Name: Cladun: This Is an RPG
Item: Cladun: This Is an RPG
Author: Retro Replay

Cladun: This Is an RPG

Cladun: This Is an RPG grabs you with a simple, old-school loop: take a character into a dungeon, fight through it, and come back richer, stronger, and better equipped. Its breezy humor and 8-bit-inspired style give the adventure a distinct lightness, even when you are deep in its character-building systems.

The real hook is the Magic Circle, a party setup that turns companions and artifacts into a flexible web of bonuses around your active hero. It can be satisfying to tune a warrior, wizard, or another class for a particular dungeon, though the amount of configuration means this is more rewarding for tinkerers than for anyone wanting a purely straightforward action RPG.

Retro Replay Review

Gameplay

The first draw in Cladun: This Is an RPG is immediate and uncomplicated: you head into a dungeon, fight, collect money and items, gain experience, and prepare to do it again with a stronger group. That familiar action-RPG rhythm makes the game easy to settle into. You are not asked to admire its systems from a distance; you are pushed toward the next run and the next chance to improve your odds.

What gives that loop more staying power is the Magic Circle system. You directly control one main character, while the rest of the party becomes a group of “subs” placed into a class-specific arrangement. Their health and attributes feed into the team, and artifacts connect through the circle to raise stats or add bonuses. Once this starts clicking, party-building becomes more than simply choosing favorites. The class you put at the center matters, since warrior, dragoon, guardian, wizard, and merchant each bring different circle configurations.

That depth is also where impatience can creep in. If you want every companion to be an equally direct participant in combat, the sub-character role may feel unusually indirect. Cladun asks you to enjoy planning around the hero you are controlling, then refining the support structure around them. For a gamer who likes experimenting with builds, it is a clever reason to revisit the party screen; for someone who only wants to swing a weapon and move on, it can feel like a lot of bookkeeping between dungeon runs.

The character creator adds a welcome dose of personality to all that optimization. You can make as many custom characters as you want, draw their faces in the in-game editor, and define personal final bosses for them. Being able to save, share, and import those faces makes the system feel built for playful invention rather than merely filling out a roster.

Graphics

Cladun wears its 8-bit influence openly. Its top-down fantasy dungeons, characters, creatures, and surreal environments are framed in a deliberately retro style that fits the game’s humorous attitude. The custom face editor is a particularly charming touch: instead of being locked into a fixed cast look, you can literally draw the faces for your own recruits.

Story

The story starts with Pudding, a tomboyish treasure hunter, and Souma, the boy determined to protect her, finding a route into the legendary Arcanus Cella. Rumors of its treasures supply a clean reason to keep moving forward: there is a secret place to explore, and Pudding is exactly the kind of person who cannot leave that invitation alone.

Cladun does not treat this setup with solemn reverence. Arcanus Cella is described as a surreal place packed with odd characters, creatures, and environments, and the game leans into a humorous tone rather than presenting fantasy adventure as grave destiny. That makes the quest feel pleasantly goofy, a useful counterweight to the dungeon repetition.

You should come for the light adventure framing, not a weighty dramatic saga. Pudding’s hunger for treasure and Souma’s protective determination give the journey a recognizable center, while the strange world around them keeps the tone from becoming too straight-faced.

Overall Experience

Cladun: This Is an RPG is most enjoyable when you let its two sides work together: quick dungeon fighting on one hand, unexpectedly detailed party tuning on the other. It has the pick-up-and-play pull of a compact retro action RPG, but the Magic Circle gives you enough knobs to turn that progress can feel personal rather than automatic.

The payoff depends on your tolerance for customization. If rearranging subs, artifacts, attributes, and class layouts sounds like part of the fun, Cladun has more to offer than its modest dungeon-crawling premise first suggests. If that sounds like homework, its central loop may start to feel repetitive before the system earns your attention.

Its humor, flexible custom-character tools, and switchable soundtrack options help preserve a sense of playfulness. You can choose between regular polyphonic music and chiptune versions of the same tracks, a small but fitting choice for a game that enjoys its retro flavor without being trapped by it.

At 7.5, this is an easy recommendation for action-RPG fans who enjoy building a strange little team as much as using it. Cladun is not trying to overwhelm you with grandeur. It wins you over by making dungeon runs, party experiments, and homemade characters feel like parts of the same cheerful hobby.