MY NOTE OF GEMFIRE

Gemfire... one of the elite games of Sega Genesis. Unlike Phantasy Star, Rings of Power, Landstalker, Shining Force etc ... it is a FULL strategy game. Not really any RPG in it except for making your leader a little stronger with items you can find throughout the game.

Gemfire takes place on the magical and peaceful land of Ishmeria, where happiness and love was frequent and prosperus... until the fire dragon came to challenge the six wizards that guarded it!

Four scenarios to play, some things may be confusing because you only get any serious storyline at the BEGINNING of each actual scenario, but I have tried my best to follow it throughout the four scenarios. ORIGINALLY obviously everything comes down to the main scenario, GEMFIRE.

But you are a player, not a story reader. The best scenario to play is the first one, where you have the face the king in his best form and largest armies and controlled lands!

That is exactly the point. Scenario one is what STARTS everything, and Erin and Ander are the easiest and most fun characters to control if you like having the largest armies instead of starting from scratch.

The battle system is like many strategy army games. You control a force of Horsemen, Knights, Swordsmen, and Archers. Also as most families have, not all but most have, a 5th unit automatically from the gem that they have been entrusted with, a wizard! For example as you see here, this is Prince Erin fighting Lord Seth for control of the province Hyland. You may see this is ZENDOR, Erin's wizard that he has from the emerald gem. 5th units usually have better ability/life force/ and better attack power than most original army units, especially when the armies are in weak numbers such as this example, 33 horsemen, 33 of every army that Seth is controlling. Zendor with one lightning spark will probably take one whole force out with his lightning. But Seth is controlling a 5th unit also, the Supreme Sorcerer of all the wizards, PLUVIUS! He shoots meteors from the sky and does some powerful damage. As figured, he can also probably take out a whole force of Erin's with one attack.

But my note on this game.....

Gemfire is an underrated strategy game, said to be a back door game of the company who made it, KOEI. Koei has always relied heavily on their Chinese style games, Romance of the Three Kingdoms. They have definately made a huge profit off all thier Romance games, and I presume being how Gemfire's sales were horrid compared to Romance of the Three Kingdom's sales... that is why they pursued on with their Kingdoms series instead of Gemfire.

Romance of the Three Kingdoms has way huger amounts of options compared to Gemfire, but why is this? Because they put more work into Kingdoms than Gemfire! Gemfire shouldn't be touched I admit, it is just easy and fun enough to play again and again... but if they would have made Kingdoms in the style of Gemfire, no one would have liked it. This reason is because Kingdoms COULDN'T be downgraded in options like Gemfire, otherwise it would be a terrible game! Gemfire in this position is A SPLENDID basic strategy game which can provide hours of enjoyment. The point is Gemfire is another one of those BEGINNING games that a gaming company made, like Rings of Power was to Naughty Dog, and yet it is one of the best games of all time. Surprising isn't it? NO IT'S NOT! Their beginning thoughts, at the writer and companies' peaks, I think is some of their most FRESH ideas that should perhaps be considered more in even the larger market. I'm not saying Gemfire should be a modern game, I'm saying maybe the characters and storyline could be in a position like a game like DYNASTY TACTICS.

This being said... it will never happen. But that is ok, that is why we have Gemfire on Sega Genesis, for it to be original and GRAND! LONG LIVE GEMFIRE!