Shiren the Wanderer: The Tower of Fortune and the Dice of Fate

Gameplay

The Tower of Fortune and the Dice of Fate is a roguelike role-playing video game in which the player traverses randomized dungeons and fights monsters. In dungeons, the player can find treasures, as well as items and equipment that they can collect use. If the player dies, they lose their items, their level resets to 1, the dungeons change, and the monsters change positions. The game has a day-and-night system; as the in-game sun sets, the player character's vision decreases, making it impossible to see enemies that are too far away. At some points in dungeons, the player needs to solve puzzles.

Plot

The story is set between the events of Shiren the Wanderer DS2 and Shiren the Wanderer 3, and follows Shiren, a wanderer and silent protagonist who is accompanied by Koppa, a talking ferret. The two are climbing the Tower of Fortune, as they have heard legends of a god that can change their fate. They are guided through the tower by Tao, a girl in a panda suit.

Development

The game was originally released in Japan by Chunsoft for the Nintendo DS on December 9, 2010. Pre-ordered copies of the game were bundled with a soundtrack CD and a booklet about the series' history. As a crossover promotion, a Nonary Game bracelet from Chunsoft's Nine Hours, Nine Persons, Nine Doors was included as an in-game item. A PlayStation Vita version, Shiren the Wanderer 5 Plus, which includes additional dungeons and the ability to look around using the right stick, was announced in December 2014. It was released by Spike Chunsoft on June 4, 2015 in Japan, and by Aksys Games on July 26, 2016 in North America.

Reception

The game was well received by critics, and was the sixth-best reviewed PlayStation Vita game of 2016 on Metacritic. The PlayStation Vita version debuted on second place on Media Create's weekly list of best-selling video games in Japan, with 16,224 copies sold; on its second week, it sunk to ninth place with 6,060 copies, and on its third it sunk to thirteenth place with 3,553 copies sold. By the end of 2015, it was the 168th best selling game of the year in Japan.