I remember last time I was on here I said I was going to go easy on myself with my next game. Well as it turns out I completely lied. Instead of playing through another old Disney game or some archaic sports game that only requires you to beat the computer once I decided to play through Shining in the Darkness. This game is a largely unheard of game today, but is it a very interesting Genesis game. It's also quite long. It's not much shorter than Dragon Warrior 3, and it has much less variety.
So if you were a big fan of RPGs back in the early 90s than you probably remember the Shining Force games. This was a series of strategy games that got released on a few different Sega systems up through the Saturn. The first two were on the Genesis, and they are two of the greatest games ever produced for it. In fact, Shining Force 2 is my personal favorite Genesis game. Well Shining in the Darkness is the little known predecessor to these games. However, the gameplay is completely different. Where the Shining Force games were turn-based strategy games, Darkness is an old fashioned dungeon crawler. In case you're too young to know what that means, it's sort of like that old 3D maze screensaver. Or are you too young to remember that one as well?
Here's that screen saver that always distracted you during math class.
And here's Shining in the Darkness poorly cropped to hide the fact that I just found this picture on someone's site.
So it has that impressive for 1991 3D scrolling effect, and that's really about it. There is one town, one castle, and one big ol' dungeon that will keep you busy for weeks. It doesn't sound much like that other games in the series, but there are some hints of Shining Force games to come. The similarities mostly come in the form of graphics and sprites. The menu screens are very similar, and I'm fairly sure the priest is that same one that's in later games. It also starts out the same with a person telling you a story that leads to the game select screen. Other than that there's not much resemblance, but the roots certainly are there.
I already mentioned that this game is mostly your characters moving around in a big dungeon with brick walls and floors. The whole game takes place in a small box in the middle of the screen, and if you look closely you'll notice that only the walls move while the floor stays the same. It sound boring, but I actually had a very good time playing this one. As you know, I love a game where you start out weak and slowly get stronger. Darkness did this at a very good pace. Levels never took too long to gain, and you could always tell a difference when you gained one. It also had three very useful party members. Often these games will have one guy who is completely useless. Also, unlike most of these old 3D games where I instantly get lost, I was able to make it through this one without cheating and looking up a map. In fact, the only time I got lost in the maze was when I thought I had missed my save point and checked it on a map loaded up on my computer.
Alright well let's tally this one up. On the downside it's a very drab looking game with little to do besides look around the dark dungeon. There's only one town that you move through too slowly, and one castle that you will probably forget about by the time it's actually useful. On the plus side I found it surprisingly engaging. Every time I went back in the dungeon I was able to make it a little bit farther. I usually couldn't wait to get back in there. The fighting system is very user friendly and fast-paced, so the game never seems to drag. Somehow they managed to make tedium seem fun, which is that main goal in this type of game.
This game only gets so-so reviews online, but I would say that this one is worth checking out, especially if you're into those old Shining Force games. It's interesting to see where the series got its start. I think I will close this one out before it starts to sound too much like a review. I promise next time will be something a little less involved. Spring break's coming up, so that would be the perfect time to play through some old platform games. Or maybe I'll start a game on Dragon Warrior 4. Either way I will try to update more than twice a month.
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