You’ve been down too long in the midnight sea —That’s why you probably never heard about Irem’s Holy Diver, a Famicom game released back in 1989. It was supposed to receive a North American release after a brief debut in Electronic Gaming Monthly, but unfortunately, that never came to fruition. Instead, the game languished for the last 30 years in obscurity. That is, until now. Three decades later, the company Retro-bit has decided to re-publish Holy Diver in its first release outside of Japan.
The game will launch with a special collector’s edition this May, which features a physical NES game cartridge, instruction manual, stickers, a colored cartridge limited to the first 1,000 units, a numbered certificate, two lithograph cards, two pins, and a special box to keep it all in. It’s a swanky collector’s edition that rivals much of what modern games get—it’s so good to see a classic game receive this kind of love.
R-TYPE and Holy Diver Pre-sales go up at 9AM Pacific, Friday 01/19 https://t.co/i8FimkCxT9 The first 1000 are CastleMania exclusives and will come with hand numbered certificates of authenticity. pic.twitter.com/fnRXXf6nk0
— CastleMania Games (@CastleManiaRyan) January 19, 2018
If the name Holy Diver has you thinking heavy metal icon Ronnie James Dio, as well it should, that’s because Holy Diver is a game that’s littered with heavy metal references, particularly inspired by artists like Ronnie James Dio (hence the game’s name), as well as in-game characters inspired by Ozzy Osbourne, Slayer, King Crimson, and more. The game’s musical ties make things all the weirder that it didn’t get an official Western release until now.
The game follows the tale of the Black Slayer, Demon King of the Underground Dark Empire, who weakened the power of the magical King Crimson in the 666th year of the world of magic. The 16th Crimson Emperor, Ronnie the 4th, has two sons named Randy and Zakk, and they’ve been handed over to his servant Ozzy to take care of them when they escape malevolent forces from another dimension that want to plunge the world into darkness. Randy, Zakk, and Ozzy work together on the side of Holy Magic Justice to defeat the Black Slayer. You can’t make this stuff up. The Castlevania-like platformer is a fitting tribute to rock music, and it’s fantastic that we’ll finally get a chance to play it.
You can preorder your copy of Holy Diver via retailer CastleMania Games, but be quick about it.
