My fellow long-time veterans of RPGs may remember the Lufia series, which had two absolutely fantastic games on the Super NES and two follow-ups on Game Boy Color and Game Boy Advance. This month, Japan will see the release of a new Lufia game- or “Estpolis,” as it’s known over there- for the Nintendo DS, entitled Estpolis: The Lands Cursed by the Gods.
It’s made by the same guys who made the original SNES Lufia games, which is certainly promising. Based on the trailer, it appears that the game play has switched from the original turn-based system to more of an action RPG, though the puzzle element of the originals looks like it’s still present.
The SNES games (Lufia and the Fortress of Doom and Lufia II: Rise of the Sinistrals) were great games that never got the attention I thought they deserved in the US, overshadowed by better-known RPGs like the Final Fantasy series. The game play was a lot of fun, and the storytelling and (especially) the characters turned what initially seems like a standard-issue “save the world from the Evil Overlords who return every X years” plot into something really special.
The game will be out in Japan on February 25. I’d love to try this out, but so far I haven’t heard anything about a future US release and the series’ relative obscurity in this country doesn’t make me optimistic about the prospects for one. Still, here’s hoping.
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I loved the Lufia series as well. The music was on point. I’m hoping with you.
Oh, I loved the music. I used to put the first Lufia game on and just let it run so I could hear the intro sequence music over and over.
Too epic.