Before Breath of Fire – years before Monster Hunter was an itch in Capcom’s balls – came Capcom’s first video game RPG, Destiny of an Emperor.

Picture this: It’s 1990. You’re standing in the video game aisle of Toys ‘R’ Us. Back then, there wasn’t much in the way of “video game media,” and the internet wasn’t in everyone’s pocket. Plus, you’re, like, 12. So you begged your parents to take you to the toy store and you obsessively read Nintendo boxes.

I remember this vividly, because it’s precisely how I first discovered Destiny of an Emperor. To my pubescent brain, the screenshots looked exactly like Final Fantasy. And I was obsessed with Final Fantasy. So, I’m sure I pestered my parents until they bought me Destiny of an Emperor that very day. (Because I was a kid, and I probably wouldn’t have shut up until they bought it for me.)

A TRUE STORY, AS SEEN ON TV

I had no idea what was happening in the game. The opening screens, which I’m sure I skipped, included info on Chinese history and character bios: Zhang Jiao. Yuan Shao. Guan Yu. Who were these guys? Who the fuck cares? I was a kid, and this was just Final Fantasy with weird names. What did I care about Chinese history?

Except, it wasn’t Final Fantasy. Instead of wizards or thieves, I was Liu Bei, descendant of the Han Emperor. And my mom said that meant my bros & me should go kill some rebels. (Sure, mom!) So I left the village, got into a random encounter, and was promptly turned into thin, red paste.

Unlike Final Fantasy’s slow, plodding, unforgiving combat, Destiny of an Emperor features quick, responsive, unforgiving combat. I could die far more quickly.

SORRY I FAILED YOU AS A SON

I remember being shocked to discover: death is not, in fact, the end of the game. To my young brain, it was mindblowing. No Game Over screen? No reloading a save file? I could just… continue playing?

You see, rather than playing as heroes getting stabbed in the face by monsters, you play as great generals (Liu Bei, Guan Yu, and Zhang Fei) who command hordes – armies of unnamed clodhoppers – to heroically join the face-stabbing distribution network. And if your soldiers run out of faces? Just run home to mom.

(Sorry, mom. I know I’ve disgraced our ancestors, mom. Wait, am I still talking about Destiny of an Emperor?)

Anyway, after mom scolds you for being so useless, you’re sent right back out to continue sending palookas to their deaths being great heroes. And you should stay at an inn so you can kidnap townsfolk in the night, impressing them into a short, painful life of military servitude so your dead soldiers can come back to life.

ROMANCING THE KINGDOMS

Much later in life, I learned that Destiny of an Emperor had been based on Hiroshi Motomiya’s manga, Tenchi wo Kurau. That, in turn, had been based on Romance of the Three Kingdoms – one of the great novels of Chinese literature.

It wasn’t the first game based on Three Kingdoms China. KOEI’s Romance of the Three Kingdoms had come out five years earlier, in 1985. But it was still years before KOEI’s Dynasty Warriors (1997) introduced most Westerners to totally-historically-accurate China.

What I’m saying is, there were no player expectations. So Capcom’s plan seemed to be “throw shit at the wall.” I’m not saying the game lacks cohesion; rather, it was Capcom’s first-ever home console RPG, so they tried a bunch of stuff without being sure what would work. Some decisions were spurious. Others were hugely innovative.

The game’s tactics system (basically, magic) mimicked how, in the book, river water could be rerouted and devastate an opposing army. That led to gameplay decisions: Do I attack a castle from the river side and use water tactics – but risk having them used against me, as well? Or do I risk a drawn-out land battle?

Also, there was the party structure. In battle, five of your generals faced up to five opposing generals. However! You could have up to seven generals in your party. This was super useful late in the game; in the rare two-stage battles, if you lost a dude or two in the first fight, their bros would show up for the second round. Oh, and Destiny of an Emperor invented Pokemon.

