Think about that. The Dynastic Hero costs as much any of today's consoles. As one of the TurboGrafx-16's final CD-ROM releases, very few copies were ever produced, and The Dynastic Hero is arguably the rarest game in the TG-16's library. This, combined with the fact that TurboGrafx fans are very rich and mostly insane, makes for a very expensive game.
No doubt to the chagrin of these collector types, the unwashed masses can now enjoy The Dynastic Hero courtesy of the Wii's Virtual Console service for the low cost of eight robust American dollars. But even at a three hundred and ninety dollar discount, is The Dynastic Hero worth the investment?
The main problem lies in the fact that The Dynastic Hero is already available elsewhere in the Virtual Console's library. Sort of. See, it was originally part of Sega's Wonder Boy series of action-RPG platformers, and...actually, just read up on the whole Wonder Boy debacle here (courtesy of the human knowledge database that is Chris Kohler), if you want. It's not important, and it's really not all that interesting. The short story: Hudson acquired the rights to several Wonder Boy titles for release on the TurboGrafx-16 in the early '90s, and rebranded them as their own creations with new characters and storylines.
The Dynastic Hero, then, is a TurboGrafx port of Wonder Boy in Monster World for the Sega Genesis, which was released on the Virtual Console back in April. The differences between both titles are minimal. If you own Monster World, you already own The Dynastic Hero. Don't waste your money on both.
The Dynastic Hero might be worth a look if you haven't already bought Monster World, though. As a sequel to Dragon's Curse on the TG-16 (also available on the Virtual Console), The Dynastic Hero features similar jump-and-slash gameplay in the context of a side-scrolling RPG. You'll talk to townspeople, beat up monsters for money, and buy new equipment and weapon upgrades in order to facilitate dungeon crawling and treasure hunting.
Unlike Dragon's Curse, though, The Dynastic Hero doesn't really evolve the Wonder Boy series' core gameplay at all. In fact, the game's early stages feel like a remake of a previous game in the series -- Wonder Boy in Monster Land -- in their simple structure and linear goals. There's a few attempts to add console-style nonlinearity, but these mostly come in the form of impassible doors that can only be unlocked later in the game. Worse, these roadblocks can sometimes only be seen after hacking through a gauntlet of tough enemies, all of whom respawn after discovering that you need to backtrack. Whereas Dragon's Curse made gameplay interesting by allowing the player to turn into different creatures with different abilities, The Dynastic Hero's nonlinearity often amounts to grinding and backtracking.
It can be entirely unfun and a genuine pain in the ass in parts (including an excruciating puzzle early in the game which requires memorizing several long strings of button presses), but The Dynastic Hero is still compelling enough in its own right, and may be worth a look for those who were left wanting more by Dragon's Curse. If you don't already have Dragon's Curse, buy that instead. If you want its sequel...well, Monster World on the Genesis has slightly more detailed graphics and parallax scrolling, and The Dynastic Hero comes with CD-quality audio and the smug satisfaction that you didn't have to pay $400 for it.
Personally, I'd buy the Genesis version, if you plan to buy either. The music composition's better on the Genesis anyways, CD audio be damned. I'm kind of Genesis-biased, though, so maybe my opinion shouldn't be trusted. Check out these videos and decide for yourself.
Here's Wonder Boy in Monster World:
And here's The Dynastic Hero:
See? Same game. Flip a coin and buy one. Or don't! The choice is yours, but you must choose wisely.
