Wizardry: Proving Grounds of the Mad Overlord Review Summary

Faithful, modernized classic experience: The remake successfully modernizes the classic Wizardry experience while remaining faithful to the original. It offers updated graphics, improved UI, and optional quality-of-life features that enhance accessibility without sacrificing the original's charm and challenge. Players can customize their experience to closely resemble the original or enjoy a more streamlined, modern version.

Challenging, unforgiving gameplay: The game retains the challenging and unforgiving nature of old-school RPGs, where strategic planning, resource management, and acceptance of permadeath are crucial for success. The high difficulty and risk of character loss contribute to a rewarding sense of progression and attachment to surviving characters. This aspect may not appeal to all players, but it is a core element of the intended experience.

Significantly improved graphics: The game features significantly improved graphics, with updated visuals, detailed monster designs, and enhanced animations. The graphical enhancements contribute to a more immersive and visually appealing experience, while still respecting the original's aesthetic. This is a major upgrade from the original's simpler graphics.

Modern quality-of-life features: The game includes quality-of-life improvements such as automapping, multiple save slots, and customizable settings, making it more accessible and enjoyable for modern players. The game also runs well on Steam Deck, with intuitive controls and legible text. These features enhance the overall experience without compromising the original's core gameplay.

Evokes nostalgia and entertainment: The game evokes strong feelings of nostalgia and provides hours of entertainment. The game's system, despite being 40 years old, still feels relevant and engaging. The game is a classic and provides positive memories.

Poor save system, item loss: The game's save system, featuring only auto-saves and no manual saving, makes save-scumming difficult and can lead to significant progress loss due to crashes or party wipes. Additionally, the game strips players of all items upon completing the game, which is seen as a poor design choice.

Outdated, not fun, overpriced: Many reviewers express disappointment with the game, citing outdated mechanics, a boring grind, and a lack of fun. Some consider it overpriced for the minimal overhaul and feel that the developers prioritized graphics over user experience. Some reviewers even requested a refund.

Unskippable, lengthy animations: Lengthy and unskippable combat animations, including enemy introductions and death sequences, significantly slow down the game's pace. This issue is compounded by the need to identify monsters to skip animations, making grinding tedious and detracting from the overall experience.

Slow pace, tedious grinding: The game suffers from a slow pace due to drawn-out combat animations, low item drop rates, and excessive grinding. This leads to frustration and boredom, especially given the lack of a deep story or engaging character development. The game's balance and experience point system also feel outdated.

Unappealing, repetitive gameplay: The game's design choices, such as distinct character designs and simple graphics, may not appeal to all players, particularly those accustomed to modern RPGs. Cumbersome controls, slow combat animations, and a lack of strategic depth contribute to a repetitive and unengaging experience.

Slow battles, corpse runs: Battles are turn-based, but lack a battle acceleration option, causing fights with many enemies to take a long time. If the entire party dies, a 'corpse run' with another party is required to retrieve them.

Challenging maze navigation: The game features a mini-map that resets upon entry, warps, or escapes, encouraging mapping. The maze contains one-way doors, floor spinners, and teleporters, presenting navigational challenges.

Save-scumming for HP gains: Some reviewers used save-scumming to manipulate hit point gains on level up, as the game often granted only 1 hit point per level. This indicates a potential issue with the game's balancing.

Turn-based combat, party management: The game features turn-based combat with party management and resource conservation. Combat involves selecting actions, and the game determines the specific target of attacks.

High skill ceiling, strategic gameplay: The game is difficult to master, requiring players to learn quirks and mechanics through trial and error. It demands a careful, strategic approach, similar to a roguelike or XCOM, with an emphasis on resource management.

Frequent freezes and lockups: Players report frequent freezes, hangs, and lockups, sometimes requiring a restart. These issues are exacerbated by the Fast Battle feature and occur in specific battles. This significantly impacts the gameplay experience.

Inconsistent stability reports: Some players are reporting a smooth and bug-free experience, while others are encountering issues. This suggests that the game's stability may vary depending on the hardware or software configuration.

Monster animations slow gameplay: While monster animations are present, they contribute to longer wait times, especially when facing multiple enemies with preemptive strikes. This can slow down the pace of the game and become tedious for players.

Early bugs mostly resolved: Some bugs were present during early access and at launch, but have since been resolved in version 1.1. This indicates that the developers are actively working to improve the game's stability and address player feedback.

Broken menu navigation: Players are experiencing issues with menu and sub-menu navigation. The navigation often breaks, requiring players to repeatedly exit and re-enter the menus, which is frustrating and time-consuming.

Good for nostalgia, divisive otherwise: Many reviewers recommend the game to fans of the original, praising its faithfulness and the nostalgia it evokes. However, many others do not recommend the game due to its outdated mechanics, high difficulty, and lack of modern conveniences. Some suggest it's only worth playing for nostalgia or as a piece of gaming history.

Significant bugs and polish issues: A significant number of reviewers mention bugs and a lack of polish as major issues, with some even describing game-breaking problems. This leads to many recommending waiting for patches or avoiding the game altogether until these issues are resolved. Some reviewers suggest that negative reviews may be overblown or system-specific.

Overpriced for the content: Several reviewers feel the game is overpriced for what it offers, especially considering its age and the lack of substantial improvements. They suggest waiting for a sale or considering it only worth a much lower price point. Some reviewers felt that the game was not worth the money even on sale.

Interesting for gaming history: Some reviewers suggest that the game is best suited for those interested in gaming history or as a way to experience the roots of the JRPG genre. They highlight its unique, immersive experience through its simplicity and focus on exploration. However, some reviewers found the game unenjoyable for treasure hunting.

Desire for more remakes/content: Several reviewers express a desire for the developers to continue remaking other games in the series, particularly Knight of Diamonds and Legacy of Llylgamyn. Some reviewers also request additional content, such as a DLC with a sound package. These points indicate a positive reception to the remake and a desire for more content.

Influential RPG design: Wizardry's design and mechanics have significantly influenced the JRPG genre, including series like Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest. Its historical significance is evident in later RPGs, and its settings are inherited by famous works such as YU-NO and Persona.

Save backups recommended: The game includes save game directory information for those who want to back up their progress, and it is recommended to do so before each expedition. There is a risk of file corruption when force-quitting the game, and money can be lost.

Shared enemy animations: Many enemies share animations, which makes enemy identification more important. Some enemies lack sounds in the Early Access version, but patches are consistent.

High experience gain: Characters with titles can repeatedly fight the final boss to gain experience, but this can be disabled in settings. The amount of experience gained after a battle is very high.

Inconsistent item naming: Item and monster names are based on older versions, but the word separation has changed (e.g., "LONG SWORD" instead of "Longsword"). The game is in Early Access, with some monster descriptions missing.