Phantasy Star on the Master System was way ahead of its time—this thing had first-person dungeons, animated monster sprites, and a proper sci-fi story when most RPGs were still doing generic fantasy. You start as Alis, out for revenge in this weird mix of medieval towns and space-age tech. The dungeons are brutal (bring graph paper), but there’s something satisfying about grinding your way through them with that chiptune battle theme looping.

Funny how this 8-bit game actually gives you party members with personalities instead of just silent hero types. Myaz’s magic feels overpowered until you hit the later areas, and Odin’s just there to hit things really hard. The translation patch cleans up the original Japanese script nicely—no Engrish here.

Still holds up if you can handle old-school RPG jank.