I have an itch again for some dungeon crawling. What would you recommend, Dark Spire or Etrian Oddissey? In which case which EO game is the best?
Etrian Odyssey is superb.
Dungeons start of a bit weak, simple architecture and only FOE puzzles. FOEs being fat superbosses that move around in the dungeon like you, and if you encounter them you get a tough bossfight that should be unwinnable on your first time meeting them. Understanding the FOEs AI and avoiding them through clever movement is most of the dungeon maneuvering, later you can come back and farm the FOEs for tough battles and rare materials for weapons.
Combat is not AC/Thac0 based but more generic JRPG stuff. It is really well executed tho, ailments and binds matter a lot.
Overall the games live by the mixture of comfy atmosphere, with cooking and monster hunting for parts for weapons, and brutal dungeon crawling and difficulty.
Where to start? There is a bit of discussion there as all games are relatively similar. To give a quick overview:
Etrian Odyssey 1: Available in remastered (Untold) form, decent starting point with it. No real reason to play original over untold.
Etrian Odyssey 2: Has an Untold version aswell, no real reason to start here.
Etrian Odyssey 3: Last of the DS originated EOs. Has not had an Untold version yet. As such the most archaic of the EOs. I havn't gotten to it yet, I heard that it is quite deep however. Sometimes recommended as a starting point, I wouldn't do so since it lacks a lot of QOL changes.
Etrian Odyssey 4: The easiest of the EOs but also the first on the 3Ds. Has a fuckton of QOL changes. Has some very interesting Might and Magic style overworld exploration mechanics, which they sadly later cut. Best starting point for casuals, as such it makes less sense for you.
Etrian Odyssey 5: Probably the best starting point. Decent difficulty, good QOL, nothing too special about it. They introduced cooking mechanics as a new gimmick, harmless and adds to the atmosphere.
Etrian Odyssey Nexus: Do not start here. Best of/mashup type game. Fuckload of content, as they just reused fan favourite maps from all the prior games. Also you can play by far the largest amount of classes in this one. It is however very long, and probably overstays its welcome if it is your first EO.
TL DR: Etrian Odyssey 1 Untold for Historic Order, Etrian Odyssey 5 for best gameplay/QOL ratio, Etrian Odyssey III if you are fine with some archaism.
I can't tell you that much about Dark Spire, but I know it is very traditional Wizardry. So EO if you feel like delving into something new, Dark Spire for the comfortable classics.
