The universe is in the throes of violent upheaval and change. Vast and mysterious forces are preparing for the final confrontation. A small group of heroes from distant lands must plunge into the heart of the maelstrom, to uncover long-forgotten secrets, and bring about a new era. Should they succeed, they will gain the powers of the gods themselves. If they fail, countless worlds will fall into the grip of darkness. Wizardry 8 raises the standard for fantasy role-playing with a vengeance. Prepare yourself for a new level of excitement, immersiveness and depth that made role-playing games one of the best-selling, best-loved genres of all time. Prepare to experience the culmination of a prestigious RPG series. Enter a vast world of intrigue and wonder. Unravel a gripping, non-linear storyline. Battle your way to victory using your swords, your magic, and your wits. Compete with rivals or align with allies as you struggle to ascend to the Cosmic Circle. Take the battle to the dreaded Dark Savant in Wizardry 8, the phenomenal conclusion to the Dark Savant trilogy, one of the most extensive and challenging stories ever told in classic role-playing games!
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Maybe good on steam deck?
Well, I can testify that with proper consideration of your formation, and the kinds of characters who should occupy certain spaces in it, the combat in this game can be a real blast. The steady trickle of new spells and ever-increasing character abilities means that one must change up their tactics fairly often to thrive, and the enemies certainly do not lag behind on the power creep.
I begin by talking about the combat because that is what you will spend the overwhelming majority of the game doing. Yet, it is not the only great part of the game -- it features an open-world, non-linear structure, great worldbuilding which makes Dominus feel like a real place without being overbearing, a main quest with multiple branching paths up to the player's discretion, no arbitrary 'critical NPCs', and generally about as much freedom of approach as one could ask from a classic-style CRPG from the early 2000s. The game also features lots of fully-voiced character dialogue, including a whopping 36 different voices to give your player characters, and over half a dozen mercenaries to hire, all with their own personalities. These character voices continuously surprised me as they made comments on story events, without a very particular reason to (for example, my bard randomly decided to mention that Bela, a returning character from Wizardry 6 was 'her type'). I found that the game had a great deal of character, and was pretty much fully-realised in terms of immersing the player in its world.
I found that the environments were varied, as was the plethora of enemies found within them. The soundscape was something of a weak point, particularly the somewhat unremarkable and very repetitive music, but it doesn't really matter in the grand scheme of things, as the other qualities of the game bear the burden of setting the mood on their titanic shoulders.
Overall, I might just recommend this game to everyone, just to see if they might like it. Now, I have not played any other blobbers, and I as told that this was a bad starting point, but I ended up beating it on Normal difficulty without much issue, taking 72 hours. Hence, if you feel like you'd be at all interested in trying this game based on anything you've seen about it, I would recommend you give it a go -- considering how cheap it goes on sale, and the amount of playtime you'll be getting, the value proposition almost becomes an irrelevant factor.
You will be thanking me every time you cross Arnika road.