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Old/obscure/underrated JRPGs
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hackncrazy
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Siveon
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Old reply, but what about the SaGa 2 and 3 remakes that were translated for the DS?
Finished Nana Eiyuu Monogatari 2, a prequel/sequel to the 1995 Himeya Soft game (D’ark and D’ark Gaiden developer).
(game has a DOS version released only in Taiwan)
Main character is a priestess/teacher who’s on a field trip in a small country with a group of children. When the country is invaded by a much bigger country she and the children are being accused of being spies and must flee to save themselves. Along the way she gathers companions who eventually make up a group of seven (as the game title suggests).
The villains are enemy army commanders who are increasingly butthurt that the children keep getting away and somehow consider it a personal humiliation.
Gameplay is exactly the same Shining Force like as the first game, but missions are more complex this time around. The group of children are an important factor – in almost every mission it is important to keep them safe from harm (when an enemy gets to them or hits them with an arrow it’s an immediate game over).
The most interesting missions are safely guiding the children through a gorge while neverending enemies spawn or saving a kid who dropped into a river by getting to two trees on opposite river banks in time all the while being hounded by enemies.
Characters gain experience by killing (or healing) during combat which means that less sturdy characters like the thief and mage might fall behind in levels. The game alleviates this by intermittent missions where enemies spawn endlessly (like a necromancer summoning skeletons or a slime constantly multiplicating).
Unfortunately, just like the first game the game kinda drops the ball at the very end. At the end of the first game, one of the seven heroes needed to sacrifice him or her. This time around there’s a big battle against the main villain which was quickly wrapped up but led to a “bad” or rather “fake” ending where the heroes (and the children) are betrayed and turned into pincushions.
Apparently in the final battle it was necessary to *prolong* the battle as much as possible so that the betrayer would reveal himself and be forced to fight. It was an annoying “gotcha” that rubbed me the wrong way.
(game has a DOS version released only in Taiwan)
Main character is a priestess/teacher who’s on a field trip in a small country with a group of children. When the country is invaded by a much bigger country she and the children are being accused of being spies and must flee to save themselves. Along the way she gathers companions who eventually make up a group of seven (as the game title suggests).
The villains are enemy army commanders who are increasingly butthurt that the children keep getting away and somehow consider it a personal humiliation.
Gameplay is exactly the same Shining Force like as the first game, but missions are more complex this time around. The group of children are an important factor – in almost every mission it is important to keep them safe from harm (when an enemy gets to them or hits them with an arrow it’s an immediate game over).
The most interesting missions are safely guiding the children through a gorge while neverending enemies spawn or saving a kid who dropped into a river by getting to two trees on opposite river banks in time all the while being hounded by enemies.
Characters gain experience by killing (or healing) during combat which means that less sturdy characters like the thief and mage might fall behind in levels. The game alleviates this by intermittent missions where enemies spawn endlessly (like a necromancer summoning skeletons or a slime constantly multiplicating).
Unfortunately, just like the first game the game kinda drops the ball at the very end. At the end of the first game, one of the seven heroes needed to sacrifice him or her. This time around there’s a big battle against the main villain which was quickly wrapped up but led to a “bad” or rather “fake” ending where the heroes (and the children) are betrayed and turned into pincushions.
Apparently in the final battle it was necessary to *prolong* the battle as much as possible so that the betrayer would reveal himself and be forced to fight. It was an annoying “gotcha” that rubbed me the wrong way.
Finished Branmarker 2, the 1995 sequel to the 1991 rpg Branmarker which I wrote about earlier in the thread. Both games were developed by D.O. who made rpgs in their early days but nowadays are mostly known for VNs such as Kana: Little Sister, Crescendo and Family Project.
P. good looking game, especially cutscene CGs. A lot of attention was also given to sprite animations – there are even quite a few neat facial animations during dialogues.
Gameplay wise there’s kind of a parallel with Kuro no Ken. There are two main characters*: a female who casts magic and a male who specializes in melee (though the female is no slouch in melee either). However at two points one of the two main characters will leave and be replaced by a temporary character – there’s a melee chick with horns who joins for a big chunk of the game and a rogue chick who joins near the end of the game.
Similar to Kuro no Ken, magic is very powerful and throughout the game can one shot mostly everything outside bosses (though some enemies are completely immune to magic). Magic spells are only to be found in dungeon chests so thorough exploration is required (in the end I missed out on one spell). What I missed from Kuro no Ken were the tactikool special melee skills who were equally powerful to magic.
However where the game shines are the many dungeons; they start out simple with some minor puzzles (including block pushing puzzles) but as the game progresses get exceedingly complex with many teleporters, chains to pull, pitfalls, buttons to press, etc. The game’s final dungeon is absolutely massive and the final part of this dungeon is arguably the most excruciating with many teleporters and the need to first locate a key before opening the path to the final boss.
Most memorable dungeon overall is a water temple where one needed to align water currents correctly in order to progress. At the end of the dungeon the player gets trolled by an unbeatable boss requiring a revisit to the starting area of the game to fetch an item needed to beat it.
Enemy encounter rate is rather high; there is an item to temporarily reduce encounter rate but it works for maybe thirty seconds. Even playing at quadruple speed it gets annoying near the end of the game to be so frequently harassed by enemies when you are trying to navigate a complex dungeon.
Story wise the game is actually more than decent; I liked how during the first part of the game there are merely a few short glimpses of the main antagonist(s) and their motives and grand design are mostly left in the dark. Even the female main character has nary a clue (at the end of the first game her sister sends her off from the island to the main continent) and near the middle of the game when everything is revealed she is promptly kidnapped. The male becomes the main character for a while – and granted, he does have one of the most badass moments I’ve ever encountered in any rpg i.e. fighting a boss alone while carrying a woman on his shoulder.
