Kishi Densetsu

Kishi Densetsu is a Japanese war strategy game for the Sega Mega Drive from 1993 that never officially left its home market — the West only ever saw it through emulation and collectors. The most controversial part first: you play a young officer of a Waffen-SS tank unit, and the campaign follows the German war effort from the invasion of Poland to the Battle of Berlin. A deeply strange choice of perspective by today's standards, and one worth stating before anything else.

In play it is a real-time simulation of a tank platoon. You command up to sixteen vehicles, issue orders and watch the terrain: trees, buildings and rock formations lower firing accuracy and block shots, and different ground changes both speed and protection. It is not a hectic action game — more a slow, methodical dance of manoeuvres in which the better map reader wins.

The most interesting mechanic concerns people. Your tank commanders gain experience, earn promotions and collect medals — and when they die, they are gone for good, with only a limited pool of replacements. The game forces you to genuinely care for your crews, pull damaged vehicles out of the line and weigh the risk of every attack. Permanent consequences of this kind were rare in console strategy games of 1993.

The obstacle is language: everything is in Japanese, and you will fumble for a while before the menus make sense — the numbers and map symbols come quickly, the rest is trial and error. And honestly, the pace is slow and the presentation austere; this is a title for patient armchair generals, not for everyone. As a curiosity that fuses wargaming with an almost RPG-like care for your units, though, it deserves a look.

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