Wizardry 5 - Won! @ CRPG Addict

Dhruin

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A deep dose of nostalgia as the CRPG Addict writes about wrapping up his playthrough of Wizardry 5:
Mapping Level 7 took a long time, mostly because I kept running into monsters bent on killing me for good. Repeatedly, I had to fight parties with multiple spellcasters who thought nothing of casting mass-damage spells like LAHALITO and LADALTO, wiping out half my party members in a single round. Eventually, I got so sick of returning to the surface to raise my dead party members that I simply started reloading every time one of them died. Thus did I start on the slippery slope to the CRPG scum that I ultimately became.
More information.
 
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Ah, the days when regular AAA games were truly hard. and it wasn't considered a bad thing.

Right now I'm playing X:Com:TftD on beginner and regularly getting my butt whooped.

When I finally tried Wiz5 I couldn't tolerate the graphics - its when they started moving away from wireframe but there's a charm with that kind of game that later improved games that I just can't tolerate today.

Andrew Greenberg was still involved with this one and he still hadn't changed the Ubliette style magic system he created. Was this the first Wiz with DW Bradley or was that the next one?
 
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Well, honestly, based on his coverage of Wizardry 5, it sounds like he does consider it to be a bad thing. He's normally a fan of hard games, but he paints Wizardry 5 as being way over the top to the point where it's not remotely fun.

Wizardry 5 was the only Wizardry game that I never completed, which probably means that I found it really hard too, but it was so long ago that I can barely remember. I remember it more for the ability to find NPCs in the dungeon to converse with, which was kind of cool at the time.

Ah, the days when regular AAA games were truly hard. and it wasn't considered a bad thing.
 
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well sure, but it sounds like its because he's resistant to reload the game and probably the designers expect you to do this in the situation instead of the old method.

Wizardry, until the later games, gave you the rare ability to rescue your party with another which helped give the illusion of a dynamic world. Its a nice touch which they probably did in pen and paper.

Later, they started letting you save the game in the dungeon and I think they added patches for earlier games to do this too. Heck, today's gamers are allowed to level up in a dungeon which was always a no-no in the 80's.

I'm guessing the playtesters and designers at this point started ignoring the "rescue" dynamic in favour of this and realistic AI. Either that, or they didn't playtest enough before release before seeing what a problem it would be.

Or maybe they did it too much and made it more challenging to meet their own skill level. That happens sometimes and they lose touch with the average player.
 
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Well if you read his reviews, it's definitely more then just his reluctance to reload the game. He gets over that, and still finds the game extremely unfair. And if you read his past reviews, he's not exactly someone who is opposed to extremely hard games.

But yeah, I remember the whole rescuing a party from the dungeon thing. I never did it though, because it was so much easier to just reload! Though back in the early days of Wizardry 1, I'd have to actually turn off my computer when I died, to prevent it from saving. I don't think that it was possible to just hit reload until....Wizardry 4 maybe?

well sure, but it sounds like its because he's resistant to reload the game and probably the designers expect you to do this in the situation instead of the old method.

Wizardry, until the later games, gave you the rare ability to rescue your party with another which helped give the illusion of a dynamic world. Its a nice touch which they probably did in pen and paper.

Later, they started letting you save the game in the dungeon and I think they added patches for earlier games to do this too. Heck, today's gamers are allowed to level up in a dungeon which was always a no-no in the 80's.

I'm guessing the playtesters and designers at this point started ignoring the "rescue" dynamic in favour of this and realistic AI. Either that, or they didn't playtest enough before release before seeing what a problem it would be.

Or maybe they did it too much and made it more challenging to meet their own skill level. That happens sometimes and they lose touch with the average player.
 
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ok, I'll read the whole interview, heh.

yeah - catching the floppy drive before it started to write became a regular sound in our computer lab - people would screaming and one guy always slammed the case when the teacher wasn't around.

timing was everything, because the disk could be stuck in an open state and be unreadable, losing all your characters. You'd then need tools to transfer your characters to a new disk and it still wasn't guaranteed. harsh times.

I think it was Wiz 2 or 3 introduced saving in dungeons and it included the patch for the first game. That's just a guess.
 
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they certainly went out of their way to prevent that kind of cheating. I can't say I've ever seen that kind of dynamic again but it sure was an interesting way to play.

If you had level 12 characters stuck at level 7 of proving grounds and you didn't have anyone comparable to dig them out, you were in for a long haul. Hopefully, you remembered to mark on the map where they were and remember where you put the map when you get there 2 weeks later.

The only real, real issue is if you take them to the Temple of Cant and the resurrection fails! That game could get quite mean.
 
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Well when I played Wizardry 1 on my Apple IIE, I didn't really get the sense that they were trying to stop me from cheating by handling saving the way they did. I just got the sense that it was one of the first computer RPGs ever made, and they just didn't know any better.
 
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The only real, real issue is if you take them to the Temple of Cant and the resurrection fails! That game could get quite mean.

Last time I tried to play Wizardry 1 by this (the proper?) way. Six ressurections failed out of eight. That was too much for me :)
 
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While I've played bits of the earlier Wizardries, I never finished one until Wizardry 5.
Since then, I was hooked, and finished 5-8. It's sad that we'll never see another one.
 
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funny, I was commenting to a guy at the store who liked my Pac Man T-Shirt that too many kids these days seem to think there were no (good) video games before Doom and Super Mario. He was a big fan of Asteroids he told me.
 
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I lived and breathed the Atari 2600. Plenty of gaming goodness there. I was 7 when it came out. Fake wood veneer… tons of broken joysticks… Pac Man, Centepede, Asteroids, Missle Command, Combat, Pitfall, Donkey Kong, Space Invaders…. geez it was a renaissance of classic gaming!

Adventure and secret rooms!!!
 
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Good post! For me it was 1995… Doom II. What game brought you in?

I can't say there was one game in particular, but Doom I&II were definitely early favorites of mine. It wasn't until Duke 3D and Blood that I realized how superior the PC was as a gaming platform.


Adventure and secret rooms!!!

Adventure on the 2600 was pure heaven to me when I was a kid. That game had a huge impact on me becoming a fan of RPGs.
 
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Ultima 3 was the one that started it all for me, during my freshman year in college. Man, was I hooked!!! I remember a weekend that I just stayed awake all through, playing that game.


-Carn
 
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