The story also takes a quick turn from light-hearted to more dark at this point with some genuinely touching moments. Ultimately the game ends on a cliffhanger; at the end you beat an evil Drizzt knockoff but the true (anti-)villainess (who basically was manipulating the main characters the entire time to get rid of him) doesn’t want to fight because her “eternal rival” isn’t “strong enough” yet. A rather anti-climactic end to an overall good game… as a third game in the series was never developed.
Finally, while the game is an eroge hentai scenes are p. rare and the majority of them are story related though I happened to trigger some optional ones almost by accident.
*I guess they could be thought of as anti-Sill and anti-Rance.
P. good looking game, especially cutscene CGs. A lot of attention was also given to sprite animations – there are even quite a few neat facial animations during dialogues.
Gameplay wise there’s kind of a parallel with Kuro no Ken. There are two main characters*: a female who casts magic and a male who specializes in melee (though the female is no slouch in melee either). However at two points one of the two main characters will leave and be replaced by a temporary character – there’s a melee chick with horns who joins for a big chunk of the game and a rogue chick who joins near the end of the game.
Similar to Kuro no Ken, magic is very powerful and throughout the game can one shot mostly everything outside bosses (though some enemies are completely immune to magic). Magic spells are only to be found in dungeon chests so thorough exploration is required (in the end I missed out on one spell). What I missed from Kuro no Ken were the tactikool special melee skills who were equally powerful to magic.
However where the game shines are the many dungeons; they start out simple with some minor puzzles (including block pushing puzzles) but as the game progresses get exceedingly complex with many teleporters, chains to pull, pitfalls, buttons to press, etc. The game’s final dungeon is absolutely massive and the final part of this dungeon is arguably the most excruciating with many teleporters and the need to first locate a key before opening the path to the final boss.
Most memorable dungeon overall is a water temple where one needed to align water currents correctly in order to progress. At the end of the dungeon the player gets trolled by an unbeatable boss requiring a revisit to the starting area of the game to fetch an item needed to beat it.
Enemy encounter rate is rather high; there is an item to temporarily reduce encounter rate but it works for maybe thirty seconds. Even playing at quadruple speed it gets annoying near the end of the game to be so frequently harassed by enemies when you are trying to navigate a complex dungeon.
Story wise the game is actually more than decent; I liked how during the first part of the game there are merely a few short glimpses of the main antagonist(s) and their motives and grand design are mostly left in the dark. Even the female main character has nary a clue (at the end of the first game her sister sends her off from the island to the main continent) and near the middle of the game when everything is revealed she is promptly kidnapped. The male becomes the main character for a while – and granted, he does have one of the most badass moments I’ve ever encountered in any rpg i.e. fighting a boss alone while carrying a woman on his shoulder.
The story also takes a quick turn from light-hearted to more dark at this point with some genuinely touching moments. Ultimately the game ends on a cliffhanger; at the end you beat an evil Drizzt knockoff but the true (anti-)villainess (who basically was manipulating the main characters the entire time to get rid of him) doesn’t want to fight because her “eternal rival” isn’t “strong enough” yet. A rather anti-climactic end to an overall good game… as a third game in the series was never developed.
Finally, while the game is an eroge hentai scenes are p. rare and the majority of them are story related though I happened to trigger some optional ones almost by accident.
*I guess they could be thought of as anti-Sill and anti-Rance.
Finished 46 Okunen Monogatari*, the very first game from Enix (1990).
This game follows the entire evolution of human kind (and beyond). Or rather, an artist’s impression thereof. You start the game as a fish who finds a “divine spark” as it were, starts to evolve and is ousted from the tribe. Soon he finds the goddess Gaia who tells him he will eventually gain all her power but needs to become stronker and find her again another 2 billion years later.
First chapter of the game deals with getting out of sea. Your evolving creature has four attributes: strength, intelligence, endurance and defense. Evolving is necessary to be able to survive/pass certain natural barriers like deep sea, forests, etc. For instance your amphibious creature will be very vulnerable to almost all terrain (Earth was an acid shithole at that point) but be able to heal quickly in pools of water.
Depending how you distribute stat points you can follow a different evolution sequence but the end result will always be a coelacanth. At the end of next chapters though there are multiple final forms for your creature.
Stat points are gained mostly by combat but there are also power ups to be found and intermittent natural disasters (earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, etc.) give a survival bonus of stat points.
In the beginning I spent a lot of points in intelligence and as a consequence I soon could cast spells and rule the waves. Before moving on to the next evolution chapter all attributes need to be maxed out.
Next evolution chapter the coelacanth becomes an amphibian (ichthyostega). After that, you get a reptilian/dinosaur and mammal age. The opening chapters are the most interesting considering the many creatures you can evolve into (during reptilian age I turned into a dimetrodon at one point which was p. cool). Though sadly, many of the creatures are fictional. At one point in the game one encounters enemies like goblins, Elves and lizardmen (supposedly Lucifer’s underlings). Not to mention it’s possible to evolve into a leprechaun at one point.
During the amphibian age aliens are introduced into the storyline. The main villain in the story is an evil spirit (literally called “Curse”) masquerading as a goddess called Lucifer who in the past was responsible for both the destruction of the civilizations of Venus and Mars; the aliens originally come from the Earth’s moon and eventually return to build Atlantis and Mu (both are destroyed in a war instigated by Lucifer). Lucifer also drops the comet that wiped out the dinosaurs and also sank Atlantis among many other things.
At one point in the game there’s a fake choice with Lucifer offering to join her which leads to an immediate game over. You actually beat Lucifer just before the advent of humanity but she ‘evolves’ too.
