The Tower of Radia (NES) Playthrough

A playthrough of Tecmo's The Tower of Radia for the NES.
The game shown in this playthrough is an unreleased prototype of a fully localized English-language version of Tecmo's Radia Senki: Reimeihen (ラディア戦記 黎明篇), a Famicom title released at the end of 1991.
The Tower of Radia is a narrative-driven action-RPG starring Ryu, an amnesiac who wakes up to find himself being ambushed by monsters in a forest clearing. He's rescued from this predicament by the wandering mage Leose, and once the dust has settled, the pair makes their way toward a nearby village. Once they arrive, things happen, vows are made, and we're whisked off on a grand RPG adventure.
The game is unique in how it combines Zelda-style adventuring with traditional RPG elements. As you wander the overworld, your party will enter into random encounters with monsters, but since the action happens in real-time, you only have direct control over Ryu himself. Your allies are controlled by the computer, but you can influence their behaviors with general orders. For instance, if a wizard is getting clobbered, you can command them to hang back and defend. If your melee-focused wrecking ball is struggling to elbow his way to the front line, you can direct everyone else to clear a path.
It's an ambitious and unique battle system that borrows pieces from several games, most notably Willow ( • Willow (NES) Playthrough ) and Final Fantasy Adventure ( • Final Fantasy Adventur... ), and it blends them into a something that feels far fresher and more modern than you might expect from an 8-bit cart. It's not perfect - the AI has the annoying tendency to get in your way - but given its age, everything works impressively well.
The rest of the game does, as well. The story is a fun mishmash of Ghibli tropes with a few genuinely surprising twists, the graphics and music are pretty nice throughout, and Tecmo's flair for the dramatic shines through in some of the bigger cutscenes.
The NES's popularity went into a sudden and steep decline following the launch of the Super Nintendo, so it's not surprising that the game never saw an international release. That's unfortunate because The Tower of Radia is a quality game, but even still, it's cool to be able to play this forgotten piece of Tecmo history in the modern day.
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No cheats were used during the recording of this video.
NintendoComplete (www.nintendocom...) punches you in the face with in-depth reviews, screenshot archives, and music from classic 8-bit NES games!

[@NintendoComplete]

Here's a fully localized but never released Tecmo RPG for the NES! Happy New Year!

[@dominickjustave3558]

Happy new year 😊😊😊

[@acrj-alfasaus4825]

happy… new year???

[@jonespianist3189]

Any thoughts on the old fan translation? Obviously it reads better, but how *accurate* is it?

[@NintendoComplete]

@jonespianist3189 I haven't played it, so I really can't say.

[@HylianFox3]

@@jonespianist3189 It's definitely worth a look if you're a fan of old-school JRPGs, but it's based on the Japanese version which has a few gameplay differences from the canned English version shown here. For one thing, all the party members move at the same speed, which makes the battles a bit more sluggish. As for the actual translation, it's quite accurate to the original Japanese, and is a bit less Engrishy than this. The only real issue is some of the character and place names may not be 100% accurate, but they're close enough (like "Fitzkerard" instead of "Fitzcarraldo")

[@krillwright]

this is so cute and since its never been released Im not surprised I've never heard of it. it's beautiful. thank you for posting it.

[@_zoinks2554]

Nice. I was wondering why I'd never heard of this. Has to be good from Tecmo.

[@devonwilliams5738]

Neat! There's hundreds of amazing games that just never left Japan for whatever reason, guess I'll have to look into grabbing this one.

[@az_esteemed]

Welcome back, Alex! Hope your inner batteries are recharged and ready to go for 2025.

[@NintendoComplete]

Thanks! :) Yup, I'm juiced up and ready!

[@Noel_573]

I played the fan translation a few years ago, unironically one of my favorite NES games

[@skyrunner14]

Something else very interesting about this game is the lead designer went on to create Klonoa, and several characters and concepts from Radia were re-used in those games, such as Lephice (named Reina in this proto), Ghadius/Gadius, Huepow, and even the nature of the game's world. In a weird way, it's almost like Tower of Radia is an alternate reality of Klonoa.

