I went in to the game not having played anything similar before so I relied on what information was in the tutorial and menus to choose my party. I felt the four detailed below at the time offered a good balance to start with. Wasted a lot of skill points first time round not knowing enough about the stat and skill choices.
1)How long did it take you to beat the game? Official game time and approximate real time?
20hrs game time which was closer to 25-30hrs. I unashamedly used the automap, I couldn't play without it. I have a lot of respect for those that can, time, accuracy and presentation prevent me.
2)Did you need help? If so how many times?
I missed a few progress related switches/buttons and things like slashing the curtains or placing of objects (the latter because I wanted an alternative to hauling ass back through two levels for a skull). I didn't look for help with secrets though, I discovered quite a few that I couldn't solve, hopefully next time I'll work them out.
3)How complete was your win? How many secrets did you find?
-See above. Not very, a bit disappointed seeing how others fared yet I'm glad I still have mysteries to unravel in Grimrock. I wouldn't want to find everything, know everything and do everything on my first play. I have lots of replay value from that alone. Obviously I still suck though.
4)What level were your characters?
1 2
3 4
1. Human Fighter (Swords) Lvl.13
2. Minotaur Fighter (Maces) Lvl.13
3. Lizard Rogue (Daggers) Lvl.13
4. Insectoid Mage (erm..diversified) Lvl.13
5)What do you rate the game out of 10?
Taking into account that the game is the first of its genre that I've played and still evolving with mod support, map editor etc to follow, I rate LoG as 8.5/10 and place it in my top 20 PC games. For a core team of four with a presumably modest budget to produce a game of this quality is quite miraculous. LoG has much more to offer in the future, although I'm more than satisfied with what it has to offer now.