After beating Lucifer 4.6 billion years of testing have passed and after being told to head to a place called Eden your character gains the final evolution into Homo sapiens. Funnily at Eden you meet a lone female who was apparently similarly tested by Gaia and also came for the final evolution phase. Basically after 4.6 billion years of evolution you end up with Adam and Eve. An odd concept.
With the advent of Homo sapiens the player is asked to choose what attribute to focus on, then the game fast forwards 60,000 years. After choosing Intelligence my character basically became Ozymandias leading humanity to an utopic earthly civilization (choosing any other attribute leads to an apocalyptic future and game over).
Of course, Lucifer ultimately returns. Ozymandias enters a spaceship, lifts up to the sky and is supposed to defeat her by the combined energy of the continents. However, his body is turned to dust by Lucifer but Gaea returns in the nick of time to pass on all her power and Lucifer is finally defeated.
Your character then becomes one with Gaia and together you set off to other worlds.
Overall, a p. interesting and unique game to play. Kind of sobering to think that the best the West could do with this subject was producing a giant turd called Spore.
*It seems this game has recently been translated.
This game follows the entire evolution of human kind (and beyond). Or rather, an artist’s impression thereof. You start the game as a fish who finds a “divine spark” as it were, starts to evolve and is ousted from the tribe. Soon he finds the goddess Gaia who tells him he will eventually gain all her power but needs to become stronker and find her again another 2 billion years later.
First chapter of the game deals with getting out of sea. Your evolving creature has four attributes: strength, intelligence, endurance and defense. Evolving is necessary to be able to survive/pass certain natural barriers like deep sea, forests, etc. For instance your amphibious creature will be very vulnerable to almost all terrain (Earth was an acid shithole at that point) but be able to heal quickly in pools of water.
Depending how you distribute stat points you can follow a different evolution sequence but the end result will always be a coelacanth. At the end of next chapters though there are multiple final forms for your creature.
Stat points are gained mostly by combat but there are also power ups to be found and intermittent natural disasters (earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, etc.) give a survival bonus of stat points.
In the beginning I spent a lot of points in intelligence and as a consequence I soon could cast spells and rule the waves. Before moving on to the next evolution chapter all attributes need to be maxed out.
Next evolution chapter the coelacanth becomes an amphibian (ichthyostega). After that, you get a reptilian/dinosaur and mammal age. The opening chapters are the most interesting considering the many creatures you can evolve into (during reptilian age I turned into a dimetrodon at one point which was p. cool). Though sadly, many of the creatures are fictional. At one point in the game one encounters enemies like goblins, Elves and lizardmen (supposedly Lucifer’s underlings). Not to mention it’s possible to evolve into a leprechaun at one point.
During the amphibian age aliens are introduced into the storyline. The main villain in the story is an evil spirit (literally called “Curse”) masquerading as a goddess called Lucifer who in the past was responsible for both the destruction of the civilizations of Venus and Mars; the aliens originally come from the Earth’s moon and eventually return to build Atlantis and Mu (both are destroyed in a war instigated by Lucifer). Lucifer also drops the comet that wiped out the dinosaurs and also sank Atlantis among many other things.
At one point in the game there’s a fake choice with Lucifer offering to join her which leads to an immediate game over. You actually beat Lucifer just before the advent of humanity but she ‘evolves’ too.
After beating Lucifer 4.6 billion years of testing have passed and after being told to head to a place called Eden your character gains the final evolution into Homo sapiens. Funnily at Eden you meet a lone female who was apparently similarly tested by Gaia and also came for the final evolution phase. Basically after 4.6 billion years of evolution you end up with Adam and Eve. An odd concept.
With the advent of Homo sapiens the player is asked to choose what attribute to focus on, then the game fast forwards 60,000 years. After choosing Intelligence my character basically became Ozymandias leading humanity to an utopic earthly civilization (choosing any other attribute leads to an apocalyptic future and game over).
Of course, Lucifer ultimately returns. Ozymandias enters a spaceship, lifts up to the sky and is supposed to defeat her by the combined energy of the continents. However, his body is turned to dust by Lucifer but Gaea returns in the nick of time to pass on all her power and Lucifer is finally defeated.
Your character then becomes one with Gaia and together you set off to other worlds.
Overall, a p. interesting and unique game to play. Kind of sobering to think that the best the West could do with this subject was producing a giant turd called Spore.
*It seems this game has recently been translated.
MRY
Wormwood Studios
Skall
Learned
- Joined
- Dec 28, 2015
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- 86
Yup, fairly recent translation: http://46okumen.com/2016/12/28/e-v-o-the-theory-of-evolution-pc-98-is-out/
Naturally.
Naturally.
Finished Gun Blaze, a 1994 rpg by Active Software. Active Software may or may not be known as the developers behind the Bible Black franchise. Indeed, the GunBlaze main female character looks suspiciously similar to Imari, the Bible Black heroine (well, and other main waifu looks like Saeki). Also similarly to Bible Black, Christian influences are a big part of the game; the main villains are the Rosenkreutz society who seek to rule the world by means of a substance called “ether”.
Jewel, the main female character, escapes from Rosenkreutz captivity in the beginning of the game with a pendant in hand made of pure ether (she also needs the pendant to stay alive due to a deadly bodily disease). The ether substance is critical to a technology literally called “photon crystallization”.
The game has a lot of dialogue with intermittent combat. Graphics wise the game looks similar to Kuro no Ken but apart from cutscenes/CGs is overall p. mediocre looking. At first I thought it was made in RPGMaker.
As the game title suggests the weapons used in the game are mainly guns (there are some melee weapons that do inferior damage). There’s a wide variety but basically there are rifles (two shots before reload) and revolvers (six shots before reload). Later though alchemy enters the game, equivalent to magic spells. They come in the form of scrolls which are destroyed upon use but mostly just replace potions or summon a creature.
