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KING'S FIELD

even wizardry hadn’t been this particular brand of wizardry since 1988, yet here we are. you can practically still see the grid it was wrenched off of; woozy textures repeating endlessly in oversized corridors, each sword swing almost as abstract as those of its turn-based predecessors. it’s all very quaint and charming, and it filled an obvious niche while the rest of japan was too busy making ultima-but-good and the crpg had long since moved in other directions as the dungeon crawler’s golden age was drawing to a close

while there isn’t much in the way of attrition, puzzling, or difficult encounters, the choice to angle for a gauzier, more stripped down approach leaves it playing to its strengths rather than its weaknesses. the mazes are frequently clever and anchored by a beautiful aesthetic sensibility, translating wireframes into haunted caverns, filling them with only the sharpest right angles and cutest little monsters, and prioritizing immediacy over menus and number crunching. despite its reputation, you’d have a hard time finding a friendlier or more accessible dungeon crawler c.1994