I became an Exile fan when III was the newest game and played the demos in reverse order. I played the shit out of the demos and had friends who were into them, then I got the registered version of the first one and played through it a bunch of times. A few years later I circled back and got II and III (Exile, even though Avernum was out then). Then maybe 8 years later I got the second Avernum trilogy, played through that, and played through the remakes of the first trilogy. Of the Blades games, I’ve played through the Exile version of the free scenario, Valley of Dying Things. I’ve messed around with Blades of Avernum and I want to get through it some day, but TBH I think that one (and presumably by extension the original first Avernum Trilogy) are uglier and clunkier than either Exile or the later Avernum games.

I haven’t played the new Avernum IV yet.

I actually prefer the old-timey tiled graphics of Exile. There are a few changes made from Exile to the later Avernum games that I regret, but I think that overall the Avernum games are made some needed improvements. There are also some elements of Exile that I liked as a kid but might not have the patience for now.

Recent play throughs of the first two D&D Gold Box Games help me understand where alot of Exile came from. I can also recognize how some elements from Exile that Avernum ditched were efforts to make everything function like a table top RPG.

I am not really clear on whether Exile was unusually complex for its time. Do you know mid-90s CRPGs well enough to answer that? If not, maybe this page will help me figure it out.

https://crpgaddict.blogspot.com/p/index-of-games-played-by-year.html

Exile III - the original version of the one you’re playing I think.

Yes, it’s the same story and most of the maps ect. were reused even if they were tweaked.