Moonlighter
Review

Moonlighter (2018) is an action role-play game where you play an adventurous shopkeeper who secretly dreams of becoming a hero. It's a game of two halves: shopkeeping and adventuring. It's novel because of how the two aspects play into each other. The better loot you retrieve the better stock you have for the shop. The better the shop the more money you have for kit and crafting.

You start in Rynoka, a small village positioned near an excavation site of a Gate to another realm. You run a store selling equipment to adventurers who go through the gate to bring back treasures to trade. During the day you run the shop then each night you can go explore the dungeon.

In one part of the game you are conducting your business, choosing items for sale, setting their price and managing your gold reserves. You can upgrade the shop as you go to cope with more stock and even recruit an assistant to run things when you are not around.

In the other part of the game you go through the gate to find wares to sell. Once on the other side you must defeat enemies and bosses, master the mechanics of different weapons, perfect your combat timing and positioning and find the best valuables to bring back. But you can only carry so much and must use the clever inventory system to pack away only the most profitable items.

As you progress in both adventuring and commerce you get to know your neighbours and slowly bring prosperity to the small town. This means you help others establish related businesses and watch them grow and trade with you. You can also learn to craft new armour and weapons, and enchant existing equipment to help with your next trip through the gate.

The result is an unusual combination of shop keeping and adventure role-play. It's a bit like the Mr Ben kids TV Show, only you don't bring things back to help you remember but to sell to those who need them.

Our examiner, Andy Robertson, first checked Moonlighter 13 months ago. It was re-examined by Jo Robertson and updated 10 months ago.