Dungeon 2048 is a tile-merging action-adventure fighting game that features elements from the popular 2048 sliding-tile puzzle game. The player's goal is to defeat monster bats in a dark fantasy forest near rocky outcroppings. They must defeat at least one bat during each level or stage of the game. The only way the player can perform this task is by creating a variety of weapons, such as daggers, short swords, axes and maces, using the merge mechanics from 2048.
The game displays a dark blue-gray 4x4 board with weapon icons labeled with numbers. In 2048, the player can merge two tiles that display the same number to create a higher-numbered tile that equals the sum of those numbers. For example, two 2 tiles merge and become a 4 tile. In this game, both the weapons and numbers change. Two 2 tiles that feature a particular type of knife merge to become a 4 tile with a different type of blade. The player must complete each merge before a horizontal bar at the top of the screen runs out of time.
Dungeon 2048 sometimes forces the player to slide all tiles instead of one in a direction to perform a merge, which makes creating weapons and preventing the board from filling entirely with tiles difficult. The player can slide the tiles in any direction (up, down, left or right). If they run out of moves, they lose the game and must start over. That said, after a certain number of merges, the game provides them with potions that extend their lives on a separate horizontal bar above the board.
