Wizardry Wizardry Empire II PLUS : Oujo no Isan - Legacy of the Princess for PC Translation - Completed!

[aweigh]

yep. right this moment i just opened the iron-bar door that's in the entrance of the castle from the other side, i.e. the shortcut you open all the way down around b3f or b4f. i don't even remember precisely man, i was going through that dungeon like it was a fucking speed-run. bumping into everything, searching everything, mapping everything, non-stop, heh.

i gotta say man, the dungeons in empire 2 are a million times better than any dungeon in elminage gothic or original. obviously everyone has their prefrences, (for example i know some people like outdoor areas); but these dungeons right here are nigh fucking perfect in terms of navigational puzzles and just-punishing-enough maze design. right from the very first floor of the very first dungeon in the game everything falls into place neatly and the difficulty curve is done PERFECTLY. the floors are big enough and twisted enough to make you think and force you to remember every detail (each floor always has a specific "solution" more or less, so you can't auto-pilot) but at the same time they don't over-stay their welcome. they made the floors just the right size and put in just the perfect amount of perfectly palced short-cuts back to safety. i think this is when the starfish devs were in their maze-making prime, back in 2000. what a treat.

edit: jessssuuussss christ those b4f enemies woww.

Dorarnae ok so what i'm doing is running laps around the water square of b1f of the castle, there are lots of hidden doorways there with monsters/loot waiting that are not as tough as the uber-fuckers down in b4f. (the yuan-ti hahaha)

is that what you meant when you said that is the place the will o wisp appears?

 

[Dorarnae]

yep. right this moment i just opened the iron-bar door that's in the entrance of the castle from the other side, i.e. the shortcut you open all the way down around b3f or b4f. i don't even remember precisely man, i was going through that dungeon like it was a fucking speed-run. bumping into everything, searching everything, mapping everything, non-stop, heh.

i gotta say man, the dungeons in empire 2 are a million times better than any dungeon in elminage gothic or original. obviously everyone has their prefrences, (for example i know some people like outdoor areas); but these dungeons right here are nigh fucking perfect in terms of navigational puzzles and just-punishing-enough maze design. right from the very first floor of the very first dungeon in the game everything falls into place neatly and the difficulty curve is done PERFECTLY. the floors are big enough and twisted enough to make you think and force you to remember every detail (each floor always has a specific "solution" more or less, so you can't auto-pilot) but at the same time they don't over-stay their welcome. they made the floors just the right size and put in just the perfect amount of perfectly palced short-cuts back to safety. i think this is when the starfish devs were in their maze-making prime, back in 2000. what a treat.

edit: jessssuuussss christ those b4f enemies woww.

Dorarnae ok so what i'm doing is running laps around the water square of b1f of the castle, there are lots of hidden doorways there with monsters/loot waiting that are not as tough as the uber-fuckers down in b4f. (the yuan-ti hahaha)

is that what you meant when you said that is the place the will o wisp appears?

yeah I agree that elminage is kinda lacking in traps when exploring dungeon. In particular 1-2-3, you have a few pit trap in the beginning and then you don't see them anymore...

I thought the spot always gave will o wisp, guess I was wrong, but you can run away and restart the encounter...
anyway here a vid that show it.

 

[aweigh]

thanks! yeah, that's what i was doing. 3 of them give 25k xp and loot. i got lucky and found a thieve's dagger haha i got to turn my thief into a ninja. so now i'm rolling w/ samurai, samurai, ninja, ranger, priest, priest (both priests have full mage spellbook).

edit: oh my! that malor trick is GOLD!

...MAAHAROOOUU...

 

[Dorarnae]

yeah it respawn all fix encounter. hehe.

there are game like Wizardry xth(elminage too I think) you can ''take a break'' with your party, and then return to your party and the fix encounter comes back.

 

[aweigh]

i like gambling with the shop-keeper by trading him random shit. sometimes he gives me awesome loot it's great

 

[Great Deceiver]

I'm getting a lot of flicker in the game, any way to run it in a window?

edit: tried at 640x480, 1920x1080 and 3840x2160. Mad flicker at every resolution.

