Dungeon Magic: Sword of the Elements
| Dungeon Magic: Sword of the Elements | |
|---|---|
 North American box art | |
| Developer(s) | Natsume |
| Publisher(s) | Taito |
| Platform(s) | NES/Famicom |
| Release date(s) | |
| Genre(s) | Role-playing game |
| Mode(s) | Single-player |
Dungeon Magic: Sword of the Elements (ダンジョン&マジック, Dungeon & Magic: Swords of Element) is a first-person RPG (similar in vein to Bard's Tale and the various SSI D&D games) produced by Taito in 1989, and programmed by Natsume for the Nintendo Entertainment System.
Plot
500 years ago, the Kingdom of Granville fought a terrible war with Darces the Dark Overlord. A great hero, the warrior "Magi", rose to challenge Darces. He owned six magical swords and a powerful suit of armor that was impervious to all but the most powerful of magic. Five of his six swords were Elemental blades, each created from the rarest metals on earth. The sixth blade, "Tores", used an even more powerful metal.
Using his powers, Magi defeated Darces, and exiled him to a far away land. After defeating Darces, Magi grew old and died.
Now, on a dark, stormy night in the Kingdom of Granville, Darces the Dark Overlord returns to the land.
According to an old saying,
- "When the shadowed veil returns to mask the midday sun
- The Fire of Serpents will rise again; Five shall become the One.
- The elements now heed his call, and hope is born alive;
- We will have our peace once more when One becomes the Five."
Gameplay
Players explore towns looking for work and through dungeons looking for monsters to defeat. Job listings are posted through every guild. Players can also be apprenticed in elemental magic like wind, fire, water, and earth. The mighty castle of the realm can be found in one of the towns. The task of the game is explained by the elder at the start of the game.
Friendly non-player characters posing as villagers, merchants, and innkeepers either provide quest-related chatter to the player or charge a certain amount of gold in order to render some services. Food and water every time the player stops to rest at either a camp site or at an inn. Levels can only be gained by visiting temples at the right number of experience points and receiving a baptism from the priest.[1]
Players can choose to either save or not to save their game after staying for a night at an inn.[1]
Miscellany
One of the interesting aspects of the game was a magic system where a caster could combine runes from various elements to form new magic spells.
Each element had three unique runes, which allowed for 125 different spells. Unfortunately, many of those "different spells" are actually just fireball spells or curative effects. This game had no "magic point" system, so some spells drained the player's hit points instead.
References
- 1 2 Advance overview of Dungeon Magic: Sword of the Elements (Japanese) at SFC no Game Seiha Shimasho