Everyone needs a chance to escape the doldrums of life on occasion to refresh and re-find themselves physically, mentally, and emotionally. For some, this could mean taking a trip to a whole different environment and possibly discovering a new course for their life. For many, that’s one of the reasons we love video games, which transport us to another reality, allowing us to escape the grind of real life when time and money don’t add up to a lavish vacation. In Dungeons of Hinterberg, Luisa is just like us, wanting to escape the daily grind of work and retreat to the mountains to search for adventure in a quaint resort town.
If you regularly browse RPGFan, you probably find slaying monsters to be pretty fun, and it’s something Luisa discovers she not only enjoys but thrives at. The small Austrian town of Hinterberg has discovered the namesake dungeons and turned them into a grand tourist industry, providing excursions for patrons to explore cavernous areas and fight monsters as if they’re retreating into a real-life video game. The portals to the dungeons are even suspiciously shaped like smartphones. Luisa receives assurance the monsters aren’t sentient, so no guilt! It’s just a chance to unwind by hitting something.
Dungeons of Hinterberg immediately feels Zelda-like, with large, open areas to explore, puzzly dungeons to solve, and action-oriented combat. The Legend of Zelda is the most straightforward comparison, especially Ocarina of Time and its successors. Despite the light fantasy elements, the story is firmly set in a recognizably modern world, where influencers visit the town to boost their social media presence, and the town greets guests by providing all the comforts of home and trendy conveniences for their stay. The game also takes obvious inspiration from Persona, as you make friends with people around town — from other visitors to permanent residents — and boosting your social links with them amounts to bonuses for you. There are many homages to other video games as you explore the world because Dungeons of Hinterberg recognizes and emphasizes the joy of playing.
If it wasn’t evident from the title, the dungeons are the main draw of Dungeons of Hinterberg. The pamphlets advertise 25 dungeons to hack and slash your way through. To get to those dungeons, you must first traverse one of the four larger areas to find them. Next, you need magic that’s specific to each area. Once you reach those dungeons, you have to navigate a combination of enemies and puzzles to complete them and get a stamp for your book to symbolize your triumph. Not all areas are snowy; only one is winter-themed, but it feels like a resort prodding visitors to the challenge of trying to ski down all the slopes or seeing all the sights as a scavenger hunt.
The dungeons aren’t all in caverns. Many appear to be in some weird alternate reality with purple skies and strange globular growths. The magic of Dungeons of Hinterberg is in using spells to make your way through these bizarre obstacle courses. In one area, you have the ability to create jelly blocks, and in another, you have a grappling hook-like skill that can pull heavy objects. Dungeons of Hinterberg gets a lot of mileage — or forces you to — out of area-specific spells, stretching your skill and creativity to their limits. There are the typical light mazes and logic puzzles, but also some wilder ones that force you to think outside the box, tailored specifically to your spells. Though I mostly loved the puzzles, some solutions I found to be a bit janky. It’s beautiful how thought-provoking the dungeons are in presenting otherworldly visuals combined with puzzles without becoming too disorienting. Again, you might recognize sequences that resemble other video games, from rollercoaster-like mine cart rides to rafting down a river with attackers on all sides.
The combat is not bad, though it’s merely riding shotgun as the imaginative puzzles drive the game. While fighting feels too simple at first, it gets better as you progress, to the point where the number of enemies the game throws at you pushes you to utilize every tool at your disposal. This is no Souls-like, though, and I rarely lost a battle on the normal difficulty. Initially, you only have a strong and weak attack, which you can combo with a basic roll as your only defense. As you gain special abilities — or Attack Conduits — it becomes more engaging to put those skills to use rather than just mashing buttons. Some of the Conduits are powerful to the point where it feels like the game is playing itself, though they’re on a cooldown timer, so you have to figure out on your own how to survive enemy attacks while they’re recharging. There’s only a handful of bosses, but they are pretty memorable, though they also aren’t as tough to dispatch as their menacing appearance would have you believe.
Narratively, Dungeons of Hinterberg is no grand fantasy despite drawing so much inspiration from Zelda. Instead, it’s a lightly compelling, relatively grounded tale of a young woman rediscovering her zeal for life after dwelling too long in a soul-sucking office job. Of course, it’s strange that dungeons with complementary monsters would conveniently appear out of nowhere, and you eventually learn that Hinterberg is not the only place in the world with them. Some former tourists have even made careers as professional slayers. As Luisa becomes more adept at slaying, she finds that all may not be above board in Hinterberg, with darkness seeping through the cracks in its veneer of trendy sterility. While it has its poignant moments, the story is generally on the lighter side. Though it’s not a sweeping, world-hopping epic, uncovering the town’s mysteries has its pull. As thoughtful as the story is, however, the modern setting also feels a little cold and sterile in comparison to imaginative fantasy worlds.
As compelling as the main story are the lives of Hinterberg’s denizens. Sure, making friends unlocks bonuses like transcendent equipment, the ability to open locked chests, and even new aspects of combat. But they also build a fuller picture of the narrative and Dungeons of Hinterberg‘s world. There is a dog you cannot only pet but also name, and of course, he’s a good boy. While some have experienced journeys of self-discovery similar to Luisa’s, the town’s permanent residents, who were there before the dungeons even appeared, are generally less enthused about the area’s new popularity. As much as this is a tale of self-actualization, it also considers the generally exploitative nature of tourism, which can be life-affirming for some yet draining for others, affecting people in various stages of life in different ways.
It might sound odd as an homage to video games, but the NieR series makes a solid comparison to Dungeons of Hinterberg. In terms of setting, they’re vast opposites. But they aren’t too different in setting a melancholy, contemplative mood. The many representations of other game styles, especially other RPGs, in this title make it an update of sorts to part of NieR’s essence. Being partly a mash-up of Zelda and Persona, Dungeons of Hinterberg is slyly self-aware of its own meta. Even if you aren’t in the loop about every RPG from the last decade, Dungeons of Hinterberg still comes off as an eclectic mix of action. If you are an avid follower of relatively modern video games, these references make for a fun celebration of a favorite pastime.
The gorgeous visuals raise the entire experience with a hand-drawn look that skirts the line between realism and surrealism. The psychedelic way clouds form and break apart as you move the camera contrasts with the grounded feel of Luisa’s unassuming look, rocking that puffy turquoise jacket that the cool kids would have worn in the ’90s. The monsters straddle the line between goofy and creepy, many with goat faces and exaggerated flailing limbs. Everything about the setting fits the vision of an idyllic tourist town, from the swooping hillside that descends into a pristine blue lake to the trendy megastores seated next to small-time local businesses. The animation is less detailed and simpler, and many characters use the same walking motion — slightly downturned head with a little confident strut. On the other hand, battles are beautiful kinetic explosions of color.
The music is mostly ambient, and though not particularly original, it’s suitable for setting a contemplative mood. The sound effects help bring dungeons to life as much as the visuals do, with the gooey schlooping sounds of sliding jelly blocks or the grinding of stone against stone. It doesn’t break the game, but the controls could have been sharper. Riding the hoverboard in the wintry area is a blast, but steering it is a pain, never mind being required to aim a spell simultaneously.
Dungeons of Hinterberg is a celebration of recreation and an assertion that video games can be not only a fun escape but a chance to dream of something outside of our routine spheres of life. It’s wonderfully imaginative, beautiful, and sometimes trippy to look at, and it is thoughtful about its subject matter. If you need a break from life, Dungeons of Hinterberg is here for your slaying needs.
