Great game engine, with several deep mechanics unfortunately buried in an unfinished experience. I call it unfinished but not unpolished. Unfortunately this game had a difficult release. Great class/race/multi-classing options. The combat is probably the best part, turn based and incredibly slow. You need a mod called 'Wiz8Fast' to play this game properly. Took me 120 hours to get the full experience.
There are two factions at war, and a faction you can later infiltrate. This leads to multiple endings. The worst part about this game is that the plot could be fleshed out much further. The NPC's in the game are all fully voiced, and yet theres maybe 20 NPCs in the entire game. That makes each on more memorable but at the same time, its hard to flesh out a story with so few charachters and such little dialogue. There are a few side quests, but for the most part you will only be advancing the main storyline.
Most important aspect is the combat and the system, the non-standard classes are all incredible in their own ways, Gadgeteer, Alchemist, Ninjas and Samurai? Wizardry 8 has a fun and unique blend of science fiction and classic middle-earth elements scattered throughout every aspect of the game. The lockpicking and disarm system is unique, and the weapons are unique. The whole game is unique. Maxing stats presents new stats and abilities, which honestly makes it so I wish the game was longer. Finished up around level 20, and would of loved to have a real reason (other than doing it to do it) to get my party stronger. Overall it was well worth my time.
There were initial troubles getting it to run, but I assumed it was a scaling to monitor issue, search engines first result fixed my issue with a quick drag and drop.
If I could give advice to a struggling player it would be: A classic elemental magic caster is great, but status effects like sleep and paralyze are way stronger in Wiz8 than casting fireball over and over like in Baldur's Gate.
