Zavix Tower Review | First-person Dungeon Crawler RPG

"First person perspective computer games tend to be strongly associated with the shooter genre, some of the most iconic games in history have been first person shooters however, the first person perspective was initially used, in the realm of computer games, by the RPG genre, these being the first person dungeon crawlers of old, things like Akalabeth: World of Doom - the precursor to the Ultima series or the Dungeon Master and the Eye of the Beholder series. 

This long-forgotten approach to making RPGs has been recently dusted off by several small indie developers from around the world, and this has resulted in absolutely stunning titles such as Legend of Grimrock and Paper Sorcerer.

Zavix Tower takes several pages out of that design approach book and adds a couple of modern gameplay mechanics to the mix, so let’s see the result.

Zavix Tower is a first-person real-time role-playing dungeon crawler with turn-based combat built around the idea of a magical tower with an infinite number of floors that requires constant cleansing by a party of adventurers.
And from a visual and conceptual stand-point, Zavix Tower fits perfectly into that category or genre but whilst exploring the floors upon floors of the Tower, I just could not shake the very World of Warcraft-esque feel, that the game imparts.

From the sort-of daily quests that you can take before going on a tower adventure to the approach of categorizing item rarity - playing Zavix Tower created a more WoW-esque feeling in my gamer gut than a feeling associated with playing a classic of the genre, say like Anvil of Dawn or Ultima Underworld. 

Not to mention that the 3D models used seem to be visually inspired more by WoW than let’s say DnD, but hey, if you’re going to be inspired by something, be inspired by the best.

The game doesn’t spend a lot of time in setting up a grand story, it gives a quick overview of the world that this is taking place in and mentions some larger machinations at play but it doesn’t spend a lot of time on them. And honestly, it isn’t even a requirement considering the type of pick-up-and play approach the game is built around.
In Zavix Tower you’re basically playing a group of mercenaries who are in it exclusively for the loot. No grand, operatic reason for their adventuring, no epic goal they’re going for, simply clearing floor after floor of mobs and getting stronger and better loot as they climb. And honestly, sometimes that’s just what the Healer orders.

The more you advance within the tower the more difficult the mobs get, in the sense there’s more of them and they have more life and damage output. I’ve only seen a rather limited number of mobs but I do think that they’ll continue adding more and more models as they continue refining the game. You also tend to discover more mobs as you go higher into the tower, so it might just be that I haven’t made it high enough yet.

Gameplay tips
There are two types of currency in the game - which you gain by selling items, exploring the floors and completing quests.

You will spend these resources to either upgrade your items, create new ones, teach your characters new abilities or indeed upgrade various other parts of the game world, such as your inventory space and adding some new features to the already-existing locations around the town map.

This last part is a very interesting addition to the basic first-person dungeon crawler recipe since it provides you with several money sinks and different ways of upgrading your party. Of course, you need to make sure that your party is clad in the best armor and has the most capable weapons possible, but you can also save some money so that you can have a wider choice of hiring other party members, as well as access to increasingly powerful character abilities.
There are no mana and health potions in the game, so healing will be done mostly by your Priest or Priests, and as a general advice for all character classes, make sure you use your mana sparingly because - at least at the beginning you might be inclined to spam your mana-using special abilities and then find yourself in a bit of a mana hole for the rest of your adventure.

This is a game where I suggest looking into and investing in the various passive talents that each class has, especially those related to mana regeneration.

And since I mentioned talents, this was another reason for my World of Warcraft flashbacks, it’s true that talent trees are a rather traditional aspect of gameplay mechanics but in the video game world, they are strongly associated with Blizzard creations, or at least, I associate them as such, either way, you can experiment with a lot of different builds since you can have at least 4 members in your party at any one time. Suffice to say, it would be a great idea to take the time and look into the various possibilities that the talent trees offer.

Also, there are a total of 8 character slots in your party, so there’s a lot of permutations and variations that you can try, as you gain more money and climb further into the Tower.

Needed Improvements
It does need some additions to make the experience a bit smoother, especially when it comes to item management, which usually is one of my favorite parts of RPGs, unless it’s poorly designed.

At the current time there is no way to filter through your various items: armor, boots, weapons everything gets thrown together in your bag. So once your inventory starts to fill up, it becomes very time consuming and rather annoying to go through each item, look at the various stats, and see on which character it might work. This wouldn’t be that annoying of a problem either, but considering the type of game we’re dealing with, you’ll be finding a bunch of items while clearing floors.

Filtering items by type would make that entire process faster because you’d at least get to compare ALL your gear of one type with what’s already equipped equipped. Having a suggestion of class attached to each item wouldn’t be a bad idea either, as well as adding a “Sell All” button.

Conclusion Tower
I need to make it clear that Zavix Tower isn’t aimed at those looking for an intriguing plot or immersive storyline, it is definitely aimed at the more casual, kicking-down-the-door type of RPG player.

And to be honest, I am sometimes in exactly that type of mood, Zavix Tower definitely goes into the category of casual-type RPGs that I’ve been featuring on my channel like Dungeon Rushers, Guild of Dungeoneering and The Book of Demons.

So in case you are looking for that more casual approach to first-person dungeon crawling, something that you can simply get into for half-an-hour and then continue with the rest of your day, then I totally suggest getting this title. Especially when it’s on sale.

And that’s about it, thanks for watching this video and I hope you found it informative.  

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