When the PC Engine was first released, NEC and Hudson knew that they would have a hard time tempting third party companies to produce games for the machine - Nintendo's NES was still the number one machine and Nintendo themselves had made many publishers agree to not produce games for their rivals. NEC/Hudson tackled this problem by releasing games that took more than a little inspiration from other successful titles.
There are about a dozen different dungeons to clear in Dungeon Explorer, most of which end with a boss that is harder to get to than to kill. The multilevel dungeons are bursting with creatures for you to kill. The creatures spawn endlessly from portals that you have to destroy, and you'll often find yourself overwhelmed by thick swarms of monsters. All of the fighting and exploring takes place from a top-down perspective, and you can shoot in eight directions.
You can shoot while moving, but you can shoot only in the direction you're moving, which is useless when enemies are coming at you from all sides. It's easier to just pick a spot and shoot until you've killed everything, then move on and do it again a few steps later.
Conclusion
Dungeon Explorer builds on the concept provided by the arcade smash hit Gauntlet, and it actually manages to be a much better game, too. There's more depth, with RPG elements and multiple locations to explore. If you're a fan of Gauntlet then you'll get plenty of enjoyment out of this, even more so if you've got a few like-minded friends.
Tip: You can play 5 players with a gamecube controller for the 5th player, hold down R on the controller whilst booting the game.
Comments 3
Pretty short review. I'd like to know a bit more about the game before I buy it, but thanks anyway.
I think it's important to note: this is not a Gauntlet clone or wannabe, this is a completely original game. It has more in common with the PS2 Baldur's Gate games than the arcadey mess that is Gauntlet.
It really helps I suppose to have some historical context with this game, being as how the music far exceeded most everything out at the time, and it was the first console game in the US to have a 5 player simultaneous option. Being an RPG in part, you could wisely choose how to power up your character, and in doing so, prepare for the upcoming battles. All of these things were so new and important when this game arrived, I give it a lot of credit.
My recommendation for anybody wanting to try this out, choose the Fighter character. Stockpile the black magic whenever possible, and you'll have a breeze with most of the games tougher moments.
As for me, I have beaten the game countless times in 1 player mode using the Elf. With focus on speed and then health, combined with his healing white magic, he is an ideal character for somebody like myself that likes to go it at a pretty methodical pace.
And for heavens sake, you can be a GNOME! Whats not to love?
All in all, I think this is a great review. I might even rate this an 8.
If you play the game with multiple players, the enemies become much easier to kill as each player can focus on crowd control. With 5 people there's an immense amount of strategy to be had in this game as you as a team need to decide who needs the white potions or the black potions more, when to use each potion, and when to position your team to easily attack bosses or enemies. There's way more depth than in Gauntlet and I agree with LasaFrog that this game surpasses Gauntlet in every single way possible.
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