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Post by Ex on Dec 19, 2018 11:26:36 GMT -5
 I'd like to make a decent list of pre-2000 era top down dungeon crawlers that don't suck. By "don't suck" I mean members here recommend them. The types of games I'm talking about are like old school Zelda, Brandish, Soul Blazer, and Arcus Odyssey for example. Action-RPGs are A-OK insofar as they feature dungeons to explore, and a top down (AKA bird's eye) perspective. I'm looking for games that are PS1-era and back. Console and handheld releases preferably. One last caveat - the game must be available in English, either officially or fan translated. If you'd like to help, just post your recommendations here! I'll get to organizing it all when I have more time. This isn't meant to be an exhaustive index guys, rather a cherry picked list of the good stuff as recommended by you. |
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Post by Xeogred on Dec 19, 2018 18:57:51 GMT -5
This is a cheap copy/paste from our ARPG thread, but some of this stuff does fit the bill! A pure SNES starter pack: I can elaborate more on any of these if someone wants me too. I'll just say that deep down, I've always loved Secret of Mana just as much as Chrono Trigger and Final Fantasy VI. And combat/gameplay wise, like I previously said in the ARPG thread, SD3 has my favorite combat system of all time for this genre and a party based system of three characters. Beyond those too you can't go wrong with any of these, special mention to Alcahest and Terranigma for mindblowing OST's as well.
If you want to get right down to the dungeon crawling, Brain Lord and Soul Blazer are probably the two that are straight to the point on this list. Alcahest is the weirdest and shortest though, as it is very arcadey but still beefy enough to be an RPG. Just have to play it to see.
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Post by toei on Dec 19, 2018 19:13:20 GMT -5
The only real top-down dungeon crawlers I can think of are the Brandish series, roguelikes, and games like Diablo. Oh, and the excellent Vagrant Story. For me, if a game has multiple towns and more of a story, it's not a dungeon crawler (and I assume you're already familiar with most ARPGs), though I guess Soul Blazer is sort of close. But yeah, play Alcahest if you haven't already. It's halfway between an arcadey action game and a ARPG, and it's only a few hours long. Neugier might just count as a dungeon crawler, as it takes place almost entirely within a castle, and it's maybe 4-5 hours long. The sword feels a bit short at first, but it's a pretty decent game as I recall.
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Post by Sarge on Dec 19, 2018 19:24:57 GMT -5
Yeah, Neugier was one of the first I played through when I got my SD2SNES. Fun fact, the game was supposed to come out here as The Journey Home: Quest for the Throne, and was featured in Nintendo Power, even getting a review. That means the game was finished! As far as I know, no one has found a prototype for it. (Along with, I'm also reminded that Lost Mission, a translation of Shinseiki Odysselya, was also never released. It also got a review in Nintendo Power. I searched for these games for a long time, in both ROM and real form, and never had any luck. Huh, wonder why?  ) |
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Post by bonesnapdeez on Dec 19, 2018 20:12:54 GMT -5
Those first three Dungeon Explorer games (PCE and Mega CD) are just sublime. All three were released in North America. Pure ARPG action, plenty of rad dungeons. Get on it.
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Post by toei on Dec 19, 2018 20:17:06 GMT -5
Oh yeah, those definitely count. They're Gauntlet-style dungeon crawlers. I always wished I could play them multi-player, though.
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Post by Xeogred on Dec 19, 2018 21:10:30 GMT -5
The only real top-down dungeon crawlers I can think of are the Brandish series, roguelikes, and games like Diablo. Oh, and the excellent Vagrant Story. For me, if a game has multiple towns and more of a story, it's not a dungeon crawler (and I assume you're already familiar with most ARPGs), though I guess Soul Blazer is sort of close. But yeah, play Alcahest if you haven't already. It's halfway between an arcadey action game and a ARPG, and it's only a few hours long. Neugier might just count as a dungeon crawler, as it takes place almost entirely within a castle, and it's maybe 4-5 hours long. The sword feels a bit short at first, but it's a pretty decent game as I recall. Have you played Brain Lord? I liked how the game only has two towns and it doesn't even have a real main field/overworld, just a few short outside sections and then 90% of the game is trekking through the huge 4-5 dungeons. Most of them had like ~5 floors or so and warp points almost every level since they were quite large and elaborate. It was also cool how the townsfolk would show up throughout the dungeons too and their positions would change as you progressed, so it felt like even the NPC's were on their own journey in a fun way.
I certainly had my frustrations while playing it and would change some stuff about it, but yeah looking back months later it was a really cool and unique game.
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Post by toei on Dec 19, 2018 21:57:47 GMT -5
Yeah, I played it years ago and liked it a lot. Didn't even have your frustrations. But it has more story and NPCs than what I'd consider a dungeon crawler.
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Post by Sarge on Dec 19, 2018 22:32:04 GMT -5
Yeah, I wasn't sure definitionally how we were going to roll here. I have a very specific type of game that comes to mind with "dungeon crawler". I do think, though, that "ARPG with dungeons" gives a bit more to work with.
Anyway, something that just came to mind were the Shining Soul games on GBA. While the first game was kinda "eh", the second ends up being rather solid. Also along those lines, I know you said PS1 era and back, but I guess the Dreamcast was alive before the PS2 came out, so... Record of Lodoss War slots in nicely here.
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Post by Ex on Dec 20, 2018 13:36:48 GMT -5
Okay guys, here's what we've got so far...
Dreamcast Record of Lodoss WarGBAShining Soul *
Shining Soul II *SNES/SFCAlcahest *!
Brain Lord *!
Brandish *!
Illusion of Gaia *!
Neugier *
Secret of Evermore *
Secret of Mana *!
Seiken Densetsu 3 *
Soul Blazer *!
Terranigma *PS1Diablo *
Vagrant Story *!SEGA CDDungeon Explorer *TG16/PCE/CDDungeon Explorer *!
Dungeon Explorer II *
* = I have played this before.
! = I have beaten this before.
I plan on adding some additions to the list, my own recommendations and inquiries, when I have more time. It's the end of the year and my department is a bit time crunched right now.
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