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nintendoduo · 1 month ago

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Playing the Super Nintendo's Forgotten Home-Made RPGs of the '90s (Part 4)

(This article is also available at Neocities.)

So far in this series, we've talked about a fan-made SNES RPG where you fight "gangstas" and evil turds, one where you end up trapped in a town because the dev forgot to include an exit, and one where you encounter Mario's grave and find out he was killed by Luigi. (Note: This was made in 1998, not 2024.) Here's one thing we haven't talked about yet, though: a finished game. And a non-terrible one, too!

As far as we can tell, what follows is the ONLY full-length English-language game made in SNES RPG Maker 2 / RPG Tsukuru 2 that still survives -- there were other cool-sounding ones in the '90s, like Black Rain and Mana Quest, but they are now what the kids like to call "lost media." This and the next article will be devoted to that one surviving game, both due to its length and because it legitimately deserves more attention than all the others we've covered so far (sorry, Turd Fighter '98 or whatever that one was called).

Of course, the fact that there was actual effort put into this game doesn't mean there aren't some bugs, typos, and very 1998 jokes involving scantly-clad women rendered in 16-bit graphics -- but enough spoilers. Let's-a RPG.

Note: This game can be downloaded at rmarchiv.de (or archive.org’s archived version of rmarchiv.de, if it goes offline again).

"Honorable Direction 2 - Enter Culex" by Spoony Bard (11-10-1998)

As you might have guessed from the "2" in the title, this is a sequel to an earlier (non-SNES) game called Honorable Direction, which appears to be lost. However, the opening crawl quickly gets you up to speed on the plot: there was a demon, and then you killed him. Well done! The game hasn't even started and you're already a winner.

Three years after your character, Corda, killed that demon, you learn that a guy named Culex is going around destroying towns with his evil army. One day, you're chilling in an inn when you're grabbed by guards and brought to meet this Culex, who seems like a charming, well-adjusted fellow.

Culex doesn't appreciate you asking why he's destroying all those towns, so he takes away all your gear and teleports you to a "derseted" island. (The hero immediately losing all the cool shit they acquired during the previous game is known in gaming parlance as "Samus' predicament.") Luckily, within seconds of exploring that island, you run across a Rusty Sword, Rusty Helmet, Rusty Shield, Rusty Armor, and even some (Rusty?) money.

It's always nice when you find equipment laying around in a game and can just take it guilt-free... but this is not one of those cases. As soon as you grab the stuff, a voice (presumably belonging to someone named "Rusty") shouts "HEY! You took my treasure!!" You're then thrown into a fight scene with an enemy named "Thief," even though you're the one who did the thieving.

Not content with stealing Rusty the Non-Thief's gear, you also steal his life. Corda has been living in an island for about two minutes and he's already regressed into a vicious savage.

After exploring some more of that deserted island, you quickly find your way to some non-deserted ones. At last, civilization! You reach an island town called Risek where you meet some fun NPCs, like this possibly bipolar guy who has conflicting feelings towards nature...

...and the best character in the game: this old man who has romantic feelings towards a body of water.

(You can't see it here, but he has a full body spasm before saying that. Dude really loves that pond.)

At Risek, you get directions to a tunnel leading to the mainland, but the tunnel is guarded by the fearsome Randolf, a Culex henchman whose job is to kill you if you try to escape your island exile. You catch Randolf just as he's mugging a priest, because "stand here and wait until a guy tries to escape an island" is a pretty dull job and mugging men of cloth is the closest thing he has to entertainment.

Once you vanquish the mighty Randolf, the priest, in accordance with RPG customs, joins your party. His name is Yelfe and he turns out to have healing powers and a healthy hatred of Culex, so he should come in pretty "handy," as he puts it. Corda and Yelfe head for a town named Capem, where Culex is infamous among the populace due to his town-destroying ways. They don't care for that guy one bit.

(No, the game clearly it was "derseted.")

Some people in Capem are about to send a boat to a town up north to check if it got Culex'd or not, so Corda and Yelfe hitch a ride with them. During the trip, they have a heart-to-heart and Yelfe reveals his motivation for becoming a butt-kicking priest: his fiancée happened to be visiting another town at the same time as Culex and didn't survive. The screen goes dark as Yelfe talks about his tragic past...

...either for dramatic effect or because the crew's trying to tell these two to shut up and let them sleep.

When you reach the town up north, it's completely on fire! Or, well, as "on fire" as the tiny fire sprites in this game will allow.

Exploring the nearby area leads to a huge wall that's blocking the way. A guard tells you that all passage is forbidden unless you have permission from the king, because Culex's base is on the other side and everyone hates that jerk. Note that it took roughly 20 minutes for this game to get to the obligatory "go talk to the king" moment most RPG Maker creations put at the very beginning, which should give you a sense of how long it's gonna end up being.

So Corda and Yelfe follow the guard's directions to the castle, walk in, and tell the king they want to kill Culex. He's so taken with these two murderous randos that he invites them to a sleepover.

The next morning, a loud noise awakens Corda and Yelfe. You exit your room to find that the castle has been invaded by Culex (whose city-destroying powers, we now learn, also apply to huge walls) and the king and his men escaped without even waking you up. You meet Culex again, and his tone implies that Randolf's next performance review would have been rough if, you know, you hadn't killed him.

(This is what you get when you entrust such an important job to someone whose name sounds like a Starbucks barista's interpretation of "Randall.")

