Ogre Battle Gaiden

Ogre Battle has had an extremely rocky road here in the United States. Either they sell out, or they don't sell at all. Thankfully now there's Ogre Battle for the Neo Geo Pocket Color ... but only in Japan!

When released on the Super Nintendo Entertainment System Ogre Battle was in limited supply. It sold out almost instantly and was never seen again on the S-NES. Years later the game was released again on the PlayStation, still in limited supply. But again, Ogre Battle sold well. So well that the game is still hard to find.

Thanks to Nintendo's lack of role playing games you'd think that Ogre Battle for the Nintendo 64 would have been a golden property. Alas the game sold poorly, and effectively ended the series (at least in the mainstream U.S.).

But hey, now there's Ogre Battle for the Neo Geo Pocket Color. Sure it's completely in Japanese, but it's still easy to navigate, and the game isn't really that difficult to play through. The game play is effectively the same, so if you have played the previous versions of the game you'll feel right at home. The battles are still fought by the computer, with you inserting the tarot cards where needed in battle.

Due to the fact that the game is completely in Japanese it's likely you will be forced to memorized the different tarot cards effects. This isn't too bad, because they all make sense when you really think about them. The one that looks like a devil does damage to the enemies, and so on so forth.

There is a lot of micromanaging here, but thankfully most of it is done visually, so it's not difficult to figure out what is going on. And did I mention that the graphics are amazing? The battles are filled with beautiful magic effects and animation (which you can turn off if you desire).

If you have tired of Evolution and Faselei then Ogre Battle Gaiden is the game for you. It's complex, but there is enough here to be one of the best strategy games for any portable system. Highly recommended.