The setting of the game is 186x London/Germany (in game currency is in shilling/mark). In the beginning of the game you fight only human enemies but the enemies become more and more fantastical as the game progresses.
What I liked is that to travel one needed to click on a map of London, reminiscent of the classic adventure game Lost Files of Sherlock Holmes. Indeed it is refreshing to see Wapanese use a Victorian setting (I know of no other rpg to do this).
The main character in the game is a detective called Mark Flint who is enlisted by Jewel for help. Mark and Jewel are actually (distantly) related (not that this fact prevents them from engaging in sexual activity). Other characters are Patricia, daughter of a noble friend of Mark’s, and Mycroft, an Oxford professor. Also bizarrely enough there’s Long Ma (龍馬), who despite the Chinese name is a samurai from Wapan who uses katana instead of gun (note that the 1860s were a time of upheaval in Wapan, i.e. the transition from Edo period to Meiji era).
Story was not bad but I lost count of how many times the waifus were kidnapped right in front of the males standing around like retarts. Not to mention at one point there’s a p. stoopid amnesia plot device leading to netorare.
Game’s very short too and overall I expected much more of it before playing. Main reason I played it is Wapanese handling Yuroppan historical settings is always entertaining. And at least it has a nice ending.
Also seems this game was also on Sega Saturn prolly with all naughty scenes removed. All bosses in the game are female and are devoured by tentacles upon defeat.
Jewel, the main female character, escapes from Rosenkreutz captivity in the beginning of the game with a pendant in hand made of pure ether (she also needs the pendant to stay alive due to a deadly bodily disease). The ether substance is critical to a technology literally called “photon crystallization”.
The game has a lot of dialogue with intermittent combat. Graphics wise the game looks similar to Kuro no Ken but apart from cutscenes/CGs is overall p. mediocre looking. At first I thought it was made in RPGMaker.
As the game title suggests the weapons used in the game are mainly guns (there are some melee weapons that do inferior damage). There’s a wide variety but basically there are rifles (two shots before reload) and revolvers (six shots before reload). Later though alchemy enters the game, equivalent to magic spells. They come in the form of scrolls which are destroyed upon use but mostly just replace potions or summon a creature.
The setting of the game is 186x London/Germany (in game currency is in shilling/mark). In the beginning of the game you fight only human enemies but the enemies become more and more fantastical as the game progresses.
What I liked is that to travel one needed to click on a map of London, reminiscent of the classic adventure game Lost Files of Sherlock Holmes. Indeed it is refreshing to see Wapanese use a Victorian setting (I know of no other rpg to do this).
The main character in the game is a detective called Mark Flint who is enlisted by Jewel for help. Mark and Jewel are actually (distantly) related (not that this fact prevents them from engaging in sexual activity). Other characters are Patricia, daughter of a noble friend of Mark’s, and Mycroft, an Oxford professor. Also bizarrely enough there’s Long Ma (龍馬), who despite the Chinese name is a samurai from Wapan who uses katana instead of gun (note that the 1860s were a time of upheaval in Wapan, i.e. the transition from Edo period to Meiji era).
Story was not bad but I lost count of how many times the waifus were kidnapped right in front of the males standing around like retarts. Not to mention at one point there’s a p. stoopid amnesia plot device leading to netorare.
Game’s very short too and overall I expected much more of it before playing. Main reason I played it is Wapanese handling Yuroppan historical settings is always entertaining. And at least it has a nice ending.
Also seems this game was also on Sega Saturn prolly with all naughty scenes removed. All bosses in the game are female and are devoured by tentacles upon defeat.
CyberWhale
Arcane
Finished Dragon Knight II, second game in Dragon Knight saga by élf released in 1990 for PC88 and 1991 for PC98 (though apparently the TurboGrafx version is the best looking).
Main hero is the same from first game (default name: Takeru). This time he is told by a mountain of a man called Baan (who also features prominently in the third game) to bring a holy book to a village called Phoenix.
Turns out this village has been harassed by a feminazi witch called Mesaania who turns womyn into monsters and the book is needed to dispel her magic. This witch not only steals the holy book but also all daughters of the village and Takeru obv. must save them.
So basically it comes down to retrieving pages of the book to turn monster waifus back into human waifus. After turning the waifus back human they will sleep with the main character (in the first game, the main character didn’t get any booty at all) at the inn. In total, there are 28 + 1 waifus to bed.
Like the first game it is a dungeon crawler with mostly identical gameplay. Except now Takeru eventually teams up with two party members: Baan and priestess Sofia.
Actually there’s a p. awesome tweest near the end of the game: Sofia turns out to be Mesaania in disguise. There’s a special armour and weapon made to slay witches but can only be used by someone with Dragon Knight blood. Turns out Baan is that person. However, somehow the armour and weapon passes to Takeru anyway – and Mesaania mysteriously mentions that Takeru is a son of one “Zeus” before she is defeated.
Enemy design is much better this time around, all enemies are female (because, well, the witch hates men) and upon defeat they are disrobed similar to Raidy games. Interestingly, every waifu enemy in the game has her own battle theme.
Like many of these old games, the game starts out rough. At level 1 Takeru has 10 hp and running into the wrong cute girl enemy in the first dungeon he just gets oneshotted and otherwise needs to return to the inn to rest every two battles. Gameplay becomes much smoother once the two party members are gained.
All in all, it’s a highly enjoyable game and much better than the first. Quite a bit longer, better puzzles, better music, fun party members with some hilarious banter and a particularly prestigious rat you keep running into. Moreover, it’s a p. light-hearted game since in the end not a single waifu is killed. Only one nasty womyn.
