Rusty Axe's Skills Aren't Too Rusty

Have you ever played a game and realized just how fun it is? We've recently been taken back to our roots with Dungeon Brawl and Dungeon Demon, two games made by Rusty Axe Games.  Not only did we nostalgia, but we even got to see an awesome program that lets you create the game.  How bad ass is that, right?


Dungeon Demon is an amazing bundle of a product that allows you to create the Role-Playing Game you've always wanted to make. With a huge number of royalty-free art packs, you are able to jump into your story with no holds barred.  All that limits you is your mind.

The top-down graphics-oriented program allows you to create maps for your characters to traverse through.  You can create something bigger than this world if you wanted to.  Build layer upon layer until you have whatever level you desire.  Explore your mind so your characters can explore the world around them.

Rusty Axe didn't stop at just creating a program, though.  Lennard from Rusty Axe actually went forth and created a game from his program, titled Dungeon Brawl. Dungeon Brawl has us remembering some of our favorite RPGs, including Baldur's Gate and Diablo for starters.  It's got that old school fun feel to it, reminiscent of those older RPGs we love so much.

Swinging your axe, using magic, collecting loot.  Not to mention owning monsters like a BOSS.  We love the sound effects and music, and the difficulty level is damn great.  It's easy to start up, but it puts up a hard challenge when you get going.  If you die, that's it.  Yep, you have to begin again; it brings me back to my gaming roots.

Lennard, being the awesome guy he is, allowed us to do a small interview with him!   We asked him a lot about game development and he even told us some of his favorite games.  Check it out!

What got you into game development?

We had Apple II's in the computer lab in high school (circa 1982) and free access to the machines at lunch and after school.  Instant boot to Applesoft was an amazing thing in this geeks high school years and the 6502 was a great chip to learn assembler on.

Was it harder to make Dungeon Demon or Dungeon Brawl? How many hours did you put into each?

DB took me about 6 months.  It wasn't a particularly hard product to make other than the part where I switched from Javascript to Flash one month in and didn't know Actionscript 3 when I did so.  Dungeon Demon - my RPG map editor - was started when I was working on Real Estate Empire 2.  I had previously talked to the folks at Dundjinni about re-writing their editor but we could never see eye to eye on feature set and how things should work.  But I've always wanted to make an RPG map editor so when REE 2 was finished and I had half the parts lying around - or so I thought - and thought it wouldn't take that long to put out a cool map editor of my own.  I was wrong about the number of hours it would take - I put about another seven months into the basic release and then maybe another five months this year into the version 1.1 upgrade.  I have since put in a few more weeks, maybe a month, on version 1.2 and expect to put in another month or two soon to do a new release in late Winter.

Dungeon Brawl is reminiscent of some of my favorite games: Baldur’s Gate and Diablo. What are some of your favorite Hack N’ Slash RPGs?

Gauntlet in the arcades!

I had ridiculous fun playing Dungeon Brawl, and would love to play it on the go. Is there any chance that an app port could come in the future?

Not likely.  I don't know how to do the proper business spin thing here but... as much as I like Dungeon Brawl, it has been a complete commercial failure.  For whatever reason nobody plays the game and decides to upgrade to the premium package.  I played it again recently and enjoyed myself but you and I seem to be in the minority.  C'est la vie, sometimes you have to let things go.

What brought up the innovative death feature in Dungeon Brawl? I absolutely love the challenge of knowing that if I die I need to start from the beginning.

I'm really old school and figure that death should have some teeth to it.  That said there is resurrection and, hey, if you really want to keep playing you could buy the premium version which would start you with 1000 gold so you could get a bunch of resurrects with that.

Is there an end? I only got up to the third level before I died ha ha! My Hack N’ Slash skills are rather rusty (pun intended.)

Yes, you meet up with the lich, twice, on the ninth/final level.  When you kill him at the end then you have won and you get a big high score bonus.  The lich is that crusty old guy who has a lot to say in the beginning of every level.

What can we expect from Rusty Axe next? Dungeon Brawl has me excited for your next project!

Well.. thanks!  I'm moving more into browser based gaming and hope to have a version of Real Estate Empire that you can play online, in a browser and against your friends, within a few months.  And, as always, more updates to Dungeon Demon.

There you have it, folks!  As you can see, Lennard is hard at work and the results are some fine products.


You can find Rusty Axe at their Facebook or website.


Bonus:  Get your Dungeon Brawl on here then let us know how you did! Take a screenshot!  Your high score will come in handy for a HUGE giveaway coming soon!