All 16-Bit

Review #7032 Dungeons & Dragons: Order of the Griffon Talk to everyone TG-16 1992 TTI RPG RPG › Western H 34 / 100 Horrible Screenshot used for review/reference purposes. 2 / 5 Gameplay One of the better 16-bit D&D titles. It's got nothing on the JRPGs of the time but it's not a complete trainwreck. Movement happens in a dungeon crawler view but combat happens on a tactical grid. The grid is weird. Movement is highly restrictive and there is so much randomness. Yes, I know it's a literal roll of the dice but I fought 6 or 7 battles and my main character Fighter never once landed a hit. I also hate how nerfed you are in the early game. Your party members have 5-10 HP so they die after one or two hits. I don't have the patience to level them up. Streamlined inventory ma...

Review #4640 Uncharted Waters: New Horizons No. Not THAT New Horizons Genesis 1994 Koei RPG RPG › Western E 67 / 100 Your mileage may vary Screenshot used for review/reference purposes. 3 / 5 Gameplay Plays like a traditional JRPG in the sense that you wander around towns and talk to NPCs while moving from scripted event to scripted event. The tutorial lasted the full 30 minutes so I didn't get to play with the training wheels off. Overall I liked what I saw and want to see more. Movement is very fast both in town and on the high seas. There's a map and ports are easy enough to find. Battles are very strange. You pick one of 6 attacks or defensive maneuvers in turn based fights but it's seemingly random whether you succeed in landing or avoiding hits. Enemies seem to hit harder tha...

Review #4639 Uncharted Waters Sailing. Takes me away to where I've always heard it could be. Genesis 1992 Koei RPG RPG › Western H 39 / 100 Horrible Screenshot used for review/reference purposes. 2 / 5 Gameplay Sailing is significantly better than the SNES version. No need to worry about wind direction, just go. What I wouldn't give for a map. I left port and wandered until I ran out of supplies and died. There might be a good game here but I couldn't find it. Understandable menus which is nice. 1 / 5 Level Design unclear objectives. Am I supposed to load up with cargo and trade at other ports? Where are those ports? Where's the cargo? What am I doing? 4 / 5 Theme I like the idea and your backstory as the ...

Review #4475 Rings of Power Worse than Amazon's show? Genesis 1992 Electronic Arts RPG RPG › Western X 4 / 100 You've been warned Screenshot used for review/reference purposes. 0 / 5 Gameplay Wow, Naughty Dog made this. Bad dog. No biscuit. Horrible control scheme. To have a conversation with someone you have to begin with C, then choose a topic with B, and then advance the conversation with A. Uh, ok Quite possibly the most laggy controls of all time. Wait a solid two or three seconds before the game responds. I am not exaggerating. I played for almost an hour and never engaged in combat, advanced the story, or accomplished anything. An utter waste of time. 0 / 5 Level Design No idea what to do or where to go. The old adage that you should talk to ev...

Review #4440 Pirates! Gold Charted Waters Genesis 1993 MicroProse RPG RPG › Western E 68 / 100 Your mileage may vary Screenshot used for review/reference purposes. 3 / 5 Gameplay Sail around the Caribbean in an overhead view. Controls are laggy but not terrible. Naval battles use same view and control as navigation with very laggy and infrequent gum shots. It would've been nice to know when you can shoot instead of having to mash. Deuling is similar to Prince of Persia. I don't get it. Better than a sum of its parts. Fun experience. 4 / 5 Level Design Tons of things to do. I could see playing this all the way through. A handful of historical scenarios plus an open world campaign. 4 / 5 Theme Pirates of the Caribbe...

Review #4163 Dungeons & Dragons: Warriors of the Eternal Sun D&D doldrums Genesis 1992 Sega RPG RPG › Western H 25 / 100 Horrible Screenshot used for review/reference purposes. 1 / 5 Gameplay Turn-based combat. Extremely simple, boring combat. Maneuver your characters into a position from which they can strike and then choose a weapon to use. Isometric view except sometimes it's a dungeon crawler, I guess. I never saw those areas. Lots of menuing. Very slow movement. I appreciate not having to push any buttons to talk with someone. 1 / 5 Level Design I couldn't find anything to do. I was outclassed in nearly every battle and would have to run back to the castle to heal after every fight. I also never gained levels or earned money or any of ...