Culex knows that you aren't leveled up enough to fight him yet, so he sics his anachronistic samurai henchman on you and leaves. After defeating the samurai, Corda and Yelfe find out that the king is now hiding in a cave with the anti-Culex resistance. That's where you meet Tani, a fellow Culex-hater who sorta invites herself into your party. She has a certain jock energy that immediately clashes with Yelfe's dweebiness.

The king asks you three to go on a suicide mission at Culex's base as a distraction while his soldiers launch a proper attack, and you're like "Yeah, sure, what the hell." The base is guarded by bizarre creatures like a winged lion with a scorpion tail and a giant snake with the upper body of a sexy lady. Is Culex a Dr. Moreau-type maniac? Is he massacring villagers to harvest body parts for his experiments?

You reach Culex's throne and find... Randolf?! Didn't you kill him? Is this another Randolf? Is the name Randolf the "John" of this world? Nope, Culex brought the original Randolf back to life, which is a thing he can do. Guess he's a Dr. Frankenstein-type maniac, too.

Randolf says he's supposed to keep you busy while Culex and his army go to the Eastern continent, because "They plan to kill more there! But I plan to kill YOU now!" :0

Naturally, you kill him again -- but he has a second phase this time and turns into a cyclops monster! So you kill him again again.

After re-vanquishing Randolf, you go back to the king, who tells you that all his men have already left for the East, and then just... dies, for unspecified reasons. Maybe he was too tired from running back and forth between here and the castle? This scene also reveals that the king was a Jedi all along, since his body disappears upon death.

Goodbye, king. We'll miss you forever. Unless we go back into this cave, since his sprite will still be there for some reason (and it isn't even blue, so it can't be a Force Ghost).

Before dying, the king was nice enough to prepare a boat for you to follow Culex to the Eastern continent, and he even asked a blond-haired knight called Jerzi to join your party. Yelfe is less than welcoming, but Tani once again puts him in his place.

There's something about boat rides that makes RPG characters particularly introspective, so it's time for more heart-to-hearts with each member of your crew: Yelfe reminisces about his wife and says he wants to prevent more wives from being harmed, Tani confesses that Culex killed her BFF, and Jerzi just tells you how much time is left on the trip. But he probably said it in, like, a really emotional way.

Once you're in the Eastern continent, you wander around fighting random monsters for a while until you run across a place called "Janki cliff" (not sure we want to know what sort of common activity earned it that name). Near the cliff, you spot a familiar face:

Once again, his body shakes before saying that. Wait, is he cheating on that other pond with this pond?! Shame on you, promiscuous pond-loving old man. You are now the worst character in this game.

After climbing to the top of the Janki cliff (doing your best not to make eye contact with the people loitering there), Corda is stoked to bump into an old friend called Joyce, who just happens to be vacationing here in the middle of the ongoing mass slaughter.

The gang goes to a nearby inn to rest while Corda catches Joyce up with the "mass slaughter" situation, which she had no clue about; some people just don't like looking at the news. Later, while everyone sleeps, Corda wakes up to a scream and realizes Joyce is missing. He goes out and finds her at the top of the cliff, but she's sorta fading in and out of reality. W-Was she a ghost? Is someone gonna say "Joyce? But Joyce died... ten years ago, on this very night!" Guess that would justify her not keeping up with current events.

Culex's voice comes out of nowhere and says that Joyce will be a sacrifice for "his master." Corda is instructed to go to a shrine in the middle of an island if he wants to find out what the hell that even means. He goes there alone and meets Culex, who says he'll finally explain his whole deal if Corda defeats his evil genie minion (because this game's creator is admirably committed to using all the sprites).

So, Corda wins a tough battle against the genie, and... Culex is like "lol, just kidding," kills Joyce, and goes away without explaining shit.

Wow. This might be coldest villain in all of gaming.

We cut to Joyce's funeral, where Yelfe gives Corda like two seconds to mourn before ruining the moment with a "Now what?" Shut up, Yelfe, you insensitive prick.

Anyway, the answer to Yelfe's question is "go kill Culex," obviously. Now it's personal (for Corda; it was already personal for the rest).

The gang heard Culex was heading north, so that's where they go. This leads to a ton more enemies (all the sprites!) and, eventually, a big mansion you can't go into unless you're "a member." Hmm, guess it must be some sort of club? You try to sneak in through a side entrance, but you're stopped by an employee who's dressed like... oh.

Oh, it's that sort of club.

Inside a nearby house, you meet a bed-ridden young lady who asks if you're the "replacement" her boss sent to pick up her "uniform." She also says she heard that "one of Culex's ex generals" is at the mansion. You see where this is going. Tani certainly does, and she's not happy about it.

Note that the usually mature Corda seems to have turned into Beavis for a second there. Tani insists that she's NOT wearing a goddamn bunny suit. Cut to: Tani wearing a goddamn bunny suit.

Oh, and a blonde wig, presumably borrowed from Jerzi. Incidentally, Jerzi is the only male in the party who handles the situation with decorum (simply wishing Tani good luck in her mission), while Yelfe follows Corda's example and turns into Butt-Head:

Wasn't this guy supposed to be a priest?!

At this point, Tani becomes a party of one as the men are left behind while she infiltrates the Medieval Playboy Mansion to get info on the former Culex general enjoying himself there. Will she complete this mission with her life and dignity intact? We'll have to wait until the next part to find out, since we just reached Tumblr's image limit.

TO BE CONCLUDED! For real, this time.

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