Some further thoughts on The Earth Lords now that Don Quijote is lvl 10, has completed his first Quest, and got his first magical weapon (which is still too weak against some enemies).
There's some silliness in combat. For example, you and your enemies are often walled in and you have to choose Flee to end combat. I assume a high Architect skill will enable you to bypass the walls, but I can't help wonder how you (and your enemies) found themselves in this position.
Enemies can't attack you diagonally with melee attacks, so you're safe if having walls on four sides and then attack through the corners.
Loot and encounter systems could have been better.
Encounters are area scaled, and at least in the first city's basement, partly level scaled (got tougher once I reached lvl 5). But terrain makes no difference, so you'll meet the same enemies in water as in forest.
EDIT: Although it seems to take into account if you are flying.
You get nearly all items from shops instead of finding random loot on slain enemies, which is rather boring. The only random element is that some shops have one slot of random items for sale, so you can get better stuff that way.
After wading and swimming through muck in the Swamp, shit really got real in Swamp Castle. I've been prioritizing Speed when leveling up, since it determines crucial things like number of moves and attacks in battle, as well as iniative. But even with 50 Speed, Don Quijote was dead in the first encounter there even before he could throw insults at his assailants.
A classic dungeon crawler with hand drawn graphics and wholly free. http://www.say-realm.com/c1/index.html#:~:text=Cardhalia is a grid-based,that you will appreciate it.
