Let's address the elephant in the room, yes, the islanders designs are pretty racist, and there's no good excuse for it. Does that mean you should disregard the entire game? That's up to you, personally I can look past that sort of thing, so long as it's not being outright malicious. I was never playing Shiren for the story or world, I came for the mystery dungeon stuff, I don't think the people playing these games looking for anything other than that. But I do think it was a bad move, regardless of it being a Japanese exclusive. It's just a shame that as soon as the English patch for this game was released, most of the buzz about it was about this rather than the amazing translation work or the game itself.

With that out of the way, I had fun with this one. I think the other review here is right, it's a bit easier compared to 5 and other games, but I don't think that's a bad thing. I'm currently on holiday in a tropical island myself, so the game being a bit more lax suited me as I melted under the blazing-hot sun in Bali. It's still challenging enough to be engaging, and if you're a newcomer, then it'll keep you on your toes. It doesn't do much to surprise you, but there's a few mechanics that can put a spin on your run.

There's not much to say, if you're familiar with Shiren or other Mystery Dungeon games, you know what you're getting into, and you'll have a good time here. If you're looking to get into the series, there are better options such as Shiren 5, Shiren 2, or even Shiren GB. But if you're dead set on playing this one like I was (I wanted to see the translation as well as play it on my RG505 lol, looks great on an OLED screen), you'll enjoy it.

Only ended up playing one really solid run as I'll likely return to this game long after shiren 6 is out, from what I've played so far though it felt "too easy" in a bad way. It's possible I've just gotten better over the years but even at its worst, the day/night system that's very brutal in 5 felt like light work as new abilities are gained every so often through leveling up allowing for less panic scenarios where typically you wouldn't have abilities filled. And damage taken was low across the board especially from night monsters. Shiren the Wanderer 4 appears at face value to be worse than 5 in every way and I'd rather recommend new players to play 5 as the difficulty is part of the journey.