Mystery Dungeon

Mystery Dungeon is a series of roguelike video games. Most were developed by Chunsoft (later Spike Chunsoft), and select games were developed by other companies with Chunsoft's permission. The series began when co–creator of "Dragon Quest", Koichi Nakamura, was inspired by a fellow developer's experience with "Rogue" and a desire to create an original series. It began on the Super Famicom, progressing to almost all of Nintendo's and Sony's home and handheld consoles, WonderSwan, Dreamcast, Windows, and mobile devices.
The series has inspired other entries in Japan and has moderate popularity, mostly with the "" and crossover entries with the "Pokémon Mystery Dungeon" series, and lesser with the "Chocobo" games based on the creatures from the "Final Fantasy" series.
Games.
Although all games in the series bear the "Fushigi no Dungeon" moniker somewhere in their Japanese titles, only the "Shiren the Wanderer" games contain original characters; all other license their characters from other role-playing game franchises. The first game, ' stars Torneko, a shopkeeper character from the same developer's '. "Mystery Dungeon" games are among the few console games in the roguelike genre. Chunsoft has also started several lines of branded "Mystery Dungeon" games, starting with one features the Chocobo from SquareSoft's "Final Fantasy" series in 1997, then Bandai's "Gundam", Konami's "TwinBee" and Namco's "Tower of Druaga" series in 2004, Game Freak's "Pokémon" series in 2005, Atlus's "Etrian Odyssey" series in 2015, and "One Way Heroics" is the latest crossover as of 2015. Other games who are not developed or published by the company but uses the same moniker would also appear throughout the years, namely the "Touhou Project" series with its spin-offs titled "Fushigi no Gensokyo".
Spin-offs.
The franchise had its first spin-off game in 2004 titled "Shiren Monsters: Netsal". It is only one game based on the monsters from the "Shiren the Wanderer" series.
Gameplay.
Most "Mystery Dungeon" games center around exploring a dungeon with randomly generated layouts and fights. These are in a turn-based manner, where the player's every action such as attacking or walking, is met by the opponents' action. Chunsoft described the gameplay as being like chess. Escape from the dungeon is usually only allowed in certain places, or through the use of certain items. When the player loses the game, the player loses all money and half the items in the more forgiving variants, or loses everything and has to start from scratch in others. An effort has also been made to expand the series' gameplay features, such as adding job systems to some games, and giving each dungeon a different feel and goal. Features distinct to the "Shiren the Wanderer" series include the "Melding Jar" which allows players to synthesize items and weapons into more powerful ones. The "Chocobo" games further simplify the genre's difficulty to appeal to a wider and younger audience.
Development.
History.
During the 1990's, the computer role-playing game genre became famous in Japan due to the successful hit of the "Dragon Quest" series. However, most of the roguelike games that were published for PC used to not have a Japanese translation; the genre's recognition remained low in result. While following the basic game system of roguelike games, other companies tried to bring the genre into a home console. Two of the earliest-known attempts were Sega's "Fatal Labyrinth" and "Dragon Crystal", both games released in 1990, but which lacked the depth of a typical computer-based roguelike. Neither proved to be successful games.
Koichi Nakamura, founder of Chunsoft and co-creator of the "Dragon Quest" series, conceived the series as Chunsoft's first original work. After the launch of the Super Famicom and finishing development for "Dragon Quest V", they ceased working on the "Dragon Quest" series and began working on the "Mystery Dungeon" series. The series was based on the game "Rogue", which has spawned its own genre called roguelike. For a week Nakamura played "Rogue" at the recommendation of a staff member, trying to understand the game's appeal, and concluded the high degree of challenge made the game very rewarding. "Torneko no Daibōken: Fushigi no Dungeon" was published in 1993 and became the first video game to bear the "Mystery Dungeon" moniker. Even if it sold less than the series' main titles, the game has sold over 800,000 copies. Two years later, in 1995, "Mystery Dungeon 2: Shiren the Wanderer" was released as their second work, with a new world setting.
Nakamura explained that the appeal of the "Mystery Dungeon" series is that every game is different and that players skills are constantly being challenged, which helps the player feel deeply involved. Seiichiro Nagahata, who supervised and planned the development of "Shiren the Wanderer DS", explained that the "Mystery Dungeon" series is all about "tension" and "reasoning".
Music.
Though the franchise is divided with numerous crossovers, the majority of its soundtracks were composed by Koichi Sugiyama and Hayato Matsuo for the "Dragon Quest" crossovers and "Shiren the Wanderer" series. Koichi Sugiyama made use of East Asian elements for the "Shiren the Wanderer" series, compared to his more European-styled "Dragon Quest" compositions, using instruments such as a shakuhachi flute. This theme would remain for the next games of the series. Other composers such as Yuzo Koshiro for the "Etrian Odyssey" crossover or Keisuke Ito and Arata Iiyoshi for the "Pokémon" crossover have frequently contributed in the franchise.
Reception.
The "Shiren the Wanderer" series has generally favorable ratings in Japan and throughout the world. Famitsu awarded a 36/40 to "Demon Invasion! Shiren Castle!" and a 38/40 to the original release of ', the highest score the publication had given to a Game Boy Color game. The series has been both praised and criticized for its difficulty, and generally noted for the uneven quality of the randomly generated levels, or "floors", the games produce. The series's protagonist, Shiren, along with the sourced series appeared in video games that were developed or published by Spike Chunsoft, with games like "Crypt of the NecroDancer", "Terraria", or '.
Other Japanese role-playing games would incorporate random dungeon generation as part of their design, mimicking part of the nature of roguelikes, and were considered roguelike titles when published in Western markets. Such titles include "Vagrant Story", "Shining Soul", and "Baroque". The massively multiplayer online role playing game "Final Fantasy XIV" added a randomly-generated Deep Dungeon that was inspired by the procedural generation of roguelikes.
Sales.
As of 2020, a grand total of 23.18 million copies across the franchise have been sold, the majority of which are in the "Pokémon Mystery Dungeon" series.
The "Pokémon Mystery Dungeon" series is known to have high sale rates among the franchise, surpassing one million copies for most of its games like ' and its remake ', and ' alone. ' was the 18th best selling game in Japan in 2012, with more than 373,000 copies sold. The "Chocobo" series is thought to have had middling success, with strong launch sales but not a huge popular response.