Oh my god, dude! I remember I let a friend of mine borrow Shining The Holy Ark. A couple weeks go by, and I get this angry phone call in the middle of the night. It was the gem puzzle. He yelling about how "this stupid game made me do a math problem!" It was the funniest thing I ever heard. I laughed my ass off. And oh yes, Farghasta in Albert Odyssey is a massive dick move. My friend and I (same guy) had to pool our resources together to get through it. We were both stuck at the same time, so he just came over and we decided to finish the game together. That dungeon was hell.
Oh for F*** sake! Thank you for including Pier Solar! I didn't finish that game my first time through, because there were so many mazes. I just got tired of it! And the funny thing is... it wasn't a dungeon that made me quit. It was a town! There's a town where you have to traverse the sewers to get around, because the streets themselves are SO CLUTTERED! UGH!!!! I hated that!
There actually was a published guide for Albert Odyssey made by Prima. I know because I was spared the awfulness of Fargasta thanks to it! The guide itself was really bad though, had no pictures whatsoever, and much like their other older guides, the cover for it didn't even use official artwork.
As soon as I heard him say there was no guide, I was like "wait a minute. I have one" and proceeded to check my bookshelf. The guide is not great and the only map is for that godawful tower but at least it has that.
There was another guide i remember reading which is actually what had me play the game. there was a complete guide in a GamerPro magazine...unofficial but better than the Prima one
Okay so I just finished watching your "Worst RPG dungeons" series and I've figured out how to make a dungeon that would drive you insane: A ultra-long sewer dungeon that's a maze, enemies that can one shot you, backtracking because of changing water levels, pitfalls, and teleporters. There will be some sort of restriction like no metal items or no magic, and a randomly generated segment near the end. Oh, and not a landmark to be found.
Phantasy Star IV music at the beginning was a good choice. Great game need to go and play that one again. If you do a genesis play through I suggest playing this one.
Ooh I was waiting for this one! Lmao at your Panzer Dragoon joke. Nice work as always! I need to go back and compare all the different versions of the Lunar games...
The Underground Ruins of Uru is the worst part of the game, but I still think it's a good part IMO. But every other part of Saga is masterful, my second favorite game of all time.
Fargasta does have an internet guide. I know because I played Albert Odyssey for the first time last year and searched until I found one (took like a week I should add). I read the guide which kept it bare bones simple. Just this floor then this floor. Step on this teleporter then this one. And just reading it made me want to quit. It makes no sense. Also the teleporters are the worst goddamned thing in any video game. If you use one to go to another one doing the reverse should send you back where you started. They don't work that way. They teleport you randomly instead. It's infuriating beyond words. I did manage to get through it and win but even with a guide I'd never do it again. I'd play the game again up to that point but no further. My honest belief is the game designer who thought up that dungeon caught his wife cheating on him and got divorce papers out of the blue on the same day he found out he had testicular cancer in both testicles that required immediate surgery to remove them after being sprayed by a skunk and stung by a wasp and just wanted the rest of the world to feel his pain. Mission accomplished.
The Meribian Sewers and the Cave of Trials are quite short, and even though you only have Alex's magic, you can use this as an opportunity to level him up fast and get some better magic spells.
I dont remember hating any of the dragon caves in lunar 2. Maybe partially due to having karate jean instead of dancer jean, its like evolving your class in final fantasy 1, and Jean is my fave character so... yeah.
I remember working my way through Fargasta right after Albert Odyssey's US release. I believe I used an issue of EGM2 which had a cursory walkthrough. It was definitely not easy, though.
Indeed, took me forever in a day to get through Fargasta, and the trio of final bosses was nothing to sneeze at either. Holy shit though, it was worth it.
A V I was personally impacted (not negatively, but not positively either) by the dialogue. I thought it was exactly what a development team would write.
Love your worst dungeons videos! I felt the same way about that Grandia II dungeon... and after getting Alex through the Magic Trial Cave, I was like "man, that was hard".
About Sega CD's Lunar 2... I personally think the ancient ruins you go through after meeting Ghaleon is horrible too because of the mirror puzzle, maybe slightly worse than the Red Dragon cave, but I suppose that to an extent, difficulty is subjective.
