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intric8
Seattle, WA, USA

Posted Wed Sep 26, 2018 12:15 pm

Now that I've finished Dungeon Master II and posted a review, I'm at the fun brief moment of anticipation for what's next. And while I might throw a quick arcade something or other in there (or get back into Star Control really quick - maybe), I'm always looking for my next D&D-inspired fix.

There are so many good options.
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There are actually more than this, of course, but these are the top contenders.

Part of me is strongly leaning towards the original Eye of the Beholder. I've completed Dungeon Master, Skullkeep, Eye of the Beholder 2 and Black Crypt. I'd played the original Beholder but never actually finished it. I remember the opening animation blowing me away (as did EotB2's - big time). And I remember Shot97's talking about how the Amiga got the best end-game animation out of literally every version out there. As I looked at these boxes this morning it seemed kind of incredible to me that I hadn't gone back to give it the time it deserved.
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So, yeah, I'm leaning pretty hard in that direction. But all of them sound great. Will decide in the next day or two while I'm in this yummy decision phase.

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Zippy Zapp
CA, USA

Posted Wed Sep 26, 2018 8:24 pm

Very cool that you have those all boxed. Hard choice there because I see some great games. If I was staring at those games I would probably go for either Bards Tale or Phantasie III. I always liked the Phantasie games. SSI published some great games.

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intric8
Seattle, WA, USA

Posted Wed Sep 26, 2018 8:43 pm

I've got enough to keep me happy for a very long time. Too many, really. Those are just the ones on my radar that I want to tackle "soon". I have a few text adventures I'd like to puzzle over, too.

But one more dungeon crawler and I should be done with that genre for some time, I think. There's plenty of RPGs in different formats to be had afterwards. :)

Plus, this looks like such an inviting place. What could go wrong?
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LambdaCalculus
New Jersey, USA

Posted Thu Sep 27, 2018 8:52 am

I haven't played Eye of the Beholder much on the Amiga; my versions were the DOS and Sega CD versions. But it's still the same game I know and love on the Amiga, and I should fire it up via WHDLoad one day again for old time's sake! :)

Just gotta play the Sega CD's soundtrack in the background while I do! ;)

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McTrinsic

Posted Thu Sep 27, 2018 9:24 pm

Legend is the one that somehow evaded me ;). Doesn't ring a bell and I am really into crpgs.
So I'd be curious to learn about it!

Cheers,
McT

User avatar
intric8
Seattle, WA, USA

Posted Thu Sep 27, 2018 9:53 pm

@McTrinsic, it's one of those interesting "isometric" 3D games that seemed to be an extremely popular format coming out of the UK back then. People nod towards Populous or Populous II, but I think the genre probably gets a little bit of inspiration from The Immortal, too, which you've played with yourself.

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intric8
Seattle, WA, USA

Posted Mon Oct 15, 2018 8:21 am

I finished Eye of the Beholder at the end of last week. Not everyone knows this, but the Amiga version is entirely unique. If you beat the game (which I did) you get a final animated sequence that was never on the DOS version. It's really cool.

So, I completely re-wrote my review from top to bottom, added 32 CRT screenshots I took along the way. I also added a video that I captured of both the intro (that everyone saw) as well as the spoiler rich ending animation. I shot footage off my Amiga 1080, where the game was being run off my Amiga 2000 and sound piped from original Commodore external speakers.

Eye of the Beholder is a ton of fun and really sparkles in the graphics department. I'd rank it on the easy side of the dungeon crawler spectrum (with one pretty hard area of the dungeon you have to navigate up and down multiple floors that nearly drove me crazy).
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