Main hero is the same from first game (default name: Takeru). This time he is told by a mountain of a man called Baan (who also features prominently in the third game) to bring a holy book to a village called Phoenix.
Turns out this village has been harassed by a feminazi witch called Mesaania who turns womyn into monsters and the book is needed to dispel her magic. This witch not only steals the holy book but also all daughters of the village and Takeru obv. must save them.
So basically it comes down to retrieving pages of the book to turn monster waifus back into human waifus. After turning the waifus back human they will sleep with the main character (in the first game, the main character didn’t get any booty at all) at the inn. In total, there are 28 + 1 waifus to bed.
Like the first game it is a dungeon crawler with mostly identical gameplay. Except now Takeru eventually teams up with two party members: Baan and priestess Sofia.
Actually there’s a p. awesome tweest near the end of the game: Sofia turns out to be Mesaania in disguise. There’s a special armour and weapon made to slay witches but can only be used by someone with Dragon Knight blood. Turns out Baan is that person. However, somehow the armour and weapon passes to Takeru anyway – and Mesaania mysteriously mentions that Takeru is a son of one “Zeus” before she is defeated.
Enemy design is much better this time around, all enemies are female (because, well, the witch hates men) and upon defeat they are disrobed similar to Raidy games. Interestingly, every waifu enemy in the game has her own battle theme.
Like many of these old games, the game starts out rough. At level 1 Takeru has 10 hp and running into the wrong cute girl enemy in the first dungeon he just gets oneshotted and otherwise needs to return to the inn to rest every two battles. Gameplay becomes much smoother once the two party members are gained.
All in all, it’s a highly enjoyable game and much better than the first. Quite a bit longer, better puzzles, better music, fun party members with some hilarious banter and a particularly prestigious rat you keep running into. Moreover, it’s a p. light-hearted game since in the end not a single waifu is killed. Only one nasty womyn.
Great Deceiver
Arcane
- Joined
- Aug 10, 2012
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- 5,894
Are these PC-88 games meant to be displayed through an interlaced monitor? The style is pretty cool (before anime went full fag) but everything is dithered...
Finished Shuten Douji (手天童子), a 1990 PC98 rpg by Enix.
This is based on a 80s manga series by Nagai Go but I hadn’t previously heard of it. There’s also an 1989 animu but also p. obscure.
I have to stress that while Nagai Go is a pervy shitlord, his works are by all means p. tasteful. The game is not an eroge.
The main character is a boy that was gifted by an oni to a Japanese couple as a baby. His full name is Shutendou Shirou (his adoptive parents’ last name is actually Murasaki, I guess under Wapanese adoption law adopted children only enter family register at age 21?).
Shutendou literally means “boy from a hand of heaven”. As soon as the boy turns 15 years old all hell breaks loose.
The game certainly has one of the craziest beginnings I’ve ever seen – first saving his crush Miyuki from a group of bullies, then saving a teacher from more of the same bullies who turns out to be controlled by a demon. Then the boy’s powers awaken and he tears everyone apart. Turns out his main enemy is the demon king who wants to kill him at all cost – tricking the boy into entering the demon realm to save his waifu again (and he does, after strangling his own (fake) mother).
Typical Wapanese schoolday.
Enix managed to convey the typical Nagai Go artstyle p. well, wouldn’t be surprised if the man himself worked on the game.
The game may look primitive but it manages to build a p. believable community of a small Wapanese town. At the beginning of each chapter you start at home and can talk to the main character’s parents for advice.
Storywise an awful lot of Buddhist/Shinto terms come into play (terms even difficult for Wapanese to read it seems, considering the amount of furigana) and as I’m not too familiar with those religions I didn’t get everything (lots of talk about mandala and such). Basically the main character was fated to destroy the demon world. In order to succeed the main character needs to gather specific companions, who are needed to create the ultimate weapon the main character needs to succeed.
Gameplay wise there are random encounters but 99% give very little experience; bulk of experience is gained by fighting story related battles.
Game is very short, it consists of four chapters. In the final chapter the boy’s mother and waifu are kidnapped. Also all companions die gruesomely (almost arbitrarily) right before taking on the final boss.
I suppose this game (and the animu) covers the first manga chapter(s) since apparently in later chapters the main character even goes into spaaaace.
Overall, interesting game that gave me some insight in Shinto/Buddhism/Wapanese mythology.
This is based on a 80s manga series by Nagai Go but I hadn’t previously heard of it. There’s also an 1989 animu but also p. obscure.
I have to stress that while Nagai Go is a pervy shitlord, his works are by all means p. tasteful. The game is not an eroge.
The main character is a boy that was gifted by an oni to a Japanese couple as a baby. His full name is Shutendou Shirou (his adoptive parents’ last name is actually Murasaki, I guess under Wapanese adoption law adopted children only enter family register at age 21?).
Shutendou literally means “boy from a hand of heaven”. As soon as the boy turns 15 years old all hell breaks loose.
The game certainly has one of the craziest beginnings I’ve ever seen – first saving his crush Miyuki from a group of bullies, then saving a teacher from more of the same bullies who turns out to be controlled by a demon. Then the boy’s powers awaken and he tears everyone apart. Turns out his main enemy is the demon king who wants to kill him at all cost – tricking the boy into entering the demon realm to save his waifu again (and he does, after strangling his own (fake) mother).
Typical Wapanese schoolday.
Enix managed to convey the typical Nagai Go artstyle p. well, wouldn’t be surprised if the man himself worked on the game.
The game may look primitive but it manages to build a p. believable community of a small Wapanese town. At the beginning of each chapter you start at home and can talk to the main character’s parents for advice.