I'd have to agree. The ancient ruins are the part of the game I dread the most. The red dragon cave is a pain in the ass the first time you play it (not that it becomes fun after that) but later playthroughs knowing what to do makes it a lot easier but those Ancient ruins are a nightmare every time! The enemy encounter rate is at it's absolute worst as well making progression a headache.
I used to hang out at this video game store as a kid. I asked for a game like FF7 because it was the first rpg I ever played and I wanted more FF7 so bad. I was given Albert Odyssey. 11 or 12 years old with no internet. I remember trying forever to get through that dungeon. I never stood a chance. 12 year old me is glad it's number one on your list.
Like this page and what I do here? Consider supporting me on patreon! www.patreon.com/davidvinc [0:39] - 10) Sand Labyrinth - Shining Wisdom [1:38] - 9) Under Toth - Vay [2:33] - 8) Meribian Sewers and Cave of Trials - Lunar: The Silver Star [3:34] - 7) Underground Ruins of Uru - Panzer Dragoon Saga [4:39] - 6) The Crypt Maze - Evolution 2 [5:40] - 5) The Red Dragon Cave - Lunar: Eternal Blue [6:58] - 4) Birthplace of the Gods - Grandia 2 [7:59] - 3) All of Them!? - Pier Solar [9:09] - 2) Tower of Illusion - Shining in the Holy Ark [10:22] - 1) Fargasta - Albert Odyssey
For me, the Silver Star Meribia Sewers and Vane Trial Cave weren't as bad since I actually grinded for all the best equipment every time in each town, so I was over-leveled for them. Playing the Sega CD Lunars after the Playstation versions, I remember what I found really cool was the fact that Alex actually became a real magic user with even healing spells since I remember being kind of letdown once I got to Vane in Silver Star Story to find out he wasn't going to do that because I thought that him learning magic was something that was SUPPOSED to happen then. Xd
I remember Fargasta from my childhood. It was like Albert Odyssey took Phantasy Star II's late game dungeons as a blueprint and asked, "hey, can we crank this up so loud it blows your eardrums?"
The second I saw Albert Odyssey in the thumbnail, I knew you'd talk about Fargasta. The dungeon is fucking beautiful to look at visually, but navigating it is a fucking nightmare!
Oh, man, I love the dungeons in both Lunar Sega CD games and Shining the Holy Ark. In fact, my biggest disappointments w/ the Playstation versions was the oversimplicity of the dungeons. They originals force you to stop and think a minute while also being a little resource savvy, but are far from over-challenging like some others. NOW, Albert Odyssey, I get that one. I remember being soooo pissed at the end of that dungeon I just wanted to quickly kill the boss and GET THE HELL OUT! So I spammed attack and died. Angrily, grabbed the disc and threw it! Hit the corner of my desk and smashed to pieces. The instant regret... Still have the empty AO case sitting in my parents basement somewhere. Thank god for emulation nowadays.
"You have to ride around on essentially a penis...Well, that actually kinda sounds like my kind of game." You sir are a beautiful human, please don't ever stop.
I thought I wasn’t going to be able to return to that area in panzer dragoon saga so I spent way too much time combing over it. What a great feeling when I realized you can re enter with the dragon. Oh well, still an amazing game.
#8 - Lunar 1 Original - Weird... good thing they changed it, because to be frank, the enemies look like mutated animals, don't they? That look like they can easily be gutted with a sharp object or bruised by the slinging stones... they don't look like magical beings that can only be affected by physical or magical attacks. :p I like how in the remakes they actually tell you about weapon/spell effectiveness from green, yellow, and red, complete with multiple attacking spells that may be good to some enemies but weak against others, and with enough party members to mix up your attacks. :p I think I remember there was a flying ammonite shell whatever bad guy in the sewers that kind of sucked though either way...
8:46 ish Oh, gosh. Overworld dashing affecting battles reminds me of Pokemon. See, in at least some of the games, running (as opposed to walking or riding a bike, not running from battles) increases your encounter rate. Not so bad if you want to grind, but if you want to get somewhere in a hurry, you better have a better option handy.
@@derangel9143 Eh, I feel that Sega CD Lunar 2 aged pretty well and didn't really need a remake. The original Lunar Silver Star definitely did not. However, it still has charisma and charm (to me at least), so I can tolerate, even enjoy it. I read somewhere that the developers remade Lunar Silver Star because they felt unsatisfied with the original, and also had to cut 1/3 of the original game due to time constraints.
