This game is a great example of the kinds of Wizardry games that came out of Japan long after Sir-Tech stopped doing things. It's a relatively faithful implementation of pre-Wiz6 game rules (there are a few changes), with two regular dungeons and one "hard" dungeon to explore. Unfortunately, nearly all of the negative aspects of pre-Wiz6 Wizardry are out in full force, with the exception of the aging system. That means that you'll probably spend some time re-building characters after they get annihilated, and you'll probably find a bit of a wall near the end of the dungeons when enemy damage numbers push beyond what your best defenses can handle (unless you get really lucky on those HP rolls). However, if you are itching for a new "old-style Wizardry" game to go through, you'll find lots of wonderful art and plenty of dungeon to crawl. Ironically, this game was part of a so-called "Wizardry Renaissance" in Japan, which I believe only resulted in two games... and the sequel to this one never made it west, despite having quite a few good tweaks to that old Wizardry system. If you already like Wizardry, you'll like this. But if you're looking for something with new bells and whistles, or if you're tired of the now-quite-old Wizardry mechanics, you may want to give this a pass. Why the heck hasn't there been a new game from Japan using the Bane/Savant/Wiz8 ruleset...?
MechWarrior 5: Mercenaries is a lot of fun and has a lot of variety, especially once you buy all the DLC. However, it does suffer from the procedurally-generated nature of its missions, in that RNG has a pretty large effect on your results, and, possibly, your enjoyment. Another negative is that you'll almost certainly want to get a bunch of mods to improve quality of life. The fact that one needs to rummage through a fairly large number of mods to get the best experience is one reason that I rated four stars instead of five. The other is the large number of relatively expensive DLCs needed to "complete" your experience. Aim for a sale, if you can.
First off: I have the PS Vita version, so this review won't cover any issues that might have occurred while porting the game over to PC, if any. Mary Skelter: Nightmares is a very expansive grid-style dungeon crawler. The art is nice, with lots of variations for each character. The dungeon crawling is fast-paced and there are a lot of interesting mechanics that depend on the special abilities of each character. There are lots of traps that require the use of character or player skills. Some of the maps are incredibly large, which reduces the requirements for grinding--as a concrete example, one of the areas consists of around five floors, each on a 60x60 grid. Just exploring these areas fully gets you most of the experience you need to advance. The class/job system is well put-together, with enough variations to keep things interesting and make fun combinations for your team. The system encourages experimentation while minimizing punishment for suboptimal choices. The combat system is fast and fun, but often requires planning, as wrong moves (especially when the girls are approaching the Blood Skelter state) can be devastating. The combat starts out quite easy, and rises in difficulty gradually. So far, I've been very satisfied. I'm a few dungeons in and the combat is reasonably difficult without being punishing. I've enjoyed the plot and character interactions so far. There's enough there to be interesting without bogging down the gameplay. The characters, being anime-styled versions of fairy tale characters, have easy-to-understand personalities, but the banter between them is reasonably well-written and gives them a little more depth (especially for a dungeon crawler). Highly recommended for fans of grid-style dungeon crawlers, especially those who enjoy the "anime atmosphere". If you've liked Etrian Odyssey and don't mind a few galge dynamics (e.g. affection levels, which are generally optional, BTW), give it a try!