Storywise an awful lot of Buddhist/Shinto terms come into play (terms even difficult for Wapanese to read it seems, considering the amount of furigana) and as I’m not too familiar with those religions I didn’t get everything (lots of talk about mandala and such). Basically the main character was fated to destroy the demon world. In order to succeed the main character needs to gather specific companions, who are needed to create the ultimate weapon the main character needs to succeed.
Gameplay wise there are random encounters but 99% give very little experience; bulk of experience is gained by fighting story related battles.
Game is very short, it consists of four chapters. In the final chapter the boy’s mother and waifu are kidnapped. Also all companions die gruesomely (almost arbitrarily) right before taking on the final boss.
I suppose this game (and the animu) covers the first manga chapter(s) since apparently in later chapters the main character even goes into spaaaace.
Overall, interesting game that gave me some insight in Shinto/Buddhism/Wapanese mythology.
CyberWhale
Arcane
Finished Ray-Gun, another early PC98 rpg by élf released in 1990.
Main character of the game is George, who works as a mechanic with his fiancée Miria in a town called Lake City. Peculiarly enough, Lake City is completely isolated from the outside world by a Trumpian wall. There’s also a mysterious wellspring that cures all disease.
Occasionally robotic enemies called “Stroids” pass over the wall and kidnap people, George creates armour and weapons to combat them. One day, George finds a crashed Stroid which he takes time to repair… and next to the Stroid he finds a strange purple crystal.
The story begins when George’s fiancée is herself kidnapped by a Stroid… and right after a mysterious woman called Rupia appears who apparently used to be locked inside the purple crystal – that’s how the Stroids transport kidnapped people.
Rupia has knowledge of the outside world and convinces George to use the repaired Stroid to go after his fiancée. Through the game Rupia basically acts as quest journal. She’s pictured with a sword on the game cover but never even lifts a finger to help in combat. Seems the developers weren’t sure whether to make a mech game or a party-based game.
So basically this game is cyberpunk/mecha - George travels the world and combats enemies inside his “Stroid” which he can equip with armour and guns.
The first four worlds are fantasy worlds, but the final two are futuristic cyberpunkish. Just before the end of the game you find out some evil womyn possessed by a devil is behind everything. She had 1,000 young girls kidnapped to restore the devil – who ultimately would resurrect inside Miria’s body. Also after beating the final boss it turns out Rupia is actually the spirit of the previous person who sealed away the devil.
There are no shops in the game but those wellsprings are scattered all over the map. At these locations it is possible to not only heal, but also construct armour and weapons. Also scattered around the map are many cute girls that give small tasks and/or hints on how to proceed.
During combat there are weak melee attacks and powerful gun attacks for which there is a cooldown before they can be used.
Setting is kinda weird since it consists of several floors/worlds connected by elevators. To operate the elevators seals need to be collected; there are six seals for six floors. The point of the game is to find six special individuals and receive their power to seal the Big Bad once again.
I encountered quite a lot of freezes and bugs playing this game, not sure whether it was the game itself or the emulator (game had a weird file format).
Like the first Dragon Knight, it is a p. short and primitive game. The only other cyberpunkish/scifi game by élf, Metal Eye, basically did everything better.
Main character of the game is George, who works as a mechanic with his fiancée Miria in a town called Lake City. Peculiarly enough, Lake City is completely isolated from the outside world by a Trumpian wall. There’s also a mysterious wellspring that cures all disease.
Occasionally robotic enemies called “Stroids” pass over the wall and kidnap people, George creates armour and weapons to combat them. One day, George finds a crashed Stroid which he takes time to repair… and next to the Stroid he finds a strange purple crystal.
The story begins when George’s fiancée is herself kidnapped by a Stroid… and right after a mysterious woman called Rupia appears who apparently used to be locked inside the purple crystal – that’s how the Stroids transport kidnapped people.
Rupia has knowledge of the outside world and convinces George to use the repaired Stroid to go after his fiancée. Through the game Rupia basically acts as quest journal. She’s pictured with a sword on the game cover but never even lifts a finger to help in combat. Seems the developers weren’t sure whether to make a mech game or a party-based game.
So basically this game is cyberpunk/mecha - George travels the world and combats enemies inside his “Stroid” which he can equip with armour and guns.
The first four worlds are fantasy worlds, but the final two are futuristic cyberpunkish. Just before the end of the game you find out some evil womyn possessed by a devil is behind everything. She had 1,000 young girls kidnapped to restore the devil – who ultimately would resurrect inside Miria’s body. Also after beating the final boss it turns out Rupia is actually the spirit of the previous person who sealed away the devil.
There are no shops in the game but those wellsprings are scattered all over the map. At these locations it is possible to not only heal, but also construct armour and weapons. Also scattered around the map are many cute girls that give small tasks and/or hints on how to proceed.
During combat there are weak melee attacks and powerful gun attacks for which there is a cooldown before they can be used.
Setting is kinda weird since it consists of several floors/worlds connected by elevators. To operate the elevators seals need to be collected; there are six seals for six floors. The point of the game is to find six special individuals and receive their power to seal the Big Bad once again.
I encountered quite a lot of freezes and bugs playing this game, not sure whether it was the game itself or the emulator (game had a weird file format).
Like the first Dragon Knight, it is a p. short and primitive game. The only other cyberpunkish/scifi game by élf, Metal Eye, basically did everything better.
deuxhero
Arcane
Been playing Glory of Heracles 4. Got some neat stuff, but holy fuck the uneven difficulty kills it. Random encounters are trivial (Though Hercules just left, so taking his free healing with him might change that a bit), but boss fights go on for forever.