GOTTA CATCH ‘EM ALL

I admit to you, readers, that I’ve never played a Pokemon game. But I know the core concept: First released in 1996 (seven years after Destiny of an Emperor), your cute critters battle competitors’ cute critters to see who’s the best. And, much like in real life, you make new friends by using your balls. Destiny of an Emperor is sort of like that, except without your balls.

After you invade a castle and slaughter the locals, enemy generals are (usually) cut loose as freelancers. So you’ll be wandering across the countryside, trying to figure out where the Spork you’re supposed to go next, when Taishi Ci (who, at the last castle, probably killed thousands of your dudes) will walk up to you on the road and say, “’Sup.” Then will (probably) kill thousands more of your dudes.

And if you win the fight? Maybe he’ll join you. But – you need to bribe him. Instead of balls, you throw a pile of gold. Or, sometimes, they ask for a really nice horse. A really, really nice horse. (It’s lonely being a general.)

THE REAL EMPIRE WAS THE FRIENDS WE MADE

Also, there’s a fair amount of player choice. With so many generals to choose from, mid-game gives you plenty of options: will I storm forward with huge armies and lots of strength? Or will I burn the shit out of my enemies? Will I take a path east so I can get slaughtered a few times, or will I take a path west so I can die painfully, over and over, before emerging so overpowered that the forces to the east crumble at my feet? (You probably want to go east.)

Even today, I occasionally take different paths just to see what happens. Much of the map is fairly gated, but some challenges give you a few ways to approach them.

For example, the general Lu Bu is, like, a colossal asshole. How big an asshole? He murdered his patron to impress his future foster dad. Later, he killed his foster dad to impress some other folks. Do you (a) mercilessly crush Lu Bu every time you meet him, because he’s such an asshole? Or (b) actively recruit him because he’s really freaking strong, even though you just know he’s going to sell you out later? The choice is yours!

THERE MUST BE A RIVER NEARBY TO DO THAT

I love this game, I truly do. But like many early console RPGs, it has some serious flaws. Let’s start with tactics. Or strategies. (To increase confusion, the game uses both terms interchangeably.)

Bizarrely, Capcom didn’t translate tactic names – it transliterated them. What does that mean? Well… what does Lian Huo do? Da Re, perhaps? Oh, both of those are fire. Yin Xin? That’s healing, but it’s called something else in the game manual. And Ji Mian? Holy shit, Ji Mian.

Ji Mian negates all your physical attacks. It’s auto-hit, so it can’t be avoided. There’s only one counterspell in the game, and you usually don’t have it. And there’s only a small chance of it expiring on its own. Every other tactic in the game is pretty well balanced, but Ji Mian should probably just be called FYAD.

Also: you know the whole “dialog” thing? Conversations between two or more people? One person speaking to another? Yeah, the game doesn’t quite grasp it. There aren’t clear line breaks or name markers – no indications whatsoever of who is saying what. It really stands out during a pivotal scene: Liu Bei, encouraged by his generals, declares he should be emperor. And it’s complete gibberish: a wall of unbroken text. Imagine Macbeth arguing with himself about whether or not he wants to lead China. You get the idea.

Also, in the late game, Pokemon mostly becomes useless. At a certain point, you’re mostly locked into using the “historically accurate” generals. You can still recruit new generals, but you have limited opportunity to actually use them.

Once you’ve got Zhang Fei, Guan Yu, Zhao Yun, Ma Chao, Huang Zhong, and Zhuge Liang, the game makes it clear: these are your dudes. Use only them. They have the best stats and (usually) the biggest armies.

So I’d recruit generals like Zhou Yu and Taishi Ci, who have some of the coolest headgear in the game, and then I had no reason to use them. Zhou Yu can assassinate enemy generals! Taishi Ci is a total badass! Wei Yan was, historically, just as big a deal as Huang Zhong! And yet, their abilities get quickly surpassed by the “correct” generals. Alas.

LIFE IS LIKE A HURRICANE, HERE IN CHINA

I managed to write two full drafts of this before realizing I’d left out one of the most important details: the music. I’m sort of ashamed of myself, considering it’s always been one of my favorite parts of the game.

