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It's derivative, it's unoriginal, and it's a lot of cheap fun.

There is an unspoken law in the statutes of game design that a new title must innovate.  It must have some new gameplay mechanic, exciting setting, or otherwise bring something fresh to the table.  A good game must derive all its qualities from other sources.

Dungeon Runners is as derivative as they come.  But it’s still a blast.

First things first.  This game’s big hook is that it’s free, which is only half true.  To download, install, and play the entire game costs no money.  Unfortunately, to access a lot of the game’s better items, players will have to fork out a $5 monthly subscription, which isn’t exorbitant by any stretch of the imagination, especially given the free initial download.  Still, this kind of hack and slash, loot-driven game loses a lot of its value when players can’t even equip the phattest of lewts.  However, one is able to keep unusable, “members-only” items in one’s inventory, just as a tease.  Other members-only perks include stackable health and mana potions, item storage, and server log-in priority over non-members—though that last one wasn’t really relevant during our playtime, since connection to the server was almost instantaneous.

The character creation system is interesting, if not as robust as other MMOs.  Players choose from three different classes: fighter, mage, or ranger.  However, these classes are basically interchangeable, since any character can purchase any spell or skill, and the ready-made attribute allocations can be redistributed.  It’s nice to have the choice to pick and choose from the wide variety of abilities at one’s leisure.