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Hey! So I’m a bit of a sucker for a lot of old media, spend a lot of time each week going to local pawn shops, swap meets, old video and record shops, the works.

And I decided I wanted to start talking more about some of the neat finds? Specifically, a rare original script version of a game that a online friend of mine managed to recommend and I got lucky enough to pick up from a tent selling import films and games.

Introducing, “Swordking’s Fold!”



Based loosely on the events of a historical period in Paradiso, you might’ve grown up with a romanticized take on the story generally known in most parts as “The Starmen Affair.”

It’s actually a pretty common thing for it to be mandatory reading in schools. Lots to say on that but a little known fact is that it’s actually the sequel to another novel, “The King’s Hand”, a classic tragedy that takes place in the formative years of Paradiso, one that really goes perfectly hand in hand with its companion novel.

You play “The King”, a self proclaimed “Champion of the Meek” who sets out on an adventure to form an army to reclaim what they dub “The god’s capital” after being banished.

You’re allowed and encouraged to name “The King” and the various party members you encounter, but for the sake of ease we’ll just use the default name.

The game is a mix of dungeon crawling and tactical rpg gameplay, something that I never really knew I wanted til now? It’s a bit of an influential one in freeware crowds too…

What really sets it apart is how heavy it puts emphasis on narrative, to the point that the mechanics of the game are actively willing to sabotage you to get the story across.

I think it’s a bold move to make a game less “fun” for the sake of immersion. Party members at on their own most of the time. You can make suggestions and if your bond is close or things are tight, they will just outright let you make shots in encounters but..

A lot of the time you just drop because you haven’t managed enough food to keep people from squabbling..

There’s management as a big element, trying to keep a good pace and well supplied between quests.



Also,these primitive but ambitious cutscenes do a lot for me.. hits different with the music..

It’s a brutal game, incredibly feast or famine on the “Criticalist” Difficulty.

There’s also branching paths too? Ones that really let you explore elements from the source material in a way that play into the nature of the actual historical events being pretty disputed in nature.

Weird to think how much is lost to time.

Recruiting party members is a mix of folks you meet in town, some mandatory story ones, and even one you meet as a boss?



Mission is my favorite for that, they’re really fast at felling your party members when you first meet them, playfully taunting you early on and then as things get desperate, makes a point by leaving you for last.

You can kill them of course, but the “canon” route wants you to recruit them, and why wouldn’t you?

Love them. Kind of a bastard, a little silly and a bit hard to understand.

Them joins you because they like the idea of living in a king’s castle. And honestly? Love that energy. Such a bastard… Want to cosplay them some day…

Needless to say, I picked them as the main romance for my run. You can actually develop weirdly complicated relationships with most of the party!

Despite everything, she’s pretty loyal to the end.

And uh.. I guess this is where I get into spoiler thoughts and localization weirdness?

There’s a lot of script edits based on region. The Spells “Holy Fire” and “Heaven’s Door” being replaced with “Pearl Flame” and “Sky Highway.” is a pretty notable one in a more popular distribution.

The nature of the red and green cavaliers? I mean in any script their closeness is apparent, and while it’s not outright said it’s clear their feelings for each other are more just platonic foils. But in some versions they seem to just loathe each other! Apparently it was a homage to a tv show in a certain continent where the lead couple is just always at each other’s throats about the milk?

The pronouns of Lucifer, the pretty bard of the party, are apparently different across scripts because even historians are still disputing it, so it’s based on the local translations of the book this game is inspired by. Wild honestly.. In my version Lucifer is she/her.

Gotta wonder if maybe they’re all right?

Non-Fat vs low fat is a pretty real discussion. A friend of mine said that if you can’t figure that out when you move in together, you shouldn’t get married. Kind of extreme but… I get it?

Also I cried when Mission gives up their form to become a sword in the route where you recruit them. They wants to live forever so they can be there for you in every life..



I want something like that maybe, but also that’s kind of sad.

I wanna cosplay them and a few other characters but I can’t find consistent examples of full body art. Seems like official illustrations are all over and inconsistent. Maybe I should go into those in a different post.

Overall the story had me engaged, the tragedy of knowing that any efforts toward a kind rule fell apart pretty much as soon as the king passed really hurt. In the novel, they only last 9 years after they become ruler, the strain of it all doing them in.

The royal family was apparently slain centuries later in a big revolution, many of the game’s real life inspirations for the “Ultima” weapons are said to be in the castle still, but it’s pretty forbidden.

The developers have several spiritual successors to this game including“True King’s Gauntlet” which is still active and popular among rpg crowds to this day. It’s neat stuff.

Overall I think it’s worth a try. It’s brutally difficult and has a lot of the roughness you expect from RPGs of the era, but if you’re into a bit of historical drama and an example of a super narrative driven game from way back when? Give it a crack, obtain it legally if you can since copies can go for up to 300 bucks in our local currency.

Credits to: @Cabinetspider and the DreamwavePreservation forum for helping me learn about and get access to this game.