«Cave Noire»: the Game Boy RPG I didn’t know but now love

Martin Jud

6-5-2022

Translation: Megan Cornish

«Cave Noire» is a Japanese Game Boy RPG – a roguelike – from 1991. In the game, you fight your way deeper and deeper into procedurally generated dungeons. Although confrontation is not always the best solution.

After coming off second best in a fight against a nasty skeleton, I try to get my adventurer apprentice Hützel to safety. Unfortunately, I inadvertently stumble two rooms further on in the dark of the musty dungeon – and notice too late that something’s crawling all around me. A giant centipede looms in front of me. Seconds later, the monster’s mouth is full and Hützel's arm is a bit shorter. He groans and falters as the beast raises its front pairs of legs. A poisonous claw peeks out from underneath, and moments later it’s rammed into Hützel’s calf.

I roll my eyes and groan too. Seconds later, however, I’m happy that I’d stowed an antidote in my backpack a few minutes beforehand. Hützel drinks it instinctively and retreats to the previous room.

With an inventory limited to eight slots, it’s not a given that my protagonist will have the right potion with him at the right moment. The fact that I left a light spell one dungeon level above me is extremely annoying, despite the joy of picking up the antidote. It would have been enabled my character to light up the room and better assess the danger.

Cave Noire (カーブノア) was released by Konami for the Nintendo Game Boy in 1991. A friend recommended it to me about a year ago. I was looking for a «new», simple retro dungeon crawler that’s also good for a short session now and then, like Jeff Lait’s «Powder». Cave Noire hasn’t let go of me since. I’ve spent more time on it than I ever thought it would, so I’m sharing this retro tip with you.

A Japanese RPG with English modifications

Even though the game can be merciless, there’s no rush while you’re playing. Cave Noire is turn-based – if your character performs an action, so do all the monsters. This means that they don’t move across rooms, and many have a fixed path of movement. Only certain monsters follow you in the same room or on a screen. It’s easy to bypass others if necessary.

The gameplay of Cave Noire is easy to learn and aimed at role-playing newbies. Or puzzle fans, because the bottom line is that tricky brain teasers await you in the caves. If you’re looking for a classic RPG, you’ve come to the wrong place.

I’ve been naughty and probably done something illegal: I ordered an English modified version of Cave Noire on a Game Boy game cartridge. The US seller was blocked on the sales platform shortly after I ordered the module, but it still arrived. Konami released the RPG in Japanese on 19 April 1991. Aeon Genesis released an English-language patch on 14 February 2012. The ROM hacker collective outlines the project in the patch history:

Thank you, Aeon Genesis!

After I bought it – or was it a «steal»? – the modded version plagued my conscience. Not only as far as Konami and Nintendo were concerned, but also in terms of the translators, who don’t earn much money from the product. That's why I also got an original version of the game. Shipping from Japan took two weeks. In total, I paid $39.99. The English copy only cost $13.98, including shipping.

But what does Cave Noire actually offer, and why does it fascinate me so much that I’ve been playing it on various Game Boys and Anbernic handhelds for a year now?

The gameplay: when beating monsters isn’t everything

Cave Noire belongs to the roguelike subgroup of role-playing games. A roguelike is an RPG that follows the gameplay of the 1980 game Rogue. In contrast to Rogue, when Cave Noire was released eleven years later, it offered real graphics that replace a text symbol-based world.

Like Rogue, it’s a turn-based dungeon crawler that spans different levels. The level design is procedurally generated, so you get a different world every time you play the game, which provides a new challenge time and again. Then there is permadeath; if you die, you have to start over again. So you can’t save in a dungeon. But that’s not too tragic, as Cave Noire consists of many quests, and each task leads to a new dungeon. Your quest level will be saved once you’ve successfully completed it.

In Cave Noire, you can embark on an adventure as a heroine or a hero. As I want to play my digital copy, I choose the male version and type in the name Huetzel. He’s actually supposed to be called Hützelbrützel, but the game only allows eight letters.

Then the story begins, keeping things sparse and not in the foreground, as is typical of the subgenre. What really counts in a roguelike is the gameplay.

Your story begins in the village of Karuzu. You’ve heard that there are four dungeons and many apprentice adventurers. They work to hone their skills in the underground labyrinths day and night. They’re striving for what you are striving for: they want to earn the title of «adventurer» from the local guild.

Four (well, forty) dungeons, four missions: saving fairies, beating monsters, collecting gold and finding orbs

In order for the adventurers’ guild to grant you the title, you have to enter four dungeons and complete a different task in each one. You also have to complete each task in six increasingly difficult passages or levels. So the game isn’t over afterwards. After completing the 24 main quests, you can tackle even harder levels. There are a total of nine levels and one master level per dungeon – that’s forty in all.

The four tasks to be completed are:

• Monster Quest – kill a certain number of enemies
• Gold quest – collect a certain amount of gold
• Orb Quest – find a certain number of orbs that look like chalices
• Fairy Quest – find keys and fairies trapped in cages and free a certain number of them

The fact that you need an inventory slot for each orb in the orb quest makes things tricky. This means that at quest level 6, for example, you already need six slots for the quest objects alone – you need all eight at level 10. In contrast, you can carry gold around with you as much as you like. You also need space for the keys for the Fairy Quest, albeit only temporarily.

