Separating the men from the boys.
The Dark Spire has many noticeable similarities with Atlus' Etrian Odyssey series. It is a grid-based first-person dungeon crawler exclusive to the DS, has modest production values and, perhaps most importantly, is excrutiatingly difficult. Harder than Etrian Odyssey? Yes, in part due to random battles being truly random. You can literally take two steps and fight two groups of enemies and then make fourty more without being bothered. It feels a little cheap at times, but a good player will never be caught off guard.
The Dark Spire's storyline is basic, but manages to be memorable despite its unambitious premise. As a ragtag group of four anonymous freelancers, your party sets out on a quest to travel to the top of a mystical tower and slay the Wizard on top. The entire game takes place in the tower (deemed the Dark Spire), with your party slowly pushing past wave after wave of visceral opposition. Flowery poetry that describes environments and battle actions complements course dialogue very well, and the vibe from Dark Spire is remarkably different from other anime-influenced RPG's polluting the DS.
The excellent vibe is partly due to the game's beautiful and haunting audiovisual presentation. Creepy 2D art with tons of shadows and odd coloring haunts the Dark Spire, and a fantastic soundtrack works in the game's favor. The 3D tower is full of diverse and lovingly crafted environments; while not technically proficient, they nail the aura the excellent 2D art gives. There is also an option to play the game in 'Wireframe mode,' which brings you back into the era of low-quality sound and 8-bit visuals. This truly is a love letter to the 80's.
The appealing presentation even extends to the game's packaging; launch copies of the game come with a great soundtrack more than an hour long and a fat box to hold the game in. Collectors, rush out to your nearest game store and make sure you get one in mint condition.
It is odd to see a game so devoted to its fans it would give them such fine packaging, then kick them in the balls when they boot up the game. Even worse for the majority of players, the Dark Spire's difficulty is the sort of difficulty that requires the player to grind. Progressing largely relies on the player's weapons and level, as opposed to relying more on the player's skill; don't worry, it still takes a high level of accomplishment to conquer all of the Dark Spire's traps and monsters, but it also takes a level of patience and a liking for grinding most gamers do not possess.
If you do enjoy grinding, however, the Dark Spire is easily among the top RPG's on the system. The potential of customization is through the roof; your party initially is made up of four members, each one of a distinguishable race, mentality (lawful, neutral or chaotic) and class. The more they battle, they may spend experience points earned on either leveling up their class level, get a new class level to form a hybrid class (Warrior and Mage, for example, unofficially form Red Mage), learn new abilities and so forth. It's a refreshing take from modern RPG's that essentially level up for the player, and it is nice to have complete control over what you do.
The customization does not end there, though; you can even select what type of attack to use every time your warriors act in battle (swift, power, rage, etc.) and your party arrangement (three in back, two in back, one in back, etc.). This is very superior to the game's spiritual brothers.
Travelling through the grid-based tower is dangerous, and there are a plethora of traps, ambushes, locked doors and oddities awaiting the party. Often after fighting a battle, a member of your party will have to take a chance of being poisoned or damaged just to receive the spoils they should have gotten in the first place; if I have not stressed it enough, this game hates you.
It is obvious some concessions were made during the development process, however, as the game's unintuitive interface will discourage some. There is no stylus option whatsoever. When travelling in the tower, the lower screen portrays useless information instead of something pertinent (like, say, a map? I believe Success did not want to put in a map because they felt it would make the game harder -- to merely reveal your location on the map you have to use a spell -- but it is simply a nuisance, not a compelling obstacle to overcome). Unlike Etrian Odyssey which portrays all enemies on the field, the Dark Spire only shows one or two sprites that represent an entire group of enemies. This means more menus to go through when specifying which member of the group you want to attack.
There are some production value issues as well, ones that are a bit tougher to overcome. There are no battle animations or even differing sound effects when in battle. Your characters do not have portraits in or out of battle, which makes it a bit harder to personalize with them.
I had a blast playing the Dark Spire (so much that I conquered it under a week, despite it being of decent length for an RPG), and I predict if you have ever enjoyed dungeon crawling before, you will too. If you are new to the genre I would recommend the slightly more approachable Etrian Odyssey original; however, for veterans this is Atlus' finest DS project yet. It is rare that I disagree with critics so vehemently, but it is my opinion that the Dark Spire is top tier for a turn-based RPG, and don't let any amount of teary-eyed critics tell you otherwise.