Gloomhaven is coming to PC as a roguelike dungeon-crawler

The best board game of all time – at least according to BoardGameGeek’s ratings system – is being turned into a computer game.

A PC version of Isaac Childres’ legacy Eurogame and RPG mash-up Gloomhaven has been officially confirmed to be in development by Flaming Fowl Studios.

If you’re wondering exactly how the team plans to bring the distinctive legacy aspects of the physical game to the digital world, know that Gloomhaven on PC won’t be a direct translation of the board game. Instead, Flaming Fowl describes the virtual edition as an ‘adaptation’ that ‘channels Gloomhaven’s quintessential spirit’, developed with the help of Childres.

One of the biggest changes is the introduction of randomly-generated dungeons for the player’s party of adventurers to crawl through, breaking away from the specific layouts detailed in Gloomhaven’s book of scenarios.

The game is said to be a roguelike, meaning that when characters die, they’re dead for good – presumably, if your whole party falls you’ll have to restart from the beginning, like other games in the genre.

The combat will at least be familiar to fans of Gloomhaven on the tabletop, utilising a hex-grid system and turn-based actions – no word on whether the game’s distinctive deck-based gameplay will remain intact, though.

What we do know is that players will be able to choose the characters in their party and customise them before each adventure, before being able to improve their skills and abilities after victories.

The PC game is only confirmed to have single player at the moment, with no hint at whether co-op multiplayer will eventually be added before – or after – its planned release into Early Access on Steam in the first few months of 2019.