>We’ve been trying to define “Roguelikes” based on what the game includes. Deep dungeons, random levels, cursed artifacts. But non-game genres aren’t define that way. Imagine trying to divvy up movie genres based on their components. This movie has a car, so it must be a car movie. No, but wait, it has guns also! It must be a guns movie! No, actually, it’s “The Godfather”, and it’s a drama movie. Or maybe it’s a crime movie, or a thriller, or even a Mafia movie. But it contains cars and guns, and it’s about drama and the Mafia. > >Roguelikes aren’t about dungeons. They’re not about text-based graphics, or random artifacts, or permadeath. > >Roguelikes are about complexity. > >Roguelikes are about handing you a set of pieces. Roguelikes say, hey, these simple parts, when put together in this fashion, will have this obvious effect. And then they hand you more pieces, and you get to figure out the best way to combine those pieces.