September 23, 2023, was the 35th anniversary of Makyou Densetsu, the original Japanese PC Engine version of the TurboGrafx-16 hit The Legendary Axe, which stars an axe-wielding warrior that may or may not bear some resemblance to a certain other popular fictional barbarian. Here are some things about the game you may not have known:
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Early on, Makyou Densetsu was supposed to be published in Japan by Hudson. It was called Jungle-ou (King of the Jungle), then it was renamed Mitsurin Densetsu ("mitsurin" = jungle). Hudson had a habit of handing off their PC Engine games to other publishers; Alien Crush was also supposed to be released by Hudson, not Naxat. <https://twitter.com/PCEngineCLUB/status/1557363543908896769>
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A look at trademarks registered in Japan show that Hudson registered the trademarks for Mitsurin Densetsu and Kintarou Densetsu. It's unknown if the latter had anything to do with Legendary Axe, but it's within the right time frame. <https://www.j-platpat.inpit.go.jp/c1800/TR/JP-1988-014894/0FE7AD837C66AE0ECF495528F3A896E06C45FDE44E96FBAAA100FE610F37C505/40/ja>
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Hiromasa Iwasaki says: Hudson did the balancing and debugging, also the sound. <http://www.highriskrevolution.com/gamelife/index.php?e=25> <https://twitter.com/snapwith/status/1559428426733195265>
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The title screen for Makyou Densetsu says "The Legendary Axe." <https://www.mobygames.com/game/16576/the-legendary-axe/screenshots/turbo-grafx/1052190/>
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On that note, Ankoku Densetsu (Legendary Axe II) was intended to be a sequel in Japan as well. Unfortunately, US publisher NEC kinda boxed themselves in with the name Legendary Axe; the axe isn't even the best weapon in the game.
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One of the game designers on Legendary Axe is Keisuke Abe, who was working for Aicom at the time. He later joined Red and worked on the sequel, where he is credited as a title (screen?) designer. More importantly, Abe was the game designer behind Bonk's Adventure.
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The other game designer on Legendary Axe is Tokuhiro Takemori, who also produced and directed The Astyanax for arcades. He also designed that game with Toshiyuki Nishimura, who designed Rastan at Taito. It's all connected. Takemori later ran CP.BRAiN.
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Legendary Axe picked up awards from American magazines including "Best Game of the Year (TurboGrafx)" from EGM and "Video Game of the Year" from VideoGames & Computer Entertainment. <https://archive.org/details/ElectronicGamingMonthly_201902/Electronic%20Gaming%20Monthly%20Issue%20005%20%28December%201989%29/page/n15/mode/2up> <https://archive.org/details/vgce_90-02/page/44/mode/2up>
Konami interviewed a bunch of different devs in the leadup to the PCE/TG16 Mini and I was surprised that so many brought up Legendary Axe in the specific context of it supposedly being a super western-styled game that all foreigners think is awesome, and that people should look past the graphics and give it a try, and it's like... is it really that grotesque?
also if we all love it so much, put it out again ya mooks