Introduction

For those of you unfamiliar with "Legend of Wukong" it's a Sega Genesis (Mega Drive) role-playing game released in 1996. At the time it was only released in China. In 2008 a North American company ,Super Fighter Team, translated and localized it. This was the second Genesis game to be released in the U.S. this decade (the first being their own Begger Prince). Upon purchase Legend of Wukong comes complete with the 16-bit game cartadge, instruction manual and clamshell case, just like buying a Genesis game back in the 90's. This was my first time buying something like this. It works with any Genesis or Mega Drive system. I played it on my CDX.

Story

You may be familar with the popular Chinese folktale "Journey to the West" which depicts the adventures of Sun Wukong known also as The Monkey King. Legend of Wukong borrows elements from this story but remains completly unrelated (similar to the Dragon Ball series.) You start off as the rambunctious boy Wukong who accidently gets sent back to ancient China in your Doctor friend's newly built time machine. Upon arrival the time machine is stolen by a nasty monster king. It's Wukong's mission to retrieve it and get back to his own time. Pretty simple. Along the way Wukong is accompanied by 2 other travelers. A pig looking guy appropriately named Pigsy and the beautiful sword weilding Wujing. Don't expect an epic story. It's simple, lighthearted and doesn't develop much. The characters don't develop much either, which isn't necessarily a bad thing. It would feel out of place for any drastic character changes. Other than Pigsy's somewhat disturbing atempts to hit on Wujing the character interactions are practically non-existent. The intro is a nice touch with some still panels. It sets you up for the quirky little adventure and I was expecting to see more like it during key story events. Unfortunatly there are no other cutscene like it until the end, and even then it was disapointing.

Gameplay

It's your standard fare of RPG gameplay mechanics. Turnbased, world maps, equipment, dungeons, random encounters etc... The game consists of 6 Chapters. Each chapter has it's own seperate world map, towns and dungeons. You can not go back to them once you've finished the chapter, but why would you. After talking to the townsfolk you should get a pretty good idea of what needs to be done. However this becomes a problem in the later part of the game. For some reason the townsfolk stop being helpful making your objectives more vague. In the last two chapters I found myself wandering around from towns to dungeons just trying to figure out where to go. Navigating the world map and towns often feel like mazes since the tinest bush will obstruct your path. Also there is no map system. Later Wujing obtains a spell called "Travel Cloud" which lets you warp to towns and dungeons you've previously been to in that chapter. No side quests or secret items (at least none that I know of) making it extremely straightforward. Without any important missable items or scenes this drops the replay value significantly.

Random encounters are about every 4 seconds and for the most part pretty quick. You have your basic RPG options of Attack, Magic, Item, & Run. Your physical attacks have two options: Single & Multiple. Single is for a single hit while the Multiple option will have everyone after that person automaticly attack one enemy until it dies. This helps speed up the flow of battle. Each character has their own unique magic spells, which are a treat to watch. You'll learn new spells about once every 5 levels. Besides healing spells the older ones become useless. They always do the same amount of damage. So if a spell does 20 HP of damage at the start of the game it'll do 20HP of damage at the end. Characters can hold around 20 items each. Managing your items is a bit of a pain and a little clunky. You aren't given any indication is the armor or weapons you're buying or equiping are stronger than what you have. You'll have to equip it then go to your stats to see if it raised it or not. Expect to waste a little by doing this money.

Now for my biggest complaint about the game, the difficulty. It's very uneven and the game actually gets easier along your journey. At the start of the game when you only have Wukong in your party it's a challenge, but a nice challenge. He dies, game over. I like RPG which are unforgiving. The very first boss is the hardest part of the game. I recommend lots of power leveling before trying to fight him. Once you get Pigsy things lighten up a little. You max out at level 50 so once you reach it there's not much reason to fight other than money. So if you don't need money just run. You can't run in the last dungeon. The final chapter is way too easy in terms of bosses. The last several bosses can be defeated in just a few turns, making them just as difficult as normal fights. The final boss fight was extremely disappointing. Sorry if that's a spoiler but it must be said.

Graphics & Sound

The visuals are nothing amazing but if you're intrested in retro games then it shouldn't be a problem at all. The main characters are clean but some of the NPC sprites look messy. Enemies are varied. You'll run across some nice looking enemies and some that are down right ugly. Bosses generally look good, some are goofy. Another graphical complaint I have is about enemy death animations (if you can call it that.) Once you defeat an enemy they flicker a little then vanish almost like the game is glitching out. Not a big deal but it looks cheap.

The music is good and very catchy. It's got the eastern Chinese sound that fits right in with the setting. I still got the town theme stuck in my head. My only problem is there isn't enough of it. One battle theme for the entire game, that includes normal fights, bosses and the final boss.The SFX department gets the job done, but overall lacking. The menu select SFX is little annoying making a "GRAWK" kinda noise.

Conclusion

It's difficult to review a game like Legend of Wukong. By what standards to you hold it by? Even when it was released originally back in 1996 it wasn't on par with the RPGs at the time. The presentaion felt like a Master System game rather than a Genesis game. But really does it matter? If you enjoy old-school RPGs then simply put this is a treat. What makes Wukong so satisfying is the fact that this wasn't avalible until 2008. It was a thrill just to play a game that not many people have played or for that matter know exist. If this game came out when the Genesis was hot I don't think it would be as satisfying now. Still, I enjoyed it and look forward to future Super Fighter Team games. Lets see more.

-- Jared

For more info on how to purchase Legend of Wukong visit:http://www.legendofwukong.com/