Brain Lord on SNES is one of those weird, underrated dungeon crawlers that starts off simple—just you, a sword, and some basic spells—but quickly turns into a puzzle-heavy maze where half the challenge is figuring out how to even reach the enemies. The first dungeon tricks you into thinking it's a straightforward hack-and-slash, then suddenly you're pushing blocks, dodging floor traps, and wondering if that random wall is actually a hidden door (spoiler: it usually is).

Combat feels a little stiff at first, especially compared to something like Zelda, but once you get used to the rhythm and start mixing in magic, it clicks. The real star here are the puzzles—some are clever, a few are downright cruel, and there’s always that one room where you swear the solution makes no sense until it suddenly does. Also, the music slaps in that classic SNES synth-dungeon way.

It’s not perfect—the translation’s a bit rough, and good luck figuring out some mechanics without trial and error—but there’s something charming about how it mashes together RPG tropes with puzzle-solving that actually makes you stop and think. If you’re into 16-bit dungeon crawlers with more brains than brawn, this one’s a hidden gem.