Cosmic Fantasy Collection 2 includes three installments of the Cosmic Fantasy sci-fi anime role-playing series:

• Cosmic Fantasy 3: Bken Shnen Rei
• Cosmic Fantasy 4: Ginga Shnen Densetsu – Totsuny-hen
• Cosmic Fantasy 4: Ginga Shnen Densetsu – Gekit-hen

Cosmic Fantasy 3: Bken Shnen Rei

Somewhere on the beautiful planet Aira, in a small village Toto lives a young boy named Rei. Rei possesses unique spiritual powers, using which he can heal diseases. One day, Rei is ordered to go to Tristan, the Royal Capital, where he is needed. This seems like a simple journey; but shortly afterwards Rei meets the cat Nyan, who got stranded on Aira following a hostile encounter with Burakki, Gorokki, and Chorokki, intergalactic feline travelers with unknown agenda. The boy realizes that his powers might be needed to aid the heroes of the previous Cosmic Fantasy installments, and deal with the mysterious Garudo, who recently came to Aira, plotting an evil scheme.

Cosmic Fantasy 3: Bken Shnen Rei is the third installment of the Cosmic Fantasy sci-fi anime role-playing series. It is a traditional Japanese-style RPG with turn-based, first-person perspective combat. Enemies appear randomly. Rei and other party members can execute various types of physical attacks and techniques in battles, each with its own strengths and weaknesses. The game features anime-style cutscenes with voice-overs. Instead of separate locations tied by a traditional “world map”, the game has a continuous world, in which locations are seamlessly connected to each other.

Cosmic Fantasy 4: Ginga Shnen Densetsu – Totsuny-hen

The fourth installment of the sci-fi RPG series comes in two parts, this game being the first. In it, the player once again takes control of the original hero of the series, the cosmic hunter Y, his lovely female comrade Saya, and their friends. Something is wrong on the planet Kazarin: the princess Saria was kidnapped, and Y arrives on the planet to look closer into that matter, while Saya agrees to impersonate the princess for a while to ensure a calm investigation. However, their quest goes far beyond the kidnapping investigation: soon they will have to face the four heavenly kings, demons who control the elements from which the universe is built.

The game features a role-playing system similar to the first three installments of the series and other Japanese RPGs: the player navigates a party of characters (up to four active combatants) around the top-down overworld, visiting towns, buying equipment, descending into dungeons, and fighting random enemies in turn-based combat viewed from first-person perspective. A new introduction to the series is an ATB (active-time battle) bar (which came to prominence after having been first implemented by Final Fantasy IV): the player can only execute an action when the bar of the character in question is filled; therefore, switching between characters and reacting quickly becomes a necessity. The game begins with a “digital comic” introduction typical for most Japanese adventures (with menu commands to interact with still anime-style pictures); however, this gameplay mode disappears shortly afterwards and plays no further role.

Cosmic Fantasy 4: Ginga Shnen Densetsu – Gekit-hen

After the first chapter of Cosmic Fantasy 4 described the brave deeds of Y and his team on the planet Kazarin, it is now the turn of Van, the other great Cosmic Fantasy hero and the protagonist of Cosmic Fantasy 2, to fight the evil forces who threaten the peace of the galaxy. Van awakens after having a nightmare that has been pursuing him after he has left his home planet Idea and joined Cadette Babette (Rim in the Japanese version) as an intergalactic cosmic hunter. However, a meeting with a friend in trouble from convinces him that his quest is just about to begin. Van and his Little Fox Team must return to Idea, and face the shadows of Van’s tragic past.

The gameplay is virtually identical to that of the first chapter, and has little deviation from the traditional Japanese RPG formula: the player navigates a party of heroes over the top-down world, visiting towns, descending into dungeons, and fighting randomly appearing enemies in turn-based fashion. Like in the previous game, the Final Fantasy-like ATB bar indicates the speed of the characters’ turns during the battles. The second chapter also opens with a “digital comic” (basically a typical Japanese-style adventure), but after this introduction the RPG gameplay takes over for the rest of the game.