Overview
Mystery Dungeon: Shiren the Wanderer ("Fushigi no Dungeon 2: Fūrai no Shiren") is a cult-favorite console roguelike originally developed by Chunsoft for the Super Famicom as part of their Mystery Dungeon series in 1995. Chunsoft's previous Mystery Dungeon game starred Torneko Taloon from Dragon Quest IV, but Shiren the Wanderer was their attempt to recreate that same magic but without having to pay license fees with an original cast of characters. As Fushigi no Dungeon 2: Fuurai no Shiren, it never made it to the US or Europe. A decade later the game was ported to the Nintendo DS; two years later it was finally brought to the US and Europe.
Those familiar with Square's Chocobo Mystery Dungeon games will see the foundations of that franchise laid about Shiren the Wanderer. However, Shiren is a much more difficult game, to the point where dying and restarting is almost necessary to have a successful playthrough. As is tradition with roguelikes, dying "resets" the game world in some ways but the effects of the previous playthrough still lingers in some form or another. Sometimes, people remember who Shiren was. At other times, Shiren might encounter completely different folks or monsters. The player loses everything Shiren has on-hand when he dies, but can store weapons in safehouses for later retrieval--or leave them in the safehouse for them to grow and power up (and retrieve even later when Shiren has inevitably died yet again).
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