hydra skill and the Orb of Fire relic summon a flaming hydra head that spits fireballs at his enemies.
  • The Collector's Edition of the DLC includes a free Cyborg Ninja head.
  • The Necromancer's Poison Nova skill and the Orb of Poison Relic fire a circular burst of tear-shaped green projectiles that poison enemies hit by them.
  • Full Health potions are a last resort source of life-saving healing, while health orbs that enemies drop periodically are your main source of healing.
  • The different difficulties are Normal, Nightmare, Hell, and Inferno.
  • One of the Redneck's wave victory lines is "All night long, all night long!"
  • There's an Champion Ice Elemental enemy that goes by the name Ancient Apparition.
• The Smurfette Principle: The Pirate is the only female class among the seven original classes from the base game.
• Superboss: Each Act boss has rarer, more powerful versions that have a chance to spawn instead of their normal versions. The strongest versions, which grant achievements when defeated, have a 1% chance of spawning.
• Took a Level in Badass:
  • The incredibly weak Blood Maggots were given a surprisingly powerful spit attack in the 1.1 patch.
  • The pink projectiles received a massive beef up in a May patch, now doing roughly half your health in damage.
• You Have Researched Breathing: You need a particular Relic (The Glove) in order to not raise other items you pick up into the air like a dumbass and leave yourself vulnerable.