Dungeons of Hinterberg was revealed at Summer Games Fest and it was one of the games on the Xbox Games Showcase that caught my attention. I was ecstatic to see it at PAX West and while my colleague Diego played through the hands-on demo, I was able to gather some very important takeaways from our brief time with the game.
The reveal trailer showcases a bit of what’s to come in the demo itself, there’s exploration, combat, puzzles, and even a social sim aspect to Dungeons of Hinterberg that’s wrapped in the small Alpine town. The demo provides a sample of each of these chopped up into its day and night cycle. You’ll explore one of the 4 biomes and 25 dungeons, as we saw a small section of an earlier part of the game that gets you a quick taste.
The game centers around Luisa, a burnt-out lawyer looking for a respite from the corporate world in the small ski resort town of Hinterberg. From there, magic starts enveloping the town and surrounding areas and Luisa takes the challenge head-on to figure out what the heck is happening. Developer Microbird Games took real-life inspiration from its own Austrian homeland and mixed in a cel-shaded, comic book art style on top.
We started our day exploring a rocky environment and fighting some enemies which gave us a sense of how the combat plays. It was fairly straightforward with basic heavy and light attacks, dodge rolls, and spells like a meteor attack that rains down on enemies in the area.
Once we enter the dungeon, it’s clear this is where Dungeons of Hinterberg’s strengths lie. The exploration was more intriguing to me as Luisa uses her powers to solve puzzles whether using a summoned wrecking ball to use as a weight or to destroy rocks to find hidden treasures. There was a section involving a minecart and figuring out how to navigate the different tracks to progress that I found neat. My only gripe is that the climbing could use a bit more work and I would’ve appreciated faster-paced movement like Uncharted’s platforming.
The demo ends with a night in the alpine town where we can wander around and interact with the citizens. The social sim aspects after a long day of exploration and dungeon-ing were appreciated as players can focus on building relationships and gaining additional stats down the line to unlock more difficult quests.
The small sample I had with Dungeons of Hinterberg tells me there are still more mysteries to uncover. Dungeons of Hinterberg releases on Xbox Series X/S and PC in 2024.
