Gemfire

"BRRRRAN"

Gemfire? What the..? This is probably what a lot of people would say at the mention of this game. Truth is the only reason I came across this game was a happy coincidence. A friend of the family had just bought a Nintendo 64 and was selling all his SNES games. I looked through them and being only ten rejected some ''boring'' KOEI games except for this one. The name and the box made me want to play it so I did. Thank God.

Gameplay

This game is of the strategy genre meaning there isn't much action. Half the time you are building up your army and food source and the other half consists of killing people. In the map screen you can choose to cultivate crops, hire strange new monsters into your army, threaten other families, give food to your citizens and many more things. This is the meat and bones of this game meaning without a sound strategy here you're sunk. The other mode is battle mode where you move your units around and try to wipe out the enemy. This is where the action happens. Battles test your tactical prowess as well as your luck. Another neat feature of this game was that it records how long you have been playing and all lords/ladies have a limited life time. In this area I rate a 9/10.

Graphics

The graphics are acceptable for this genre in this era. However the artwork for the faces of your lords and ladies is astounding. For graphics I rate a 9/10.

Sound

The sounds are good for this time in video game history. Some of the music can get annoying after awhile but other songs are really cool and upbeat. The sounds your units make when they attack other units are also for the most part cool. Let's not forget my favourite sound, the BRRRRAN you make when you try to break a fence. For sound I gave it a 10/10.

Difficulty

This is the lone problem with this game. It was WAY too easy. The AI is limmited and you'll find it using the same tactics over and over. Here I give a 5/10.

Story

The story is great. It really has the ''Play the game to conclude the story'' effect on the player. All in all the story is a 10/10.

Replayability

With 4 scenarios and four family choices in each you have a total of 16 ways to capture Gemfire with each choice having a different difficulty level. Also adding a second player makes up for the lack of AI as well as providing a long, moving game to share with a friend. Here I give a 10/10.

Summary

With good tunes, gameplay and replayability, I would recommend buying this game at first sight for any fans of KOEI strategy games. This is truly one, Gem, of a game. (Pardon the pun)

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 02/15/03, Updated 02/15/03