Many enjoyable secrets, allright difficulty, yet unfortunately very short and not varied enough...
I usually do not like comment on GS reviews and keep to my opinions, but now I must say they got the "The bad" wrong. There are things wrong with the game, but difficulty is absolutely OK, I had no problems whatsoever on hard, so most people should be fine on medium (or easy for that matter) and visual are OK, plain in environments but very fine and easy on the eyes on the monsters.
I see the main positives is a refined gameplay system, enjoyable puzzling and in the great, many and enjoyable secrets the game has to offer. The bad points would definitely be the short length (for this type of game), too few graphic environments, not enough sounds and not enough different equipment for your characters.
Graphics 8/10
GS thinks the graphics are busted, I do not.I must say, the environments are pretty plain, just your standard dungeon walls, and definitely the bad point would be that there are only three environments an you will spend most of the game time in one of these three. Making the game longer or making atleast 4 environments would be a very welcoming sight. But not all is bad, the monsters graphics are fine - I enjoyed ogres and other beasts up close and how detailed they are.
Sounds 7/10
Unlike graphics I see sounds as the weaker point. The menu song is great and enjoyable, so are the monster and spell sounds. What the game lacks is more sound tracks, usually going through the dungeon the game is quiet. Why did they not make atleast a few tracks to play in the background or even made the menu music play on low volume in the background? I do not know, but it would definitely improve the game experience, now for 3/4 of the gamee the mood is pretty silent, only towards the end the environmental sounds improve and you will get pulled more into the game. Another thing missing is some sort of voice-acting, but it is really not needed either for this type of game.
Story 7/10
Overall the story is pretty much non-existent for most of the game, only towards the end the puzzle begins to unfold. Notes left by a previous prisoner tend to push the story forward, but it is not enough. More of these, perhaps meeting a live person from time to time, I think this would help the story. Nobody says they have to create an underground town, this does not even suit this type of game, but still a few live prisoners (since you are in a giant prison the whole game) would make the game better. One funny thing about the story is the ending and ending monster, the game makes you believe it some ancient god if the ancients and then this...entertaining...
Gameplay 9/10
Love it or hate it. If you are a current gen gamer only this gameplay will most likely not suit style. You will find the hex based (no true freedom of movement, but movement by steps in 4 directions) movement restricting, the combat system tedious, the dodging system ridiculous and the inventory system lame. But if you are an older gamer you might appreciate the oldschool feel without shops or towns, the different monster behaviour, the ability to dodge almost all blows if you are quick enough (this actually makes the game far too easy, I did not see any punishing difficulty at all GS!!!) and the many many manyn secrets. I absolutely love secrets, as well secrets within secrets (yes that, even secrets within secrets or secrets, damn...).
The difficulty is pretty easy if you will remember that you can dodge at any time, but pretty hard if you will stand in one place like a tree.
A downpoint might be that there are few equipment items to be found and if you miss for example a secret with an axe, you might not get another axe for 1/4 of the game (or any axe for that matter). But fortunately fiding secrets is not that hard and is pretty enjoyable.
Replayability 7/10
There are only 3 classes and 4 races and you choose a party of 4 charactes. Each character has 8 skills and the ability to max out only one (yes, it is nearly impossible to max out 2). The too few classes decrease replay value, the impossibility to max out everything increases replay value. But still the replay value would be around 5, since there are secrets to find but too few items (notes from prisoners) to gather. What makes the replay value a 7 is the Toorum mode a special mode with only 1 character which is unlocked after finishing the game and fulfilling a special requirement...
Overall a great revival of one the greatest genres. If you consider yourself and RPG fan, try it, you've got nothing to lost and it costs little. If you cannot stand any RPG or can stand only the like of for example DA2 or WOW, then you are probably better off without trying this game and giving it bad rating is the "times change" style.