I don’t remember many specifics about Grandia II, except that I never got a game over and only had an ally fall one time. Great story, but way too easy.
Yeah the Tower of Illusion from STHA has all the trappings of the dungeon crawler genre, Also the fact that it's convoluted to get through especially with a boss that can cast silence on your ass is enough to have you go nuts.
Speaking of nonsensical up and down teleporting maze towers or whatever, as much as I love the game, Legend of Mana's tower level and at the very least the Inverted Hell was such a pain in the ass... it didn't really make me want to rage quit since in the default difficulty at least, the game is actually pretty easy, but it was certainly long, the place takes hours to figure out how to go through... easily worse than the other two secondary final dungeon and the actual final dungeon by far... at least I love the stories in this game and the many different weapons and skills you can use. :p Also, monsters and golems (robots).
I successfully did, but it was a while ago. Typically, I just start by googling emulators, and then locating the ROM afterwards, and if I have any problems, I hunt around the internet.
Do a TH-cam search for "sega Saturn emulation". The youtubers ETA Prime and Simply Austin have very good videos on how to set up the latest and greatest Sega Saturn emulators.
I only played 1 and 10. I thought the sand was kinda a fun dungeon, especially since I played the game begining to end twice cause of the systems battery save deleting everything. I actually finished that dungeon in Albert without a guide....it took weeks and lots of starting over when dying due to the game not being generous with save states. I don't need my hand held like psx lunar does, but a few more here and there would have been nice.......
Man, even more than the PSP one, I probably know none of these, LOL. XD All I've ever really owned was a Genesis which I think my family sold for some reason, I only had Sonic games, Vectorman, and Disney stuff I think, and then a Dreamcast also for Sonic and whatever else, no Shenmue or Skies of Arcadia sadly...
@@davidvinc Thabes Labrynth/Duma Tower from Fire Emblem Echoes; Shadows of Valentia. Both are tedious and everywhere looks the same. Also Tjabes Labrynth suffers from some of the hardest enemies in the game.
No, sorry. That shit's normal and FUN for the Evolution games. These were light-hearted dungeon crawls. You go in expecting this and you come out gratified by your achievement.
As I go scrolling your many videos I'm wondering about twitter like u can follow and comment on anything seems odd tho that's what I did here so hmmm lol I don't know I still prefer here nice and cosy
I laughed so hard at the Panzer Dragoon Saga joke my Monster energy drink came out my nose.
Oh my god, dude! I remember I let a friend of mine borrow Shining The Holy Ark. A couple weeks go by, and I get this angry phone call in the middle of the night. It was the gem puzzle. He yelling about how "this stupid game made me do a math problem!" It was the funniest thing I ever heard. I laughed my ass off.
And oh yes, Farghasta in Albert Odyssey is a massive dick move. My friend and I (same guy) had to pool our resources together to get through it. We were both stuck at the same time, so he just came over and we decided to finish the game together. That dungeon was hell.
Oh for F*** sake! Thank you for including Pier Solar! I didn't finish that game my first time through, because there were so many mazes. I just got tired of it! And the funny thing is... it wasn't a dungeon that made me quit. It was a town! There's a town where you have to traverse the sewers to get around, because the streets themselves are SO CLUTTERED!
UGH!!!! I hated that!
There actually was a published guide for Albert Odyssey made by Prima. I know because I was spared the awfulness of Fargasta thanks to it! The guide itself was really bad though, had no pictures whatsoever, and much like their other older guides, the cover for it didn't even use official artwork.
As soon as I heard him say there was no guide, I was like "wait a minute. I have one" and proceeded to check my bookshelf. The guide is not great and the only map is for that godawful tower but at least it has that.
There was another guide i remember reading which is actually what had me play the game. there was a complete guide in a GamerPro magazine...unofficial but better than the Prima one
Okay so I just finished watching your "Worst RPG dungeons" series and I've figured out how to make a dungeon that would drive you insane: A ultra-long sewer dungeon that's a maze, enemies that can one shot you, backtracking because of changing water levels, pitfalls, and teleporters. There will be some sort of restriction like no metal items or no magic, and a randomly generated segment near the end. Oh, and not a landmark to be found.
calm down satan
One save point in a town through a small tunnel cave away
With no map/minimap and save points.
