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Dungeon Automata combines classic dungeon crawling, programmable golems, and hands-off battles in a strategy RPG arriving January 26, 2027.
A New Name for a Very Different Dungeon Crawl
Dungeon Automata doesn’t ask you to swing a sword every few seconds. Instead, it asks a more mischievous question: what if you designed the adventuring party, wrote its marching orders, and then had to live with the consequences?
That unusual idea has now received a firm release date. Medium-Rare Games’ dungeon RPG is scheduled to launch on January 26, 2027, following a partnership with publisher Raw Fury and a Western name change from Algolemeth to Dungeon Automata.
The new title fits the game’s central concept rather neatly. This isn’t simply a dungeon crawler with mechanical characters sprinkled on top. The entire adventure revolves around building a party of AI golems, assigning their roles, preparing their equipment, and watching them attempt to survive the dangers ahead.
At first glance, that sounded to me like a standard auto-battler wearing an old-school RPG costume. After looking more closely, I’m not so sure. The exploration system appears to be just as important as the combat, which gives Dungeon Automata a more intriguing identity than the usual “set up a team and watch numbers go up” formula.
A Wizardry-Style RPG With the Fighting Taken Out of Your Hands
The game draws from the traditions of classic dungeon RPGs such as Wizardry and Ultima. That means dangerous labyrinths, carefully assembled parties, hard-earned upgrades, and the faint suspicion that every unopened door is personally offended by your confidence.
The difference is that players take the role of an alchemist rather than a conventional hero. Their task is to create and manage a team of golems capable of venturing into the dungeon, defeating enemies, and bringing back valuable rewards.
Before each expedition, the player handles the strategic work. That includes:
- Forming a balanced party of golems
- Assigning specific roles within the group
- Equipping parts collected during earlier runs
- Establishing commands and behavior patterns
- Preparing the team for the hazards expected inside the dungeon
Once the party has been sent out, direct control largely disappears. You don’t dash across the battlefield to rescue a careless companion. You don’t pause every two seconds to issue another command. You watch, study the results, and decide what needs to change before the next attempt.
That structure gives the game a distinctly old-fashioned flavor, even though its automated systems feel modern. Classic dungeon crawlers often demanded careful preparation, but Dungeon Automata pushes that preparation to the front of the experience. The adventure begins before the party ever enters the maze.
The Real Battle Happens Before the Door Opens
This is where the auto-battler influence becomes most obvious. The challenge isn’t necessarily reacting quickly; it’s understanding why a plan worked or failed.
Did one golem lack the right defensive parts? Was the group too heavily focused on offense? Did the party’s instructions create an awkward chain of decisions once the situation became messy? The game seems designed around those post-run questions.
There’s something appealing about that loop. You send a team into danger, observe the outcome, identify the weak link, and rebuild the party with a little more wisdom and perhaps a little less optimism. It’s the sort of design that can make a failed expedition feel useful rather than merely punishing.
Still, the hands-off combat may not appeal to everyone. Players who enjoy the immediate satisfaction of landing a perfectly timed attack could find the spectator role frustrating. Dungeon Automata seems to want patience, analysis, and a willingness to let a plan play out—even when that plan is visibly making a terrible mess of things.
I initially worried that watching automated characters fight would feel detached. My impression changed when I considered how much of the game’s personality comes from preparation. The golems aren’t just units on a grid; they’re the result of choices, experiments, and previous failures. When a carefully built party finally performs well, the reward should come from understanding the system rather than merely overpowering it.
A Project Built Around One Persistent Idea
The concept began in 2021, after the developer wondered whether the logic behind an adventure could be designed rather than directly controlled.
The idea reportedly came while playing a dungeon RPG. Instead of managing only the battles, the developer imagined leaving exploration and return trips to a system created by the player. That curiosity became the foundation for the project.
That origin matters because Dungeon Automata doesn’t sound like a collection of fashionable mechanics assembled in a meeting room. Its systems appear to grow from one clear question: can a player experience the satisfaction of designing an adventuring routine and then observing how it behaves in the wild?
The developer had previously worked outside the games industry before leaving that job to concentrate on game development. The project also went through a difficult period, with the team questioning whether it could reach the desired result. Rather than abandoning the idea, development continued as a deeply personal final attempt to create the kind of game the developer genuinely wanted to play.
