Jikuu Yuuden: Debias

Part of a storm of side-scrolling action RPGs, influenced in part by the Dragon Slayer series and Zelda II: The Adventure of Link, Jikuu Yuten Debias (roughly “Dimensional (or Space/Time) Legend Debias”) has the player control a warrior as he completes quests for the local monarchy, fights legions of monsters and gathers hints and items from helpful NPCs. Like its many contemporaries of the time, it’s a fairly straightforward fantasy RPG with some action hack-n-slash/platforming sequences.

Of the game’s few notable qualities, first and foremost is a “feelie” included in the box that resemble a pair of runed circles – the idea was that the player could overlay the circles and use them to decipher certain runes; a process which was necessary in order to progress in the game. The circle/rune feelie system was clearly inspired by Western RPGs like Bard’s Tale (which would also later influence The Secret of Monkey Island’s slightly more tongue-in-cheek “Dial-a-Pirate” anti-piracy protection device).

Also of note was the game’s use of the day/night cycle which, similar to Castlevania II: Simon’s Quest, would clear civilized areas of wandering NPCs at night and replace them with monsters. The player can also hack apart said innocent NPCs as readily as monsters, though doing so will usually carry grave consequences.