Разработчик: SEGA
Описание
Король Дрейк и его помощники понятия не имеют, куда она пропала. Как сын Мортреда, объедините ваши силы с Мило и Пирой, чтобы найти принцессу.
Поддерживаемые языки: english
Системные требования
Windows
- ОС: Windows® XP или новее
- Видеокарта: с 32 МБ видеопамяти или лучше
- DirectX®: DirectX® 9.0 или новее
- Жесткий диск: 50 МБ свободного места
- OS *: Windows® XP or higher
- Graphics/CPU: NVidia GeForce GTX 280 or ATI Radeon HD 6630 or equivalent DirectX® 9c or higher 1GB VRam / Intel i3-2100 or AMD Phenom II X4 940 or equivalent dual core CPU
- DirectX®: DirectX® 9c or greater
- Hard Drive: 50MB free disc space
Mac
Processor: 2.6GHz Intel Core i5
Memory: 8 GB RAM
Graphics: Intel Iris 1536
Linux
Processor: Intel i3-2100 or AMD Phenom II X4 940 or equivalent dual core CPU
Graphics: NVidia GeForce GTX 280 or ATI Radeon HD 6630 or equivalent DirectX® 9c or higher 1GB VRam
Отзывы пользователей
This is a sequel to the first Shining Force series using the same Shining Universe and one of the 3 beginning evil overlords, but instead of being a SRPG this one is a DRPG. While being made in the age where the Japan media has gotten tired of serious and righteous heroes and out pop the anime "Slayers" with the infamous Lina Inverse as an evil-good anti-hero type character and the whole Japan went crazy with the idea... This game is also one of the first Shining series that introduces an "Anti-Hero" type of characteristic to their game. While we can also see it's heavily influenced by Lord of the Ring and Star Wars... well all the old school games back then are more or less influenced by them. Like most of the DRPG genre, the story is quite shallow, with the typical go to dungeon save the princess type of story, but some of them are still quite nice imo but some can be miss-able or mess up-able if we stay in the dungeon for too long and didn't come back to the town to follow up. But overall it's a good game nonetheless, with old school DIY mapping system... so those who wish to challenge yourself to a series of mazes without a map, this is definitely the game for you. :3
Shining in the Darkness is the first game in whole Shining franchise. Unlike the more known Force part of franchise, this one is just an old-school turn-based dungeon crawler with random encounters. It was apparently made as a joint effort between what would be Sonic Co, company invested by Sega, and Climax Entertainment. Kinda confusing. Was given minimal budget as well. It came out to the West around 1991 on 8 Megabit cartridge. 3 save slots.
Fancy, the Japanese name is just "Shining and the Darkness", HA!
The game that you have here is nothing more than emulation of Sega Genesis version.
Now, technical part about Sega's emulation here:
The Sega Classic games that you purchase on Steam count as DLCs for "Sega Mega Drive & Genesis Classics" game that should appear in your library.
It has Bedroom HUB which is the one with many features yet lags for many and Simply Launcher which lacks Workshop and Online but at least it works just fine for everybody.
However, Simple Launcher has it's fair share of glitches as well. It can crash. And it does the second time you go to main menu, so always quit after saving there so it doesn't crash when you want to save next time!
Emulation itself, mostly sound, isn't that good but it does it's job. Also, yes, emulator supports quick saves.
As alternative, you can use external emulator to run games that you purchased. Sega kindly placed in all games that you purchased in "uncompressed ROMs" folder that program itself doesn't use, just change file extension to ".bin" or so. The file for this one being "SHININGD_UE.68K".
I also demand you to read digital manual of this game first. You can find it here on store page or go to "manuals" folder of game root and open "10 SD_PC_MG_EFIGS_US_v6.pdf".
And yep, this game includes saving. In-game saving, not emulator one. Bedroom HUB works fine but Simple Launcher one is buggy:
You have to remember, you have to close emulator in proper way, otherwise it will not have them actually saved in files. That means that you have to avoid crashing it or closing in different way.
Even more, if you load emulator-side saves, the emulator will not see in-game saves and will not be able to do in-game saves either. Even if it makes look as if it does.
The princess, Jessa, and your father, Mortred, the knight, have disappeared near the Labyrinth. You was called to the castle to handle it out. And defeat the darkness in face of Dark Sol of course, which looks nothing like on US boxart. You also will quickly meet cleric Milo and mage Pyra who will stay with you for the rest of the game.
