Shining in the Darkness

"Light shining on an old game"

Intro: As you start the game, you give yourself a short name and then instantly become the son of Morted, the Kingdom of Thornwood's finest knight. The story starts off as Princess Jessa, the King's Daughter, takes a walk with Morted outside, and both go missing afterward. First, you must get permission from the King to enter the Labyrinth, which is where Morted and Jessa are being kept. As you and the King start getting a good conversation going, you are very rudely interrupted by a dark figure who goes by the name Dark Sol. He confirms Jessa and Morted are in the Labyrinth and says he will give them up, but on one condition: the King has to give up the Kingdom to Dark Sol. The King refuses and instead assigns you to toughen yourself up and enter the Labyrinth.

Gameplay: 7/10
This is a very interesting game to play. Although it is only in first person and your character seems to have super-glued his mouth shut, everything else is pretty much flawless. The game starts out very slow and can become very hard and frustrating at first which caused it to lose a couple of points, but once you beat the first tough enemy, known as the Kaiser Krab, things start to pick up. When you enter the four caves (Strength, Courage, Truth and Wisdom) things start to really pick up speed, and after that, the game pretty much just blasts off.

Graphics: 9/10
The graphics are a dinosauring comparison today, but back then in 1991 when the game was released, they were quite something. The characters and monsters look like a lot of work was put into making them, and they even slightly move to simulate that they're alive. The walls and floors also look like a lot of work was put into them. Unlike most other games, the walls were either made of stone, or cave walls or that kind of material.

Sound: 6/10
The music and sound effects are excellent, but the fact you hear the same stuff over and over again really hurts the overall score. At first, the music is a pleasure to listen to in the background, and the sudden doom music when a monster attacks is also interesting to listen to, but when you hear it literally hundreds of times over, you start getting crazed. Some monsters, like Sentinals or Grimwalls are pretty good when you hear the sounds of them coming to life, but they're really nothing to get too excited about.

Length: 7/10
As stated above, the game starts off really slow which almost makes the length too long. Once you beat the four caves, the game quickly picks up speed and you seem to be hurtling towards the end. This balance sort of makes the game medium length, but once you really get into it, then it just goes too fast. Still, it's a decent length for a very good game.

Replayabilty: 3/10
This is an RPG, therefore, once you finish it, there's really no point to going back and playing it again unless you really liked it. However, after a few months, or years in some cases, you may want to just go back and try it again. Who knows? You just may be surprised....

Final Score: 6.4 (rounded down to 6)

Buy or Rent?
This game can become pretty long, so I'd recommend that if you're going to play it, you should buy it. Despite the fact it only got to 6, this is one of my top 5 favorite Genesis games and is my favorite RPG game.

Reviewer's Score: 6/10, Originally Posted: 11/01/04