~ NECROMANCER ~
Hudson Soft
HuCard
1988
Necromancer lets us know right at its unsettling title screen that it isn't some sort of lighthearted jaunt. It's a dark affair that conducts itself with an air of maturity, employing gloomy environs and tall, thin character models as opposed to pastel fields and typical old-RPG squat-folk.
It also stars a very bizarre cast of creatures, animated abominations who explode in bloody messes upon being slain.
As cool as those monsters (and their gory fates) are, and as quickly as fights are decided, combat is forced upon the player far too often to remain enjoyable, and the battle theme loses its luster early in the adventure. The title's other tunes hold up well, though, particularly the ominous cavern tune (which is reminiscent of another excellent piece, The Legendary Axe's eerie Stage 2 track, by the same composer).
The mature theme and well-presented battles make Necromancer an interesting, solid-if-not-fantastic RPG, though there's little to it besides linear field-desert-cave questing with only a few dramatic confrontations to look forward to until a run of bosses at the very end.
As one of the best HuCard RPGs, it's worth a play, though there are a couple of things to bear in mind if you aren't able to read Japanese. The passwords are enormous and consist primarily of Japanese characters. And you simply won't be getting through the game without a guide in hand... so here are two very helpful ones:
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