So when I think of a roguelike, it essentially revolves around exploring a darkened dungeon and encountering random monsters,
Yes, although the monsters are not random in their own stats. The monsters you encounter, and in what concentrations, are random however.
which you then kill for experience points, cooler weapons, and gold.
No EXP, no levels, no gold or other currency. Also no new weapons, technically, although at one point you do get new Exos entirely. Instead you get tons of procedural loot in the form of "parts" that you customize your mech with, making your weapons and other subsystems (propulsion, shields, reactor, computer) both more powerful and different. The loot comes from chests that you find around the mission, and from winning the mission itself. As well as from type of mission on the city map, really. But the monsters themselves are no reward; they are obstacle only, and avoiding them is just as good as killing them. If you can.
Is this essentially that with a team of mechs instead of dwarves and a dilapidated cityscape instead of a dungeon, or will the turn-based sequences be more like missions where the enemy team is also well-defined and you face off (a la Final Fantasy Tactics)? Or will it be something between that?
It's between that. The overall city map has a well defined mix of mission types, in a nondefined position structure. The city map is where you choose your missions, and what missions you choose is really important. It's what determines how the rest of the game goes, really. You strengthen yourself in certain ways, or weaken your enemy, etc. Most tactics games and roguelikes have nothing like this; it's more strategic, really. Although all it involves, literally, is choosing which icon to click to undertake your next mission. Still: it's a hard choice many times.
The missions themselves are like floors in a roguelike. So you're choosing your floors, both which you do and in what order. There are 125 missions, and you can only do 50, max. Likely you'll choose to do fewer via attacking command centers of the robots.
I'd also like to know a bit more about the character customization; is it more about customizing the mechs or the character actually controlling the mech? Will you be able to give your mechs certain standout color schemes or designs to make them differ from other peoples' mechs?
The characters cannot be customized at all. The point of them is that they have a large fixed bonus that they give you throughout the game. Something game-changing, like better loot from Meg, or more health and ammo closets for Emma. A smaller end-game force for Tuck, and more scouting range on the city map for Axis.
The mechs themselves are hugely customized internally, via something like 30ish item slots per mech (it varies). Maxed out would be 3 slots each for 5 weapons, 4 reactor slots, 3 propulsion and shields slots, and 5 computer slots. That 30 total is theoretical, though, as a mech with 5 computer slots would never have 5 weapons. These things vary by type of mech, and so 20-25 per mech is probably a better guess. Times four, since you have four mechs.
So in terms of making your mechs unique, there certainly is a ton of gear. In terms of visual customization, there is none: nothing you do affects the appearance of your mech, except in the customization screen you can see all the little icons in their slots I guess, heh.
Character customization has probably always been the largest factor for me in enjoying roguelikes or D&D games. If I can be happy and leveling up, which is the hook that keeps people playing, doesn't mean much.with my character customization, then I have a much higher chance of being happy with the game, but if not, then the experience
To give examples, good customization = Neverwinter Nights, with lots of races, outfits, armor, feats, physical customization of how character looks, etc., while bad customization = Torchlight, where even though you can name your character, that's about it.
You're likely to find this as being bad customization by that specific criteria, I think, although you can decide for yourself. This game just isn't about that sort of thing, and I think the cross comparisons you're making aren't really the same sort of goal of game. Think of this almost like the biggest SHMUP customization screen ever: kind of like Tyrian's ship customization to an extreme degree, but with loot drops instead of a store. Or it's like Borderland's loot drop systems, but with way more customization flexibility, but no levels or store.
In other words, it's pretty sideways from that sort of thing. It's not a level grind, as there are no levels. The impetuses for keeping playing are:
1. It's just plain visceral fun (to me) to run around shooting guys with rocket launchers in particular.
2. Getting sweet loot drops and then figuring out what to do with them is really fun. This is akin to many of the weapons in FFTA for me, or again Tyrian.
3. The interesting tactics of how to navigate each mission is fun, and there is real tension as to whether you will win or lose; I lose quite a number of them at this point.
4. The overall meta-narrative of the city as you explore, find new missions, and impose your will on how the final showdown is going to play out. This has a sort of grand strategy aspect to it, but without complexity. It's something Keith and I both find really compelling, but people that don't may not be captivated here.
5. In general the constant improvement of your Exos, and the increased flexibility you get from more gear. You may change loadouts for specific types of missions in order to emphasize different attributes of your Exos. This is sort of like the level grind, but it's not linear or even orthogonal. It's scattershot in that interesting roguelike/roguelite way.
So, yeah. I have no idea if you specifically will enjoy it, but I think it's pretty darn cool.
Generally speaking it doesn't have all the same hooks as other similar games, partly because saying those games are similar is always slightly misleading, heh.
