With the imminent release of Heroic Edition in the public eye, I felt it was as good a time as any to go back and see where it all began. What started as a passion project based on "everything I enjoyed as a kid" during the later half of the 2000s became an RPG Maker juggernaut that had mainstream appeal outside of its humble beginnings, even getting a place in a popular gaming magazine at one point. With tens of thousands of downloads under its belt on this website alone, it's easy to see why a commercial venture would seem like a wise investment (even ignoring those who said many years ago that they would pay for a game like this).

But with all the notoriety and a hearty lineage founded in console gaming's infancy, what is it that drives so many to quest in this realm of heroes? While many have come to the realization that there's not a whole lot in terms of a story as nearly all of the game's strength comes in its tour de force capitalization on RPG Maker's default database options to create hero classes, Hero's Realm still has the most resilient legacy of gameplay perfection in all of RPG Maker. What makes Hero's Realm so special in this respect is that the quest - for the most part - is based entirely on you and what you want out of the world. By approaching the player on their own terms and giving them all the tools they need to succeed regardless of which options they choose, it's easy to see why it's had such resounding success with the gaming masses both new and old alike.

Yet, this world isn't just a tabletop game without graphics or music; no, this is a fully realized digital role-playing adventure! Kentona has managed to craft - with resources all taken from separate sources - one cohesive experience all its own. Each song used throughout the experience is rich with emotion and captures the essence of your quest expertly. Never once will you find a song which doesn't seem to fit the scene it plays in. And the graphics are equally brilliant. The maps are all constructed from the runtime package graphics native to RPG Maker 2003 and were designed with the scale of the world's inhabitants in mind, so while it doesn't have the veneer of an RPG from the SNES library, it still feels right at home with all the masterpieces of the past.

The players and monsters of this world come from Final Fantasy IV, V and VI and are all colorful enough to evoke that sense of wonder so prevalent in oldschool RPGs. Even if you had never touched a Final Fantasy game before, you'd still get a solid grasp of what made this series a household name through playing Hero's Realm. What this means is that Hero's Realm builds up classic RPGs while classic RPGs build up Hero's Realm. Neither one is better than the other as Hero's Realm was built solely from the heart and the imagination that was birthed straight from video gaming's ancestry.

With an expansive world full of colorful characters and locations with their own backgrounds and riches, Hero's Realm is most certainly not a game you should let slip by your scope if you consider yourself a rugged gamer who's mastered many challenges. Before the release of Heroic Edition, I challenge you to throw yourself into this RPG Maker masterpiece, start up your four parties of classes picked solely to your liking and tackle the adversaries of this Hero's Realm. Will you succeed against the forces of evil spearheaded by the dreaded Mephistocles? Or will you be turned away by the Dreadlords under his order?

Will you become the Heroes this Realm needs? It's all up to you!