I'm kind of obsessed with the PC Engine's HuCard-based RPGs at the moment

Did you know that only a handful--as in, less than 20--of RPGs were released for the PC Engine in HuCard format?

The reasons for that seem obvious enough, of course--with the compact console's "CD-ROM2" attachment, which allowed developers to use higher quality music and cut scenes, hitting Japanese store shelves barely a year after the base system's release being the biggest one.

Dungeon Explorer

Were CD games cheaper to manufacture than HuCards? If so, that would be another reason.

Regardless, the lack of chip-based RPGs at least somewhat surprises me, especially when I remember how many games of that genre found their way onto Famicom cartridges and disks.

Jaseiken Necromancer

In a way, though, I'm kind of glad so few HuCard RPGs saw the light of day on the PC Engine, because it means it'll be far easier to play through them--you know, should I ever decide to do something stupid like that--than it would be to, say, play through every Famicom or Super Famicom (or even PC Engine CD) RPG.

Don't worry, I'm not planning to make that a goal anytime soon, although I am planning to pop two or three of them into my trusty PC Engine Core Grafx II sometime in the next few (OK, six or seven) months.

Necros no Yosai

The most like candidates: Cyber Knight, Dungeon Explorer, Jaseiken Necromancer, Necros no Yosai and War of the Dead.

Should any of you be curious as to the names of the other HuCard RPGs of which I'm aware, here you go: Cadash, Double Dungeons, Lady Sword, Makai Hakkenden Shada, Momotarou Densetsu II, Momotarou Densetsu Gaiden, Momotarou Densetu Turbo, Neutopia, Neutopia II, Silent Debuggers, Spiral Wave and Susa-no-Oh Densetsu.

Neutopia 2

Only a couple of these could be called traditional RPGs with turn-based battles and such, mind you. A good portion of them are action role-playing games of some sort or other, and a similar number are dungeon crawlers.

If I left any HuCard-based RPGs off of the lists above, by the way, please let me know about them in the comments section below, as I wouldn't be at all shocked to hear I've missed a couple.

R.I.P. H.R. Giger

You may wonder why a gaming blog is offering up condolences regarding the sad and untimely death of Swiss artist H. R. Giger yesterday.

For starters, I'm doing so because I've been a big fan of Giger's work since I first encountered it while watching what has become one of my favorite films, Aliens. (Giger was responsible for the design of the eponymous creature that has been the focus of all four Alien movies.)

Each of the Alien films has spawned a number of video-game adaptations, of course, so I think Giger's death is well worth noting here for that fact alone--despite the fact that few, if any, of said adaptations have been all that enjoyable.

Another reason I'm noting and commemorating Giger's death here: his surreal designs were utilized in a handful of games over the years--Cyberdreams' spooky, point-and-click PC games, Dark Seed and Dark Seed II, as well as Hudson's Jaseiken Necromancer, a gory (for its time) PC Engine RPG, among them.

I've actually owned a copy of Jaseiken Necromancer for some time now (the photo above is of my own HuCard), but I've yet to play it because of the language barrier.

Maybe I'll finally pull it and my PC Engine Core Grafx II out soon and give them a go in honor of Giger's life. And, who knows, maybe I'll even use the experience as an excuse to re-start my Japanese studies?

Five PC Engine games I'm going to (attempt to) play once I've learned enough Japanese

Could it be said that I'm getting ahead of myself here? Yes, it could. The fact is, though, that the possibility (slim as it may be) that I may someday learn enough Japanese to play any of the following PC Engine games is what's driving my studies at the moment, so I'm OK with this "getting ahead of myself" business.

So, which previously inaccessible (well, except for in the case of one of the games below) am I itching to stumble my way through, Japanese-to-English dictionary in hand, at some point in the future? Read on to find out.

1. Laplace no Ma--I'm including this Human-developed Super CD-ROM title here for one reason and one reason only: it's one of the few horror-themed dungeon-crawlers I've come across. Considering it's a CD-based game, I'm guessing it's stuffed full of kanji (the most difficult of Japan's alphabets), which would make things quite a bit trickier, but I don't care. That said, let's see if I'm still this cavalier if and when I find myself staring at its title screen.

2. Madou Monogatari--To be completely honest, I'd already own this Arcade CD-ROM title--lack of Japanese knowledge be damned--if it weren't for one little thing: it's sky-high price. It's supposed to be a pretty great game, though, and it's surely an adorable one, so maybe I'll reward myself for reaching a particularly daunting educational milestone by picking up a copy (assuming I can find one).

3. Necromancer--I've heard that this HuCard-based RPG is a bit rough around the edges and features far too many random battles, but I've long wanted to give it a go anyway because of its dark theme and because of its H.R. Giger-inspired box art (which can be seen here).

4. Pro Tennis World Court--A weird choice, no? Especially since I could play the English version of this game (known as World Court Tennis) whenever I want. The thing is, that iteration's localization is absolutely atrocious, while its Japanese counterpart is supposed to feature lots of "loony, in-jokey dialogue," so I'd really like to experience the game as it was originally intended.

5. Tengai Makyo II: Manji Maru--True story: I bought a copy of this game all the way back when I was in high school, when I still owned a TurboGrafx-16 system (along with the bulky CD-ROM attachment, thank you very much) and obsessed about grand Japanese RPGs such as this one. Sadly, GameFAQs was but a twinkle on someone's eye at the time, so I barely put a dent in it before raising the proverbial white flag. Like the other CD-based games mentioned here, this one is chock-full of kanji, so it's likely to continue to stump me for some time to come, but I'll give it my best all the same.

Honorable mentions: Dragon Knight II and III, Record of Lodoss War, Seiya Monogatari: Anearth Fantasy Stories and War of the Dead.

Note: the Laplace no Ma, Madou Monogatari and Necromancer screenshots above were taken from shinjuforest.blogspot.com and thebrothersduomazov.com.