Ankoku Shinwa: Yamato Takeru Densetsu (暗黒神話 ヤマトタケル伝説? lit. Dark Myth: the Legend of Yamato Takeru) is an adventure game developed by Zap and published by Tokyo Shoseki exclusively in Japan in 1989 for the Famicom. It is an adventure game based on a manga of the same name by Daijiro Morohoshi, which in turn is based on early Japanese folklore and historical events. Daijiro Morohoshi wrote a lot of sci-fi and historical mangas with dark Lovecraftian themes. He is credited in the game's opening credits.
The story of the game is that a distant descendant or reincarnation of Takeru Yamato, the legendary prince of the Yamato people that assassinated the leader of the supposedly barbaric Kumaso clan, is looking into the death of his father and discovers a plot by some still-existing Kumaso to resurrect their dark gods.
Primarily, each chapter of the game is played by exploring various areas, searching for clues and talking to NPCs using a menu-driven interface, which was common for many adventure games for the Famicom. When each chapter is close to being completed, the perspective of the game switches from first person to a side-view, where the player must fight a boss. The boss must be defeated to gain access to the next chapter.
Although the game was never published outside of Japan, and English fan translation patch was completed in 2010, and is available here.
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Title screen
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Investigation screen
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Boss battle
