Well it was fun and tactical. The problem was the really outdated visual style. When Wizardry started way back in the day, it was difficult to implement a full party of six on your screen so they took some short cuts.
Unfortunately in the name of tradition they continued with the same shortcuts in Wizardry 8, despite there being no need. I put up with it, but I don't think I would today.
You have a party of six but all you see of your party are dynamic portraits. That's it. You view the game from a first person perspective switching between party members at will, but at no point can see any of them!
The combat is very good and highly tactical, and there is plenty of hack and slash depth. Even the visuals are good, but the fact that your party is invisible to you as a gamer really hurts the overall experience. The game also featured some really cool world inhabitants. The mook as I mentioned looks a lot like a wookie, except not as retarded. There were also cat like and lizard like creatures, while you could also create a hobbit! I actually remember taking more than a couple of hours to create my entire party before starting the game. That was insane, yet a lot of fun.
In the end, it is the visual style that keeps the game from being a classic. The sad thing is that the game came well after games like Baludr's Gate II, so it wasn't bound by technology or something. Also the game was in trouble when it was ditched by its publisher, and in the end was published by EB. When I purchased it, I was extremely disappointed to note that the game came in paper sleeves with a thick yet cheap looking manual. It was probably because the game was published by EB games, but I was quite unhappy. Little did I know that that would become the ugly trend.
Also the game reviewed really well. I wonder how it scores on gamerankings.com
