Rent A Hero

Rent A Hero starts with a joke that has real teeth: an ordinary guy puts on a mistakenly delivered suit and immediately learns that super strength is a terrible thing to test around the family. From there, the game turns superhero work into a part-time hustle, asking you to earn enough through odd jobs to justify keeping the armor rented.

Its mix of top-down city exploration and side-view brawls gives the adventure a pleasingly scrappy rhythm. The battery drain adds pressure without changing the basic goal: take work, get paid, stay powered, and gradually realize that Aero City has much bigger problems than errands.

Retro Replay Review

Gameplay

The first hour has a wonderfully offbeat hook. You are not a chosen savior or a professional crime fighter. You are Tarō Yamada, a suburban young man stuck paying rental fees on a suit that happens to turn him into a superhero. That makes even the earliest jobs feel funny in the right way. Delivering something or running an errand is not glamorous, but the idea that you are clocking in as a rented hero gives the routine a distinct personality.

Aero City is explored from a traditional top-down perspective, with shops, homes, and residents to visit. Then fights shift to side-view action scenes, creating a clean separation between wandering around town and throwing punches in the armor. That structure gives the game a brisk, approachable feel: explore, find work, handle trouble, and collect the money you need to continue operating.

The armor’s battery is the part that can either sharpen the experience or irritate you. Its power steadily drains while equipped, and a dead suit must be recharged with fresh batteries bought at a convenience store. It makes the armor feel less like a permanent reward and more like rented equipment you must budget for. If you enjoy games that turn a premise into a practical concern, the loop is charming. If you want uninterrupted superhero power fantasy, the repeated need to maintain your gear may wear thin.

The jobs also have room to grow beyond their humble beginnings. What starts as basic paid work gradually leads into confrontations with gangs, corrupt businesses, and a larger conspiracy affecting the city. That escalation is important because it gives the errand-running a purpose. You are not merely padding out a superhero costume rental. You are working your way into a mess that finally deserves the suit.

Graphics

The side-view fights get their charm from the collision of the ordinary and the ridiculous. A black-and-silver armored hero trading blows with a green, lizard-like enemy inside a living room, complete with tan couches, paneled doors, and a staircase, is a memorable image. Large pixel characters have clear outlines against the muted domestic backgrounds, so it is easy to keep your eyes on the fight.

Story

Rent A Hero understands that its best story idea is also its funniest one: superheroism has bills. Tarō receives the Combat Armor by mistake, discovers its strength in a disastrous accident involving his father, and then learns he can keep it only if he pays. SECA’s solution, offering paid jobs to armor renters, turns a simple accidental-hero setup into a story about earning your way through a strange responsibility.

That setup keeps the tone grounded even as the stakes rise. Aero City is full of everyday places and people, so the growing trouble with gangs and corrupt businesses feels like an invasion of regular life rather than a distant science-fiction crisis. The contrast gives the game its personality. You can be dealing with absurd hero business while still feeling like you came from a neighborhood where errands matter.

The conspiracy gives the later work more momentum than a collection of disconnected jobs would have. You begin as someone trying to make a living with a rented suit, then find yourself pulled toward trouble spreading across the city. It is a sturdy arc for an action RPG, and the premise remains more memorable because the hero never stops being, at heart, an average guy trying to cover the cost of his equipment.

Overall Experience

Rent A Hero is worth your time if you like older action RPGs with a weirdly specific central joke and the patience for a little resource management. The battery system means the game asks you to think about upkeep, not just victory, and that can be frustrating when you simply want to stay armored up. Still, it is exactly the kind of limitation that fits the concept: this suit is useful, expensive, and never entirely yours.

The payoff is the game’s escalation. Simple work becomes city trouble, while the oddball premise stays grounded in errands, homes, stores, and a hero who has to get paid. It is a more human and playful angle on superhero action than the usual grand destiny, and its top-down exploration paired with side-view combat makes the journey feel pleasantly unusual.

If this premise clicks for you, it is also worth knowing that Rent A Hero No. 1 is a later Dreamcast reworking of this Mega Drive game. The original’s strongest selling point remains its combination of everyday city life, paid hero work, and the wonderfully petty problem of keeping a superhero suit charged.