Kingdoms of the Dump

Kingdoms of the Dump displays plenty of effort and ideas stemming from a unique premise. Combat tries something new, but ultimately feels like a complicated way of doing something routine, and the platforming bugs can irritate quickly. However, the heartwarming and remarkably designed party members and its world, with something new to see around every corner, make that irritation disappear quickly.

Purely off the charm of its setting, commitment to its motif, and a relatively fun combat system at its core, I can almost recommend Kingdoms of the Dump. Unfortunately, it just feels incredibly unpolished and undercooked. It’s littered (no pun intended) with incomplete sections, massive swaths of graphical issues, major design problems, and many bugs of the bad variety. The farther in I got, the less polished the game felt, such that by the final act I began to doubt if even the non-buggy parts were properly playtested. The story and characters also just don’t elevate the game past these issues. I had a share of fun despite navigating around these issues. There are plenty of cool ideas here. This game is an obvious love letter to the great JRPGs of old. Sadly, the handwriting of that love letter is very messy in a few too many places.

Kingdoms of the Dump is a wonderful RPG held back by some glaring technical issues. Despite this, it still stands tall among other indie RPG throwbacks over the last decade, deserving the attention of anyone looking for a cozy game to envelop themselves in this Winter.