When it comes to massively multiplayer online games, there are those that attempt to create a brand new gaming experience, and there are those that stick squarely to the tried and true. NC Soft’s Dungeon Runners falls squarely in that second category, unashamedly borrowing the well-worn scenario of kill stuff/ collect loot from iconic games like Diablo, but nay-sayers who would write it off as a copycat or a wannabe are missing the game’s point. Dungeon Runners isn’t trying to give players anything more than a bit of a laugh and some simple good fun, perhaps introducing some neophytes to the world of the dungeon crawl in the process. If World of Warcraft is the girl you marry and grow old with, Dungeon Runners is the girl you meet at the beach one summer and date for two months. Shallow? Sure, but shallow can be fun, too.

Devotees of the MMO genre might find Dungeon Runners to be far too basic for their tastes. NC Soft has taken the expected tenets of the genre and stripped them to the bones, making the game highly user-friendly for newbies or those who simply don’t feel like making the enormous time investment usually demanded by more traditionally-structured MMOs. Upon entering the fantasy realm, players select one of three character types—Fighter, Mage, or Ranger— and head out to make with the adventuring. Character customization is simplistic to the point of being virtually non-existent. Skills and attributes, such as they are, are determined by the character type, though once you’ve got enough gold in your pocket you can later be trained in any skill you like, no matter its class of origin. This lack of options makes character set up a breeze and you’ll be running off to your first dungeon just a few minutes after you install the game, but anyone fond of fine-tuning their in-game persona is going to be left feeling more than a bit short-changed.

There’s no real story arc threading through the various zones and areas of Dungeon Runners, and there’s no PvP (yet), so all the action stems from the quests that are handed out by the NPCs. Though they come in some amusing trappings (one particularly elaborate one has you collecting a full set of action figures then getting them painted), they pretty much all boil down to either fetching a certain number of somethings or killing a certain number of somethings. It can get fairly repetitious, especially since there’s not much in-town interaction to break up the combat. You’ll scoot back to sell off swag or stock up on potions, but there’s little else to hold your attention in any of the local NPC hotspots.

The world of Dungeon Runners isn’t exactly a feast for the eyes, either, with so-so environments that lack any sort of great detail and an overall design that was cribbed from Fantasy Setting 101. There’s the obligatory forest levels, the ice levels, the lava levels, blah, blah, blah. Your character’s appearance does change as you equip new weapons and armor, however, a fact that you will especially appreciate the first time you see someone run by brandishing an enormous pizza cutter. And so we come to the real reason to play Dungeon Runners: its sense of humor.

Whether or not you actually play Dungeon Runners with your tongue in your cheek is entirely up to you, but that’s clearly the approach NC Soft took while developing it. The Ring of Fire spell “burns, burns, burns” and Lothar of the Mound people will train fighters in new skills like the “Fear of Gosh.” One of the first quests you receive will come from a trader who sounds suspiciously like Moe from The Simpsons, and the loot you collect will have names like the “Edifying Great Axe of the Perspicacious Wallaby” or the “Crystal Greaves of the Vivacious Ladybug.” Quests might send you to Arborgeddon, the Horrific Dungeon of Legend, or maybe just to Vexation Station. Nothing in the game is taken particularly seriously, which makes it all the more hilarious when some player starts whining in World Chat about how he can’t multiclass.

Dungeon Runners is free to download and play, a pricing structure that makes it ideal for those who are new to the genre or simply want to dabble, but membership, as they say, has its privileges. The best weapons and armor are for members only, as is the ability to stack potions and use that most valuable of in-game resources, the bank. Still, the game is completely playable without coughing up the five buck a month fee, if only slightly less convenient. Similarly well-suited to the new or casual player is that unlike many other MMOs, one can make significant progress in Dungeon Runners by soloing. Though there are some dungeons and bosses that are designed for larger parties, going it alone is almost always a viable option.