Intervention of the Dungeon Sage

Calamity! There was no other word for it outside of synonyms. Dozens of miners were trapped below, and worse than that, the mine might not resume operations for years. Owners and managers could do nothing but stand apart and compete in frowning.
"Pardon me." Normally people gawked without introducing themselves, but one look at this man precluded any idea he could be normal. "I came to investigate the new dungeon. Is that it over there?"
"Dungeon Sage Hesperno!"
"I suppose a mine could be used as a dungeon . . ."
"Please use your magic to make a stable new opening! And save the miners if it's convenient. Don't forget the opening, please!"
"If they're on the way. So that is the new dungeon?" Receiving confirmation, the sage advanced and, using proprietary techniques, descended. Within the day awed miners began emerging. Not more than a week later, Hesperno came out, wiped his hands, and sought the nearest owner.
"I've cleared everything out. Thank you for the nice dungeon. I liked the sorcerer-slug that was sinking curses into all the ore. It was different."
"The what?"
"It was a little exotic but not self-indulgent. Goodbye. I'll come back after you've expanded it some."
And so it transpired.
Finis

Dungeon Upgrade

Rotating dungeon

Thoughts on Dragalia Lost

As an expert in not playing Dragalia Lost, seeing as I only played the intro, I decided to explain its failure. Publish or perish, after all.
First, right from the beginning, the controls felt worse than similar games like Bleach Brave Souls.
Second, that intro gave the impression the game would be dungeon-focused, but when I looked in later, it seemed the entire thing was boss-in-a-box fights with a heavy co-op focus. The audience that wants more of the former feels deceived, and that which wants the latter will never know that game has it.
The biggest problem, however, is that it missed its aesthetic. It seems to me, a professor of not playing Dragalia Lost, that there's a triumvirate of aesthetic categories such that the successful mobile games hit one or two hard, which we will call Cute, Cool, and Coom. Games can touch on all three, but you can tell where its heart is. Granblue Fantasy is cool and Princess Connect is cute, for example.
So what's Dragalia Lost? It has those chibis, so it's cute, right? Not really. They don't have particularly cute expressions. They look like low-poly characters in an early Playstation game, as if their tininess were a technical limitation rather than a choice. Furthermore, they're being used to tell a pretty po-faced fantasy story about dragons and time travel. The music is cutesy, not cute. The difference is crucial. Maybe it's cool, but then, it's full of chibis and tubby dragons, not to mention pastels and slice of life type wyrmprint art are not the least bit cool, to say nothing of Euden's hair. It certainly isn't coom. The occasional bikini doesn't cut it. You need to hit different tastes and have a sense of the erotic which Dragalia Lost lacks almost completely. That's why it got so little fanart.
You can talk about this or that update or monetization all you want, but that only matters if people play it in the first place. Dragalia Lost's numbers were disappointing from the very beginning. I contend the primary reason was the lack of aesthetic appeal, although of course some people liked it a lot. Plenty of stuff I like also isn't popular, so I know how it is.

Thoughts on Ys IV Dawn of Ys

Spoilers!

Not only is Dawn of Ys better than Mask of the Sun, it's better than the earlier and the next Ys game to the extent that I start to wonder if maybe Falcom stunk.
HP regeneration is too slow for the higher levels. MP regeneration is too slow, but only if you make multiple stops with Warp. Warp should be free.
It's a bit of a problem that in boss fights you don't know if you can or cannot use magic before you go in them. Still, it isn't as bad as it could be since dying puts you right outside and skips the cutscene.
Putting a generic evil dude in at the end makes your story better? Strange but true. The motivations of the villains are clearer in this than in Mask of the Sun because of it.
Exciting music, wild bosses, reasonably personable characters even if Karna doesn't really do anything in either version, dungeon variety (straightforward or twisty, plain or puzzley, dense or sparse enemies, flat or vertical). The experience gives a real sense of adventure.
There's a sense of place, too. It still has inexplicable dungeon layouts, but the way dungeons relate such as the one becoming a tower later, as well as the relative sanity of the evil empire's castle make you feel like you're going places instead of running on a treadmill while a fire background and an ice background are rotated behind you.
Freeze magic doesn't really have much of a purpose. Half the spells don't, really. You only use Shield when the boss is immune to magic, and Seeker simply replaces the mask.
what do the Ruby and Necklace do? Two shops sell those. One's a secret shop. And the other gems. What's the deal?
Ys IV Dawn of Ys is a fantastic game. I give it my Ysiest rating: Ten Dogis through ten walls.

Forethought

"Put the magnagorgon over there. Good. What is it?"
The acolyte wrung his sweaty hands and spoke. "Great one, you have captured by your incomparable arts some of the most dangerous creatures. The magnagorgon, the tyrannolisk, the mindful mass . . ."
"Yes, yes."
"In furtherance of what aim are you having us haul them to this empty field? Not that we mind, of course, but . . ."
"An empty field. You do not see, as I do, the complex I will erect here once all my sentinels have been placed."
"Ah!"
"You see now? When robbers intrude and run across these monsters, they will wonder how such colossal beasts could be there, being bigger than the corridors and doors as they are. These magical mirrors I have devised will capture their expressions at that exact moment. Oh, how we will laugh!"
"Ha ha ha!"
"A ha ha ha!"
"Gya ha ha ha ha!"

"And that's probably how that magnagorgon got in there."
"I can't see any other explanation, frankly."
Finis

Innovative Idea Do Not Steal

A dungeon that's actually a dungeon. I'm not sure that's a good place to have adventures, but nothing ventured, nothing gained.