Dungeons of Dreadrock (PC) review "Hard to go wrong with it for the price, at least if you can deal with the action and timing elements"

I expected Dungeons of Dreadrock to be a nice little puzzle game that I'll be able to finish quickly, but after reading some reviews I had some concerns about the action elements, the required timing and reflexes, since even the hint system wasn't going to help with that, and I also wondered whether I could "manage" to mess up the connected puzzles in a manner that'd lead to getting locked out of continuing. So it was a relief when my concerns proved unfounded and I finished the game without ever using the hint system, the video driver's software claiming that it only took me six hours, though they were split over six days and the number surprised me when I saw it, since it definitely felt like it took longer.

If that sounded bad, let me assure you that I merely meant that I really didn't think that my playing sessions were so short and that, seeing as there are 100 levels, each of them took me only a few minutes, on average. And that would remain the case even if that timer's off by as much as a few hours. But what's more important is that I wanted more when I was done, and not just because I generally want to spend a significant amount of time with a game I choose to play and count requiring anything less than quite a few tens of hours to finish as a negative, but because I actually found it enjoyable and satisfying. Plus that the story, such as it is, couldn't just end there. And, indeed, it doesn't, the series apparently being planned as a trilogy and the sequel having already been released... Though it's unfortunately not DRM-free yet.
But that's another issue, so let me get back to this game and say that the bite-sized puzzles are generally just right, with only a few threatening to be potentially frustrating by requiring more than a matter of seconds to reach a trickier final part, while in the large majority of cases you don't really "feel" it even if you have to retry several times. And you also don't really feel the increase in complexity or difficulty, the features being introduced gradually, most of them being intuitive, and adequate explanations usually being provided in the remaining cases. So there shouldn't be more than a few moments when you'll find yourself at a loss, and the hint function is available if you do find yourself in such a situation. But, as I already mentioned, I never used it at all, not even to test it, so I can't say how helpful it actually is. What I can say, however, is that some features are pretty clever, those that involve connected levels probably being the most notable. And, perhaps more importantly, almost all of the solutions make sense and there are moments when the game will make you feel pretty clever for figuring things out on your own. Admittedly, there may also be moments when you'll feel pretty foolish for failing to do so sooner, and a few solutions that may be rather strange. Since they could be seen as spoilers, I won't give any examples, not even naming the one puzzle that I ended up solving by accident, just trying everything and then going to check a guide after it finally worked to find out just what I had actually done, but I will add that, at least in my case, the former far outweighed the latter. And I'll also add here that those dream sequences do their job well enough, both in terms of the story, such as it is, and providing hints.
As for those initial concerns, the fact that I never had good reaction times or coordination and they're definitely not getting any better as I get older did mean that the action and timing elements were an issue, and there were a couple of moments when I thought that there must be another solution because it didn't seem possible to actually do what seemed necessary, but I eventually managed to scrape by. So you can make it if your reactions and finger movements are a "normal" kind of poor, but if they're at a level that may or does indicate health problems, not to mention a disability, the only solution is probably activating the cheat mode and skipping levels. And that mode would also cover the worst case scenario of becoming unable to continue by messing something up in a level that's connected to another in a manner that couldn't be fixed normally. But I for one didn't happen to find myself in any such situation and those levels are typically designed to assume that you'll initially go for the easy or obvious solution of the first one, end up making the next one impossible as a result, and then go back and fix things. Sometimes that's possible right away, in a few cases it requires restarting that first level of the pair after returning to it, but you can always restart a level at will and it seems to always be possible to find the solution normally, without even resorting to using the load function that allows you to go back to any previously completed level. And yes, you'll clearly know when you may need to go back up because those are the only times when you can do so, a message stopping you otherwise.

Still, I'd have felt much more at ease if manual saving would have been allowed, and I'll always see it as a major negative aspect of a game, any game, when it's not. Yes, Dungeons of Dreadrock lets you reload previously completed levels if you wish, the cheat mode means that even if the save is lost or corrupted you can get back to where you were, and the short levels mean that you lose very little in case of a crash, power failure or immediate need to quit, but not allowing manual saving, in different slots, still shows a lack of respect for the player's time and doesn't allow multiple people to play the game on the same account, and needing to use the cheat mode because the one automatic save somehow got lost, corrupted or overwritten may be disappointing. And there's also the option to clear that save, and while it requires confirmation, it's not impossible that someone would accidentally activate it.
On the other hand, I can find few other faults. I mean, yes, the game is too short, it doesn't have much of a story, and the action and timing elements can prove difficult to manage even if you correctly figure out the solutions to the puzzles, but all of that is pretty much expected and should be known by those who look up a little information about the game before getting it, and the price is right for what it offers, especially considering the typical discount. There is the fact that you can't customize the controls, but there are very few of them. And I wonder if being unable to skip those logo videos is some sort of Unity thing. And another potential tiny niggle that has to do with starting the game is that, in case of the GOG.com version that I played, it attempts to connect to, or through, the Galaxy client even if it's not installed, leading to a pretty significant delay unless you add ", "auth_timeout": 1" in the GalaxyConfig.json file from the game's folder.

In short, if you know what you're signing up for and can deal with the action and timing elements at least to some passable extent, it's hard to go wrong with Dungeons of Dreadrock, especially when you can pick it up even for well under $1. It won't be memorable, even less so in terms of the story, but it provides 100 bite-sized levels of generally enjoyable and at times clever puzzles that will make you keep thinking "just one more level" while you play and leave you wanting more at the end. Just keep in mind that there's a single slot, used for automatic saving after each completed level...

Community review by Cavalary (September 24, 2025) A bio for this contributor is currently unavailable, but check back soon to see if that changes. If you are the author of this review, you can update your bio from the Settings page.