Tag Archives: Dungeon Crawler

Chaos Strikes Back, FM Towns

Chaos Strikes Back is a continuation of the classic Role-Playing Game, Dungeon Master. It’s a sequel – but not the sequel – to the first game, and was originally released as a stand-alone expansion disk on the Atari ST. On the FM Towns it was published on CD-ROM by Victor Musical Industries in 1990, and there’s a bit of faffing around to do before you can actually start the game*. Thankfully you can at least do this in English as there’s an option to play in that language.

*= Before you can play Chaos Strikes Back you must either create a new party (by entering the prison and choosing from the available portraits), and then save it to a new 720Kb floppy disk; or load a set of characters from a pre-existing FM Towns Dungeon Master save. You then need to enter the CSB portrait editor utility program and then click on ‘Make New Adventure’ to activate and save a new Chaos Strikes Back file to the disk. Only then will you be able to load and start the game…

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Dungeon Master, FM Towns

The FM Towns version of the classic Dungeon Master was ported by FTL Games (the game’s original developer) and published by Fujitsu in 1989 (two years after the original Atari ST version, and three years before the DOS version came out). This was a Japan-only release, on CD-ROM, but the game is playable in both English and Japanese, which is great.

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Mysterium, Game Boy

Developed by Maxis Software and published by Asmik Ace Entertainment for the original Game Boy in 1991, Mysterium is an obscure first-person dungeon-crawler in which you play an alchemist’s apprentice exploring a maze – called the Mysterium – in order to complete a test.

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Lunar Legend, Game Boy Advance

Developed by Japan Art Media and published internationally by Ubisoft in 2002, Lunar Legend is a handheld remake/re-telling of Game Arts‘ classic RPG, Lunar: Silver Star Story Complete, with new graphics, content and story changes.

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The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past and Four Swords, Game Boy Advance

The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past and Four Swords is a two-game package developed by Nintendo EAD and Capcom and first released for the Game Boy Advance in 2002 in North America and 2003 in Japan and Europe. It features a slightly modified port of the 1991 SNES classic, A Link to the Past, plus an all-new, multiplayer-only adventure called Four Swords.

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Lunar: Walking School, Game Gear

Lunar: Walking School (aka Lunar: Sanposuru Gakuen) is a Game Gear exclusive handheld RPG first released in 1996. It is a spin-off/side story from the main Lunar series published by Game Arts. This ‘Walking School‘ edition was developed by Ehrgeiz and written by Studio Alex.

Again: thanks to the efforts of fans a number of translation patches exist to make the game playable to non-Japanese speakers/readers.

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Alcazar: The Forgotten Fortress, ColecoVision

Alcazar: The Forgotten Fortress is a dungeon-crawling action game, designed and coded by Tom Loughry with graphics by Keri Longaway (nee, Janssen), and first published by Activision for the Coleco Adam and ColecoVision console in 1985.

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Final Fantasy Mystic Quest, Super Nintendo

Final Fantasy Mystic Quest is a Role-Playing Game aimed at beginners and was the first Final Fantasy game released in English-speaking territories, coming out on the Super Nintendo through Square in 1992. It was actually released in North America first, then in Japan and Europe the following year. The game was released in Europe as “Mystic Quest Legend” which hints at its similarity to the classic Final Fantasy Legend series on the Game Boy.

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Towers II: Plight of the Stargazer, Atari Jaguar

Towers II: Plight of the Stargazer is a rarity on the Atari Jaguar – it’s a first-person 3D Role-Playing Game, in the style of Ultima Underworld, The Elder Scrolls: Arena, or the early King’s Field games, and it’s probably the only RPG that was ever officially released for the console. The game does look pretty grim, but thankfully plays better than it looks.

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Towers: Lord Baniff’s Deceit, Atari ST

Towers: Lord Baniff’s Deceit was first released for the Atari ST by JV Enterprises in 1993. It is a first-person RPG in the style of Dungeon Master, with tile-based movement and real-time combat.

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