[I'm reposting my thoughts on reddit, here]

Short and Sweet:

I'm thankful I got to play this game on my PC, as it was a blast to venture back into the Endless Universe.

The only bugs/issues I encountered were: Crystal Bot Pathing Issues (Got around it by using the Follow Me Order), Boss Killed Bonus not firing, killing certain mob-types not counting for the archive list(first blob enemy), Requiring Aim Assist--because it's hard to use the Mouse to shoot at short enemies, and my PC programs freezing every time I fully Exit out of the game--requiring me to turn off and on. Otherwise, my experience was smooth (which seems unique/rare when looking at the bug reports on this subreddit).

The Long gist:

He might be too humble to say it, but Fassie pretty much melted enemies with his 283x12 DPS Shotgun

It took me:

• 60 hours (over the past ~7 days)

• 5 Runs (Not including the tutorial)

• ~700 industry on final run

• Fassie (Lvl6), Shroom(lvl4), and Blaze(lvl4)

• Massive Turret Damage Increase Bar Drink

• Damage increase turret + Long Range Laser Turret + Regen Turret.

To beat the boss on the final floor, while playing SOLO.

Final Zone Before Final Boss

A High Skill Efficiency Fassie + A hero with a light weapon that's high DPS allows him to turn his weaponry into Omega Death Cannons, or in my case: A Shotgun into a 5.7second firerate monster (DO NOT USE HIS TIMED ABILITY ON HEAVY WEAPON HEROES). The Weapon Damage Increase turret and the Long Range Light Laser Turret, no joke, are the most valuable turrets that allowed me to massively save on industry use in the early floors by being able to make kill rooms that only had my group of heroes supported by 2 or more damage turrets (in part thanks to somewhat decent luck on Dungeon Layout). I came into the final zone with about 300 Industry,  and that's where I used up nearly all of it spamming Damage Increase and Light Laser Turrets across two monster spawn rooms, and four chokepoint rooms, which helped allow two heroes hold their own against 2 rooms, while I controlled Fassie to open up the final rooms that contained the Final Boss. And after entering the final boss zone, I only needed to set up 4 Attack Increase Turrets to give Fassie enough of a buff that his Timed Skill (9 spice) was able to melt through the final boss. When it came to the A.I Heroes, I got by with them never using their Ultimate abilities, though Shroom saved me a lot of Food.

Fassie, is crazy powerful with the right build. But do I want him to be nerfed to oblivion? Eh.......

I can not overstate just how Powerful Fassie is, thanks to his Timed Ability, as finding a shotgun in the second Floor Pretty much turned him into an Emergency Win Button for a short period of time, once I figured out his abilities. His Pistol does 1117 DPS, too, but I almost never used it.

The Game is at its strongest:

• Making me stressed on having to plan around bad luck in terms of Randomized Room Layouts.

• Presentation (includes art, music, animations, etc).

On Normal Difficulty, I've yet to encounter an experience like my time playing Easy Difficulty in Dungeon of the Endless; where I was on the Final Floor and had to make the decision to Use the Team Fortress 2 Doctor Hero's Invincibility ability to YOLO the Crystal across many Dark rooms as I blindly led my party through opening random doors in hopes we can find the Exit before we run out of food, But, the spirit of being 2 to 3 underdogs against the evil forces of RNG layouts is still felt.

The Game is at its weakest:

• Repetitive Dialogue voices when leaving each zone (I swear I only hear Fassie keep repeating his one voiced Line every-time we exited a zone).

• The Rate of Unlocking new Challenge modes (Drinks)

As I post this, I have only unlocked 2 Drinks--which I assume are the stand-in for the Escape Pod Mechanic back in Dungeon of the Endless, and the Second Drink I only unlocked after Beating the Final Boss for the first time. My most pressing issue is that the game has three colors for non explosive canisters containing items: White, Yellow, Purple. The problem I find is that Purple Light is also used to dictate Explosive Light Damage Canisters, so I'd appreciate if there was a more obvious glow or something when around the Item Containing Canisters, as players who don't know what Subtle Designs and colors they're looking for will easily miss such items... Maybe make the Dust Flashlight/whisp hover over the purple Cannisters that contain special items or something.

Overall:

I enjoyed the overall presentation of this game, especially the Art Style and Atmosphere. Though I may not have been a fan of some of the writing for the Hero Journals, like Sweeper, and some of the voice lines, things started to grow on me once I took a short brake to think, and begin resuscitating my child-like wonderment from Death.

I last played the Original Dungeon of the Endless back in 2022, and it sits in my steam folder at 80hrs of playtime, with me having little interest in turning that game on again at the moment (outside of finding the Goop Drakkan). In comparison, Endless Dungeon does it's job, for me, on being the modernization of the Tower Defense Rogue-like/light gameplay from the previous title. And I will most certainly be trying to complete the Archives and get the secret ending that's hinted, eventually in the future.

Thanks for Making this game!

edit:

The Discrepancy with the playtime is likely because Steam counts me being interrupted by real life and leaving the game on pause as playtime, which also explains why my playtime with Dungeon of the Endless is so high, also.