And all the enemies are women in bikinis
Lunar 2 for the Sega CD is my all time favorite game. Biggest problem I had with the PS1 remake was how they neutered the Borgan fight.
I recognize that Shining the Holy Ark footage >_>
and I agree, that tower is a massive pain
Phantasy Star IV music at the beginning was a good choice. Great game need to go and play that one again. If you do a genesis play through I suggest playing this one.
Grandia II is one of your favorite games of all time? You, sir, have excellent taste.
Skies of Arcadia dodged this list entirely? cool
Skies scuba suit maze. uuuugh
Ooh I was waiting for this one! Lmao at your Panzer Dragoon joke. Nice work as always! I need to go back and compare all the different versions of the Lunar games...
OMG the memories, Albert Odyssey and Lunar! Fondly remembered, BS dungeons and all.
The Underground Ruins of Uru is the worst part of the game, but I still think it's a good part IMO. But every other part of Saga is masterful, my second favorite game of all time.
Fargasta does have an internet guide. I know because I played Albert Odyssey for the first time last year and searched until I found one (took like a week I should add). I read the guide which kept it bare bones simple. Just this floor then this floor. Step on this teleporter then this one. And just reading it made me want to quit. It makes no sense. Also the teleporters are the worst goddamned thing in any video game. If you use one to go to another one doing the reverse should send you back where you started. They don't work that way. They teleport you randomly instead. It's infuriating beyond words. I did manage to get through it and win but even with a guide I'd never do it again. I'd play the game again up to that point but no further.
My honest belief is the game designer who thought up that dungeon caught his wife cheating on him and got divorce papers out of the blue on the same day he found out he had testicular cancer in both testicles that required immediate surgery to remove them after being sprayed by a skunk and stung by a wasp and just wanted the rest of the world to feel his pain. Mission accomplished.
‘Cream of the crap’ that’s a great line! Thanks for another fun Top 10!
If you’re up to such a colossal task, I would love to see a video about the differences between the original Lunar verses the PS1 version.
The Meribian Sewers and the Cave of Trials are quite short, and even though you only have Alex's magic, you can use this as an opportunity to level him up fast and get some better magic spells.
I dont remember hating any of the dragon caves in lunar 2. Maybe partially due to having karate jean instead of dancer jean, its like evolving your class in final fantasy 1, and Jean is my fave character so... yeah.
I remember working my way through Fargasta right after Albert Odyssey's US release. I believe I used an issue of EGM2 which had a cursory walkthrough. It was definitely not easy, though.
Indeed, took me forever in a day to get through Fargasta, and the trio of final bosses was nothing to sneeze at either. Holy shit though, it was worth it.
yeah, Pier Solar has some pretty annoying dungeons and it's not just the dungeons that I found annoying.
A V I was personally impacted (not negatively, but not positively either) by the dialogue. I thought it was exactly what a development team would write.
Love your worst dungeons videos! I felt the same way about that Grandia II dungeon... and after getting Alex through the Magic Trial Cave, I was like "man, that was hard".
About Sega CD's Lunar 2... I personally think the ancient ruins you go through after meeting Ghaleon is horrible too because of the mirror puzzle, maybe slightly worse than the Red Dragon cave, but I suppose that to an extent, difficulty is subjective.
I'd have to agree. The ancient ruins are the part of the game I dread the most. The red dragon cave is a pain in the ass the first time you play it (not that it becomes fun after that) but later playthroughs knowing what to do makes it a lot easier but those Ancient ruins are a nightmare every time! The enemy encounter rate is at it's absolute worst as well making progression a headache.
I used to hang out at this video game store as a kid. I asked for a game like FF7 because it was the first rpg I ever played and I wanted more FF7 so bad. I was given Albert Odyssey. 11 or 12 years old with no internet. I remember trying forever to get through that dungeon. I never stood a chance. 12 year old me is glad it's number one on your list.
