Shiren the Wanderer: The Mystery Dungeon of Serpentcoil Island

[oscar]

I saw a couple of posts about the new Shiren the Wanderer game in a few other threads but thought it deserved its own! From what I’ve played it’s shaping up to be one of my favourite games in a good while.

After 20-something attempts last night I managed to beat the first story dungeon in one of those classic ‘there’s no way I’m gonna make it this run’ runs where everything comes together in the most chaotic way possible and you manage to scrape through at the last second. Peak gaming!

So far this Shiren seems much more streamlined than 5, which I loved but did have a bout a hundred systems I never fully understood or even interacted with — here, things have been stripped back a little to the essentials, and when new mechanics are introduced they’re doled out in cute little story sequences that double as explainers for how they actually work.

I’ve seen the visuals get a bit of flack online as the series has gone 3D after 5’s gorgeous pixel art, and while technically they are quite basic, for me they are nailing a sort of lost PS2 game aesthetic (or perhaps just channeling the series’ previous ventures into three dimensions on the N64 and Wii). All cosy towns and charming little characters, it’s providing the perfect chill atmosphere for me to spend hours and hours getting knocked unconscious by horrible little pig men who throw nasty rocks at me >:-(

I’ve just begun to dip my toes into the post-story content and already the game has opened up in a number of exciting ways. Keen to see what else is in here! Is anyone else playing this? What are your impressions so far?

 

[oscar]

Ok this game might be a 10/10 imo!! I’m deep into the postgame dungeons (which isn’t to say I’m actually completing very many of them, they are quite hard) and I think it’s even better than Shiren 5 in terms of the pure clockwork precision of its systems. Equally important: the vibes are really quite lovely and the music is excellent — some tracks absolutely pop off in the most unexpected ways and I am very much enjoying it

 

[spines]

yeah, this game is good stuff. as much as i adore 5, especially the party members and their mechanics, not having to manage them and tons of extra items and stuff due to the night mode really makes this game feel a lot breezier and less convoluted, especially for the introductory clear (which i've not yet managed in 5). definitely going back to that (and 2 and 3) at some point, but i agree on pretty much everything. the music's great, the game really does look nice overall, and i think a lot of the changes (slightly more unidentified items in base game, no undo grass, high healing rate, the sumo stuff making it less appealing to hoard food for way too long) are really positive for the flow and feel of the game.

i've finished a second run (i died on floor 12 due to a monster closet where a bowboy leveled up to a tank and then started killing things even faster till it maxed out and started quickly attacking for 50 damage, lol, but i had such a good inventory i wanted to save it, so i took a break for a few days waiting for a rescue) and a few of the ongoing sidequests. also both of the "inference" dungeons, which are a fun way to ease into the concepts of identifying stuff because i don't have a strong background in roguelikes still. during all that the next story dungeon has also come up, but i don't feel ready for it yet, lol

 

[spines]

finished behemoth rush, which is a weird and slightly repetitive dungeon (basically...the goal is not be within 1 tile of anything. as such i feel like all the monsters are about the same) highlighting a few important/interesting interactions. and the pirate ship, both of which had entertaining little stories (this game's a lot less serious than 5...haha). i'm leveling up some equipment to try dunes of batsu again, but really, i'll probably give it another go with some of my cheaper items before i finish leveling up to the extent i'm thinking of.

 

[jpfriction]

Being able to rescue yourself is a nice touch. Let’s you kind of optimize the run.

 

[jpfriction]

Rolled the credits, that’s gotta be a record for a shiren game, even if most of the game is still to come.

Special thanks to the riceball saleswoman who sold me a dozen onigri and let me go sumo at will. Chunky boi packs a punch.

 

[spines]

another exploratory run through batsu where i got killed by the fire guys around 6f, i accidentally hit "start again" but then after walking around for a second i found hibiki and was like "huh, does this work??"

i uh, almost made it to the last floor despite a couple of huge blunders. she's so op. i had porky for a while but i hadn't fully registered how he kinda forces you into fights...you can't really peel him away from a guy he wants to kill, which is bad when that's not gonna happen because it's a fire guy who can't be hit by the rocks. anyway, losing him wasn't really too bad, but i got separated from hibiki by a staff guy who used the "teleport to the stairs" on me. i was in the room next to the one i got warped from, so i used the stairs for a bit thinking it would let her come with me automatically, but...well, i was mistaken on at least one point. oh well! from that point on i was alone and i couldn't really hold up to the damage from enemies very well, so i probably would've run out of items too soon even if i hadn't messed up

anyway, i dunno how uncommon that kind of thing is, now i'm actually going to go back to raising up a fuuma shield and sword to hopefully make most of this real easy. it'll be a fair number more runs, it seems, but i've learned a bunch more on my last couple of serpentcoils, so it's not that big a deal

 

[spines]

i've finished the main story cycle of 3 dungeons and think i've unlocked every dungeon overall after going through a ton of events today? still a lot left to clear, a handful of "training" dungeons and other tutorial-ish ones and a few with character stories behind them. seki's is extremely hard, akin to the inference dungeons where around floor 6 the monsters become extremely hard to fight but without the leg up on identifying you get...it's kinda fun though, there's a lot of wacky items in there and pretty high amounts of shrines and stuff. (the clear rate is only a little higher than the ultimate dungeon, haha.) i haven't really tried the pirate or peach ones yet though.

 

[spines]

alright i have now failed yamakagashi pass 40 times

there's like a hint of something cool here since it's definitely plausible to hit some really cool builds (e.g. removing the breaking rune from a break-off shield?) and it's kind of hard for me to stop trying again because i have gotten a lot better, but...nah. it fucking sucks. it's a fast ramping dungeon where everything (except incense) is undentified, which would be one thing if it was "just" something like batsu where you start taking heavy damage a third of the way through but they threw in pretty much every kind of item manipulation in the game and monsters who can move and attack on the same turn, so while you're getting hammered by monsters who are already barely 1v1-able you also become unable to change your equipment freely, run away, and get new items. it's basically inevitable that if you find one revival or invincible grass you'll eat it and never find a second, and the same goes for many of the useful scrolls (like exorcism). wishing shrines are relatively common but they're generally not very powerful since there's a good chance knaves will just kill almost all the items on them.

and then, even if you do score some pretty good combination of stuff, like the fan resonance, or a nice combined shield, or just something like fuumas or yamanba's equipment with their solid stats, you still have to not get caught by a monster house for 15-20 more floors. which is not very likely.

i had one run where i got a wallpass bracelet from the wishing shrine, and only died because i both fucked up and lost my shield to a swordsman, and then forgot to use the bracelet. which was my bad, but it's pretty fucked up that the only way this seems kind of balanced is if you manage to get an item that generally doesn't seem to exist in this dungeon

 

[spines]

holy shit, i did it. all it took was basically getting the luckiest run i can possibly imagine. i mean, i guess i could've also gotten a peach staff and not had that one fairly high level monster house but it did basically spawn at the exact moment i was most ready to handle it instead of being full of monks and those teleporting polygon jerks or something. i got two rounds of cave mamel power leveling, fully runed up manji equipment (they weren't the best runes ever, but nice enough), multiple fallbacks of windblade scrolls, invincible/revival grass, and four (!) blank scrolls, one of which i used to identify the windblades, one missed clearing out knaves (it really sucks when they miss bc it lands on them and they get to destroy it instantly lol), one did clear out swordsmen, and then i cashed one for the boss

kiki island is supposedly much easier and uses inference identifying, so i guess that's next up. hopefully won't be too bad after all that. i really do feel like i improved SO much at this game and the general concepts of roguelikes playing it so much...