SD Sengokuden - Kunitori Monogatari is one of those weird little Game Boy gems that flew under the radar. It's a chibi-style strategy RPG where you control tiny samurai warlords battling for control of feudal Japan—except everyone looks like they stepped out of a super deformed anime. The first time I booted it up, I wasn't sure if I was looking at historical figures or angry toddlers in armor.

Gameplay's surprisingly deep for a Game Boy title—you move units across a grid map, capturing castles and recruiting more troops. The rock-paper-scissors combat feels simple at first, but positioning and terrain actually matter more than you'd think. I kept getting wrecked by enemy cavalry until I figured out how to bait them into forests where they couldn't charge properly.

It's entirely in Japanese, but the icons and menus are intuitive enough that you can muddle through. Just don't expect to understand the story unless you're fluent—my playthrough basically amounted to "small man yell at other small man before they bonk each other with spears." Still weirdly addictive once you get the hang of it.