Like this page and what I do here? Consider supporting me on patreon! www.patreon.com/davidvinc
[0:39] - 10) Sand Labyrinth - Shining Wisdom
[1:38] - 9) Under Toth - Vay
[2:33] - 8) Meribian Sewers and Cave of Trials - Lunar: The Silver Star
[3:34] - 7) Underground Ruins of Uru - Panzer Dragoon Saga
[4:39] - 6) The Crypt Maze - Evolution 2
[5:40] - 5) The Red Dragon Cave - Lunar: Eternal Blue
[6:58] - 4) Birthplace of the Gods - Grandia 2
[7:59] - 3) All of Them!? - Pier Solar
[9:09] - 2) Tower of Illusion - Shining in the Holy Ark
[10:22] - 1) Fargasta - Albert Odyssey
For me, the Silver Star Meribia Sewers and Vane Trial Cave weren't as bad since I actually grinded for all the best equipment every time in each town, so I was over-leveled for them. Playing the Sega CD Lunars after the Playstation versions, I remember what I found really cool was the fact that Alex actually became a real magic user with even healing spells since I remember being kind of letdown once I got to Vane in Silver Star Story to find out he wasn't going to do that because I thought that him learning magic was something that was SUPPOSED to happen then. Xd
Whoa this episode has some adult jokes!!! Had to cover my niece’s ears!!!
Lunar Eternal Blue is one of my old favorites, but ugh...those dragon caves...
I remember Fargasta from my childhood. It was like Albert Odyssey took Phantasy Star II's late game dungeons as a blueprint and asked, "hey, can we crank this up so loud it blows your eardrums?"
The second I saw Albert Odyssey in the thumbnail, I knew you'd talk about Fargasta. The dungeon is fucking beautiful to look at visually, but navigating it is a fucking nightmare!
Oh, man, I love the dungeons in both Lunar Sega CD games and Shining the Holy Ark. In fact, my biggest disappointments w/ the Playstation versions was the oversimplicity of the dungeons. They originals force you to stop and think a minute while also being a little resource savvy, but are far from over-challenging like some others.
NOW, Albert Odyssey, I get that one. I remember being soooo pissed at the end of that dungeon I just wanted to quickly kill the boss and GET THE HELL OUT! So I spammed attack and died. Angrily, grabbed the disc and threw it! Hit the corner of my desk and smashed to pieces. The instant regret... Still have the empty AO case sitting in my parents basement somewhere. Thank god for emulation nowadays.
Pier Solar - "All of them?!" Made me laugh. I was waiting to play that game since first hearing about it and man was it a disappointment.
"You have to ride around on essentially a penis...Well, that actually kinda sounds like my kind of game."
You sir are a beautiful human, please don't ever stop.
I thought I wasn’t going to be able to return to that area in panzer dragoon saga so I spent way too much time combing over it. What a great feeling when I realized you can re enter with the dragon. Oh well, still an amazing game.
All those dungeons makes the ones in both Phantasy Star 1&2 look like cakewalks.
PSII still takes the cake for me when it comes to hardest/worst dungeons.
#8 - Lunar 1 Original - Weird... good thing they changed it, because to be frank, the enemies look like mutated animals, don't they? That look like they can easily be gutted with a sharp object or bruised by the slinging stones... they don't look like magical beings that can only be affected by physical or magical attacks. :p
I like how in the remakes they actually tell you about weapon/spell effectiveness from green, yellow, and red, complete with multiple attacking spells that may be good to some enemies but weak against others, and with enough party members to mix up your attacks. :p I think I remember there was a flying ammonite shell whatever bad guy in the sewers that kind of sucked though either way...
This is Bull.... Shining the holly arc was the best RPG of its time... only beaten by FF7 later!!
He didn't say the game was bad. Just that the 1 dungeon was crap.
Man, everyone always says how much they like Grandia II but outside of the combat system I found it really lacking
8:46 ish
Oh, gosh. Overworld dashing affecting battles reminds me of Pokemon. See, in at least some of the games, running (as opposed to walking or riding a bike, not running from battles) increases your encounter rate. Not so bad if you want to grind, but if you want to get somewhere in a hurry, you better have a better option handy.
The og mega drive cd versions of the Lunar games are really rough around the edges.
They're still pretty charming in their own right, but they definitely do not age quite as well as the Complete versions.
