Super Black Onyx

Super Black Onyx is a first-person dungeon crawler role-playing game published by BPS for the Famicom, an enhanced adaptation of the early computer RPG The Black Onyx. Players assemble a party of adventurers and delve into multi-floor grid dungeons to recover the fabled Black Onyx artefact. Drawing inspiration from Western CRPG design, the title features turn-based combat, character levelling and permanent death risk for fallen party members.

Exploration unfolds in first-person perspective within interconnected dungeon levels. Random encounters trigger tactical turn-based monster combat. Victories grant experience and gold to purchase weapons, armour and healing potions. Hidden secret walls and concealed stairways reward careful mapping of every dungeon floor.

Deeper dungeon levels host progressively powerful monster groups, lethal floor traps and locked treasure vaults holding rare equipment required to survive the final confrontation guarding the Black Onyx.

BPS’s Famicom adaptation delivers moody first-person dungeon visuals. Slow, tense ambient background music reinforces the claustrophobic danger of underground expeditions.

Strategically, successful quest completion requires balanced party composition including frontline fighters and reliable healers. Venturing deep without consistent healing capacity risks catastrophic party wipeouts and potential permanent character loss.

For contemporary Famicom retro early dungeon crawler historians, Super Black Onyx represents one of the foundational Western-style RPG ports that helped shape Japan’s console role-playing scene before Wizardry and Ultima gained wider fame.