Seiya Monogatari (Anearth Fantasy Stories)

~ ANEARTH FANTASY STORIES ~
Hudson Soft / Media Works
Super CD-ROM
1995

I've long hailed Anearth Fantasy Stories as not only one of the greatest 16-bit RPGs but also one of the PC Engine's most beautiful and innovative games. Yet, it's never lost on me when I play it that, stylistically, it isn't the type of title I'd typically be interested in, as I'm an impatient sort, and Anearth never seems to be any hurry to get anywhere. Ships lazily drift into ports; butterflies slowly flutter about towns. It's as if the game is inviting players to take in every dazzling aspect of the magnificence that surrounds them, every detail of the beautifully drawn trees, buildings, grottoes, and statuaries. Surprisingly (considering my no-time-to-lose nature), I'm always more than willing to accept its invitation. The unbelievably gorgeous world of Anearth never fails to enthrall me.

The red book-heavy soundtrack does its part to ensure immersion. Delightfully pleasant numbers accompany worry-free jaunts through forests while an unforgettably eerie track portends events yet to unfold on a misleadingly tranquil island. Cinemas serve as bookends for the quest, and the touching opening sequence lays the groundwork for what ends up being an incredible artistic accomplishment.

But the unparalleled presentation is just one aspect of the game's overall brilliance. The land's enormous labyrinths are packed with so many secrets and puzzles that every single one of them becomes a unique adventure unto itself.

There's so much terrain to explore, so many niches to examine, such a wide variety of challenges to face. Morph from a fish to a frog to a butterfly to circumvent various obstacles. Make your way through an upside-down nightmare by making alterations to the flip-flopped structure. The tasks you're asked to perform are appealingly unusual and intriguing.

Character interplay is fascinating and deep. Enter a realm of cannibals who serve up flesh stew (which restores your health!). Challenge a roaring behemoth for his treasure or hammer out a deal with him diplomatically. Trail a wall-smashing dragon. Buddy up with a bunch of pirates. Give in to a lizard king's demands and achieve revenge later on; and mutilate a vicious, near-invincible villain.

The focus on exploration, puzzle solving, and character development means there are no random battles to deal with, as there's just no need for the game to have players partake in such busy work. Fights are set to occur at various spots, with the manner in which your party develops dependent on the techniques you utilize during scuffles. I never needed to bore myself by "leveling up," yet my little band was a force to be reckoned with by adventure's end. Pacing- and design-wise, the title is simply perfect. Strategy is a more important factor in combat than stats or equipment, making every fight interesting rather than an RPG standard level of tedious.

This is a special game, folks--perhaps the best ever released for the system. Don't let a perceived language barrier bar you from picking it up--a wonderful guide has been written by Duomazov ally M1savage to help people play through it. And playing through it is a pleasure not to be missed.

Startling Odyssey

~ STARTLING ODYSSEY ~
RayForce
Super CD-ROM
1993

I played through Starling Odyssey II prior to obtaining its predecessor, and I thoroughly enjoyed the game, but I found myself at a loss when attempting to pinpoint a virtue that accounted for its excellence. The first episode, as I quickly discovered, leaves players looking to identify a defining element in no such quandary, even though it's of the same traditional-style-RPG ilk. This is an affair predicated on speed. A single tap of a button can take you through a number of successive menu options (whether the ride is one you want to take or not) and may leave you rather annoyed when you cast a spell inadvertently or take a swipe at an unintended target. Still, the fact that rumbles can be resolved in relative milliseconds just by revving up the turbo is something to appreciate.

But then, if players weren't able to fly right through combat scenes, the game would be utterly intolerable, as the encounter rate is frustratingly high and practically eliminates the allure of exploration. And that's just one of many problems that plague the early stages of the adventure. The music is absolutely wretched, the cinemas are technically unimpressive and daft content-wise, and the graphics are revoltingly primitive.

Endure the aesthetic torture and you'll arrive at dungeons that are basic, uninspired sort-of-mazes inhabited by riffraff.

Thankfully, SO eventually picks up its game. Later labyrinths are rather large, and dedicated explorers will emerge from them with plenty of nice loot in tow. The plot never quite shakes itself of gratuitous goofiness, but interesting villains join the goings-on, and romantic elements are handled adequately enough.

The encounter rate will elicit grumbles regardless of how far along you are with your adventuring, but at least some respectable creatures ultimately step up to challenge your band.

While most players will view SO as a decent, worthwhile product once all is said and done, it may prove most valuable to those who are novices in the realm of Japanese adventure games. Aside from the first Cosmic Fantasy, this is as straightforward and accessible as PCE traditional-style RPGs come. A couple of potentially baffling spots can be covered here:

Make sure to have the flame sword, thunder sword, ice blade, and gaia blade in your possession but unequipped when you visit this bedridden fellow.

You'll pass through this segment of cavern early in your quest, but don't forget about it. Towards the end, those stalagmites will be replaced by an object the shape of a crescent moon--your sign that you'll be able to pass through a nearby wall.

