Please stab, toast and devour the demo for the disgusting mushroom RPG Shroom And Gloom

Today Nic did me a great injustice by dismissing my suggestion to write about Shroom And Gloom because “I want to read how you describe mushrooms in interesting ways”. Nic, I can't think of any interesting ways to describe mushrooms at the moment. I used up all the mushroom knowledge I've ever gained from real life collecting when I wrote about Morels 2 and I spent most of this article whining about unicorns. The best I can say about Shroom And Gloom is to say that these mushrooms look very grim indeed, possibly because some crazy human wandered into their burrow and is now stabbing and eating them.

The aforementioned mad human (that's your character, yes) doesn't even bother murdering the mushroom people before feasting on their slaughtered brethren. Kill a mushroom with a fireball, and you make the corpse “toasty” enough to consume. You stuff the stubby, singed body into your mouth while slicing up another mushroom with a wavy dagger. If this were a real collecting expedition, you'd at least want to count the spots and gills before sinking your teeth into it.

Find a fleshy prototype for Shroom And Gloom on Itch.io. It definitely has atmosphere, with a dirty 3D parchment world made up of awkwardly convoluted 2D rocks and vegetation. Moving along the branching path feels like crawling through someone's intestines. Someone who's eaten a lot of mushrooms and treasure chests. Gangs of belligerent toadstools appear at intervals, ranging from tiny, er… consult Usborne Spotter's Guide – From puffballs to angry stinkhorns. Is that interesting yet, Nic? When I wrote for Edge, they'd cut my commission in half if I called something “interesting.” It was one of those forbidden Edge words, like “wowza” and “ginormous.”

You massacre the mycelium, the traditional enemy of the fungus, with ability cards. After 20 minutes with the demo, the card combat is notable for a couple of reasons: first, the lack of conventional healing abilities in combat means you'll want to devour at least half of the enemies you kill, and second, there's a “mood system” that lets you generate cards for “suppressed anger,” “impatience,” and other mood states, unlocking buffs and special attacks. Yes, this is a game where victory can be achieved by tactically driving yourself mad. In addition to your combat deck, you have an exploration deck of cards that includes various types of lockpicks and shovels. I say “lockpicks”—one of the “lockpicks” is the ability to vomit caustic slime. Ah, if only Thief's Garrett had thought of that.

“Our dream version of this game includes hundreds of maps, deep meta-progression, and tons of unique enemies spread across a dense network of caves and tunnels to explore!” explains development team Lazerbeam, funded by Anger Foot and Terra Nil developers Free Lives. “This prototype offers a taste of what that experience could look like.”

“We shot for the stars with what we tried to cram into this prototype over three months of development, and we're really proud of what we managed to accomplish,” the blurb continues. “That being said, please note that this is a prototype. Expect rough edges and a few quirks. Remember, this is all a work in progress.” I hope they make it to the end, because Shroom And Gloom is my kind of desperately gloom. One of the late-game map options lets you turn mushrooms into soup. I wonder if we'll hear mushrooms scream. That would be interesting.