Rumours are doing the rounds that Disgaea may be appearing on the iPhone. People are getting excited, but not me. I would dearly loved to see it, but I think it’s far more likely that any Disgaea that does appear will be a port of the “visual novel” Disgaea Infinite. Mark my words.

Instead, let’s all spend 59p to examine the roots of the SRPG genre with Megadrive classic Shining Force. It’s a simple emulation of the original game, with a terrible virtual d-pad that would ruin any game that wasn’t turn-based. Seriously, I’m completely comfortable with virtual pads and sticks these days, but kept finding myself moving in the wrong direction. It doesn’t matter one bit in a game like this, but it’s a bit, well, shit. Surely Sega could do better?

The game itself, though, seems lovely. I’ve never played it before, but the non-battle parts are so classically 16-bit RPG that I immediately found myself warmed by a comforting nostalgic glow. It even starts with you being woken up after passing out. Ah, the good old days!

Shining Force

I really like the little character portraits of everybody.

After wandering around talking to townsfolk, it was time for the first battle. A simple grid-based battle system that didn’t require any sort of glance at the instructions.

Shining Force

Yes! Attack! Attack with all your might!

I lost first time – if your character “dies” then you fail, but got through it second time. Then it was on to another battle, this one taking place on the world map. It’s really rather lovely and I spent much longer playing it than I thought I might. I really hope I can concentrate on this long enough to finish it. If not, at least I’ve now played one of the founding fathers of a genre that I love.