One of my favourite RPGs to date. Character building is critical. Decisions made early on can effect outcomes later. Wide team of companions to choose from. Interpersonal dynamics can modify companion behaviour. Some very tough battles. I think to enjoy the game properly all combat should be micromanaged. This game takes quite a long time to play through but I've happily done so three times.
Just love the look and feel of this. Unusually straightforward for an RPG. Definitely not the most challenging I've played (neither was the prequel but I bought this on the basis I enjoyed that and I enjoyed this as well). If I knew someone who never played RPGs this is probably the one I'd try to introduce them to. A game which I really can describe as fun to play.
First rate game. Thouroughly enjoyable, interesting to explore, lots of good quests with different approaches working (a couple did seem very slightly susceptible to being impossible to complete unless certain actions were carried out in a very deliberate order, couldn't really tell if this was intended). I found it reasonably challenging at a number of points. Just one critique, the magic mirror, not that it shouldn't exist but perhaps a cost which increases with each use ? Obviously the player can choose not to use it but the player is hardly going to know that on the first playthrough. Anyway overall a first rate game.
I originally played this a long time ago. I have thoroughly enjoyed replaying. It is as described in the site notes. It is essentially an ASCII based Rogue like RPG. Your character moves from square to square by turn, there are cleverer dynamics where if fast or weapon proficient you get X turns to every Y your foes get (could be more or less). If you want an RPG to be something that lets you develop your hero over the full course of the game and enforces significantly different game progression based on decisions made then this is the game. The decisions which effect outcomes start from the word go, what weapons shall I specialise in (spend days playing the game progressing your bow skills to pick up a ridiculously powerful artifact sling). Invest lots of effort praising one God only to find some game characters won't give you the time of day (changing the quests available and the rewards). Your race and gender effect costs when trading. It is exactly these very different game progressions that make this thoroughly replayable (which I have always felt is the true top accolade for an RPG).
This game was not quite what I expected. It is not an out and out RPG and it is not especially similar to it's predecessor. It is a sequence of short strategy based combat puzzles with an element of RPG style character building. There are four main party members throughout most of the game and a number of mercenaries with different skills (who fight for the hero based on something approaching religious ideals so don't need paying). Each combat puzzle provides Action Points and upgrades (the upgrades can be: attributes for party member/mercenaries, additional special skilled mercenaries, availability of extra equipment). Everything to this point in no way detracts from the experience. The character building options are a numerous but a little less interdependent than is often the case in out-and-out RPGs but on the other hand you get to select which mixture of party members/mercenaries will take part in each combat (I feel this sort of balances quite well). I only really have one critique. I bought this expecting something RPG-ish and I would usually expect a lot of replayability in an RPG. I didn't feel this was especially challenging (I found three particular combat scenarios needed more than a couple of attempts) and having completed it feel like it is fully solved and I am therefore unlikely to replay it.
I really enjoyed this game. To win efficiently requires a strategy which means developing characters along a carefully planned path from begininning to end. It is extremely unforgiving of bad (inappropriate) decisions and this gets exponentially worse as bad decisions accumulate. However if you are patient enough to bumble through it once (making heavy repeated use of the quick save/quick load facilities) you can develop a strategy of character development that makes a second playthrough fairly straightforward. It's a bit like a simultaneous equation with a large number variables which I know probably doesn't sound overly exciting but if you like puzzles which take a lot of perserverance and you want to try to hone the answer towards the best you can it is very well worth the price.