Also, while you are forced to name the main character, the fans have found out that he is called Hiro in game's code. Might not be canon though.
As you can see, the setting and plot is the extremely generic fantasy rescue-princess kind. And nope, no big twists there, it's straight Light vs Darkness story.
But on good side, this one realizes that it's pretty much on fairy tale level of story-telling. And it embraces it. And instead of feeling stale, it comes off as extremely charming. You can easily see that developers put a lot of effort into presentation. Main menu is taking place at old sage's house, implying that the game might be a fairy tale. The game takes place in one small kingdom and only in one big dungeon, which makes it feel quite humble compared to other RPGs. The village feels cozy, the music coming from tavern grows louder as you move the camera closer. You can even talk with other NPCs in the taverns, who usually have quite nice personality, albeit the amount of dialog is as spartan as expected with early jRPGs.
And my god, the artstyle that Shining series had back then is totally awesome. Unperfect bodies with large noses, thin limbs and big hands. Extremely cartoonish and charming, quite interesting to see this from Japanese developers. Colorful as well, you will not feel that “Genesis has not enough color-on-screen”.
Shame that Sega would abandon this artstyle after Shining Soul 2 for some generic anime moe stuff. Oh well.
Also, before you enter the main gameplay, you have to set the speed of messages. It's actually related only to battle messages, not the NPC dialog ones. So you should set it to the “Fast”. The NPC ones are “press button to continue” anyway.
As for game overs in this jRPG, then nope, you can't get any. If all members of your party die, then you are going to be fully restored in the village's shrine. The only punishment is losing half of your current gold. Which isn't so bad.
And yep, it's a dungeon crawler, where you crawl through the many floors of a single dungeon. Which does mean that you often have to pass through the low-level areas on your way and the monster encounter frequency is quite high to the point of being annoying. Thankfully, escape option works reliably on lower level monsters. You don't need to grind much as long as you actively exploring by yourself either.
And just like with most turn-based dungeon crawlers, the best way to enjoy them is to draw maps yourself! So, pull out a graph paper and take pen out of your nose. Each floor of dungeon in this game takes 32x32 squares, though I am counting the outside walls in this case, that are always there. Yup, don't be lazy, it's more enjoyable to draw your own map than to look up at Internet. You will also quickly see that developers weren't wasting a single free space, haha.
Also, use map magic or wisdom seed to find out your starting coordinate. Do it on each floor.
I also have to be honest: The first hour of it isn't fun. You only have one single magic-less character and you have to grind a bit for levels, otherwise you are going to #gitCrabd.
But after that, you will get two other character in party with magic and you will get back to usual crawling. Still high encounter rate, but it's fairly enjoyable, sometimes going back to town to resupply or talk out with NPCs. It's pretty nice that they try to introduce a new gimmick each floor. The only sad thing is that the battles are too repetitive. It almost always plays out in same pace, your two mages always going first, your main char going last.
Sadly, as it's early jRPG, shops won't tell you who exactly can wear equipment right away and what each item does. Just have to buy the more expensive ones.
Also, there is another fancy thing. Sometimes the shopkeepers start to sell an item that isn't part of their usual list. It goes into Special Deals. I am not fully sure when and what makes Special Deals appear, but I think that they are randomly chosen to appear in shops over playtime, so perhaps each walkthrough will have different deals. But not sure.
But eh, it's enjoyable for what it is. The first person dungeon crawling animation is actually the smoothest out of all Genesis RPGs, albeit it doesn't hold the candle to Phantasy Star 1 at all. But hey, at least this one has different walls and non-corridors. Music is also nice, albeit I am sick of how there is only two main tracks for dungeon, each lasting half of a game.
Still, it could be less repetitive, with more varied combat or less of it. And while cutscenes and dialog are fun, as well as full of charming personality, there still isn't that much of them. If there was at least two times more of them, I could recommend it fully. Otherwise, eh, it's pretty nice, but not for people who hate grind absolutely.
You better watch out,
You better not cry,
The Darkness fears
My Shining butt!
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Дополнительная информация
| Разработчик | SEGA |
| Платформы | Windows, Mac, Linux |
| Ограничение возраста | Нет |
| Дата релиза | 22.12.2024 |
| Отзывы пользователей | 100% положительных (3) |