I stumbled onto Dark Quest 4 on Steam while looking for something that scratched the same itch as a tabletop dungeon crawl. Having played Baldur’s Gate 3 over and over several times, I was looking for something a bit more tactical. The graphics for Dark Quest 4 looked really interesting with its stylized dungeons and anime-like main characters, so I decided to give it a go. It just released in December but already has a big legion of players. It’s possible that many of those people have been with the series for quite some time.
As a newcomer, I was pleased to find a really detailed tutorial, something that many other titles seem to skip these days. The tutorial guides you through a small, multi-level dungeon where you will experience most of the kinds of monsters and hazards that you will find in future adventures, including combat encounters and traps. You are also shown what cards can do, how to collect money and other mechanics like how the skull on the side of the board works to help or hinder your progress.
As I played the tutorial, everything seemed very familiar. It turns out that the Dark Quest series is based on the HeroQuest board game. Now, for players unfamiliar with the roots of this kind of gameplay, HeroQuest was a beloved board game from the late 1980s and early 1990s that combined modular dungeons, turn-based movement, treasure hunting, traps, spells and monsters into an epic miniature-heavy adventure that often ended up taking most of an evening to complete. The original board game included over 70 miniatures to play with. Because of that, it was quite expensive. If someone in your RPG group owned a copy, you were pretty lucky. Dark Quest 4 captures much of that spirit. You travel slowly, one room at a time, as you explore a labyrinthine dungeon where every step could trigger treasure, traps or terror.
The core gameplay in Dark Quest 4, like in HeroQuest, is deceptively simple. Players control a party of adventurers, each with their own abilities, equipment and roles, and guide them through a series of increasingly elaborate dungeon maps. Movement, combat and exploration are all turn-based, which means you have time to think through your choices. Planning out how each of your heroes will move, including things like who is going to open a door to make room for someone else to charge through, is key to survival. You’ll open doors, search rooms for traps, loot treasure chests, fight skeletons and goblins, cast spells and manage your inventory all while trying to keep your party alive.
Despite the simplicity of the system, the dungeons themselves can be surprisingly deep and challenging. Design veterans will recognize familiar trappings like narrow corridors that funnel enemies into choke points, secret rooms tucked behind illusionary walls, pressure plates that trigger poisoned darts and halls filled with wandering monsters just waiting to ambush you. The simplicity of the core ruleset is precisely what allows Dark Quest 4 to support these larger, more ambitious dungeon designs without feeling bloated or overcomplicated.
Combat is turn-based and tactical, with each character having a limited number of actions. You’ll need to position melee fighters where they can protect squishier spellcasters, decide when to heal and when to pursue fleeing enemies, and choose between offensive and defensive spells depending on the circumstances. Hardcore RPG fans might find this system straightforward, but there’s enough nuance here—especially when enemies have resistances, status effects or unique abilities—to make each encounter feel meaningful.
There’s also a satisfying layer of character progression. You can equip weapons and armor you find in chests, buy new gear with gold from defeated foes and level up your characters to unlock new abilities or to improve existing ones. The inventory management is familiar to anyone who’s played other dungeon crawlers. You’ll often juggle potions, scrolls and limited-use items to eke out every advantage you can.
Graphically, Dark Quest 4 evokes the look and feel of classic tabletop RPGs brought to life as a digital experience. The art style isn’t cutting-edge, but it does convey the mood of a dark, monster-infested maze effectively. Maps are clear and readable, character sprites are distinct enough to tell at a glance, and the UI largely gets out of your way once you’ve learned the basics. Ambient sound and music provide a light bit of atmosphere without ever becoming distracting. There are even a few special things the developers toss in from time to time. For example, over the holidays you could play on snowy-looking tiles which was both festive and seasonal. It seems like the developer Brain Seal is constantly working on both improvements and new content.
There are plenty of quests to tackle in Dark Quest 4, and each new area introduces fresh challenges. I found the difficulty curve to be fair but occasionally spiky, much like the random ambushes and unexpected traps you might encounter around a pen and paper Dungeons and Dragons session. There were moments that reminded me of sitting around a table with friends, rolling dice, hoping for crits and groaning at the critical misses. Darn those low rolls!
If there’s any real criticism to be made, it’s that Dark Quest 4’s simplicity, while part of its charm, occasionally makes the pacing feel slow. A few of the quests and side objectives can feel repetitive after a while, and players used to more narrative-driven RPGs might find themselves wishing for larger story beats or deeper character arcs. But for players who enjoy the crawl more than the plot, that won’t be a deal-breaker.
Ultimately, Dark Quest 4 delivers a cozy, classic dungeon crawl with a surprisingly robust set of features for its price point. Its homage to HeroQuest-style exploration will appeal to both fans of old tabletop games and players who appreciate turn-based tactical RPGs that let you take your time and plan your moves carefully.
At a time when many modern RPGs are trying to be bigger, flashier and more cinematic, Dark Quest 4 is content to just be fun. And in that sense, it delivers exactly what it promises: a satisfying dungeon-delving adventure that’s easy to jump into and hard to put down.