Once you have decided on a dungeon, you first pray in front of a tree – the forest god – and receive four items that can be of use to you alongside your sword. Then, before you enter, you should consider that killing monsters isn’t the right tactic for every task – it’s actually only the best course of action for the Monster Quest. This is important, as only the first few quest levels will be forgiving when it comes to major blunders. After that, the level of difficulty increases sharply – I find some rounds downright brutal, especially from level 7 onwards. At some point, you need to rise to the challenge of collecting 79 pieces of gold or killing 20 monsters on level 9 – there were only three opponents on level 1.

If you’ve achieved the goal of a quest run, a door will appear nearby. Entering it will transport you back to the village.

The game world: secret passages, magic and monsters

Pain teaches you important lessons. If you see exclamation marks in a thought bubble above your character, it could be that the ground is about to give way. If you wait around and don’t go any further, you’ll fall to a lower level. This will cause you damage and you’ll end up in a new area.

Something you should never stand on is lava. Of course, every child knows that. Likewise, I don’t question the lack of diagonal movement. It’s only when I’m writing this that I realise I consider it normal to only be able to move in four directions.

Aside from the problem areas I mentioned, there are also holes that exist as soon as you enter a room. In rare situations, falling to the lower level can help as well as hurt you. It’s a calculable risk when the alternative is a staircase guarded by a cyclops. It may only have one eye, but it can take about the same amount of punishment as you and hits you just as well.

Did I mention that stairs always lead down? Once you’ve reached the bottom, there are no stairs to the top of the new level. Where did they go?

Never mind.

The tide can also turn in other hopeless situations where the escape route appears to be cut off. If you’re standing next to a wall and question marks appear in a thought bubble, they indicate a secret passage. To open it, you walk into the wall, which sounds and looks painful, but doesn’t do you any harm. It even says so in the manual, which also tells you to look out for creatures that can jump over holes. Likewise, if you stand next to an invisible box, a thought bubble will appear, so gather your courage and walk over it.

Incidentally, all the other areas that haven’t yet been mentioned are fine. A small underground river is no problem – just go through it and keep going.

Attributes, boxes, loot and the fight

Cave Noire gives you permanent attribute increases when you reach certain quest levels. This happens automatically, but the effect is so minimal that it doesn’t scale with increasing difficulty. Likewise, skills aren’t an issue – you don’t have any, need any, gain any, or level up.

You can slash with your sword, move, pick up items, use or drop items, bang your head against walls, teleport via an appropriate warp, take the stairs down, fall down, fry in lava, or find a myriad of other ways to die. Or you can just wait a turn. Since opponents move around the rooms, it can be worth it. You wait in safety in the antechamber until the spider has scurried away into the scouted target room, then you sneak past it.

Items are relatively rare in Cave Noire. Most can be found in crates – monsters provide neither experience points nor loot. The sparse range of items fits in with the ultra-small and almost always full inventory. Where other RPGs offer a large arsenal of weapons, here, for example, there are only four swords and shields each – such as a flaming sword, which adds two to your attack score.

If you find a better sword or shield, there’s no specific place to use it. In contrast to the «Starting Sword», they’d take up an inventory slot, which makes dropping inferior equipment mandatory.

If you decide to fight, you should first check two things: press the Select button, which will display the opponent's HP. If, based on your experience or hit points, you think it’s a bit too much, check your inventory first – if in doubt, use a flying spell that takes you to a random area. Alternatively, you can bring down the scoundrel with a flame spell. If anything moves after that, swing your blade and hope there’s no counterattack.

If you ever get lost, you can use the Start button to call up your camp, where you’ll not only find a character overview, but also a map. Unfortunately, resting and healing yourself or learning magic aren’t an option in the camp. There’s no levelling up and no rest – you’re in the dungeon day and night. There’s nothing wrong with that, as a minotaur might surprise you while you’re asleep. Or worse…

Verdict: simple graphics are enough for lasting RPG fun

Cave Noire is challenging in terms of difficulty. Not too challenging though – it doesn’t leave me feeling patronised or frustrated. For those who like the Dark Souls games, it should be a walk in the park. For me, though, it’s just right. As an occasional gamer, I manage to be pretty successful, thanks in part to game mechanics that are easy to learn. If you like brain teasers and role-playing games, you’ll find it hard to stop playing. This is also due to the procedurally generated world and the constantly rearranged rooms, monsters and chests. If you can accept that death is part of the learning process, you and your budding hero or heroine will emerge from the dungeons as a celebrated adventurer.

Cave Noire offers a great contrast to today’s titles with its retro graphics. Even after more than 30 years – or only after 30 years, as in my case – it’s a satisfying role-playing experience whose main quests you can complete in under two hours with a little savvy and quick thinking. But you don’t need to, as successful quest runs are saved, unlike the running game.

Martin Jud

Senior Editor

martin.jud@digitecgalaxus.ch

I find my muse in everything. When I don’t, I draw inspiration from daydreaming. After all, if you dream, you don’t sleep through life.

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