 

[aweigh]

Dorarnae i found the absolute best place to get super easy XP, very good quality loot and you're there and back in town in less than 5 minutes! it's a specific spot in b5f of the castle where i found a fixed encounter that is (relatively) easy, just human thieves/lords/mages, and they almost always leave behind gold/platinum treasure chests. i've found a ton of loot already. i'm uploading the video rite now...



p.s. ummm yeeeah dat beheading rate haha. oh, and yes i fucked up with TWO encounters and let the enemies go so my party alignement got fucked up... which is why you see me beating up some monster-generator to get everyone evil again

 

[aweigh]

it's like slicing bread. glass cannon ninja builds are absolutely ridiculously op unless the enemy has behead-resistance, heh. put as much THACO-increasing (well, lowering) armor pieces on the ninjas as possible don't even bother worrying about his -AC, just lower his THACO as much as possible then get the swords/daggers with the highest # of attacks (which usually do very very small damage-range) and of course with a high ACC modifier (i.e. negative THACO on the blade) as possible.

- In Elminage (and Wizardry as well) fighters gain an extra natural attack every five character class levels and their d100 percentile miss-chance is reduced by 1d3

- in both games as well ninjas gain an extra natural attack every five character class levels and their d100 percetile miss-chance is reduced by 1d5 in Wizardry 5, and i *think* probably the same or a very similar amount in the Elminage games. (samurais get a 1d4 miss-chance percentile reduction, fighters 1d3, clerics 1d2, etc, etc, depending on the game and version).

- therefore a level 30 ninja with thaco-boosting gear and a maxed STR score for a Human of 18 dual wielding daggers with vorpal attribute and insane ACC modifiers and +10 or more # of attacks per swing and that is one broken beheading system. it's like slicing bread! thankfully beheading is rolled and resolved versus -AC as always so once both you and the enemies -AC is reaching -AC 30's and above what's seen on the video won't be happening all that frequently.

(oh, yeah, eery point after STR 15 adds +1 to the miss-chance percentile roll, i.e. 10%, also a +1 to the damage dealt; as well as a +1 to the combined -THACO modifier active during the character's attack which is a combination of his class, level, gear and weapon, and in SOME versions of these type of games the attribute bonii are exponential instead of linear, such as INT in Elminage increasing spell damage by leaps and bounds from 18 pts to 19 pts with as big a difference as going from 10 pts to 15 pts)

edit: the brown demon in the video has -18 AC, btw.

 

[Dorarnae]

the floor looks weird. on the ps1 version it was very dark, even with the light spell. and dude celerity is 75 years old and a faerie, ouch. his vitality looks fine but I remember the first time I played elminage gothic my faerie died at age 50 ish. heh.

and those monster generator. on the ps1 version it was only creeping coin monster.

 

[aweigh]

yeah man celerity keeps fucking dying on me. it's a paaaain. i have to save before going to rest at the inn every time in case he dies lol

i should probably start training a replacement bishop... bleh

as for the graphics the ps1 version was basically a remake. in some aspects it looks much better, but the pc version looks better in some areas. but there's no denying the dungeons are much better lit and and painted in the ps1 version. the castle looks lovely in the ps1 version.

emp 2 was starfish's last (and only) project for windows pc for the next 14 years afterwards, right until they released elminage gothic on pc ! wow, long time.

edit: oh! i understand you better now: yes, the dark red floor you are referring to is from b6f onwards, and in the video i am only in b5f. from b6f onwards it is very, very dark, very red, and quite similar to the visuals in the ps1 version.

 

[Dorarnae]

ps1 version came out in 2002 and it seems the pc version was in 2004. they also changed some of the sound, which are similar to wizardry asterisk

 

[aweigh]

elminage original on psp features identical monster-generator in b1f of first dungeon, by the way. it even has a text description saying "beware of generator" or something like that. good for levelling up early hehe

 

[Celerity]

No poser can contain my power you FOOL!

 

[MrRichard999]

I'm getting a lot of flicker in the game, any way to run it in a window?

edit: tried at 640x480, 1920x1080 and 3840x2160. Mad flicker at every resolution.

If you have crossfire enabled video cards, disable it. I found that to be an issue when I first played this.

 

[Great Deceiver]

If you have crossfire enabled video cards, disable it. I found that to be an issue when I first played this.

