Together Retro: First-Person Dungeon Crawlers

[prfsnl_gmr]

Awesome. Thank you.

I am also tempted to pick up the North American PS3 Wizardry (Labyrinth of Lost Souls). Does anyone have experience with that one?

[MrPopo]

Awesome. Thank you.

I am also tempted to pick up the North American PS3 Wizardry (Labyrinth of Lost Souls). Does anyone have experience with that one?

I do. I'm about halfway through, and it's got a bit of an interesting structure. There's a training dungeon and a real dungeon, but the later floors of the training dungeon are harder than the opening floors of the real dungeon, so you'll ping pong back and forth a bit. It's done by the same team that did Class of Heroes, and it shows in the art style and the UI. But otherwise it's pretty standard Wizardry; there's a hub town, some quests, confusing layouts, and some enemies that can be mean.

[Exhuminator]

Awesome. Thank you.

Here's two video links for you:

The intro:

Very early gameplay:

it's pretty standard Wizardry; there's a hub town, some quests, confusing layouts, and some enemies that can be mean.

This describes WTotFL pretty well also. The thing with WTotFL is its presentation is above average for a Wizardry, at least versus other games in the series that preceded it.

[Nemoide]

I feel completely hooked on The Dark Spire. I like how the game requires you to really learn SO MUCH about the dungeon, it really makes you take your time and try to understand the system and mechanics.

That description makes me think of Etrian Odyssey. I'm very much enjoying reading your updates on The Dark Spire. I'm quite interested in your overall take once you've completed it. You're making me want to play it.

I wish this was a genre I had more experience with so I could provide better comparisons. Before The Dark Spire my only FPDCs were Shining in the Darkness and the first few Ultima games (Akalabeth being the only pure FPDC of the Ultima series but also not something particularly special for modern gamers). As it stands, I would definitely recommend The Dark Spire as being a pretty great game, though I don't know if it's really worth the crazy cost on the second-hand market.

But I have a friend who's a big fan of the Etrian Odyssey games who has also tried The Dark Spire. He ended up giving up and selling his copy pretty quickly though. The beginning of the game is the hardest part because it's very easy to have your party wiped out from any combat encounter. When I told him I started playing again, he expressed regret at selling it because he wanted to give it another try.
At the point I am now, I can still get my party killed, but I'm comfortable saving regularly in the tower because I have a spell that can teleport me back to town if I end up low on HP and spells.

I've officially reached the sixth floor of the tower. At this point I am now, I can still easily get my whole party killed, but I'm comfortable saving regularly in the tower because I have a spell that can teleport me back to town if I end up low on HP and spells and the elevator makes getting back to sixth floor not a big deal. And at the same time, my spells can make short work of tough enemies. While I can understand why some folks wouldn't like the D&D style "spell slots" rather than MP, I think it works well with the game.

But yeah, I understand why FPDCs have the following they do in Japan and am looking forward to exploring the genre more even after the month has ended!

[crazythink4]

How far along are you? All my characters are around level 14, I did a lot of grinding on the respawning Kaiser Crab. I can now take him down with three physical attacks (one from each character) and the XP he's dishing out isn't cutting it anymore, so I'll move on. I think these respawing boss creatures are the best way to grind. I believe I've explored most of the cave of strength. Ran in to some enemies who kept putting me asleep so I made a quick escape. I have a super-powered shield that was "randomly" available at the armory. Paid 3500.

I've barely made a dent in the game, seemingly. This is likely to consume most if not all of the entire month for me. I'm okay with that.

Level wise, I think we’re similar, though you may be a bit further. I’ve mapped about half of the first floor of the Cave of Strength. Besides my first runs with the Cave Beak, I haven’t felt like I’ve been in serious danger.

I also have been pushing forward fairly briskly. I think the most gold I accumulated was around 2500, which I spent on common weapons and armor. No lucky drops so far, otherwise.

If you haven’t been to the Cave of Strength yet, you’ll likely breeze through it. The XP, as expected, is much better there. No balance concerns so far.

There are a couple of pits which drop you to the lower level (as is common in Etrian Odyssey), so I’m expecting some traps soon where you have to trudge back to the previous level to start that part of the maze again. Looks like that mapping will come in handy! I’ll take a photo of my mapping progress when I get home tonight.

This’ll likely also be my only TR game for the month, so I’m glad it’s turning out well. Howlongtobeat claims that this game tends to take around 25 hours. I usually take a little longer than their metrics, plus I’m doing the whole translation thing, so it’ll easily keep me busy for May.

[MrPopo]

So Shining in the Darkness is actually pretty good about how it handles pits. There's only one area where pits are used as a major obstacle. Otherwise it tends to be used as ways to access additional areas, or temporary barriers. You won't be running into "ha ha, now you have to redo everything" stuff.

[Exhuminator]

I wish this was a genre I had more experience with so I could provide better comparisons.

The Etrian Odyssey games are definitely worth playing. I'm not so sure I'd recommend playing the first two on DS these days, considering they have (IMO) superior remakes on the 3DS. There's also EO4 and EO5 on 3DS. One last EO is coming to 3DS as well (supposedly the final in the series, but this is Atlus we're talking about). However EO3 remains DS only. They are absolutely high quality FPDCs, albeit can be brutally difficult. The first two on DS are super hard, but the 3DS entries allow lower difficulty settings, and that did improve series sales. Most folks tend to play the 3DS entries on "Standard" (easy) or "Picnic" (press A to win) difficulty, but that's honestly just playing with the games' fists tied behind their back. Real Gs play on Expert mode.

In portable land, there's a fair amount of English localized FPDCs on PSP as well. A few I know of:

Class of Heroes
Class of Heroes 2
Elminage Original
Unchained Blades

There's more on PSP that were not English localized. The Vita has a lot of English localized FPDCs, but we're getting way out of retro land to discuss those.

As it stands, I would definitely recommend The Dark Spire as being a pretty great game, though I don't know if it's really worth the crazy cost on the second-hand market.

No worries for me, already have a copy of it. There was a period of time where it was less than $20 new off Amazon.

But yeah, I understand why FPDCs have the following they do in Japan and am looking forward to exploring the genre more even after the month has ended!

Yeah man FPDCs are awesome. One of my all time favorite genres, hence my gusto in this thread.

[MrPopo]

Class of Heroes 1 has some balance issues in the later game; Class of Heroes 2 improves things a lot, as well as creating I think a more interesting set of dungeons. Unchained Blades has been a really rough experience so far; it has some major balance issues because of this convoluted system of skill unlocks that need to be further unlocked by equipping monsters that you can randomly capture in battle as helpers. Unless you know exactly what you're doing you can very easily put yourself in a super under powered state. I'm about halfway through and seriously considering doing a full restart and a much more careful party building.

[crazythink4]

So Shining in the Darkness is actually pretty good about how it handles pits. There's only one area where pits are used as a major obstacle. Otherwise it tends to be used as ways to access additional areas, or temporary barriers. You won't be running into "ha ha, now you have to redo everything" stuff.

Good to know! Thanks!

[noiseredux]

Morrowind finally arrived. Hopefully I can find some time over the weekend to start it up.