Old/obscure/underrated JRPGs

[abnaxus]

Played Kigen Kagayaki no Hasha by Riverhill Soft (1991)

It’s from the developers of Burai, you can tell from the conspicuous art style. I had actually tried the game in the past but dropped it because of the combat, which is completely automated but you can still input commands at any time (like Final fantasy 13). I guess I got over it.

It’s basically a generic jrpg compared to Burai, decent enough to play to the end although the second part of the game with the three new party members is p. boring.

Spoiler

 

[downwardspiral]

Not really obscure. Quite popular actually.
Meine Reise
Good open world sandbox JRPG.
https://www.dlsite.com/home/work/=/product_id/RJ185196.html
The author is still patching it in the last year.

 

[Falksi]

Not really obscure. Quite popular actually.
Meine Reise
Good open world sandbox JRPG.
https://www.dlsite.com/home/work/=/product_id/RJ185196.html
The author is still patching it in the last year.

私はいくつかの女がこれらのジャップゲームを英語に翻訳してくれることを望みます

 

[Reinhardt]

Codex, i need your help.
What is the name of japanese game about bunch of cats piloting giant super-tank? Because it's japanese game it's grimdark and edgy and you need to sacrifice your crewmembers if you want to fire main cannon. That's all i remember but game is actually not that old.
It's just bugging me that i can almost remember it but...

 

[Nifft Batuff]

Watership Down?

 

[downwardspiral]

This?

 

[Reinhardt]

No, when i said giant super tank i was serious. You know - animu stuff. Evul empire, orphans, drama.

 

[downwardspiral]

https://store.steampowered.com/app/263400/War_of_the_Human_Tanks/?l=japanese&cc=ar
But not really fitting all the descriptions.
Got more specific details ?
Like genre or art style?
If it is really serious sounds interesting.

 

[TheImplodingVoice]

Codex, i need your help.
What is the name of japanese game about bunch of cats piloting giant super-tank? Because it's japanese game it's grimdark and edgy and you need to sacrifice your crewmembers if you want to fire main cannon. That's all i remember but game is actually not that old.
It's just bugging me that i can almost remember it but...

Fuga: Melodies of Steel?

But not sure if it even released or even the right game. Last I remember about it that it was to be released in 2019

 

[LJ40]

Codex, i need your help.
What is the name of japanese game about bunch of cats piloting giant super-tank? Because it's japanese game it's grimdark and edgy and you need to sacrifice your crewmembers if you want to fire main cannon. That's all i remember but game is actually not that old.
It's just bugging me that i can almost remember it but...

Fuga: Melodies of Steel sounds like it might be it.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuga:_Melodies_of_Steel

Edit - Beat me to it.

 

[Reinhardt]

Codex, i need your help.
What is the name of japanese game about bunch of cats piloting giant super-tank? Because it's japanese game it's grimdark and edgy and you need to sacrifice your crewmembers if you want to fire main cannon. That's all i remember but game is actually not that old.
It's just bugging me that i can almost remember it but...

Fuga: Melodies of Steel?

But not sure if it even released or even the right game. Last I remember about it that it was to be released in 2019

YES! Thank you!

Codex, i need your help.
What is the name of japanese game about bunch of cats piloting giant super-tank? Because it's japanese game it's grimdark and edgy and you need to sacrifice your crewmembers if you want to fire main cannon. That's all i remember but game is actually not that old.
It's just bugging me that i can almost remember it but...

Fuga: Melodies of Steel sounds like it might be it.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuga:_Melodies_of_Steel

Edit - Beat me to it.

and you.

 

[abnaxus]

Played Kigen Kagayaki no Hasha by Riverhill Soft (1991)

So Himeno Michi and Araki Shingo worked for this company. That explains everything about the art.

 

[abnaxus]

Played Progenitor (1994).

It’s a space sim/adventure game hybrid by Koei with some occasional popamole shooting sections.

The game is virtually unknown although it is p. good. The game prolly got lost in the big library of Koei games on PC88/98: there are six Nobunaga’s Ambition and five Romance of the Three Kingdoms strategy games on the platform alone among many other strategy games .

Since the title is “Progenitor” it’s not hard to guess what the story is about. Protagonist is bit of an arse and looks like Jerry Seinfeld.

Spoiler

 

[MRY]

abnaxus Neat looking game which, as you say, is almost entirely undocumented on the internet. What is the gameplay actually like, other than the shooting segments? Almost all of the screenshots look like they're just (scripted?) dialogue segments in something like a visual-novel menu-driven environment. But there are a few shoots that look a bit like MOO1 tactical fleet battles? What do Map/Chart/Org do? What's the money for...?

 

[abnaxus]

At the start of the game you have a p. good shuttle with a mini-drive that allows you to instantly travel from planet to planet. But soon your shuttle is destroyed and you’re forced to start over with a crappy shuttle with no mini-drive. Then there’s a whole lot of activities to raise money in order to buy a new shuttle with mini-drive: bounty hunting/trading/smuggling/mining/transport/pirating. You also need to buy fighter jets and hire new pilots for space combat, hire prospectors if you’re into mining.

If you play your cards right you can make money extremely quickly. Most of the time in order to drive the story forward a certain amount of time needs to pass for an event to trigger or you need to pick up the right rumour somewhere.

Also my game version did not have the game opening



I think in the end they even left things open enough for a sequel that never came. That other sci-fi game, Alshark, never got a continuation either.

What do Map/Chart/Org do?

Solar system map, galaxy map, party members

 

[abnaxus]

Played Otome Senki by Alice Soft (1996).