First of all, thanks for the awesome translation and for putting this out! Your work is amazing!

I'm not running multiple video cards, just a single GTX 770. I've tried every compatibility setting and resolution under the sun, and I'm running Windows 10, no luck. Same flickering problem.

However, I did manage to get it running in a window with the aid of a nifty program: http://sourceforge.net/projects/dxwnd/ . Works for other games as well; now I can have it and grid cartographer running side by side! yay.

 

[MrRichard999]

Im glad those who are playing this are enjoying it! I just got some stuff to insert so i'll post another little update soon. Go some school garbage to get out of the way so hopefully I can get some free time and put more work into this. Also be sure to check out out Lunatic Dawn I+II+III & also the Passage of the Book project which Helly & Elegnaim have going on also!

 

[MrRichard999]

I kinda want to incorporate this in the game when you hit a human enemy

 

[TigerKnee]

Is the Escape button -> Quit - No Save & Quit - Save options bugged?

I quit with the Save option and it doesn't seem to have actually saved my game, just made me quit (and lost my progress)

I can basically only save at the town screen "SaveGame" button

 

[aweigh]

they're reversed. you have to select quit > no save.

the best way is to simply use the Option Menu's "Quit" function as it auto-saves without asking.

 

[TigerKnee]

Two things
1) Anyone got a chart of class stat requirements? So far I can only figure out the basic classes

2) Why doesn't using the light spells seem to do anything in the Dark Rooms in the start dungeon?

 

[aweigh]

Question #2 is a translation faux paus. The light spell increases the hidden inspection % for Thief/Ranger/Ninja/Kunoichi's to detect secrets and does not actually light anything up in the PC version. In the console version it does the very same thing BUT it also brightened a little bit. I guess with the entirely re-done and completely new and higher-res art assets used for the PC version they forgot or didn't want to light map? anyhoo as for question #1 don't you worry friend, i'm on it! one sec...

 

[aweigh]

 

[aweigh]

a chart detailing the nitty gritty of compatability bonuses (and penalties) for every possible race combination:

 

[aweigh]

as for the following specific classes:

- Lord
- Kunoichi (Female Ninja)
- Ninja (Ninja Ninja)
- Summoner


you *will* find gear that class-changes you into those classes. specifically.

- For the Lord you will find Shield of Protection usually in the 4th dungeon, the castle. NOTE: the shield is only equippable by HUMAN MALE FIGHTERS.
- For the Kunoichi you will find a Mask of Hashya. it's cursed but if you're only gonna use it to change obvious that doesn't matter. Obviously the char has to be female to invoke the power.
- For the Ninja you will find not one, but TWO daggers: dagger of thieves that class-changes any Thief into a Ninja (i.e. best way to achieve a Neutral-Ninja) and the butterfly knife in the post-game which can change ANYONE into a Ninja. lol i have 3 ninjas in my post-game party.
- Magician's Robe class-changes anyone who can equip it, i.e. "caster types", into Summoner. Oh! there is also a Whip of Training which ALSO class-changing the wearer into a Summoner but unlike the robes the whip has very limited usability/equiablity in terms of races/gender/classes.

Once you unlock 10 Titles (I had managed to unlock 12 titles in my post-game save... of a total of 30. jesus christ) you can class change into a Barbarian in the Training Grounds but the character cannot be Neutral. There is NO WAY whatsoever to change out of a Neutral alignment in the game that i am aware of. The stat requirements for the barbie are absolutely ridiculous and i never managed to meet them.

if you somehow or other hex-edit your way into unlocking 20 titles you can class change into the Almighty class which is basically a Bishop with access to Identification and access to all 4 spell schools including summoning but without the nerfed XP rate and with regular mage/cleric spell learning progression. The Almighty's equipment allowances are similar to a Clerics.

edit: if you're looking at the Barbie's reqs and thinking they're not THAT insane it's the 19 LUCK one that will kill ya. Hell, half the races can't even reach 19 luck, heh.

 

[aweigh]

oh, and also you can go into the king's room > record > inventory + bestiary, then go to Archives > inventory/bestiary to look at the stats for all gear/enemies at once all in the same place and organized. Best way to look up the weapon stats IMO.