Light Crusader

released on May 25, 1995

Fight your way through a dungeon of evil! Innocent people are vanishing victims of horrifying magic. You a master swordsman are challenged to save them! Only your sword and razor sharp mind will help you survive the lethal labyrinth rescue the people and save the kingdom! Brutal real time arcade style fighting against legions of gruesome and deadly dungeon monsters! Incredible 3-D graphics make the action real! Solve intricate 3-D puzzles or perish! Save up to four games so you can fully explore the expansive playing environment.


Reviews View More

Short and to the point Treasure game with all their funny quirks and sense of humor, at one point you encounter a lady which you think will be the typical character that changes the background music with a sweet melody but actually starts banging her hands all over the keys making a cacophony. The only NPC you can sell stuff to is a straight up cat, not an antropomorphic creature that speaks, just a cat that only meows yet seems to manage money. There's a point later in the game where some magicians are trapped in different dimensions and you get to fight world war 2 soldiers and a tank or even in feudal Japan and a futuristic setting with your european medieval armor, sword and magic.

I would have liked the villain to be more complex but the game is charming enough with its interesting atmosphere (which also extends to the experimental, ambiental soundtrack at points) without overcomplicating things (I'm looking at you, unnecesary time travel in Ultima I) that it reaches decent status

Cleared December 31st, 2023 (SEGA Genesis Challenge: 41/160)

Logging this game, I didn't really expect too much. In fact, my expectations have been decreasing given my records with RPGs on the Sega Genesis so far. The only exception was Beyond Oasis (and maybe Shadowrun) which would've stood as my favorite Sega Genesis game had it not been for Alien Soldier, so to find out that Treasure developed this game, I thought it actually had a reasonable shot at being at least 7 out of 10. So, unsurprisingly, I really enjoyed it.

The premise is that the town is suffering from civilians disappearing and as it turns out, there is a crypt hidden within the town's graveyard where evil lurks threatening the summoning of a demon lord to end all existence. An interesting premise, but given the ESRB rating is K-A (E for Everyone), don't expect anything too gruesome in the way it's told. Along the way, you meet kidnapped civilians and characters among the royals that will aid you through information to help you advance the story.

The combat is also rather simple as well. It's an asymmetric POV RPG which allows you to move 8 different directions for more fluent combat although the range of your sword can feel rather scuffed. The most interesting thing about it is the elements and how you can mix and match between different elementals which include Air, Fire, Earth, and Water. And it's not as simple as equipping them because since this is the developers of Gunstar Heroes we're talking about, they are going to find a way to allow you to mix and match elementals and this time, you can mix up to all 4 of them. There's a variety from simple spells like Wind Slash and Fireball to utility based spells like Heal, Guardian, or Shield. More niche and situational spells like Turn Undead and Cure. But then there's Judgement which allows you to perform an AoE attack that damages all foes on-screen. It's really cool to be able to mix and match different elementals which adds a layer to the game's combat mechanics although the game is remarkably easy.

Not just the enemies, but the hazards in this game feel rather inconsequential because you take a small amount of damage from things like spikes and flames and you just shrug it off like it never happened. Not helped that healing items come very abundant throughout the game (including a means to revive you) and your inventory capacity is really high. Likely for the best because sometimes the asymmetrical view can make precision when avoiding hazards at least when jumping very difficult.

This unfortunately makes the bosses in the game very easy too. It's cool to fight them and see them in action, but if you're stacked on steaks and pendants, you are never going to be in danger no matter how shit you are at video games.

Even the puzzles are surprisingly much easier to figure out compared to most other RPGs that I've played on the Sega Genesis. Sure there are some real thinkers, and a few of them you will need context clues. Hell, one of them I solved in the way the developer did not intend for me to. Basically, it was at the room where the rolling stones are first introduced. You're supposed to push a barrel to the elevator, then you roll the stone underneath it after standing on the button just as the stone is rolling. Then get off and the elevator stays where it is because the stone holds it up. The way I did it was that I took the one small stone cube in the room, positioned the barrel on it so that it stops the rolling stone at a certain point, move the barrel around so that I can push the stone without rolling it onto the cube, and then push the cube towards the point where the button is and have the stone hold the button while the barrel is on the elevator. Imagine my shock when I decided to look up how other people did it out of curiosity only to realize just how simple the solution really was. That said, I do not think of this as a bad thing as it's a fun way to challenge your problem solving skills without being insanely cryptic.

But I think what really makes the game really enjoyable for me is just the presentation. Being a late Sega Genesis game, it managed to find a way to push it's graphical capabilities to the limit which allows for really colorful and diverse setpieces especially once you get to Floor 5 which has you going to all sorts of places. And the music in this game is so good. Easily one of my favorites from the Sega Genesis line-up and really adds to the experience of the game.

