Has the grind of completing dailies and constantly grinding loot gotten repetitive and boring? Has the routine of clearing dungeons in Path of Exile, Diablo, or Vampire Survivors become mundane? Do you crave a change of scenery but still love those gameplay loops from dungeon crawlers and loot grinders? Well, if you answered yes to any of these questions, then we have two games for you: Hell Clock and Conquest Dark.
At PAX East 2025, we met with Publisher Mad Mushroom to preview their two games, Hell Clock and Conquest Dark. At the booth, they were joined by Starforge, their sister company; each demo station showed off some of the different amazing designs that Starforge has for custom PC cases, including Frieren: Beyond the Journey and Kaiju #8. The red, green, and black atmosphere and design of the computer case added an additional element of darkness and fantasy to the overall experience.
To start the meeting, we decided to check out Conquest Dark. Conquest Dark is currently in early access as of April 30th, 2025. Despite being in early access, the game already seems well polished and has been positively received.
According to the developers, Conquest Dark is both a Rogue-lite and a roguelike. As you level, you can pick what new abilities you unlock, and combat will pause until an ability is chosen. Conquest Dark is a blend of Path of Exile/Diablo with Vampire Survivors.
At the beginning, we were able to choose a map. Once in, we jumped right into the action and started slaying enemies.
Rather than a slow burn like most other RPGs, we were thrown into the action quickly and had to make impulsive choices. As you level and gain new abilities/equipment, the game will pause to give you time to select what you want to equip/use.
The game shows you what abilities you already have unlocked and if increasing the ability will have an immediate impact.
For equipment, it will show if you already have other pieces of that armor type and how equipment will work with each other; gathering the same type of equipment will lead to a buff in players’ stats.
Combat within the game very much felt like other ARPGs, but we knew that our time on that map was limited.
On the screen, there is a timer that is counting down; once that clock reaches 0:00, a hunter will be sent out to kill you, and you will most likely die. Death doesn’t mean the end, but means that you can move on to other maps or try different builds.
Since we had limited time to level as much as possible, we were only able to try one build. We were able to select our gender, but after that, we received randomized builds with different stats affecting health, skills, and attacks.
At that point, it was up to us how we proceeded. Do we attack multiple enemies at once and try to tackle hordes, or do we take them on one at a time and scale up slowly?
The answer to that question is both. At the beginning, you are fairly weak, and it is very easy to become overwhelmed.
If you are not used to that type of combat/action system, you will die. Honestly, the entry skill level is fairly low, so almost anyone can play the game; however, beating the game on the hardest difficulty will be another story.
As someone who has played very few ARPGs (League of Legends: Swarm – Operation Anima Squad and some Vampire Survivors), it was refreshing to be able to just sit down and play something, knowing that you only had a limited amount of time that you could be on that map.
This makes it easy to feel like you accomplished something in a very limited time. This is also helpful as someone who doesn’t always have a lot of free time; these quick adventures felt satisfying and rewarding.
Conquest Dark has been available in early access since April 2025 for Windows PC (via Steam).
