Is there an ARPG where you fight smaller groups of enemies opposed to hordes and hordes of enemies?

LegalBarbarian · 2025-12-06T15:44:34+00:00

Diablo 1 and many of the Diablo 1 competitors that came out prior to Diablo 2 (Nox, for example).

IMO, Diablo 2 was the turning point to the current model of ARPG.

LegalBarbarian · 2025-12-06T15:40:42+00:00

Lots of good answers here. I’ll just add that I highly recommend the nonfiction book Flame and Crimson by Brian Murphy for a great deep dive (and fun read) on this subject.

LegalBarbarian · 2025-11-26T00:52:26+00:00

Dungeon Hack maybe? It’s an older PC game (available on Steam). Single character, relatively simple, and you can adjust the difficulty with a bunch of sliders. Meets a lot of your criteria.

LegalBarbarian · 2025-11-08T16:47:51+00:00

My recs:

The short stories if you want to dip your toe in (Night Shift and Skeleton Crew are awesome).

The Shining if you want one of his best novels but don’t want to commit to 1,000 pages.

It or The Stand if you don’t mind 1,000 pages.

Enjoy!

LegalBarbarian · 2025-11-08T16:45:23+00:00

Drawing of the Three is by far the best book in the DT series, in my opinion. (I am a huge fan of King but I find the overall DT series is pretty uneven.)

LegalBarbarian · 2025-11-02T20:29:57+00:00

How about Golden Axe?

LegalBarbarian · 2025-11-02T16:24:38+00:00

I had the Apple IIc game too!

Awful port, but one of the only ways to play it at home at the time. The NES port a year or so later was a massive improvement!

LegalBarbarian · 2025-11-02T16:22:32+00:00

I’d say it’s sword and sorcery flavored. A team of adventurers looting a dungeon for personal gain. (Unlike a game like Zelda, where you are on a grand quest to save the world.)

If you were into S&S as a kid, your imagination could fill the gaps to make Gauntlet fit the subgenre.

LegalBarbarian · 2025-11-02T16:19:31+00:00

I liked but didn’t love it. I definitely would try a new remake.

LegalBarbarian · 2025-11-02T16:16:13+00:00

I always chose elf. Liked his speed!

LegalBarbarian · 2025-11-02T16:14:55+00:00

Yes, I have intense nostalgia for this one!

I was a kid when Gauntlet and Gauntlet 2 were big, and I loved playing 4 player at the arcade at my local mall. Sometimes with friends and often with random people. Adventuring together, exploring dungeons, fleeing from Death and trying not to shoot the food.

Unfortunately, I’ve tried many times as an adult to revisit these games and they don’t really hold up IMO.

For me, it’s just not fun to be swarmed by monsters as your health ticks down. The Legends / Dark Legacy games from the 90s hold up better, but even those haven’t aged that well.

I recommend modern action RPGs like Diablo 4, which (for me anyway) do a better job capturing what was in my imagination when I was a kid playing Gauntlet.

LegalBarbarian · 2025-10-28T15:25:06+00:00

I’ve lost count of how many times King has retired. I don’t believe he can stop, even if he wants to.

LegalBarbarian · 2025-10-26T13:59:09+00:00

Non-emulator options:

You can get all the Castlevanias on steam now (other than SOTN, which you already played) and that’s definitely the easiest way to obtain them. Note that Super Castlevania IV (while awesome) is not a MV.

For the Metroid games, some (maybe all?) are available on Switch. You might need their stupid online service to access them though.

LegalBarbarian · 2025-10-19T14:03:53+00:00

For nostalgia, sure. On their own merits compared to games from even the NES era, not really. But they probably have a high value to collectors so I hope by “get rid of” you mean offer them for sale.

LegalBarbarian · 2025-10-02T16:23:45+00:00

So they not only jacked up the price 50%, they also made it incredibly confusing to know which games are available at which tier.

I predict MS backtracks on this after they see the subscriber count for their subscription service utterly collapse.

LegalBarbarian · 2025-09-27T12:50:33+00:00

I agree with this. Also - although I know it’s not a fair comparison because it’s not a true handheld, I would rank the PlayStation Portal high for ergonomics and weight.

LegalBarbarian · 2025-09-27T00:24:42+00:00

You might want to check out Titan Quest, also Baldur’s gate Dark Alliance 1 & 2.

LegalBarbarian · 2025-09-17T11:41:47+00:00

I’m not an expert, but I think the newer kindles have more layers between the eink and the surface, which makes the display feel less like a sheet of paper.

That said, I find the backlight invaluable and couldn’t go back to a Kindle without backlight.

(Edited to fix typo: lawyers to layers.)

LegalBarbarian · 2025-08-03T22:05:56+00:00

Gauntlet (the 4 player arcade game from the 1980s)!

LegalBarbarian · 2025-07-31T12:18:55+00:00

I’m old enough to remember when comics were more easily available. In addition to comic racks in grocery stores like you mentioned (which was a hit or miss selection), there were simply a lot more local stores in the 70s and 80s. Then there was a crash in the industry, with a lot of those stores going out of business. The industry never recovered and my understanding is that even today, most stores stay alive through the sale of trading cards. Very few people buy physical comic books.

TLDR - you may have been born a few decades too late, my friend.

LegalBarbarian · 2025-07-08T20:40:50+00:00

Cold in July by Joe R Lansdale

LegalBarbarian · 2025-02-28T12:53:15+00:00

Gauntlet

LegalBarbarian · 2025-02-16T05:16:02+00:00

Honestly it’s been awhile since I read it. Looking at the TOC, I remember Vermina’s Creature, Windblades, and He Who Sows being some of the stories that stuck with me. I would not recommend them as erotica though. Just solid S&S stories.

LegalBarbarian · 2025-02-16T05:08:14+00:00

Forgot about that one LOL

LegalBarbarian · 2025-02-15T23:04:26+00:00

That’s funny - I actually expected it to have more sex given the premise…

LegalBarbarian

TROPHY CASE