Welcome to VC Weekly, N-Europe's guide to the wonderful world of Nintendo's download service. Written by Sam C Gittins.

A beautiful start to a spectacular series has graced the Virtual Console this week, read on to find out why it's so highly regarded. Anyway enough from me and on with the erm... game!

Available for download this week we have...

• Phantasy Star

Points: 500
Publisher: Sega
Developer: Sega
Released: 1988
System: Master System

When the humble Sega Master System came onto the scene it really didn't have a great deal to shout about in terms of games and despite the best platforming efforts of Alex Kidd gamers wanted something a bit more substantial to justify owning the system. Thankfully many prayers were answered with the release of a Role Playing Game unlike anything that had proceeded it; taking place in a Sci-Fi setting and arriving just before the market got swallowed by Final Fantasy sequels, this humble game helped to diversify the RPG genre and in many ways has been extremely influential.

Step into the world of Phantasy Star, set in the Algol solar system which consists of three planets named Palma, Motavia and Dezoris which are of Forest, Desert and Ice alignment respectively; Algol is ruled over by King Lassic who's a good ruler turned evil dictator. An uprising ensues and at the front of this is a young would-be hero named Nero, tragically he is killed by King Lassic's forces right in front of his sister Alis who then swears revenge against Lassic and his evil minions, this is where the real adventure begins.

The first thing you'll notice is that everything is stunningly well presented, this is almost unheard of for the time in which it was released and as a result it ended up trumping everything on a visual level regardless of console. Everything from the impressively rendered title screen to the intricately detailed towns, anime style cut-scenes and character avatars plus the 3D dungeons just makes the game feel so far ahead of its time considering that all of this was done on a mere 8-bit console.

Everything surrounding you feels incredibly real as you are sucked deeper into this virtual world where characters feel genuinely engaging not to mention that you always want to keep exploring to discover what lies ahead all the while never losing sight of your ultimate goal of taking down Lassic. Another rather unique feature is in the battle sequences as yes you can take down hordes of monsters for exp but you can also attempt to negotiate with monsters which may sound odd but it makes sense especially when you have a certain degree of success with the more intelligent monsters, it helps to add an original mechanic and indeed it has been borrowed upon several times since.

Perhaps the biggest revolution in the game though is one that we now take for granted, Alis is one of the first leading female characters in an RPG as before it was the somewhat generic scenario that it was always a young male that played the role of the hero so this newborn heroine of her time is well deserving of her now legendary status. Music is well deserving of a mention because from the beautiful title screen score to the accompanying tracks for wherever you go everything sounds exactly like an RPG should while still retaining a large amount of refreshing originality.

You may be thinking that if you've played one RPG from this era then you've played them all but in the case of Phantasy Star you could not be any more wrong because it's a monumental achievement which helped to move the genre along rather than sticking to a tried and tested formula, for this it should be praised. If you've yet to play this classic title then you owe it to yourself to give it a try and really at a paltry five hundred points there really is no excuse not to, so please go forth and enjoy this genuine classic RPG from a bygone era.

Verdict : A truly fantastical title.

That's it for another installment of VC Weekly which will return again soon. So until then, enjoy the rest of the week and Game On!

Sam Gittins
[email protected]

Looking for reviews on other Virtual Console games? Or a full list of games available on the system? Then Check out our Virtual Console Index Page.