Destiny of an Emperor’s music was made by Hiroshige Tonomura. He’s no household name; he worked on only six Capcom games, and only two of them were for NES. But even if you’ve never heard of him, you’ll know his work:

Duck Tales.

That’s right. Destiny of an Emperor‘s music was composed by the guy who made The Moon.

And the music slams. Every track is an earworm. To this day, the Boss Battle Theme is one of my all-time favorite game tracks. (If I’m ever IRL invading a castle, you’d better believe it’s what I’ll be blasting.) And it’s hard to describe how powerfully the Second Overworld Theme hits after you’ve united Jingzhou and peace has (temporarily) spread across the land. In fact, it’s hard to describe how every track is so perfect, whether you’re combing through moist depths or simply buying shit.

IS IT WORTH PLAYING TODAY?

Destiny of an Emperor isn’t for everyone. It’s loaded with period-appropriate oddities – the menus are clunky, the translation is wonky, and the plot is obtuse (mainly because of the flawed translation).

But.

It’s also a very satisfying game to play. Each new castle, each new dungeon, feels like an accomplishment. So if you’re okay with some jank, it’s a great window into the start of Capcom’s RPG ambitions.

Also: for such a little-known game, Destiny of an Emperor has a surprisingly robust modding community. The hilariously-named Destiny of an Editor (available at niahak.org) allows nearly every aspect of the game to be edited: the generals and their stats, the text, even the game maps.

This has allowed the community to fix a few of the biggest issues. For folks wanting to play today, I recommend the DoaE 2.0 Patch, available at kongming.net. (Not to be confused with Destiny of an Emperor II, which also exists.)

From the patch’s description page (emphasis mine):

“This project’s objective was not to remake the story, but rather to make the game more challenging, accurate, accessible, and exciting. Numerous errors have been corrected, many fictional and less interesting officers (excluding classics) have been removed and replaced with a new fare from history.” Personally, I didn’t notice too much of a difficulty jump. The improved translation, and especially having the tactics in English, more than make up for the original’s nigh-incomprehensiveness.

TURN AND FACE THE STRANGE

On top of that, some modders have used Destiny of an Editor to create all-new stories. Remember that asshole Lu Bu? In The Rise of Lu Bu, a mod available at the lordyuanshu.com forums, you can be that asshole as he slaughters everyone he knows and loves. (It’s a comedy, run with it.)

The modding community seems to have peaked around 10 to 15 years ago, but if you dig around you’ll find lots of interesting fan games and patches. I still occasionally poke around various fan forums, just to see what new things people have found.

INSPIRED BY, BUT NOT ACTUALLY, TRUE EVENTS

Years later, I did learn more about the true history behind Destiny of an Emperor: the fall of the Han, the rise of warlords, and the reunification of China. I even read the unabridged Romance of the Three Kingdoms. All 2300 pages of it. It took months. There were hundreds of characters. And more than once, I found myself thinking back to playing Destiny of an Emperor – “Oh, I remember storming that castle!” Or maybe, “Wow, that was worse than I realized.” And more than once, “Christ, what an asshole.”

The biggest changes made to the story? Lieu Bei, the great hero, died a failure! Sima Yi never tried, or even wanted, to be emperor! And the climactic battle at the end, Zhuge Liang facing Sima Yi? It never even happened! Zhuge Liang got sick and died in camp while Sima Yi was stalling him.

Capcom was probably right to change the ending, though. Getting sick and dying in bed wouldn’t have been a very good boss fight. And Zhuge Liang’s other career made him happy, so there’s that.

I guess if you enjoy Three Kingdoms China and want a game about it, play Destiny of an Emperor. But if you want, like, actual history? Go read a book.

6/10

This review was conducted and screenshots were captured using Retroarch on Steam and a game ROM. The author also owns an original NES cartridge of the game, and can play it on his childhood NES whenever he damn well pleases. It was paid for, long ago, by the author’s parents.