It's a fun game, and a good entry point for newbies to the Wizardry series. Not perfect, but a 7 / 10 and pretty laid back to chip away at. It gets kinda zen to delve down and explore or grind. Gameplay is the essential Wizardry experience. Make a party of six, enter the dungeon, grind a little bit to be competent. Go in and explore, killing monsters and claiming loot, deciding when to turn back (or doing so if a character gets taken down). Return to town, rest and recover, then go back to the dungeons to explore and slay s'more. All the best items are found by exploring and as monster drops; after a certain point, those pricey items at the shop will become purchasable, only to be resold back once you find duplicates, or items that outclass them. There is a certain rush of endorphins when you identify a cool new weapon or armor that gives your characters the boost they need. There's a little story here and there, but nothing special. Just set dressing to give you a reason to dungeon crawl. All in all, it's the quissential dungeon crawling blobber experience. Labyrinth of Lost Souls (LoLS, if you will) does some stuff to stand out compared to the classics, however. You can tithe excess gold at the church to get XP on a 1:1 ratio, kinda like old-school D&D. Useful to aid grinding, or help a recently-revived character get back up to speed. Either way, a good use for gold that would otherwise do nothing. There are item trades that show up now and again at the tavern, as well as some sidequests to do there. The inn also holds a bestiary to peek at monster stats, art and lore. and also item collection records. You'll also notice that each of the ten characters (male and female each for the five races) also act as their own save file each. These heroes each have their own specific quest in the game, and IIRC items in the shop can be bought and stocked across these heroes' journeys. Be warned that if your main character is permakilled for any reason, it's game over. That said, LoLS is surprisingly forgiving for a Wizardry game because it doesn't auto-save. This means that if reviving a character fails and they'd be gone for good, you can reload your save. Just don't forget to save periodically from the pause menu, and be warned that each hero can only have one version of their save file at once. There's no saving in multiple slots this way. Now, some personal gripes. The dungeons are pretty basic compared to others in the series, or with other spinoffs. No real puzzles, other than finding switches to open gated rooms. Mages' spell lists feel a little too Final Fantasy Black Mage -- that is, mostly elemental spells and that status ailment spells are pointless. Classic Wizardry gave the mages more varied spells. Likewise, priest spells are also mostly pointless tiers heals, and the first half of their light-elemental damaging spells are utterly pathetic. If you encounter a treasure chest in the dungeon that isn't a monster drop? Be prepared to run into the same lame pairs of shoes and torches. The optional sidequests are very RNG-based, having to do with drops from specific enemies (albeit, more than one enemy can drop the needed items). Those optional ones are mostly for extra gold though, so they aren't urgent. The dungeons themselves don't have puzzles or riddles to speak of, either. Pretty barebones, though the later levels in the Dungeon of Trials start to feel like a proper maze. Shiin's Dungeon is fairly challenging and labyrinthine from the get-go. I also cannot stand the Japanese voice acting, particularly the female voices. The screams and shrieks of running into shock floors, shock walls, bumping into walls or getting hit in battle make me want to claw my eardrums out. I always turn Voice Volume down to 0% in the menu immediately. Lastly, the game has something of a W-shaped difficulty curve. Most blobbers start out hard, forcing you to grind for a little while before things get easy. Around the middle floors of the Dungeon of Trials, things get stupidly easy before long. Once you get to the later floors there, the challenge returns. Shiin's Dungeon is usually one you chip away at, and is tied to the plot. It's one you venture to after getting your feet wet in the Dungeon of Trials first. And unless you have a death wish, avoid the Deeper Levels until you're in late-to-postgame content. Those levels were a DLC expansion that are included for free in the PC version. Oh yeah, you also get five "growth fruits" as free DLC as well, built into this version. They give a stupidly good boost of stats when creating a character. Once each fruit is used up though, it's gone for good and cannot be restored. All in all? Like I said, it's not perfect, but is a good starting game for the fledgling Wizardry fan. A pretty fun labyrinth to get lost in.
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