A little bit of exploration and occasional utilization of the old "push up against walls to find secret passageways" technique will get you past most other potential problem spots. Experienced players who have had their fill of relatively simple quest games can skip ahead to the followup without missing out on anything remarkable, but SO makes for decent fun all the same.

Startling Odyssey II

~ STARTLING ODYSSEY II ~
RayForce
Super CD-ROM
1994

Startling Odyssey II lacks a calling card. Not a single thing about it stands out as being superlative. But it's an example of an RPG that achieves excellence thanks to its makers doing solid (if not standard-setting) work on just about every aspect of the title.

The graphics, though they fall short of magnificence, are likely to garner some attention as soon as play begins. Canvases done up with subdued hues are sprinkled with flecks of brightness to create appealingly distinctive field and town designs.

The element of visual intrigue extends to the cinemas, which utilize lots of bluish greens to give outdoors scenes an overcast look (which works quite well for gloomy old me). Intermissions are plentiful and showcase the game's cool (if occasionally roughly sketched) main characters. Amusing shenanigans are periodically interrupted by episodes of tragedy; one particularly stunning event stuck with me through the years separating my first and most recent playthroughs.

The combat scenes are also visually interesting in that the action is presented in a "slanted" manner. Nice-looking backdrops and large enemies are on offer, and the characters are hardly the stand-still types: kicks and sword swipes are actually carried out rather than simply being told of via text messages, and badly hurt warriors slump to the turf in agony. The skirmishes don't play out quickly, and the encounter rate leans a bit towards the gratuitously high side, but the positive aspects of the brawling render those issues minor.

While battle sequences proceed methodically, field play is never slow or arduous (provided that you dig through the menus and ramp up the character-walking and message-relaying speeds). Your determined little party members let nothing stand in their way as they travel from one important location to the next--even bumbling townsfolk can simply be shoved aside.

Among those important locations are labyrinthine areas that seem rather plain appearance-wise but earn accolades for offering lots of treasure- and trap-strewn paths to explore.

Once the last of those areas has been conquered, you get to enjoy a long and interesting cinematic sequence that concludes matters in atypical (for a PCE RPG) fashion.

The music is perhaps the only element that disappoints. Early promise of classical symphonic greatness is quickly forgotten as annoying town and combat tunes come to the fore. A masterpiece of a soundtrack just might have elevated the game to the tier of the classics. But even as it is, SO2 is absolutely fantastic and far superior to its respectable predecessor.

Image Fight II

~ IMAGE FIGHT II ~
Irem
Super CD-ROM
1992

The first Image Fight is no pushover, but I don't think it's nearly as demanding and punishing as many tout it to be. Its sequel, on the other hand, is nightmarishly hard and really seems to revel in the dismembering of players. If you're okay with risking dismemberment, go ahead and take up its challenge--and prepare yourself for a ten-level-long journey that'll demand constant attentiveness and be nothing if not hellish for long stretches at a time. You'll frequently find yourself navigating uncomfortably tight spaces as powerful enemies soar onto the field from the front, side, and rear (and even emerge from the backdrop at particular points). These steel-ship berserkers typically dart about erratically and launch hard-to-evade projectile attacks.

But they do play fair when it comes right down to it. IF2 is tough, but it's seldom cheap, and it actually grants players what amounts to a fairly stacked hand. Back to tag along with you are the series's trademark option pods (blues shoot straight ahead while reds fire in the direction opposite the one you're moving in). You can adjust your craft's speed at any time and acquire a wide variety of highly destructive weapons as you blast apart the enemy legion. And if you experiment with those weapons a bit and give matters some thought, you just might figure out ways to take out the large, formidable bosses with ease.

But even if you're a skilled pilot and a master strategist, you'll have to take a few knocks and endure some frustration as you attempt to make headway in this realm where shooter fans die. You'll also have to remember that you can't afford to let up once you do get on a roll. Like its predecessor, IF2 sends players who fail to destroy a significant portion of the enemy's frontline forces to an extremely difficult "penalty area." But while achieving the kill percentage required to avoid penalization is practically a given in the first game, it takes quite a bit of hard work and smooth flying here.

You won't get much incentive cinematically to continue getting pummeled. IF2's interludes primarily consist of terribly drawn characters chatting within the confines of tiny windows.

The in-game graphics get the job done, however. The rings of Saturn and wavy gas storms make for extremely appealing backdrops. The soundtrack is also of fairly high quality, boasting plenty of tense numbers that lend to the game's sinister air. Image Fight 2 knows that it's brutal, which is why players feel so good once they've put it in its place.

But most people won't get to experience that feeling. Frankly, I don't think there's much fun to be had here for "casual" players, as the game will pound on them mercilessly. And this is no cheapie, so those who whimsically decide to "give it a shot" will have to part with a pretty significant sum of cash to take their thumps. But if you're good--and I mean if you're sure you're good--and you're willing to put in plenty of practice and weather some frustrating times, then go ahead and try to make your way through IF2. The process won't always be enjoyable, but it can prove very rewarding.