Review #4082 Buck Rogers: Countdown to Doomsday XCOM, in the 24th and a half century! Genesis 1991 Electronic Arts RPG RPG › Western H 28 / 100 Horrible Screenshot used for review/reference purposes. 2 / 5 Gameplay Turn based with ability to position your characters during a fight. Isometric view. Not as much menuing as some RPGs. Equipping seems to be automatic for example. Not sure how to use special skills. Has depth that I don't feel like exploring. 1 / 5 Level Design Not sure how to escape the first battle, but the design of the battles is ok I guess. I have a feeling there are a bunch of missions. Could be fun if the objectives were more apparent. I feel completely lost. 1 / 5 Theme This feels like a space-themed ...

Review #663 Uncharted Waters: New Horizons No. Not THAT New Horizons SNES 1994 Koei RPG RPG › Western E 67 / 100 Your mileage may vary Screenshot used for review/reference purposes. 3 / 5 Gameplay Plays like a traditional JRPG in the sense that you wander around towns and talk to NPCs while being stressed from scripted event to scripted event. The tutorial lasted the full 30 minutes so I didn't get to play with the training wheels off. Overall I liked what I saw and want to see more. Movement is very fast both in town and on the high seas. There's a map and no wind nonsense from the first game so not much to complain about. Battles are very strange. You pick one of 6 attacks or defensive maneuvers in turn based fights but it's seemingly random whether you succeed in landing or avoi...

Review #662 Uncharted Waters Sailing. Takes me away to where I've always heard it could be. SNES 1992 Koei RPG RPG › Western G 41 / 100 Bad Screenshot used for review/reference purposes. 2 / 5 Gameplay Sailing is like watching paint dry. Depending on how the wind is blowing your ship moves quickly or not at all and everything in between. What I wouldn't give for a map. I left port and wandered until I ran out of supplies and died. There might be a good game here but I couldn't find it. Understandable menus which is nice. 1 / 5 Level Design unclear objectives. Am I supposed to load up with cargo and trade at other ports? Where are those ports? Where's the cargo? What am I doing? 4 / 5 Theme I like the idea ...

Review #656 Ultima VI: The False Prophet Six button controller. One button gameplay SNES 1993 FCI RPG RPG › Western H 33 / 100 Horrible Screenshot used for review/reference purposes. 2 / 5 Gameplay Plays like a dungeon crawler but with some streamlining. You get a party without any setup and battles can be automated. At least the first and only one I could find was. I spent the rest of my time wandering around the small castle without figuring out how to leave the darn place. Inventory management is a massive problem. It takes a good long while to get and use something like a key on a door. You've got a controller with 6 buttons but this game uses exactly one of them. Instead everything is done through menus. Not sure why these PC ports do this. Controls are ok I guess but there's not ...

Review #148 Drakkhen Faceball 2000 meets Ogre Battle ...'s annoying cousin SNES 1991 Kemco RPG RPG › Western X 22 / 100 You've been warned Screenshot used for review/reference purposes. 1 / 5 Gameplay Gives you a full (optional) tutorial on the controls and gameplay. Nice! Battles are fully automated with you issuing minimal suggestions and you have the option to take direct control of a character if you'd like. Similar to Secret of Mana or Ogre Battle in this respect. I appreciate not having to micromanage every little thing like in a dungeon crawler RPG. Seems very streamlined compared to those. Also seems like I'm watching and not playing. Nevermind this is pretty bad. Movement is done via first person view but no strafing makes it frustrating to get around. Innovative but...

Review #2 The 7th Saga Japanese gameplay, Western styling SNES 1992 Enix RPG RPG › Western G 48 / 100 Bad Screenshot used for review/reference purposes. 2 / 5 Gameplay Battles take place in an over-the-shoulder view with the standard top-down overworld. Random battles are shown with dots that run toward you like Zelda II but they're unavoidable so I'm not sure why they exist. Oh and they happen every 3 seconds. WAY TOO OFTEN. The game is stupid hard. I had to grind up to level 3 before I could survive more than 2 battles before having to go get healed. This wasted my entire 30 minute playthrough. I don't have a party. An NPC promised that I might be able to recruit one of the other selectable heroes later on so that's something to look forward to I suppose. The game also has...