The body surfer thing is neat, but underutilized. There's a handful of extra stuff you can get by using the right body, but it's pretty minimal. New bodies become obtainable super frequently and bodies obtained later into the game are flat out better than older ones. Each body has its own "fitness" level (effecting how good a character is with a body, seems to have different growth rates for the two characters), but it grows too slowly to actually have a use for the ability to change bodies mid-battle or experiment.
The body surfer thing is neat, but underutilized. There's a handful of extra stuff you can get by using the right body, but it's pretty minimal. New bodies become obtainable super frequently and bodies obtained later into the game are flat out better than older ones. Each body has its own "fitness" level (effecting how good a character is with a body, seems to have different growth rates for the two characters), but it grows too slowly to actually have a use for the ability to change bodies mid-battle or experiment.
Finished Libros de Chilam Balam, a 1992 PC98 rpg by Right Stuff Corp.
The Books (Libros) of Chilam Balam are a Mayan occult artifact and indeed occultism (Mayan prophecy mentioned in the books) is central to the plot. This game is a Wapanese rpg with a Wild West setting – which is quite unique (aside from Wild Arms, there aren’t any others).
The game is certainly very good looking for its time; it uses animu cutscenes that look way better than Phantasy Star 4 which came out two years later. There’s some p. cool detail in the game; it manages to capture the feel of quaint western town with saloons, newspaper service, corrals, etc.
Protagonists are two cowboys called Fred (Willfred R. Anderson, 17 years old) and Max (21 years old).
In the intro of the game (taking place 7 years before game events) a convoy led by Fred’s father is attacked by some weird cultist-like enemies because of what was transported – Max is the only survivor of the attack, partially loses his memory and returns to town only two years later.
The game story begins 5 years later. Some weird guys show up asking about the brothers’ father and turns out Fred’s sweetheart Christina is kidnapped and they demanded his father’s antique gun as ransom. Fred eventually gets Christina back but loses his father’s gun and decides to chase after it (the gun ultimately turns out to be an important occult artifact).
Aside from Max (who can actually dual-wield pistols unlike Fred who’s a single-hander), Fred gains a mestize shotgun toting party member early in the game called Edward Bradford.
Combat is p. fast-paced and very reminiscent of Phantasy Star 2 which I liked very much. During combat there is usually a front and back row; enemies in back row will take less damage if attacked (unless they’re shot by a rifle) but will move to front row when the front row is defeated.
The weapons in the game are handguns, shotguns and rifles but there are also various throwing weapons, bows and eventually magic. There’s a need to buy bullets & weapons can be modded increasing range, damage, accuracy, etc. Every character also has a weapon skill level that increases as they level up.
Edward with shotgun can hit an entire row while pistol users are single target. Though as the game progresses conventional weapons become less and less effective as opposed to magic. Luckily later on Fred’s old man’s antique gun turns out to be especially effective against supernatural enemies.
Christina becomes a party member for a while but leaves the party almost as quickly as she joins (she’s a very minor character despite her presence on the game cover). Tough luck if you spent some time leveling and equipping her (new party members usually start at level 1). She is replaced by a rifle wielding US Army officer.
There’s actually quite a big cast of party members in the game; on the way to Texas the same mysterious enemies that appear in the prologue attack and Max dies pierced by an arrow. The enemies are immune to gunfire but an Indian (Native American) girl - whose arrows can hurt the enemies - appears and saves everyone. She reveals that the assailants are descendants of a “snake god”. They can’t be hurt by most weapons because of their divine blood.
The Indian girl is called Luka/Ruka and when she joins she shares a scroll that allows party members to cast magic. She escaped the snakemen who were going to sacrifice her and is looking for her father after her village was torched by the same snakemen. Initially her bow is the only weapon that can hurt supernatural enemies.
Not long after arrival in Mexico Richard dies and mentions a mask to Fred before dying. Edward rejoins the group a bit later along with an occult expert and magic user named Roger. At this point there are a lot of Mayan ruins to be explored, ultimately the group ends up in Yucatan (and beyond…) where both Edward and Roger kick the bucket.
Beyond Yucatan the game takes a pause from the dark & gritty involvements and becomes rather light-hearted. Fred and Ruka enter the “dream world” and find themselves in a literal witch forest and gain a new party member called Vivian who uses the rather unique “cat magic”.
This “dream world” is a full fantasy parallel world but the game doesn’t last long enough to fully explore it. Sylvia, colleague of Roger, is recruited here as final party member and only at this point the grand design is revealed.
The gist is that the Big Bad is the Aztec god Tezcatlipoca wants to return to Earth. Fred’s father was transporting a mask essential for Tezcatlipoca’s return which is the reason why he was attacked by them snakemen (who are of Tezcatlipoca’s blood). Fred’s old man’s antique gun is an artifact that has the power to destroy the mask.
Later it turns out Max is still alive and has been a traitor in cahoots with Ruka’s father from the very beginning. Moreover Fred’s waifu was again kidnapped since she is the needed sacrifice to restore Tezcatlipoca. After saving her again she becomes party member until the end of the game.
The events before the end of the game are kind of a rollercoaster with another party member dying, a previously dead party member returning and Fred’s waifu who nary had any effect on the game storyline turning out to be the most important character of all.
Though Max is the final boss, the true power behind the mask manipulating Max turns out to be Nyarlathotep, the god “with a thousand forms”. But Fred destroys the mask with his old man’s gun while Christina blows up the entire Mayan ruin.
Overall the story is quite enjoyable with a lot of twists and turns. To further the storyline there’s usually a lot of talking or reading required (and on occasion, some adventure game like pixel hunting). A nice touch is also that at any moment Fred can consult with party members who will comment on what’s going on (also some fun banter).
Also props to the music which was p. decent throughout.
Taking everything into account, p. great game.
