What is Dungeonomics?

Dungeonomics is a 2D tycoon-dungeon-management game taking place in a corporate-dungeon space, where the player will build their dungeon, hire monsters to staff their dungeon, and manage their monstrous staff to make sure they're doing what monsters do best: killing heroes for a profit.

Gameplay

Moment-to-moment gameplay is about monitoring ones resources. As the game plays out, the player will be tasked with keeping their eyes on how their employees are doing during the workday, making sure combat is going smoothly within their dungeon, keeping tabs on the constant flow of Monster Applications, and building/upgrading their dungeon to make sure everything is working at maximum efficiency. The focus of the game is less on direct combat, as the combat happens automatically if monsters are staffed in rooms, so the focus is more on the player's management of their given resources and monitoring interactions, as well as interviewing monsters.

What makes Dungeonomics unique in the genre is our focus on the employees of the dungeon. Monsters can have a variety of different traits and not all of them work well together. The player has to not only make sure their monsters are working as effectively as possible, they should try to hire the best monster for the job. Interviewing plays out like an RPG conversation system where the player will be able to choose from a list of questions to ask the monster. The answers will lead to fun responses that allude to monsters' combat stats and traits, leaving the exacts up to the player's interpretation. However, interviewing is also an investment of time; the more time the player spends with a monster, the more they learn about them. As time is spent, monsters disappear from the interview pool while the dungeon runs in the background. The interview process and trait interactions reinforce Dungeonomics' resource-management based gameplay, while making the player think critically about how to use their staff members most effectively.

For a more in depth look at these gameplay mechanics, see:

• Core Loops
• Hiring

Player Experience

In Dungeonomics, the player takes the role of a monster who has worked in a dungeon their entire life, and now wants to strike out on their own. The player will build their own dungeon from the ground up, and establish their business as the most fearsome dungeon in all the land; and make a killing while they're at it.

The core experience we want players to have playing Dungeonomics is that of a business manager and dungeon overseer. To fulfill this goal, we've designed the gameplay around micro-managing resources: gold, space, staff, and most importantly, time. The player will be building up their dungeon, interviewing incoming monsters, and overseeing their employees progress over the course of the game. This process immerses the player in the progress of their dungeon's growth, along with giving them a more personal understanding of the employees that they're hiring. Since the focus is more on managing resources and making sure employees are working effectively rather than on combat, the player will feel more like a boss rather than another minion scraping gold from dead heroes.

More on Progression and Player Goals

Visual Style

Dungeonomics will have a pixel-art style, that's cartoony to a degree, but not entirely unserious. For reference, we're hoping for a style similar to Rogue Legacy and Boss Monster, pictured below.

For examples of concept art created for the game so far, see Art & Sound.

Target Audience and Monetization

We are targeting fans of fantasy, light-strategy, and Tycoon games. We're also aiming for players who are fans of longer play sessions, so we're designing our game for the PC audience with this in mind. Our target age range likely delves into an older audience.

We're aiming for a price point of $9.99. We kept our competition in mind when determining pricing, as our competition is either primarily free to play with micro-transactions, or around AA to AAA price-ranges.