It’s a game where you create a party of cute gurls from JAPAN to save a princess from a dungeon. And that’s p. much it for story. It’s a decent dungeon crawler with some creative enemy design (actually upon review a lot is copy pasted from Toshin Toshi) but ends on a cliffhanger.

The exploration theme and (boss) battle theme never get old:

Spoiler

I like it better than early Rance games and Toshin Toshi

Actually got a craving for more Alice Soft games now too

Spoiler

 

[abnaxus]

I play again Bastard!! to get hidden/best/troo ending.

You need to recruit Angus Young, a well-hidden character, in the beginning of the game. Then after making the right choices during the game at the end Prince Larz will pop out of him. Most importantly you then gain access to secret dungeon where you face Satan at the end. Beating Satan leads to well-deserved harem ending.

D.S. best jrpg protagonist together with Rance and Anduke

Spoiler

 

[abnaxus]

I wanted to play Dark Wraith, second game of Artec (Digan no Maseki) but when I tried it characters’ stats remained frozen upon leveling up when they should increase… no idea about the cause. Bad copy or copy protection? It happens occasionally (iirc I ran into some whacky copy protection issues with Vain Dream and La Valeur as well).

Spoiler

So I play Artec’s third game instead.

It’s a more traditional setting and story compared to Digan no Maseki but it shares some similarities, like potentially getting robbed when sleeping in the open. There are no cutthroats roaming the streets at night, though (or prostitutes giving you STD).

At one point the party is split in two and you witness the story develop from two different viewpoints. Like Digan no Maseki the story itself is quite short. I guess Dark Wraith must be a short game as well.

The final boss is immortal unless you use a certain spell. The game gives no hint about this.

Spoiler

 

[KeighnMcDeath]

That dark wraith box is awesome.

 

[Derringer]

Codex, i need your help.
What is the name of japanese game about bunch of cats piloting giant super-tank? Because it's japanese game it's grimdark and edgy and you need to sacrifice your crewmembers if you want to fire main cannon. That's all i remember but game is actually not that old.
It's just bugging me that i can almost remember it but...

Fuga: Melodies of Steel sounds like it might be it.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuga:_Melodies_of_Steel

Edit - Beat me to it.

So it's furry/kemono Bokurano?

 

[Zandig Slaytanic]

Dark Wraith does looks really good. Checked out some videos of gameplay and really liking the morbid atmosphere and music.

abnaxus ...

Did you create a User Disk before playing?
I set the game up in Neko Project Fmgen from the Neo Kobe archive and here's what I found....

• To play the game: Insert Dark Wraith (Disk 1).hdm in Floppy Drive 1 - and the (Created User Disk).hdm in Floppy Drive 2
• To see the opening: Insert Dark Wraith (Disk 1).hdm in Floppy Drive 1 - and the Dark Wraith (Disk 3).hdm in Floppy Drive 2
• User disk creation: Insert Dark Wraith (Disk 2).hdm in Floppy Drive 1 and a blank disk in Floppy Drive 2 ....
• ...press RETURN to create the User Disk

My Japanese is limited so I could not check what you experienced with the game. You can start the game with Disk 1 in Drive 1, and Disk 2 in Drive 2 but that may be the issue for not leveling up? Seems like it wants a valid User Disk in Drive 2 when starting the game?

 

[KeighnMcDeath]

Kobe has such awesome archives but the fm-towns one has fucked up repeatedly for DLs even on highspeed. Dunno wtf is wrong. It should be uploaded in sections rather than the whole thing all at once in broken up stitch together when unzipped.

 

[abnaxus]

Played Mime (舞夢) (1995) by Studio Twinkle (Grounseed)



It’s a better game than Grounseed which was memorable mostly for its soundtrack. This game has a similarly impressive soundtrack (but not by Ryu Umemoto?)

Spoiler

It’s a standard dungeon crawler but the game has a rather interesting setting and story: the 4 main characters who form the party are ancient kings and queens who ruled the world 12,000 years ago. At the start of the game they all have amnesia but eventually regain memories of their past. As the game title suggests the entire game takes place in some kind of dream world and is a rather surreal experience. Despite all this it is overall p. light-hearted with a lot of humour; the end of the game is beautiful.

Spoiler

 

[abnaxus]

Played Fangs for PC88 by Enix

Spoiler

The game is called Fangs because the purpose of the game is to gather 6 wolf fang amulets in order to unlock artifacts to beat the evil. The main character is called Remus (guess what he’s brother is called).

Encounter rate and challenge are comparable to Phantasy Star 2. I liked that at one point a boss dude you beat becomes party member. A few bosses have special attacks that can only be countered by using an item. Final boss has an instakill move that can only be countered by an item you get at the beginning of the game.

It’s a p. badass game. I just wish it had a decent ending. After beating the final boss you just leave with your brother and that’s it.

Spoiler

 

[abnaxus]

Played Paracelsus no Maken (1994), the sequel to Laplace no Ma.

(Paracelsus was a Renaissance Swiss physician).

These are rpgs with occult themes set in 30s USA and Western Europe, otherwise known as Ghost Hunter series #1 and #2. “Ghost Hunter” is the rpg system devised by Group SNE who also created Sword World.

In Laplace no Ma you create a full party, in this game only one character is created, a survivor of Laplace no Ma. Other party members (the journalist, detective, mystic, scientist) are fixed and retconned as fellow survivors of the first game.

Like Sword World it is comprised of many different small scenarios visiting various places in 1930s Europe but with an overarching story (involving werewolves, Nazis, vampires, Ludwig II, Atlantis) that feels like Blake & Mortimer.

You only gain experience after finishing a mission/furthering the main story (so not much incentive to fight random encounters). Bonus experience can be gained by using skills during missions (like successfully negotiating or interrogating, finding hidden clues, etc).

Spoiler