Also found some stuff from the manual:
The Books (Libros) of Chilam Balam are a Mayan occult artifact and indeed occultism (Mayan prophecy mentioned in the books) is central to the plot. This game is a Wapanese rpg with a Wild West setting – which is quite unique (aside from Wild Arms, there aren’t any others).
The game is certainly very good looking for its time; it uses animu cutscenes that look way better than Phantasy Star 4 which came out two years later. There’s some p. cool detail in the game; it manages to capture the feel of quaint western town with saloons, newspaper service, corrals, etc.
Protagonists are two cowboys called Fred (Willfred R. Anderson, 17 years old) and Max (21 years old).
In the intro of the game (taking place 7 years before game events) a convoy led by Fred’s father is attacked by some weird cultist-like enemies because of what was transported – Max is the only survivor of the attack, partially loses his memory and returns to town only two years later.
The game story begins 5 years later. Some weird guys show up asking about the brothers’ father and turns out Fred’s sweetheart Christina is kidnapped and they demanded his father’s antique gun as ransom. Fred eventually gets Christina back but loses his father’s gun and decides to chase after it (the gun ultimately turns out to be an important occult artifact).
Aside from Max (who can actually dual-wield pistols unlike Fred who’s a single-hander), Fred gains a mestize shotgun toting party member early in the game called Edward Bradford.
Combat is p. fast-paced and very reminiscent of Phantasy Star 2 which I liked very much. During combat there is usually a front and back row; enemies in back row will take less damage if attacked (unless they’re shot by a rifle) but will move to front row when the front row is defeated.
The weapons in the game are handguns, shotguns and rifles but there are also various throwing weapons, bows and eventually magic. There’s a need to buy bullets & weapons can be modded increasing range, damage, accuracy, etc. Every character also has a weapon skill level that increases as they level up.
Edward with shotgun can hit an entire row while pistol users are single target. Though as the game progresses conventional weapons become less and less effective as opposed to magic. Luckily later on Fred’s old man’s antique gun turns out to be especially effective against supernatural enemies.
Christina becomes a party member for a while but leaves the party almost as quickly as she joins (she’s a very minor character despite her presence on the game cover). Tough luck if you spent some time leveling and equipping her (new party members usually start at level 1). She is replaced by a rifle wielding US Army officer.
There’s actually quite a big cast of party members in the game; on the way to Texas the same mysterious enemies that appear in the prologue attack and Max dies pierced by an arrow. The enemies are immune to gunfire but an Indian (Native American) girl - whose arrows can hurt the enemies - appears and saves everyone. She reveals that the assailants are descendants of a “snake god”. They can’t be hurt by most weapons because of their divine blood.
The Indian girl is called Luka/Ruka and when she joins she shares a scroll that allows party members to cast magic. She escaped the snakemen who were going to sacrifice her and is looking for her father after her village was torched by the same snakemen. Initially her bow is the only weapon that can hurt supernatural enemies.
Not long after arrival in Mexico Richard dies and mentions a mask to Fred before dying. Edward rejoins the group a bit later along with an occult expert and magic user named Roger. At this point there are a lot of Mayan ruins to be explored, ultimately the group ends up in Yucatan (and beyond…) where both Edward and Roger kick the bucket.
Beyond Yucatan the game takes a pause from the dark & gritty involvements and becomes rather light-hearted. Fred and Ruka enter the “dream world” and find themselves in a literal witch forest and gain a new party member called Vivian who uses the rather unique “cat magic”.
This “dream world” is a full fantasy parallel world but the game doesn’t last long enough to fully explore it. Sylvia, colleague of Roger, is recruited here as final party member and only at this point the grand design is revealed.
The gist is that the Big Bad is the Aztec god Tezcatlipoca wants to return to Earth. Fred’s father was transporting a mask essential for Tezcatlipoca’s return which is the reason why he was attacked by them snakemen (who are of Tezcatlipoca’s blood). Fred’s old man’s antique gun is an artifact that has the power to destroy the mask.
Later it turns out Max is still alive and has been a traitor in cahoots with Ruka’s father from the very beginning. Moreover Fred’s waifu was again kidnapped since she is the needed sacrifice to restore Tezcatlipoca. After saving her again she becomes party member until the end of the game.
The events before the end of the game are kind of a rollercoaster with another party member dying, a previously dead party member returning and Fred’s waifu who nary had any effect on the game storyline turning out to be the most important character of all.
Though Max is the final boss, the true power behind the mask manipulating Max turns out to be Nyarlathotep, the god “with a thousand forms”. But Fred destroys the mask with his old man’s gun while Christina blows up the entire Mayan ruin.
Overall the story is quite enjoyable with a lot of twists and turns. To further the storyline there’s usually a lot of talking or reading required (and on occasion, some adventure game like pixel hunting). A nice touch is also that at any moment Fred can consult with party members who will comment on what’s going on (also some fun banter).
Also props to the music which was p. decent throughout.
Taking everything into account, p. great game.
Also found some stuff from the manual:
Great Libros de Chilam Balam review Abnaxus! I was linked to this post via our PC-98 Discord group and it was great reading through it all and seeing all of your screenshots. Our translation group, 46OkuMen, have had our eyes fixed to work on this one at some point if it can be hacked well enough. It's currently being researched at least as a prime candidate for a translation. I own a copy of the game and will be preserving it by way of scans eventually, so if there is any interest in those please let me know!
I'm also happy to hear that I'm not alone in that it seems fit rather well with the Koudelka and Shadow Hearts series which I and a few friends of mine are big fans of. Looking forward to reading through this thread in it's entirety.
-Thomas
I'm also happy to hear that I'm not alone in that it seems fit rather well with the Koudelka and Shadow Hearts series which I and a few friends of mine are big fans of. Looking forward to reading through this thread in it's entirety.
-Thomas
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