Portugues
Hook, Line, and Spelunker
Saved games stay in this browser only.
About the game
Hook, Line, and Spelunker is a small roguelike about a cave explorer whose only tool is a fishing rod. There is no sword and no spell: you fight by fishing. Cast a lure across the cave, let a creature smell it and come to eat, and while it is busy chewing your bait you walk up and hit it. Three levels of flooded caves separate you from the surface, with piranhas, alligators, killer crayfish and giant snails in the water and on the mud, and a ladder up on every floor.
The cave is part dry rock and part water, and the water matters. Some creatures live only in it, you get soaked when you wade in, and the ones that can walk move slowly on land. Bait is limited, so every cast counts, and four special lures you can find add tricks (a wrecking ball, a magic sponge, a second sight and a telecasting lure, each with a hint about when to use it). A turtle here and there asks for nothing but a pat, and the game keeps count of how many you made friends with.
The author, Devin Spikowski, made it in seven days for the 7DRL 2022 challenge. It is turn-based, runs in a few minutes per game, and the whole thing is drawn with a single small sprite sheet.
Playing it here
Click Play, then click inside the game once so it hears the keyboard. Move with the keys; when a monster comes near, press C to start a cast, steer the target with the movement keys and press C again to confirm. When you hook something the game says ANGLING and the movement keys pull and swing the line; C cuts it. The progress is not saved: a game is short, and Enter starts a new one after a game over.
Controls
| Key | Action |
|---|---|
| W A S D, H J K L or arrow keys | move (or aim a cast, or swing the line) |
| C | start a cast, confirm it, or cut the line |
| 1 to 9 | switch a special lure on or off |
| E | eat bait to heal |
| Space | wait a turn |
| Esc | cancel a cast |
| Enter | new game after game over |
A few things worth knowing
Bait is a weapon. A creature that is eating the bait stays still for a few turns, which is your window to hit it, and a hit on a feeding creature can do extra damage. Do not waste bait on enemies you can walk around.
Water changes everything. Piranhas cannot leave it, and you can see your own state in the corner of the screen: dry, damp, dripping or soaked. Fight from dry ground when you can.
Eat bait when you are hurt. It is also your food, and you can only do it when your health is below the maximum.
Pet the turtles. They are harmless and the end screen counts them.
Credits and licence
Hook, Line, and Spelunker was made by Devin Spikowski and is released under the MIT License. The game is written in TypeScript with the open-source libraries pixi.js, rot.js and bitECS, and all its art is the author's own sprite sheet; it has no sound. We built it from the author's source with a small change to the build files only, and the source of this build is linked from this page.