And I just enjoy a few little interactions like how you can work the game's physics to push the literal king down the stairs and away from his throne, push the civilians around, push the cows around, and push those two elder people in the town to make it seem like they are talking to the walls. Having to stand on the table where the item is in order to buy it is so strange, but I find it so amusing. You can even spam arena fights with 3 goblins to get around 200 gold per victory which can be as simple as pre-emptively pushing off two goblins, whack the other goblin off the arena. Collect your gold, leave the room, come back, repeat multiple times and you can have more than enough money to max out your elemental quantity.

It's just a very easy game with some puzzle challenges here and there, and it's not very long either. You might not like that about the game, but I really don't mind. I think it would make a great RPG for anyone looking to get into the genre.

I wanted to like this more than I did. Light Crusader is basically a focused dungeon crawl, a game in which we hack, explore and puzzle our way through one giant labyrinth. I love those kind of games. But I think the usually reliable Treasure erred in the "realistic" art style that comes across as generic fantasy, and the combat is rather clumsy and unsatisfying. Some puzzles are too opaque, some bosses too simple. But for the most part, "serviceable" is how I'd describe this.

There are some good ideas in here, and I had a good time throughout, but the game doesn't really do anything to distinguish itself beyond the premise.

Played on Genesis Mini.

spoilers!

If I had to name my favorite dungeon tropes in games, I think the 'multi-floor world-dungeon' would be one of them: where the space that you traverse downwards (or upwards) is tied to the story that's being told. Nepheshel and its descent into the abyss is a particularly breathtaking example, as is the indie game Slimes and its frightening slime-horror-cave. ... Usually this trope is within the turn-based RPG genre. Now in those two games cases, they're relatively short.

But in other cases - like dungeon crawlers like Etrian Odyssey, Undernauts, Nemuru Mayu, Labyrinth of Galleria, SMT Strange Journey etc, the games are very long! And at least in Undernauts/SMT (I haven't played much EO, Nemuru Mayu, or Galleria), things get more involved the farther you go in. You really have to love the time-consuming dungeon crawl to enjoy the 'spatial story'.

Well, that is to say, I really liked Light Crusader trying to marry action elements to the dungeon crawl RPG. If I'm being honest its actual action and puzzles are maybe a 3/5 at best, but the whole world set-up - explore 6 floors underneath a castle, each its own huge dungeon - was a lot of fun. Each floor reveals some new secrets and twists, and although the game's narrative never reaches exciting territory, it was still such a memorable and fun structure. Also there were great tunes and Treasure's pixel art is amazing!

(Yes, the same studio that made Ikaruga made this!)

The action, like other games of the era, suffer from enemies having poor tells for ridiculously fast attacks. This game is isometric fake-3D, meaning it's hard to line up or dodge or jump over things. Your attack hitbox is really small, too.

There's a real 'small-team' feel to the game. Little one-off jokes here and there which I won't spoil. The way the late game floor has you warp off into 8 different zones with completely different genre settings - Japanese rooms, warzones, future, etc - was surprising. Unfortunately I wish they had done something more interesting with that other than just let you visit briefly! But it was still a fun surprise.

The way everyone talks is brief and almost stilted, but in a way that suits the tone - it's a small, scary medieval town and everyone's getting kidnapped. Things seem to be in a panic..

Well, also, it's just a short game. I finished in like 4-5 hours! I miss that length. The game is just trying so much, and using all these fun ideas, that it's hard to not give it a 5. It's a game with very good Spirit.

Back to the time when Isometric 3D was a peak.
Light Crusader is a cool game with charming graphics and good controls, and a interesting spell system. Enigmas are very pleasant to play too.
But the battle system is so bad and the ennemies have way too much HP it lessen the pleasure.

Treasure never misses, even when they try doing something completely different. This game is very strange in almost every aspect if you try to analyze it with the context of its release year and developer, considering this is a super late-life mega drive game, and the last game my personal favorite development studio, Treasure, made on the Mega Drive, which not only is the console that they got their start on, but also the console that they were able to push to its absolute limits with games like Gunstar Heroes, Alien Soldier, and Dynamite Headdy. And unlike most of treasure's other offerings, it doesn't seem to me like this game exists as a concept to be evolved into a later game (though I could be wrong as I have not yet played every game that the studio has made.) Unlike their previous anime-inspired action-packed explosion-fests that we are used to seeing on the system, this is a more western-looking isometric action RPG. There is one central dungeon to be cleared and you solve basic puzzles and fight enemies to progress and save a village, all rather standard fare for games of this caliber. The game plays well, allowing for 8 directions of movement in the isometric view to make movement easier (looking at you, landstalker), and there are still plenty of interesting graphical tricks like polygonal graphics in some sections, and lots of sprites with little to no slowdown, which is standard fare for Treasure. But I guess the blander aesthetics and slower-paced gameplay make this a bit more forgettable than their bombastic forebears. All in all though, this game was still a good time, it's just so different. Which honestly is just as much of a good thing as it could be a bad one.