Ultimately a very neat concept, but I find myself getting frustrated that the early game enemies are just "solve the puzzle, win the game". That doesn't feel very enticing when its far more fun to be gambling, card counting and chucking dice.

I'll support this since they have good ideas, I'd never recommend it.

11.03/11.03 8/10

im gonna rip out every single strand of hair on my body

Dice Eater is a rock papers scissors card game with supernatural abilities in the Staffer Case universe. Such abilities are called "skills", and have specific triggers and abilities that greatly change many things considered normal, such as an enhanced detection of vibrations, manipulate fire or ice, change perception, among others. The previous games, Staffer Case and Staffer Reborn has puzzle elements to figure out the abilities and their triggers of people, called staffers, and of objects, called staff.

I enjoyed the tutorial, first, fifth, and sixth chapters. I found the mechanics of those chapters fun to figure out and the clues are well made. Additionally, the story in this game is interesting as well, introducing a new character that is likely going to be in the next main series game. I would have liked more characterisation of the main character and some dialog as they currently have none, but the setting and the story told by the person in the earphones is still interesting for a Staffer series fan like me. However, for me, the third and fourth chapters were not as fun.

Edit 2: Um, it seems like I was just blind. I originally had a complaint about chapter 3 not having an obvious way to tell the skulls apart. When I read a walkthrough guide though, I quickly realised my mistake. Link to the guide: https://gtm.steamproxy.vip/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3443061459 I will still say I wish there was a visual difference, as that would be more accessible, but my complaint is invalid as there was a clear difference.

On the other hand, the ability in chapter four is explicitly said in an unavoidable dialog by the earphones. While the revelation that the crow dice is not utterly useless was surprising, the path to realise that was not interesting at all. I feel like it would be a more engaging experience if the trigger of the skill was more gradual and required some critical thinking instead of outright spoiling the solution of the puzzle. While there are hints that spoil the puzzle, most can at least be avoided by not losing or quitting and retrying before losing. This hint cannot be avoided and just ruins the fun of the game.

Overall, Dice Eater is a simple card game that hides a puzzle game about figuring out the abilities that let your opponent cheat and finding how to turn that ability into your advantage. I had a lot of criticism for two chapters, but I observed these slight missteps in a mostly well made game and wanted to see these remedied. This game is different from the previous Staffer games which had you connecting two relevant pieces of information to continue the story, as this one requires the player to understand the hint, and to properly execute on that hint to continue. This can be slightly disorienting for Staffer fans, as there is not a clear border between story and puzzle solving. However, the atmosphere and setting of this game is quite similar, so it is worth considering buying this game if you were a fan of the previous games.

Edit 1: I saw another review about an endless mode, which unless has new opponents with new skills and triggers, does not really interest me. A game with the same opponents would just be boring, and a pure game with no skills is not interesting either. I would spend more time refining what is already made than waste time on a meaningless made for "replayability".

A solid card game where you rely more on puzzles than luck

Nice game, I thought it was going to be more gameplay focused in this one but it kind of serves more as a lore episode if that makes sense.
However almost every time you figure out what the enemy powers are it kind of goes linear from there. After episode 2 it really takes a nose dive to eh because the gimmicks are easy to find out or too hard without a clue. Yet, it was very satisfying every time you got the actual answer.
I do feel as if the game itself needed a little bit polishing as it felt just a little too luck based as in the final and the first chapter I started to just shout "We going all in!" and just throw some dice to hope for a good roll.
Yet it's a nice 2 or 3 hours of gambling. I just feel there had to be a little bit more things I myself the player could do myself instead of the slightly forced linearity the game had.

Early access review, prior to any updates.

It's neat! Expect the story element to be pretty minor compared to Case and Reborn. As always with this series, the presentation is very good.

The card game however is quite mundane. It's just rock paper scissors and dice rolls, it's basically just a complete crapshoot unless you are cheating or being cheated. Which makes it a perfect game for a game about cheating, but I honestly don't foresee this making for an interesting rogue-like mode unless there are some major changes, but I look forward to seeing the attempt.

I did enjoy figuring out the cheats. The game doesn't hold your hand at all in figuring out how to turn the cheat around on your opponent, unless you lose then you start getting hints. This made putting the pieces together on what was going on was a very satisfying every time, except for the final opponent which was a bit of an anticlimax (Sort of on purpose, though?)

Currently I would recommend waiting for the full release unless you're a big fan of these games, I think it's serviceable now but will probably be great after the EA period.