‘But where is Aphrodite now?'

In 1987, after several years of developing only arcade-oriented titles, Data East sought to diversify its catalogue by exploring new genres. One of these new forays was Shinjuku Chūō Kōen Satsujin Jiken (1987), which introduced the prolific Jingūji Saburō series, better known to Westerners as Jake Hunter. At the same time, the company, like many others, decided to emulate the success of Dragon Quest (1986) by releasing its own version. Heracles no Eikō was thus born under opportunistic auspices, and turned out to be a title that copied the very broad ambitions of the Enix series, while injecting a bit of Greek mythology, but failed to establish a true identity for itself.

     An inability to incorporate Greek mythological references

The use of Greek material in Japanese video games is not new. In the strict context of RPGs, Courageous Perseus (1984) and Argo (1986) were pioneers, the former released in the archaic period of Japanese RPGs, several years before Dragon Quest and a few months before Hydlide (1984). Just as these games featured well-known heroes from Greek mythology in epics that were only vaguely based on their stories, here the player takes on the role of Herakles, whose goal is to rescue Aphrodite from the clutches of Hades. He has decided to send a horde of monsters to ravage Greece and conquer the world. Herakles must therefore open a passage to the Underworld in order to defeat the God of the Dead, fighting a series of mythical monsters, alluding to his twelve labours.

The world of Heracles no Eikō is effectively generic and abstruse. Neither the geography nor the graphics are reminiscent of heroic Greece, and the colourful buildings hardly resemble the shimmering roofs the tourist might see on the Aegean islands. The architecture itself is more reminiscent of late medieval Italian style: it takes a certain amount of abstraction to remember that the adventure is supposed to take place in Greece, and only the rare mentions of Attica, Paros and other real regions – among other names that have nothing to do with Greek – mask the lack of references. In general, the title never manages to use the heroic setting or the exploits of Herakles to build its story. The various creatures are never introduced to the player: the hero encounters them more or less by chance and hunts them as if they were common game.

     An uncomfortable and jagged exploration: how to pace resources

From the very first minutes, the game proves to be particularly awkward due to the rigidity of its controls. Herakles always takes a second to change direction, and the dialogue is terribly slow. As is often the case in these early JRPGs, NPCs often block the player's path, and it takes a lot of patience not to get annoyed beyond reason. If Heracles no Eikō borrows ideas from Dragon Quest, such as the importance of NPCs to obtain clues to progress, certain items or death, whose only negative effect is to halve the player's money, the title offers other elements that struggle to impress. The pacing of Heracles no Eikō is very different from that of its predecessor, as Herakles starts off particularly weak. In the early stages of the game, it is more common to run away from fights until equipment is acquired that allows the player to withstand the opposition. To make matters worse, weapons and armour have a durability score that decreases every time the player attacks or takes a hit. It is therefore necessary to regularly return to Athens and ask the blacksmith Hephaestus to repair the equipment.

In Dragon Quest, world exploration radiates from Ladatorm Castle: the player progresses both by gaining levels and by solving small mysteries. The first few steps into a new area are often painful, but subsequent trips back and forth are no longer a problem. Heracles no Eikō imitates this formula, but without really understanding it. The main offender is the extremely high rate of random encounters, which turn round trips into full-blown expeditions, not because they are difficult, but because they are never-ending. It is normal to find oneself fighting one battle after another at every step, forcing the player to work their way through the slow and tedious combat system. While this is partially alleviated when acquiring the Travel Wings – which, unlike Dragon Quest's Chimaera Wing, can be used indefinitely but cost HP as all spells – some parts of the world remain an ordeal due to the lack of towns to rest in along the way. This is notably true of the second half of the game, when Herakles must travel to the Shrine of Popos after traversing the vast Amazonian Queendom and its endless battles. This section seems to be a copy of the Swamp Cave journey to the city of Rimuldar in Dragon Quest, but the length and difficulty is prohibitive here.

     The inventory issue: backtracking and unflattering lengths

In fact, in Heracles no Eikō, prolonged exploration is severely punished by the inventory design. Herakles can only carry nine items at a time, including quest items. This choice has several consequences: the player must decide what to keep and what to discard. Given the importance of quest items, consumables and potions are often ignored until a sequence requires the player to carry a key or some other small item purchased from a shop. As the player progresses, they are forced to make more and more choices, first discarding weapons rendered obsolete by Herakles' level, then disposing of essential items hoping they will not be used again.

Progression is often chaotic, as the various puzzles are cryptic and sometimes poorly programmed. Towards the end of the game, Herakles must acquire the Silk Reins from the survivors of the Gaia tragedy. To buy them, two triggers must be met: the player must have spoken to the Queen of Nana and also be in possession of the Ares' Axe. For some reason, the game does not recognise the queen trigger if it is done before the axe trigger; the problem is that getting the axe is more or less contingent on talking to the queen. This soft lock is solved by using the password system of Heracles no Eikō. It lets players save their progress, but has the side effect of restoring the world to its initial state, even though their equipment remains intact. This means that all progress other than obtaining items is erased: mountains that have vanished reappear, as do all bosses and the chests' contents. The player then has to redo the entire quest leading to the Queen of Nana, as the item used to gain an audience was destroyed in the first playthrough. These problems plague the game throughout and reflect a serious lack of quality.

Likewise, while the title has a system of weaknesses based on enemy characteristics – air, underground, sea – and encourages the player to use the right weapons, it never really conveys its intentions, and it is sometimes difficult to know whether Herakles' poor damage is the result of using the wrong weapon or because he needs to gain more levels. This is particularly noticeable during the fight against Varroc, where only the Silver Box can hit it. As the weapon can be obtained very early on, it is quite weak and more or less requires Herakles to be at the level cap; however, the only effective farming location is the Shrine of Popos, forcing an interminable expedition across half the world to acquire the remaining levels. Since Herakles can only carry three weapons at a time, it is also easy to discard one that quickly proves essential; Heracles no Eikō forces inelegant and vapid backtracking for all the wrong reasons.

Despite a very high density of elements, the title reveals a pervasive indigence. Poor choices of game design accompany an aesthetically very limited game. The story and pseudo-Greek world fail to make up for the rest, making Heracles no Eikō a consistently frustrating experience. Surprisingly, Data East did not abandon the franchise after this first, underwhelming attempt, and Heracles no Eikō II: Titan no Metsubō (1989) proved to be much more enjoyable, discarding some of the first game's ideas to stick closer to the Dragon Quest formula. Kazushige Nojima, who had worked on Jingūji Saburō, took on the script and gave the story real depth with strong tragic flourishes, foreshadowing the quality of the 16-bit-era instalments.