THE LIBRARY

Seventeen Super Nintendo and Super Famicom role-playing games, cover first, with the Japanese and Western boxes side by side wherever both exist, and the missing Western boxes named as missing.

One hero from birth to fatherhood: monster recruitment, the marriage choice, and 1.3 million copies sold in a single day in Japan.

Because Horii built a life, not a quest: the father searches, the son answers, and the party spans thirty years.

Heartbeat's first entry in the series, two worlds that explain each other, and the trilogy ending America waited fifteen years to read.

Wolf Team's singing cartridge: a rejected Enix pitch, a Namco contract, and a staff walkout that founded tri-Ace.

A 48-megabit cartridge, a sound system called Flexible Voice Drive, and Yukari Yoshida singing Yume wa Owaranai.

The cancelled CD-ROM launch title, the forty percent that was cut, and the three-player action RPG that resulted.

Square and Nintendo's 1996 collaboration: the making, the SA-1 chip, timed action commands, the scores, and the two series it started.

Neverland's prequel built out of puzzles: Maxim's first war against the Sinistrals, the IP skills, the 99-floor Ancient Cave, and the scores.

Capcom's first traditional RPG: Inafune's characters, the Square Soft American release and Woolsey translation, the scores, and the series it founded.

The direct sequel 500 years on: town building, shaman fusions, the church that eats prayers, its famously rough translation, and the scores.

Yasumi Matsuno's branching war story: the making, the massacre choice, the ports that carried it West three years late, the scores, and the legacy.

Matsuno on record: the Yugoslav Wars on the evening news, the fall of the Berlin Wall, and Queen, with interpretation labeled Tier 2.

Tokita's seven-era omnibus RPG: seven heroes, seven manga artists, Shimomura's first major score, its Japanese failure, and its worldwide remake.

A 270,000-copy disappointment, a localization chief's on-record doubts, fallen-through revivals, and the HD-2D style that finally unlocked it.

Quintet's resurrection epic: raising the continents, reviving life itself, its Japan and PAL releases, the American release that never happened, and the scores.

Enix closed its US branch before localization finished; Nintendo published it in Europe instead, and the rights tangle that froze it for thirty years.

Square's newcomer team and its dragons you raise but do not control: the making, the Japan-only release, its fan translations, and the scores.

Five Super Famicom games Square never sent West, cover first, with the missing Western boxes named as missing.

Ishii and Tanaka's six-hero Mana sequel: three heroes chosen from six, light or dark classes, Kikuta's score, and its 2019 arrival as Trials of Mana.

Planned in 1995, cancelled in 1996 over bugs, cartridge space, and cost, and released as Trials of Mana just under twenty four years later.

Kawazu's Free Scenario System: eight protagonists, no experience points, a million Japanese copies, and a 2005 remake as its first Western door.

Tsuchida and G-Craft's wanzer tactics game: Square said no robots, Amano drew the cover, and 500,000 Japanese copies followed.

The West started at part three in 2000; the wanzer original arrived twelve years late, expanded, on the Nintendo DS.

Square Osaka's fifteen days before the end of humanity, built around a mantra system in which players write their own spells.

Prefix, elemental core, suffix: the mantra language explained, from learning spells off enemies to the coding problem that blocked translation.

Sting's first game and Square's last published Super Famicom title: pre-rendered sprites, Action Point tactics, and seven composers.

The Rudras was the last Square developed; Treasure Hunter G was the last Square published, seven weeks later. Both claims are true.

Quintet, the studio: ActRaiser, Soul Blazer, Illusion of Gaia, Terranigma, and Robotrek, cover first, with the boxes side by side and the histories behind them.

Quintet's first game: the god simulation and action hybrid, God renamed The Master for the West, Yuzo Koshiro's score, and 620,000 copies.

Quintet's resurrection system: a king sells his kingdom soul by soul, Lisa and Dr. Leo, the best reviews on the shelf, and no re-release in any form.

Moto Hagio draws and Mariko Ohara writes Will's tour of the real world's ruins, Nintendo published in the West, and 650,000 copies, Quintet's biggest sale.

Quintet's comedy RPG: invent three robots and send them out in capsules, Slapstick in Japan, average scores, and only 65,000 copies.

Morrowind, both Knights of the Old Republic games, Fable, Jade Empire, Dark Alliance, and the two Japan only prints, Shin Megami Tensei: Nine and Metal Wolf Chaos: the verified covers, the honest gaps, and the histories behind them.

The History: Bethesda builds one island by hand, ships the Construction Set, and puts a PC epic on the Xbox.

The History: BioWare's first Star Wars RPG, the Revan twist, a 93 on Metacritic, and the road to Mass Effect.

The History: Obsidian's first game, Kreia's deconstruction of the Force, and a sequel made in fourteen months.

A date moved up from 2005 to December 2004, penalties for missing it, a cut planet, and the fan mod that put much of it back.

The History: Project Ego, Peter Molyneux's promises, a hero whose body keeps the score, and 375,000 copies in a week.

The History: BioWare's dream project and first original world, an 89 on Metacritic, and the launch window that sank it.

Greg Zeschuk's on record answer: Microsoft's advice to ship at the end of the original Xbox's life, in his words the stupidest thing ever.

The History: Snowblind's console reinvention of Baldur's Gate, PlayStation 2 first in 2001 and Xbox in 2002, and the engine that powered Champions of Norrath.

The History: Atlus's Japan only Xbox RPG, announced as Shin Megami Tensei Online, nine alignments, and a cancelled online half that became Imagine.

The History: FromSoftware's Japan only mecha game, a president in a mech suit, and English voices recorded for a release that never came.

FromSoftware's own 2018 answer, the end of the Xbox's cycle, and the 2016 tweet that brought it back as XD.