Hands On: The Happy Dungeons Open Beta Is Worth a Look on PS4

Happy Dungeons is a cutesy little free-to-play title that's coming to PlayStation 4 this September. It's an action role-playing game with loot drops, character classes, quests, co-op for up to four players, and a daft story. It's also available to download now on Sony's console as an open beta -- and we'd recommend giving it a quick look if you can.

Now, we know what you're thinking. Anytime we hear "free-to-play" these days we automatically expect the worst. Fortunately, from what we can tell from our time with the beta, Happy Dungeons' free-to-play elements aren't too invasive. There's a store where you can buy the usual loot boxes and all that nonsense to help develop your character that much quicker, and while we do worry that there'll come a point where the grind will really set in unless you opt to spend real money, the game already seems to have a pleasant progression system built into it.

As you work your way through short mission after short mission, enemies drop in-game currency and loot. It's standard stuff, but the hope is that together with an equipment upgrade system, you'll have plenty of reasons to keep playing. What's more, your character gains experience and levels up after each successful run, and you unlock special attacks and abilities that you can use in battle as you go. Again, none of this is anything new or particularly exciting, but it's nice and simple, which is perfect for a casual free-to-play romp.

Similarly simple is the combat. You mash square to do regular attacks, and then hit different face buttons to pull off special moves. When you're not whacking hordes of goblins you'll be dodge rolling with L2 to avoid their telegraphed attacks. There's a definite hint of mindless hacking and slashing here but it's easy to get to grips with and, dare we say, quite enjoyable. Whether it'll get repetitive remains to be seen, but throw other players into the mix and you've got a recipe for good clean fun.

Obviously Happy Dungeons isn't going to blow anyone away, but as far as free-to-play games go, we've played a lot worse -- and this is just the beta. We're not here to tell you that this is going to be a surprise hit, but if you're looking for something simple and fun to play with friends over the weekend -- maybe when you're all bored of playing that single Destiny 2 Strike -- then consider giving Happy Dungeons a try.

Have you played Happy Dungeons? Will you be giving the beta a shot? Beware small green monsters in the comments section below.