While neither are pure analogues of the UW games...

Legend of Grimrock is among the few recent games that has a similar dungeon crawling style with a story, although it doesn't have the same variety of environments and character styles. LoG 2, currently in development, looks like it's taking a great leap forward on both fronts.

An older alternative, and while party-oriented and not limited to a single underground locale, Wizardry 8 is also story-oriented toward dungeon crawling (with a strange sense of humor). Continuous-mode combat makes it semi-real time.


I think the main reason why you don't see many direct successors is simply that the shooter genre was taking off at around the same time as the UWs came out, and they came to dominate both the market and developers' attention.

Hoo, look's like it falls to original developers to do new Underworld(like) game.

http://www.othersideentertainment.com/

The phrase is used commonly because examples of it are so prevalent. If something gets streamlined to increase accessibility, but reduces utility, then it's a perfect case-in-point for the phrase.

It may not have been intended to be "AF with side quests cut off", but it ended up being exactly that.

What about King's Field for the playstation and playstation 2?

This is a good thing because the Apple IIGS versions were probably the best ones. The only sacrifice is the Apple ][+ version of BT3 which is not quite as good as the DOS version which had 16 color graphics. The Apple ][+ version has far fewer bugs.

Well ideally GOG would be able to include both versions (as with Defender of the Crown); most GOG releases only have one version of a game.

I dunno...I think there was a more marked difference in graphics between the Amiga and the 8 bit versions of BT 1 and 2, than between the BT3 versions.
Also, the Amiga version of BT3 was bugged; the monsters didn't use their special attacks, for instance. I think only the Apple versions were bug freee. Fortunately there is an unofficial patch for the DOS version of BT3 which I will probably play in the neat future. I never played more than the first dungeon of the Amiga version, when I quit due to the bugs. Only 20 years later did I learn that there was indeed bugs, so I think I made the right choice.

The Apple II GS and Amiga versions use the same graphics. But different sound quality.

There never was an Apple IIGS version for BT3. So the only graphically enhanced one was for Amiga (32 color?).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wF3xkDsI_XQ

It's like comparing CGA vs VGA in quality.

DOS had EGA, but it looked like CGA putrid choices out of the 16 colors. Albeit I think its the best looking of the DOS trilogy.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ru5kg35dNso

I wish they could port a new version with the Amiga graphics, without the bugs. Or better yet, do an enhanced remake with even better graphics, and maybe new material.