As a lover of games that are just plain weird, and the developers who make them, I’m a fan of the bold folks at Messhof for clearly being focused on just doing their own thing. The iconically odd head-to-head fights of Nidhogg 2 may not have been for everyone, but the quick, violent, and pretty ridiculous bloody action it offered made for great fun with friends who like carrying on and simply having a good time. With Blood Dungeon they’ve made some significant strides towards making something with much more mainstream appeal, but there’s also no doubt that their strange sensibilities have been brought forward as well, making it a pretty memorable experience.

If you’re looking for a reductive elevator pitch that broadly describes the action, it would probably be a mix of some of the auto-fire roguelike upgrading of Vampire Survivors, with frantic side-scrolling platforming action, and weirdo sensibilities of a game like GoNNER as the cherry on top. You can play as either a naked (only covered by small censorship bars) male or female, a baby, wield the power of directed flatulence, and much more. All of that oddball energy is only surpassed by the rapid pace you’ll find yourself developing, getting adept at climbing on walls, ceilings, and dodging your way around all manner of enemies and their fire simply trying to stay alive.

Par for the course for this sort of affair, it’s absolutely a grind as you’ll need to do some work to unlock all of the weapons, skills, characters, and stages that you can play in, but honestly the bulk of it feels like it comes to you pretty quickly with some persistence. As you’d also expect, every run pretty well feels unique, even when playing as the same character, since which weapons and skills you’re presented with as options will end up dictating how things go, with the expectation that you’ll adapt or literally die trying. Now granted, the fast-paced action and bizarre goings-on may not be appealing to everyone, but I absolutely applaud any efforts that use great and addictive gameplay to encourage people to enjoy giving some time to their inner weirdo.