English Title: Makai Tenshō
Japanese Title: 魔界転生
Publisher: D3 Publisher
Developer: Tamsoft
Genre: Role-Playing / Roguelike
Released: Jul. 31, 2003
Product Codes: SLPM-65329 / JAN 4527823992092


First thing's first: Check out that awesome cover art. That's not just a great cover, that's an awesome piece of art full stop. I'd buy a poster of that and put it on my wall.

Unfortunately, that cover is about the only standout part of Makai Tenshō. It's essentially a straight clone of Chunsoft's Fushigi no Dungeon series, based on a famous Japanese novel by Fūtarō Yamada. There was also an unrelated movie adaptation of the novel released around the same time (known in English as Samurai Resurrection), and they were pretty obviously trying to cash in on the movie's hype.

As can be expected from Tamsoft, it's pretty cheap all-around, though I suppose if you're starving for a roguelike set in fuedal Japan, you could do worse than this. It doesn't have the cute anime girls of Izuna on the DS, though...

Also saw a release in D3's Simple 2000 series.