About Mystery Dungeon
 |
This article is in a sorry state
This article may contain spelling errors, have poor organization, is way too short or just unsightly to read and use. Please consider adding information or organizing the existing information on the page. |
| Mystery Dungeon Franchise 不思議のダンジョン | ||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| ||||||||||||||||
| ||||||||||||||||
| ||||||||||||||||
| ||||||||||||||||
| 1993 | Torneko's Great Adventure: Mystery Dungeon | |
| 1994 | ||
| 1995 | Mystery Dungeon 2: Shiren the Wanderer | |
| 1996 | BS Shiren the Wanderer: Save Surala Shiren the Wanderer GB: Moonlight-Village Monster | |
| 1997 | Chocobo's Mysterious Dungeon | |
| 1998 | Chocobo's Mysterious Dungeon 2 | |
| 1999 | Torneko: The Last Hope | |
| 2000 | Shiren the Wanderer 2: Demon Invasion! Shiren Castle! | |
| 2001 | Shiren the Wanderer GB2: Magic Castle of the Desert | |
| 2002 | Shiren the Wanderer Side Story: Female Swordsman Asuka Arrives! Torneko's Great Adventure 3: Mystery Dungeon | |
| 2003 | ||
| 2004 | The Nightmare of Druaga: Mystery Dungeon TwinBee Dungeon Mobile Suit Gundam: Mystery Dungeon | |
| 2005 | Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Red & Blue Rescue Team | |
| 2006 | Dragon Quest: Young Yangus and the Mysterious Dungeon | |
| 2007 | Final Fantasy Fables: Chocobo's Dungeon Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Time & Darkness | |
| 2008 | Shiren the Wanderer 3: The Sleeping Princess of the Karakuri Mansion | |
| 2009 | Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Adventure Squad | |
| 2010 | Shiren the Wanderer 4: The Eye of God and the Devil's Navel Shiren the Wanderer 5: The Fortune Tower and the Dice of Fate | |
| 2011 | Shiren the Wanderer: The Rainbow Labyrinth | |
| 2012 | Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Gates to Infinity | |
| 2013 | ||
| 2014 | ||
| 2015 | Pokémon Super Mystery Dungeon Etrian Mystery Dungeon Mystery Chronicle: One Way Heroics | |
| 2016 | ||
| 2017 | Etrian Mystery Dungeon 2 | |
| 2018 | ||
| 2019 | Chocobo's Mystery Dungeon: Every Buddy! | |
| 2020 | Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Rescue Team DX Shiren the Wanderer: The Tower of Fortune and the Dice of Fate |
The Mystery Dungeon franchise is a long running series of roguelikes created originally by Chunsoft (later Spike Chunsoft), a Japanese developer company, in 1993. Eventually growing to include other developers and publishers, the series now spans multiple console generations, platforms and uses both licensed and original characters.
About the franchise[edit | edit source]
Dragon Quest Mystery Dungeon titles[edit | edit source]
- See also the page: Dragon Quest Mystery Dungeon
The Mystery Dungeon series first began as a spin-off of Dragon Quest Ⅳ: Chapters of the Chosen, known as Dragon Warrior Ⅳ in North America, with the Torneko's Great Adventure trilogy. Torneko would also appears as a cameo in the spin-off and prequel of Dragon Quest Ⅷ: Journey of the Cursed King, Dragon Quest: Young Yangus and the Mysterious Dungeon, which marks the first and only game to control a different character.
As of now, only one game was able to receive an official translation and port in North America, which is World of Dragon Warrior: Torneko: The Last Hope. The other games have remained in Japan due to the series' popularity in Japan, being more important than overseas.
Shiren the Wanderer titles[edit | edit source]
- See also the page: Mystery Dungeon: Shiren the Wanderer (series)
The naming and numbering convention of Shiren games is complex due to the fact that the company has made many games (all derived upon and building upon the "Mystery Dungeon" roguelike framework) on various platforms and localized for various markets over the course of decades. For example, what players today call "Shiren 1" (the first game featuring the character Shiren) was in fact originally called "Mystery Dungeon 2", as it was the second game using the Mystery Dungeon framework. Some games were apparently numbered based on their original release platform plus their release sequence on that platform while others originally had unique titles with no numbers featured. Then, over the course of time, some but not all of these games were ported to other platforms or localized into English and sold in other markets, often under a new name as the original name or number wouldn't have made much sense in the new market. Games that were released in English were often released many years after their initial Japanese releases, even though one or more newer games in the series had already been released in Japan in the intervening period. Games that were re-released on other platforms also sometimes included additional content that was not part of the first release, or that was optional downloadable content (DLC) for the first release. Fortunately for the English-speaking audience, the company seems to have bundled all DLC whenever they have localized a game into English.
To date, only three Shiren games have been officially localized into English. Note that none of the English titles uses the same numbering system as the original Japanese titles did. But lack of officially localized releases has not stopped some hardcore English-speaking fans of the series from playing other games in the series, either via imported games and struggling to play in a foreign language or via hacks, mods and player translations. Consequently, this site has more complete information for games that were officially released in English but also has content for other games in the series as well.
The name or numbering convention is so complex that English-speaking fans of the series usually use shorthand names or nicknames for the games in the series. Unfortunately, there is no single canonical short name for each game used by all players, as different audiences favored different short names based on which release or re-release they were playing. For convenience, this site uses short names based on the original release title to the greatest extent possible, otherwise the short name is derived from the original release platform plus the sequence on that platform.
Chocobo's Mystery Dungeon titles[edit | edit source]
- See also the page: Chocobo's Mystery Dungeon
The Chocobo's Mystery Dungeon series is fully developed and published by Squaresoft, then Square Enix for the third installment. Even though few developers from Chunsoft worked in the two early games, including Nakamura as a supervisor.
As of now, only the original Chocobo's Mystery Dungeon for the PlayStation and WonderSwan does not have an official translation or port in the west.
Pokémon Mystery Dungeon titles[edit | edit source]
- See also the page: Pokémon Mystery Dungeon
The Pokémon Mystery Dungeon series is published by Nintendo and co-developed by The Pokémon Company. It is currently the most popular sub-series worldwide.
As of now, only the Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Adventure Squad titles do not have an official translation or port in the west.
Etrian Mystery Dungeon titles[edit | edit source]
- See also the page: Etrian Mystery Dungeon (series)
The Etrian Mystery Dungeon duology is co-developed and published by Atlus.
As of now, only Etrian Mystery Dungeon 2 does not have an official translation or port in the west.
Individual Mystery Dungeon titles[edit | edit source]
There were also many titles who only got one installment. Namco's The Tower of Druaga, Konami's TwinBee and Bandai's Gundam franchises were developed with help from Chunsoft.
Reception and popularity[edit | edit source]
- See also: Mystery Dungeon references in other media.
The series can be seen as moderately popular in Japan whereas the overseas community has a smaller following of dedicated fans.
- Numerous characters from the Shiren the Wanderer series have appeared in other video games developed or published by Spike Chunsoft.
- In Super Smash Bros. Brawl, a category titled Chronicle represents a list of games published by Nintendo, including the Mystery Dungeon series. Therefore, only the two first Pokémon Mystery Dungeon games—Red & Blue Rescue Team and Explorers of Time & Darkness—were shown to the Game Boy Advance and Nintendo DS lists respectively in the Japanese version of the game. However, only Red & Blue Rescue Team were shown in the western version of the game because Explorers of Time & Darkness was not release yet, at the time of Brawl's western release.