@@derangel9143 Eh, I feel that Sega CD Lunar 2 aged pretty well and didn't really need a remake. The original Lunar Silver Star definitely did not. However, it still has charisma and charm (to me at least), so I can tolerate, even enjoy it. I read somewhere that the developers remade Lunar Silver Star because they felt unsatisfied with the original, and also had to cut 1/3 of the original game due to time constraints.
I don’t remember many specifics about Grandia II, except that I never got a game over and only had an ally fall one time. Great story, but way too easy.
Yeah the Tower of Illusion from STHA has all the trappings of the dungeon crawler genre, Also the fact that it's convoluted to get through especially with a boss that can cast silence on your ass is enough to have you go nuts.
Speaking of nonsensical up and down teleporting maze towers or whatever, as much as I love the game, Legend of Mana's tower level and at the very least the Inverted Hell was such a pain in the ass... it didn't really make me want to rage quit since in the default difficulty at least, the game is actually pretty easy, but it was certainly long, the place takes hours to figure out how to go through... easily worse than the other two secondary final dungeon and the actual final dungeon by far... at least I love the stories in this game and the many different weapons and skills you can use. :p Also, monsters and golems (robots).
How do you manage to emulate panzer dragoon saga? Please share the knowledge
Jym Fisk Burk some programs that can run it may be better than others.
I successfully did, but it was a while ago.
Typically, I just start by googling emulators, and then locating the ROM afterwards, and if I have any problems, I hunt around the internet.
Do a TH-cam search for "sega Saturn emulation". The youtubers ETA Prime and Simply Austin have very good videos on how to set up the latest and greatest Sega Saturn emulators.
Isn’t Vay pronounces “Vy”?
It is.
NO, please. My poor child. Albert Odyssey; what have you done?
Great video. Thanks for the heads up 👍
Sega consoles had just as many RPGs as Nintendo consoles...maybe more, but most of them never left Japan.
Can Sega does what Nintendon't?
I only played 1 and 10. I thought the sand was kinda a fun dungeon, especially since I played the game begining to end twice cause of the systems battery save deleting everything. I actually finished that dungeon in Albert without a guide....it took weeks and lots of starting over when dying due to the game not being generous with save states. I don't need my hand held like psx lunar does, but a few more here and there would have been nice.......
Tower of illusion. Gave me flashbacks from shining the holy arc.
Finally one for me!
I loved Albert Odyssey. I wished it would be re re released or remade. But fix that dungeon.
I would rank Sand Labyrinth way higher than 10, but I 100% agree with Albert Odyssey.
Great list!
Man, even more than the PSP one, I probably know none of these, LOL. XD All I've ever really owned was a Genesis which I think my family sold for some reason, I only had Sonic games, Vectorman, and Disney stuff I think, and then a Dreamcast also for Sonic and whatever else, no Shenmue or Skies of Arcadia sadly...
I love Grandia II so much!
Teleportation maze is pretty long
With Nintendo Announcing that they won't produce more 1st party titles for the 3DS, would you consider it to have completed its life cycle?
Yes, hit me up with all your 3DS worst dungeon suggestions!!
@@davidvinc Thabes Labrynth/Duma Tower from Fire Emblem Echoes; Shadows of Valentia. Both are tedious and everywhere looks the same. Also Tjabes Labrynth suffers from some of the hardest enemies in the game.
Apparently the white dragon cave in Lunar belongs to Starfleet?
No, sorry. That shit's normal and FUN for the Evolution games. These were light-hearted dungeon crawls. You go in expecting this and you come out gratified by your achievement.
Why didn't you go over any of the import rpg's or the ones that later got a dub?
you gotta admit even though sega didn't get as many rpg's the ones it did get were fucking q u a l i t y
david is a great kisser
You are right on about albert odyssey could not beat the game got lost so many times spend many many hours
Good game, great graphics and music. Too bad the random encounter rate is so high, making some of the dungeons just plain unfun.
My hate for Lunar knows no bounds...
Iv devoted all my online time to u I forgot about everyone eles lol
And I wouldn’t have it any other way. Love you for that!
As I go scrolling your many videos I'm wondering about twitter like u can follow and comment on anything seems odd tho that's what I did here so hmmm lol I don't know I still prefer here nice and cosy
Your a worst dungeon.
Pff.
I'm not gonna 'dislike' but this video is a joke...
In what way?
I find this very informative. Especially since I was too poor to buy these games when they came out.