The bandits that killed me outside a mysterious cave had moved on by the time my second Wayfarer took up the Staff. Though the overworld map stays the same, the layout, enemies, and challenges found in each individual area I explore change. Alliances between clans strengthen or dissolve, and new quests replace old ones. During those intervening years, I watch in fast-forward as the Empire's influence creeps across the continent, corrupting the land and making the journey more dangerous. Each death moves the clock forward a few years until the next Wayfarer rises up to complete this sacred task. I still have to make a new character each time I die, but the world doesn't reset and randomize itself. Unlike other roguelikes, my attempts to destroy the Staff of Yendor don't happen in a vacuum. Unexplored 2 asks "What if Frodo and the Fellowship all died on their way to Mordor?" and then builds a complex simulation to play out that scenario again and again. Wes once described the original Unexplored as "quietly revolutionary" and the same can be said of Unexplored 2-except for very different and much more ambitious reasons. Unexplored 2 has wormed its way into my brain like few other games this year.
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