Shiren the Wanderer: The Mystery Dungeon of Serpentcoil Island review

The decades-old Shiren the Wanderer series has a reputation for being uncompromisingly uncompromising, and Serpentcoil Island Mystery Dungeon is no exception to this intimidating rule. I’ve been thrown into a random dungeon and expect to get by using only what I can find lying on the floor, and the stairs to the next level only promise more of the same pain. The monster enters the room, tile by tile, and I freeze, carefully considering every step and sword swing I can make before I act.

It is tense and unpredictable. Learning to improvise is a must, especially since I can’t guarantee when, where, or even if the necessary equipment will be available. Spells rarely do anything as plain as harming the enemy in front of them, and death traps can lie under every inch of the floor. Any mistake or negligent mistake could quickly turn into an irreversible disaster, and that would mean that I would lose everything, every item, weapon, and even my stats, and have to start over from the first floor. Again.

It’s strange that Shiren doesn’t feel ruthless in practice. It’s more like juggling chainsaws on horseback. If-If— everything goes my way and I don’t blink, sneeze, or breathe at the wrong time, and then I’ll pull off the greatest trick of all time.

Labyrinth of the maze

The first few floors cover plain concepts like attack and diagonal movement in concise pop-ups, and keywords can be clicked at any time (making it basic to answer questions like “What the hell is ’empathetic’ status and do I want it?” “), and the Monster Dojo in the first village is a training ground and a safe experimental sandbox in one. I love being able to drop in there and use pre-made puzzles to not only read but also play the basics of successful Shirening, or customize an empty room to test out some status effect or just observe enemy behavior. How long, ExactlyCan I send a room full of monsters to sleep? How much damage is reflected on my opponent when I have Counter Shield equipped?

Everything I learn here can be applied to my exploration of the island, giving me a sneakier and smarter option when faced with a battle I would surely lose if I faced it – like the sudden appearance of a muscular tiger, a monster that during my previous run he threw me like a basketball. This time it was different. I took a moment to experiment with the magic staffs in the dojo and remembered that I now had one with me that could paralyze anything its magic balls touched. In one move, this tiger became about as dangerous as a fluffy kitten, literally unable to catch me with its paws while I drained its health from a safe distance.

It was a perfect reminder of Shiren’s most important lesson. Everything from simple bracelets to shiny swords are filled with conditional effects and unique properties (and can often be upgraded with even more), and I really need to use them all. Mindlessly running up to a monster and punching it in the face – even if I can hit it really hard – is rarely the right answer unless I want to die quickly and ingloriously.

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I’m not sure what will show up and try to kill me while I’m making the long trek from the sandy beach to the rocky peak, but when Serpentcoil draws monsters from specific pools, I can get a sixth sense when archers and samurai grasshoppers may start to spawn, and with a little time and practice I can at least prepare for them.

In the end, I was so well prepared – based on my own experience rather than shiny objects laden with special effects – that I decided to test my skills in an epic frigid game in which I was thrust into a do-or-die battle against the final boss with nothing more than some semi-random pieces of standard equipment that may aid. The game expects me to lose here. I’m supposed to watch Shiren pass out and then wake up on the beach, ready to begin his first escape into a full dungeon. Instead, I won. No, I did more than just win: I comfortably completed the entire adventure on a fresh save in less than five minutes.

To put it in up-to-date roguelike terms: it’s as if I took an elevator directly to Hades and defeated him without a single upgrade or divine boon.

Destroy everything

After spending many hours learning, trying, failing, trying and failing, just to hopefully reach the final battle, I felt like I had reached a modern stage of enlightenment. This game is so willing to accommodate absolutely every crazy idea I have, to employ any cracker strategy I can imagine, allowing me to even win unwinnable battles. This makes all the difficulties along the way feel like cooperation – every enemy attack is a modern clue, every sneaky trick is something I can exploit myself. Shiren wants me to learn the rules so that I can’t just break them, but forget each one of them once again. Strategy and knowledge beat anything, even a backpack full of really piercing swords and shiny shields.

And the best part? Once he’s sure I’ve mastered the basics, Serpentcoil explodes into a wildly imaginative version of himself. Much like Hades, defeating him once is actually just the beginning.

Clearing a story at any speed unlocks an avalanche of more stories. Challenges and modern features await everyone who dares to continue the adventure. New mazes often revolve around a specific concept or special item, such as clearing a dungeon in the fewest steps possible, or stuffing Shiren so full of delicious onigiri that it temporarily becomes a sumo-sized vortex of destruction. I’m tested in dozens of modern ways I’ve never even dreamed of, encouraged to not only exploit everything I already know, but come up with entirely modern strategies to counter problems that didn’t exist an hour or two earlier.

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It’s an amazing roguelike. Newcomers will find it has all the information they need to learn the basics at their own pace, as well as a charming, fast-paced story filled with memorable characters, from food-loving samurai to clumsy pirates. Long-time adventurers can exploit their skills to get to the NG+ features in just a few minutes, and the game happily immediately raises the bar to meet them.

At every level, it’s a pliant and multi-layered adventure full of rewards that happily gives players a toolkit filled with absurd skills and allows them to invent their own path through the game.