Dungeons and Dragons: Shadow over Mystara Arcade Review

Fifty-One

Total cost to finish game: $12.75

Released 3 years after D&D: Tower of Doom, D&D: Shadow over Mystara displays improvements in both graphics and gameplay from Tower of Doom. The storyline picks up from events in Tower of Doom and chronicles the attempts of a group of heroes to thwart the resurrection of Raziel the immortal. Updated graphics are on display in both the backgrounds, enemy renderings and the effects of character and enemy attacks. Gameplay is little changed from Tower of Doom on the fighting side. However, Shadow over Mystara plays with gameplay styles like escape the baddie and explore the village gameplay styles in a departure from the pure hack'n'slash gameply of Tower of Doom. Given this was the 2nd D&D Capcom action fighting title I had played, I was more used to executing special moves and item attacks this time around. As a result, I felt that the item system in Shadow over Mystara was more useful and had a positive effect on gameplay. Difficulty in Shadow over Mystara is worse than Tower of Doom, if that could be possible. The game is designed for multiplayer, so the single players needs to come loaded for bear with several rolls of quarters to hope to finish this game. D&D: Shadow of Mystara is a worthy sequel to Tower of Doom and deserves a play through, just remember to bring a bowl full of quarters to the party.