
	Platform TurboGrafx-16 Genre Action Publisher Victor Interactive Software Developer NEC ETA 1989
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The Legendary Axe

Flipping through a video game magazine in the late 1980s, readers would see no lack of adverts for TurboGrafx-16 games. One game in particular to stand out from the system's early library was The Legendary Axe. After constantly seeing ads for it months on end, the game became synonymous with NEC's console for me during that time. On the surface it looked like your standard side-scrolling action game, but there were some interesting little innovations to its gameplay that helped it stand out from the pack a bit better.

Simply looking at The Legendary Axe, some may have been tempted to write it off as a fairly run of the mill side-scrolling action game. Players controlled a barbarian named Gogan out to save his girlfriend, Flare, from an evil cult that has kidnapped her for a sacrifice to their deity. From there one set off on an adventure spanning six separate stages ranging from dark, murky forests, to mountain tops, to castles in search of Flare. All the while, enemies would pop up trying to stop Gogan, leaving players with no choice but to hack up these evildoers with Gogan's trusty axe.

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It was this combat that allowed The Legendary Axe to carve out a little niche for itself. Instead of just mindlessly swinging away at enemies, players had a strength meter at the top of the screen. The more full the bar was, the harder Gogan would hit an enemy. After the meter was depleted, it would slowly refill over time, and players would also come across potions now and then that could fill it even faster. With that, one

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had to use their brains when playing, deciding when a burst of short, weak attacks might work, and when slow, big strikes might be more appropriate. Given how a lot of other games in the genre during this time were relatively mindless hack fests, this attack meter was a welcome addition to the game.

From an aesthetic sense, the game hasn't aged all that well, even compared to a lot of its contemporaries. For its time, The Legendary Axe's visuals were decent, but still paled in comparison to what the Genesis was capable of, so we probably can't expect too much from the game in that regards. It's music was pretty decent, though.

As far as action games on the TurboGrafx go, The Legendary Axe was one of the system's better outings. This largely hinges on the axe-swinging strength-o-meter, but it was one heck of a nice feature to have at the time. It may not be the best looking classic nowadays, but it's still worth spending some time with.

Mr. Nash
May 22, 2011