Tag Archives: futuristic

Digital Devil Story: Megami Tensei II, Famicom

The second game in the Megami Tensei series was developed by Atlus and published for the Nintendo Famicom by Namco in 1990. It’s another Japan-only RPG featuring demon-summoning and turn-based combat and is considered by many to be much better than the first game.

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Digital Devil Story: Megami Tensei, Famicom

This is the very first Megami Tensei game, released for the Nintendo Famicom in 1987, and it looks very basic compared to later Megami Tensei games, but was the foundation on which a successful series was built.

Based on a trilogy of fantasy novels by Japanese author Aya Nishitani, Megami Tensei was originally created as TWO distinct role-playing games. One version (this game) was developed by Atlus and published by Namco in 1987 for the Famicom. A separate version for home computers was co-developed by Atlus and Telenet Japan and published by Telenet Japan the same year.

The original game was never officially released in the West due to its use of religious themes, and Nintendo‘s sensitivity to them, but an English fan translation does exist that can be applied as a ROM hack.

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The Eternal Castle, PC

The Eternal Castle is a stunning platform/action indie game from Leonard Menchiari, Daniele Vicinanzo, and Giulio Perrone, and published by Playsaurus in 2019.

It is a tribute to games such as Another World, Flashback, Limbo, and INSIDE, and features a lone character, running from left to right, moving from puzzle to puzzle, trying to survive in a weird, dark world full of technology, destruction, mystery and death.

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Phantasy Star III, Megadrive/Genesis

The third Phantasy Star game, subtitled Generations of Doom, was released for the Megadrive by Sega in 1990.

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Flashback, Megadrive/Genesis

Delphine Software‘s classic futuristic adventure game, Flashback, came out first on the Amiga in 1992 but was originally developed with the Sega Megadrive as its target platform.

Timing and cartridge production issues meant that it came out after a number of other ports had already been released, but that didn’t dent enthusiasm for the game on the Megadrive.

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Herzog Zwei, Megadrive/Genesis

Developed by Techno Soft and first published in 1989, Herzog Zwei is an early real-time strategy game, predating Dune II by three years. It is the sequel to Herzog on the MSX2 and it shares the same DNA as that game.

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MUSHA, Megadrive/Genesis

MUSHA is a well-liked Megadrive shooter, made by famed Japanese developer Compile. It is part of the Aleste series, but features a ‘mecha’-suited protagonist fighting against a super computer that has taken over the Earth, rather than a spaceship.

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Command & Conquer, PC

The classic Real-Time Strategy game, Command & Conquer, was originally published for PC MS-DOS by Virgin Interactive in 1995.

Command & Conquer was developed by Las Vegas-based company Westwood Studios and it took the world by storm…

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Herzog, MSX

This obscure Japanese action game is a prototype of one of the first ever real-time strategy games – Herzog Zwei on the Sega Megadrive – and it is also one of the best games you can play on an MSX.

Herzog was developed and published on disk for the MSX2 by Techno Soft (nee, Tecno Soft) in 1988.

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Psycho-Nics Oscar, Arcade

This obscure 1987 arcade game from Data East was a big influence on many games that came after it, in particular Manfred Trenz‘s Turrican series. It is obviously itself influenced by Nintendo‘s 1986 game, Metroid.

It also displays some similarities to Karnov, another Data East arcade game released the same year.

And, while you may have never heard of this game, it’s safe to say that it’s a bit of a ‘hidden gem’ in terms of old arcade games still worth playing today.

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