After 14 years, Shiren the Wanderer is embarking on a brand new adventure and climbing Serpentcoil Island – or at least trying his best to do so, that aspect is entirely up to the player. Spike Chunsoft invited us to their Tokyo office to preview the upcoming Shiren the Wanderer: The Mystery Dungeon of Serpentcoil Island, giving us a few hours with the game as well as the chance to chat with Director Keisuke Sakurai, Project Director Hideyuki Shinozaki and Associate Producer Ryo Nishimura in a roundtable conversation held in Japanese with an interpreter provided by Spike Chunsoft.
Like its more famous sibling series, Pokémon Mystery Dungeon, Shiren the Wanderer is, as described by its creators, a “roguelike” game with procedurally generated dungeons. In the latest version, The Mystery Dungeon of Serpentcoil Island, scheduled to be released outside Japan on February 27, 2024, for Nintendo Switch, the titular Shiren and his weasel friend Koppa arrive on the island to explore and find the mystery. treasure.
©Spike Chunsoft Co., Ltd. All rights reserved. Licensed and published by Spike Chunsoft, Inc. (Screenshot taken by Daryl Harding on Nintendo Switch)
In a few hours of play, I climbed up to the 11th floor of Underwater Passage, which is a little less than the allowed number of floors in this preview session. Although getting to that point doesn’t take long in terms of distance traveled on the map, it’s the player’s skill that determines how far you get and my skill level was too low and not up to par. was given what the dungeon punishment was like.
Director Sakurai explained in the Q&A that he felt like fans wanted a more back-to-basics Shiren 1 (known internationally as Mystery Dungeon: Shiren the Wanderer when it was finally released). released internationally in 2008 through it). Experience the Nintendo DS remake of the original 1995 Super Famicom game) instead of the newer elements of Shiren the Wanderer: The Tower of Fortune and Dice of Fate, such as the removal of the night system and removal of upgrades. weapon level. Shinozaki said elements that make other games “too complicated” should be eliminated.
©Spike Chunsoft Co., Ltd. All rights reserved. Licensed and published by Spike Chunsoft, Inc. (Screenshot taken by Daryl Harding on Nintendo Switch)
It’s been so long since the release of The Tower of Fortune and the Dice of Fate and The Mystery Dungeon of Serpentcoil Island that the roguelike game genre has grown to include the likes of Hades and even the now classic now The Binding of Isaac. The team wanted to strip away all the “hardcore” audience elements and wanted to show people what an “original” roguelike game is like, an “authentic” experience compared to other games in the Mystery series Dungeon.
And it’s completely punitive. Once defeated, you lose everything – loot, upgrades and more – and start back to the first village on the island. While I didn’t count the number of times I fell in the preview, I once died on the first level in less than five seconds. Another one in less than 10 seconds. I initially said this was a skill issue but bad spawns are still just bad spawns. I couldn’t help but go down those stairs the first time and had nothing but a weak fist to help me.
The game is addictive and fun, hours passed while playing in the office without me noticing. While collapsing too quickly over and over again is annoying –thankfully the ability to respawn is very quick, an aspect much loved by the game director–, the game’s strength comes from Enter the villages multiple times and meet new characters at each village. time, get more storylines in the meantime.
Dear localizers who adapted these sweet characters into English, the script does a great job portraying all the characters with their adorable dialogues and personalities. It helps ease the pain of constantly restarting over and over again after discovering (and then losing) one of the new Sacred Items.
©Spike Chunsoft Co., Ltd. All rights reserved. Licensed and published by Spike Chunsoft, Inc. (Screenshot taken by Daryl Harding on Nintendo Switch)
Before the preview, I familiarized myself with the series by playing the Switch remakes of The Tower of Fortune and Dice of Fate, which gave me a baseline for what Serpentcoil Island’s Mysterious Dungeon could be. require. Thankfully, Serpentcoil Island’s controls are just as intuitive as the previous game, with just one new twist, which is using the joystick to move diagonally. This may seem a bit odd to use on a grid, but there are some generations that are forced to use the stick instead of the D-pad.
The graphics also get a major upgrade from the previous entry and are now available in 3D. The staff worried that this graphical update would make gameplay “heavy,” especially on the Nintendo Switch, which Shinozaki said was “hardware… challenging.” No one can feel that while playing. The game plays very well and has extremely attractive visuals.
There’s a depth of field effect added above and below the screen to give the game a tilted look to create depth, like on Octopus Tourist. Although the game is on Nintendo Switch, meaning the graphics aren’t as clear as on the PlayStation 5, the charm still radiates from the towns, interiors and dungeons with some vistas scattered throughout some of the dungeons made me “Wow!”
©Spike Chunsoft Co., Ltd. All rights reserved. Licensed and published by Spike Chunsoft, Inc. (Screenshot taken by Daryl Harding on Nintendo Switch)
With a few hours of playing Shiren the Wanderer: The Mystery Dungeon of Serpentcoil Island, I couldn’t help but feel frustrated by the gameplay loop but as I continued to play, I learned the mechanics and discovered more of the sweet story as time went on. The preview is over, I’m a bit sad that I can’t continue playing. Those who have been waiting for the next Shiren experience will certainly be pleased, but it must be remembered, this is a “roguelike” game and not the more popular (and better-looking to players) “roguelite”.