Wibarm port of
Wibarm (1986), an early
role-playing shooter that combines
shooter and
role-playing game elements. Screenshot demonstrates early use of
3D polygon graphics,
third-person perspective, and
automap feature.
Wibarm (1986), stylized as
WiBArM (ウィバーン), is an early
role-playing shooter released by Arsys Software for the
NEC PC-88 computer in Japan and ported to
MS-DOS for
Western release by
Broderbund. It combines
run and gun shooter gameplay with
role-playing video game elements, and was also the first
action role-playing game to feature
3D polygonal graphics. In
Wibarm, the player controls a transformable
mecha robot that can shift between walking mode, a
tank, and a
flying jet. The viewpoint switches between several different perspectives: a
2D top-down perspective while flying, a
side-scrolling view during on-foot outdoor exploration, a fully 3D polygonal
third-person perspective inside buildings, and arena-style 2D
shoot 'em up battles during
boss encounters. In contrast to
first-person RPGs at the time that were restricted to 90-degree movements, ''Wibarm's
use of 3D polygons allows full 360-degree movement. It won the 1987 Game of the Year award from Japanese gaming magazine Oh!X''. combined with early
first-person shooter gameplay, It won the 1988
Game of the Year awards from the Japanese
computer game magazines POPCOM and
Oh!X. The game's sequel,
Star Cruiser 2, was released in 1992, for the
PC-9821 and
FM Towns computers. Seven
chiptune video game music soundtrack albums of both
Star Cruiser games, composed by Toshiya Yamanaka, have been released from 1992 to 2008.
Air Combat and Gran Turismo The company contributed to the development of several games from other companies. These include
Namco's 1995
combat flight simulator Air Combat and
Sony Computer Entertainment's 1997
racing simulator Gran Turismo both for the
PlayStation. ==List of video games==