That personal angle comes through in the design. Dungeon Automata’s most unusual feature isn’t there simply to make the game stand out in a crowded market. It seems to exist because the developer wanted to experience this particular style of dungeon adventure firsthand.
A Community Helped Shape the Dungeon
A clever idea can remain locked in a developer’s head unless players get the chance to push against it. Dungeon Automata was shown at exhibitions, where people could play early versions and offer feedback.
Those reactions helped guide the game’s development. The project gradually changed as players interacted with its systems, tested its assumptions, and revealed which parts of the concept were immediately understandable—and which needed more work.
That exhibition history is encouraging, although it also leaves one question hanging in the air: how well will the game explain itself to players sitting alone at home? A show-floor demo benefits from nearby people who can clarify a mechanic or point out where the fun begins. A full release has to communicate that through menus, tutorials, and carefully paced systems.
I’m uncertain whether Dungeon Automata will make its deeper strategy immediately readable. Its appeal may not be obvious in the first few minutes, especially for players expecting a traditional dungeon crawler. Yet that slight barrier could also be part of its charm. Some games hand over their tricks at the front door. Others make you rummage around in the basement until you find the fuse box.
Recognition Before Release
The project has already received attention from the independent game-development community. Dungeon Automata was nominated for Best Game Design at BitSummit Let’s GO!! 2023 and previously won Bandai Namco’s second GYAAR Studio Indie Game Contest.
Those honors make sense given the game’s unusual structure. Its hook isn’t simply an art style or a familiar genre label. It’s the relationship between preparation, automation, and observation. The design asks players to become part strategist, part systems engineer, and part patient dungeon supervisor.
The soundtrack is another notable part of the package. Industry veteran Yuzo Koshiro is contributing the music, adding a recognizable name to a project that already carries strong retro-RPG DNA. His involvement seems especially fitting here. Dungeon Automata is looking backward toward classic dungeon adventures while using automation and simulation to create something that those older games couldn’t quite offer.
The game will launch with support for seven languages: English, Japanese, Simplified Chinese, Spanish, German, French, and Korean. The development team is currently making final adjustments ahead of release, suggesting that the broad concept is settled and the remaining work is focused on polish.
Why Dungeon Automata Could Stand Out
The best thing about Dungeon Automata is also its biggest gamble. It removes much of the direct action that usually makes an RPG feel immediately engaging, then asks the player to care about preparation, prediction, and incremental improvement instead.
That can sound dry on paper. In practice, it may produce the same strange satisfaction found in tuning an old machine until every part works together. The fun is not necessarily in watching one battle. It’s in recognizing that a small change to a role, command, or component altered the outcome of the entire expedition.
There are reasons to remain cautious. Automated combat can become repetitive if the available decisions are shallow, and dungeon exploration may lose its tension if the player feels like a passenger. I can’t yet say how deep the systems will become over a full campaign. But the central idea is strong enough to earn attention, especially for players who enjoy seeing a plan succeed—or fail in a revealing way.
Dungeon Automata is scheduled for January 26, 2027, and the development team is encouraging interested players to add it to their wishlists before launch.
Dungeon Automata looks poised to turn the familiar dungeon crawl into a laboratory for strategy. You won’t be the warrior charging into every room; you’ll be the alchemist behind the curtain, building a team, setting its logic, and hoping the machines don’t interpret your brilliant plan in the worst possible way. Would you trust your own golems to make it through the dungeon?
FAQ
- What is Dungeon Automata?
Dungeon Automata is a dungeon-crawling strategy RPG in which players create teams of AI golems, assign their roles, equip them with parts, and establish commands before sending them into dangerous expeditions. - When will Dungeon Automata be released?
The game is scheduled to launch on January 26, 2027. - How does combat work in Dungeon Automata?
Players prepare their party and instructions before an expedition. Once the team enters the dungeon, the action plays out automatically, allowing players to study the results and adjust their strategy for future runs. - What inspired Dungeon Automata’s design?
The project grew from the idea of automating not only battles but also dungeon exploration and return trips through player-designed logic. - Who is composing the music?
Veteran game composer Yuzo Koshiro is providing the music for Dungeon Automata.
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