[@skyrunner14]

Adding on to this, Leorina would end up being a character in Klonoa 2. Given Radia ends on a pretty blatant sequel hook, one can't help but wonder how much of the unrealized Radia 2 ended up in the Klonoa games...

[@darkridearts]

Wow this looks incredible!!!

[@beatsinmycrates]

Played on emulator but always forget the title to go back and play it. All what u would expect from a tecmo game, greatness

[@HallyVee]

This battle system would have ROCKED back then. Like Ultima but real time.

[@01MrBLA]

The opening caught my attention, then when the gameplay started, I was weirded out. But this seems like a masterpiece. The battle system feels like an ancestor to Star ocean Didn’t expect that from the main character Soundtrack is nice

[@johnle6543]

Looks and plays like Final Fantasy Adventure. Never even heard of this adventure RPG for the NES.

[@MrVariant]

Some of these late nes games look good. I also think gbc was a bit of an nes renaissance with metal gear and daikatana.

[@geovaughan8261]

Damn this looks like an actual gem. I need to play this one.

[@muntheralimodhffar8768]

This first time I see this game it's so good

[@edparadis4371]

i remember this game ....too bad it never came to the us. this was a great rpg game. Temco and Capcom sure had a couple of great rpg games that need to be re released

[@NawHomee]

Similar sound effects and graphics to the Legend of Zelda oracle of Ages & Seasons😮

[@VahanNisanian]

Happy New Year, Alex. Hope things are still going strong for you.

[@NintendoComplete]

Thanks, man :) It's off to a good start! I hope things are going well for you, too.

[@EuSouRCS]

Excellent Famicom Game 💙💎💙

[@mariusamber3237]

Yup, this one's solid, too bad it wasn't released officially in the West, but I guess it really was late in the NES's life cycle. Doesn't help that it's an (action) RPG, a genre that wasn't that commonly localized at the time.

[@mnemonichotpocket]

Cool tower, bro

[@HylianFox3]

It's criminal that this game never released in the US. Sure, the official translation is rather bumpy, but it's still a good game with a decent story and characters. Few things make me laugh more than the hero saying "Another I?" when the doppelganger shows up.

[@jacob8586]

Radia Senki Reimeihen..Great game.

[@brandonvillamizar1216]

The music is as good as in any Ninja Gaiden

[@RPG_Guy-fx8ns]

They should have released this.

[@jeremydavidson1420]

shame this game didnt get a release here in the usa cause it looks pretty fun.

[@juanmarquez-e9f]

Sick

[@pixelgoat7317]

2:06 Ryu: ....One name comes to mind.....I am RYU. Yes, Ryu HAYABUSA! Ninja of the Wind!! ....wait, no....

[@Dorian_Scott]

Welcome back, Alex. How's the new year going for you so far?

[@NintendoComplete]

So far so good, thanks. How about yours?

[@Dorian_Scott]

@@NintendoComplete It's alright, I guess.

[@mateusbertolaccini2224]

Ótimo jogo

[@acrj-alfasaus4825]

ninja gaiden like ost

[@Ragnarok182]

Strange, I feel as if I played this game before, but under a different name for some reason?

[@HosseinAnsari-wc4ws]

If it overmake with high garffic become perfect

[@davidspyro]

Is there a rom of this prototype?

[@HosseinAnsari-wc4ws]

It is very good game but without quality

[@PaladinLarec]

That last boss is poorly designed imo. You just have to stand there and take its hits and hope you have enough healing options left. I hate when RPGs do that. Funny that Tecmo recycled the tower idea at the end with the cinematic from Ninja Gaiden. Looks almost identical.

[@ezg8448]

This game needs to be played at 2X or 3X speed!

[@SmeeHal]

This game looks... I dont know... heavy in its gameplay. While it looks and sound great, it just seems incredibly boring. This game is more of an acquired taste.

[@therealseanw.stewart2071]

Hold up, another cool game from Tecmo that I'm somehow unfamiliar with? This action RPG looks really nice.

[@Dorian_Scott]

Never even heard of this one before. But yeah, the quality seems to be on par with Tecmo's other releases for the NES.