Brilliant. The only thing wrong with this game was the name of the hero...
Yeah, there's nothing too original about a young elf making his way through an RPG in a quest to save some fantasy land. But I felt that this one was particularly special.
The graphics were very polished for the time. It was also made in pseudo 3D, and it was initially a bit awkward to get used to the controls. However, once you got used to the controls, it was sensational. There was a great cast of characters (cutesy, but cool), great adventure music (for the time), brilliant puzzles, plenty of secret areas, stacks of hidden chests and a huge world to explore.
The funny thing is I actually stumbled upon this game by chance. I was given a second copy of SF2 for my birthday, and when I went to exchange it, Landstalker was the only game I was mildly interested in. Had I not been exchanging SF2, I would never have played it.
As a matter of fact, the only thing I could even think about changing was the main characters name. Nigel is such an incredibly cruel name...
Oh yeah, a significantly larger irritation was the save function. I'm not sure if it was just my copy, but the cartridge came with a faulty battery, which meant I was unable to turn off the Mega Drive without losing my saves... But I couldn't stay angry at Nigel...
All up, a sensational game. A worthy opponent to the Zelda games. The shining light of Mega Drive RPGs. A pure classic.