Shining in the Darkness

Climax Entertainment and Sonic Software Planning debuted with Shining in the Darkness, a first-person dungeon crawler a la Wizardry with echoes of Phantasy Star and a charming, colorful medieval-fantasy artstyle, although still prone to the tedious pitfalls of its era (bland combat, languid pace, brutal encounter rate, etc.). Its quaint sense of humor constitutes the game's best moments, which sadly are too few and far between to leave a lasting impression.

Shining in the Darkness is part of the Shining Force game legacy, but predates the classics Shining Force and Shining Force II. This game is an older release for the sega genesis and it shows - the world and town layout is small and relies on recycling of textures and sprites, a common trick in older games (first fight the green slime but later fight the red slime). Your choices for locations to explore are three: the castle where you can talk to the king and his court, the town where you can save, heal, and buy/sell items, and lastly the labyrinth. All of the fighting occurs in the enormous labyrinth. Shining in the Darkness in an old-school dungeon crawling rpg with the labyrinth being composed of a vast collection of hallways and stairways. Boss battles occur at set places in the map but all other minor battles are random. If you enjoy the Shining Force legacy, you might enjoy this game, but I will warn you that apart from some of the spells your characters can cast, there is very little overlap between this game and the upcoming core Shining Force games.

You begin this game as the main character sent to rescue the king's daughter from the evil clutches of Dark Sol. You soon meet up with two other characters that join your team, Milo and Pyra. Dungeon delving rpgs full of twisting hallways and random encounters are hard to get into, especially following the advent of the labyrinth free rpgs. Progress far enough and you will get out of the boring looking dungeons and into some more dynamic scenery. Despite having only three characters, I felt like my team was well equipped and balanced. The music is good in this game, but you will hear the same tunes over and over throughout your progress which will evenually poison the appeal. The magic system is good - characters gain the ability to use magic as they level up and the spells come to be your best friend. This is the same system that is used in Shining Force I and II.

Overall, Shining in the Darkness is ripe with frustration. The labyrinth is massive and getting lost is commonplace. There is no map so either make one as you go or find one online. Armed with these, the game is a bit more bearable. As with many of the old style rpgs, expect to do a ton of character leveling. You'll need to kill a lot of slimes before venturing into some of the deeper parts of the first level. As I mentioned before, all non-boss battles are random; each step you walk has a probability that you will be attacked. And this probability is annoyingly high. There will be times in the game where it seems that with every step you walk, you are getting attacked. Lastly, despite all of the fighting and killing, the characters and dialogue are elementary. The three characters in your team look like children, the king and his court are cartoonish, and the fighting is nerfed (you fight 'tough looking' oozes...).

The labyrinth idea is not new. Shining in the Darkness came a few years after the original Phantasy Star, another dungeon delving rpg. However, due to the incredibly small world map (three locations) and the one giant labyrinth, I much prefer the openness of Phantasy Star in terms of this style of rpg. If you are an old-school gamer that love dungeon diving, this is worth a shot. Shining Force fans may also find small enjoyment here if you have lots of patience.