Gemfire (1992) NES Game Review

War is brewing in the kingdom of Ishmeria! It’s up to you to bring peace to the people by uniting the kingdom under one banner. Whoever manages to overthrow the evil king and take over every territory is crowned the ruler of the land! This isn’t your mama’s crown, either: the titular Gemfire is a magic crown encrusted with jewels that summon powerful wizards, witches, and dragons to your beck and call. So yeah, it’s a pretty big deal. There’s also a princess to save in the middle of all this, but she only shows up at the very beginning and the end of the game, so don’t worry about it.

As is the case with many KOEI games, Gemfire‘s gameplay consists of micromanaging your kingdom(s) via keeping track of lots stats and numbers as you plan your strategy to take the land for yourself. Make money through cultivating your crops and keeping the people happy, and pour your hard earned funds into hiring soldiers to wage war with your nasty neighbours. This is all done through the same few menu’s, and while the game’s UI is much prettier than the plain black screen 99% of Nobunaga’s Ambition took place on, there’s a good chance this lack of visual stimulation will turn off a lot of players who don’t know what they’re getting into. Not me, though. I FUCKING LOVE micromanaging things through menu’s and formulating plans to claw my way to the top, and I would have never known this oddly specific fact about myself if not for KOEI games. I guess I should thank them.

Gemfire was the first KOEI strategy game to be specifically designed with the home console market in mind, as opposed to being a port of a pre-existing PC game. It really shows, because it’s much, much simpler and easier than their other meaty historical strategy titles. When it comes to combat, it plays like your typical strategy RPG. The twist here is that while most SRPGs tend to be relatively difficult, the AI armies in Gemfire are some of the stupidest, most airheaded enemies I’ve seen in any game. You could probably have your team stay still for five turns and somehow still manage to beat them six ways from Sunday. This is the only part of this strategy game that takes zero strategy.

The lack of difficulty doesn’t make Gemfire bad, though; rather, it makes for a surprisingly relaxing game of waging war. It still manages to carry the same maddeningly addicting quality other KOEI games do for me though; put me in front of one of ’em and you won’t hear a peep out of me for days. And that’s no exaggeration: for three days solid, every moment of my free time went into Gemfire. My life was a blur of war mongering and back stabbery, and it totally ruled (pun intended).

In case that didn’t make it obvious, I had a blast with Gemfire. If I had to be really picky, I would’ve liked for it to have been on the same level of intricacy that KOEI titles are known for, but that’s a nitpicky complaint; it’s still an excellent game that I’d be happy to play again in the future. Aside from the lack of depth, I genuinely have no complaints about Gemfire whatsoever. Hey, first time for everything!

It may not be for everyone, but if you’ve got any interest in in-depth strategy games, give Gemfire a look. One read of the manual should be enough for even beginners to this genre to springboard off of, and you won’t be disappointed with the fantastical web that follows. It’s surprisingly tough to talk about games I actually liked, so just take my word for it and check it out! It’s rad, I swear!

Final Rating: