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Legacy of the Wizard

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Title Screen

Legacy of the Wizard

Also known as: Dragon Slayer IV: Drasle Family (JP)
Developer: Nihon Falcom
Publishers: Namco (JP), Brøderbund (US), Bandai Namco (EU/AU)
Platforms: NES
Released in JP: July 17, 1987
Released in US: April 1989
Released in EU: June 18, 2020 (Namco Museum Archives Vol. 2)
Released in AU: June 18, 2020 (Namco Museum Archives Vol. 2)


GraphicsIcon.png This game has unused graphics.
MusicIcon.png This game has unused music.
SoundtestIcon.png This game has a hidden sound test.
RegionIcon.png This game has regional differences.


DCIcon.png This game has a Data Crystal page

Hmmm...
To do:
Debug mode, (1:15:48)

Legacy of the Wizard is a port of Dragon Slayer IV, and one of the few entries in the series to be released outside of Japan. The game follows the Worzen family (or the Dragon Slayer family in the manual) going on a quest to find four hidden crowns in a massive open world to obtain the Dragon Slayer sword and, well, slay a dragon! Also contains a soundtrack by Yuzo Koshiro, of Streets of Rage fame.

The Famicom port was the first version of Dragon Slayer IV, followed shortly by an MSX2 version, and eventually an MSX version.

Sound Test

On Controller 2 press and hold Up + Right + A + B, then on Controller 1 press Down + Left + Select. A sound will confirm correct entry. You can now cycle through the songs by moving the cursor over the picture on the wall and pressing A.

Unused Sprites

The game's graphic tiles include 4 monsters which are never seen in the game in enemy groups 4 and 7. They do not have any associated color or behavior, so they are shown in grey here. These appear in the game data for all 3 versions of the game. This includes:

  • Bee form of the giant enemy, which would show if its behaviour allowed it to climb a ladder.
  • Monch, an intelligent monkey (named in guidebooks).
  • An unknown humanoid with a helmet.
  • An unknown goat-like humanoid.

LegacyOfTheWizard-UnusedMonsters2x.png

There is a set of sprites for the family at home that is only partially used. On the character select screen each of them is shown in only one pose. In the ending sequence, they are all seen walking and waving, but only Royas faces upward when climbing the ladder out of the dungeon. Pochi is only seen lying down or facing up. Douel and Jiela are not seen at all during the ending.

Ds4 family unused fc.png

On the wall of the family home is a portrait of Jiela's great-great-grandfather Lark. There is a second portrait of found amongst other background tiles which is never used, depicting an unknown character. This unused portrait is also present in the MSX1 version.

Ds4 portrait fc unused.png

Many unused 8x8 background tiles contain what appears to be the Japanese character ア enclosed in a box. This unused marker tile appears in many places across the tile data, and is contained in all 3 versions of the game.

Ds4 tile empty fc.png

Unused Title Screen

The Famicom ROM contains what appears to be data for a second title screen at $17BCA. This may have been an earlier title screen that was abandoned but never deleted from the PRG-ROM. Unfortunately its original tileset is not present in the CHR-ROM, and if loaded this screen data instead selects the tileset that is used for the finished title screen.

Japan US
LegacyOfTheWizard-UnusedTitle17BCA-Famicom.png LegacyOfTheWizard-UnusedTitle17BCA-NES.png
LegacyOfTheWizardTilesetMockup.png LegacyOfTheWizardTitleMockup.png

By creating a mock-up tileset and injecting a few tiles from the final title screen into it, we can get a rough approximation of how the early title screen should have looked. Tiles 7B-7D, 8B-8D, and 6C-6F would be used for a slightly bigger version of the Falcom graphic, one that preserved the larger "F" and "l" characters seen in the official logo.

Unused Music

The 10th track in the sound test is not used anywhere in the game. It may represent a theme for Roas, who does not have a dungeon area of his own.

Regional Differences

Title Screen

Japan US Namco Museum Archives
DragonSlayerIVNESTitle.png LegacyoftheWizardTitle.png LegacyOfTheWizard NamcoMuseumArchives Title.png

The new name and publisher meant that the title screen had to be rearranged, though the Legacy of the Wizard logo looks quite a bit cruder than the Dragon Slayer one. Legacy of the Wizard also recolored the bricks surrounding the logo from greenish-blue to brown, with the shading being seemingly reversed on accident. Interestingly, said new brick colors are closer to those of the MSX2 and MSX versions of the game.

Credits

The credits differences between the Japanese and US versions are minor:

  • The US version starts with the word "CREDITS" at the top.
  • The King Dragon has a different name.
  • The '"Lightball" monster gets an accidental lowercase "l" in US.
  • The "Lee" monster is renamed "Edo".
  • Those credited with Scenario in Japan are "Scenario Staff" in US.
  • Aside from title and company copyright changes, the name "QUINTET" appears in the Japanese version. Though Yuzo Koshiro, a founder of the Quintet game company, worked on this game, the use of this name here predates the founding of that company by two years.

All lines that differ are compared in the table below.

Japan US
CREDITS
King Dragon Dilgyos King Dragon Keela
Lightball Prandi lightball Prandi
Lee Edo
Scenario Scenario Staff
Dragon Slayer 4

QUINTET

© 1987 Falcom

© 1987 NAMCO LTD.

Legacy of the Wizard

©1987 Falcom

©1988 Broderbund Software, Inc.