Having now taken a single party through the DOS versions of Wiz 1-3+5, I want to just make a separate post with my overall thoughts.
Before going through these games over the last couple of years, the only experience I had playing any of them was fooling around with the NES and DOS versions of Wizardry 1. I never saw the appeal back then, and I figured they now were only of historic interest due to how influential they were. However, I had a total blast playing these games! There were some frustrating moments, but these are some of the best games I have ever played.
Overall thoughts:
Wizardry 1: Tied with Wizardry 5 as the best of the bunch. Great and memorable dungeon design and balanced very well; if you take your time and explore/map, you'll always be just about ready for the next dungeon level. Even the dreaded WERDNA battle was not as bad as I thought it would be.
Wizardry 2: Dull and short. It's like a victory lap for your party, where you just get more and more insanely powerful throughout the game. I am pretty certain I finished this in a single drunken night.
Wizardry 3: Fortunately, it's more substantial than Wizardry 2; unfortunately, it's the most poorly-balanced game in the bunch. The game often forces you through anywhere from 5-10 fixed encounter rooms in a row just to get from point A to point B. On top of that, enemies give hardly any experience and treasure chests hardly ever give you anything of value. Then you have the tedious alignment-restricted levels. I was happy to get this one over with.
Wizardry 5: Tied with Wizardry 1 as the best of the bunch
. Excellent dungeon design, possibly the best of the early series. It's balanced pretty well up until you reach the last 15-20% of the game or so, when the game gets much more difficult. The addition of rear rank weapons, some interesting new spells, NPC interaction, and item-based puzzles makes this game feel like the true sequel to Wizardry 1. It even plays different in that the game doesn't automatically save the game state as frequently AND you can quick-save in dungeons. I got frustrated with this one (partly because I didn't realize I could save and continue in the dungeons until I was nearly at the end of the game) but loved it from start to finish.
[edit] Oh! I also want to thank
aweigh for championing these games, because I would never have played through them had I not read his passionate and insane (
) posts in this very thread.