Xuanyuan Jian

In the beginning of the world, the goddess Nüwa created two genres of intelligent life: those of Man, and those of Monster, who warred among each other all the time. The Sword was created by Men in an attempt to end the everlasting war. Led by a single heroic figure, Xuanyuan Jian Xia (軒轅劍俠, Crusader of the Sword, or simply the Crusader) who wielded the Sword, the War Between Men and Monsters ended with both sides suffering heavy casualties. Seventeen years later, the main character, He Ran (何然), a young discipline of Xian Shu (仙術, sorcery) left his mentor, into the aftermath world of China to carve a future of his own.

The first game of the series, Xuanyuan Sword was also Softstar's first RPG product, released in 1990. The storyline in this game was not based on any certain period of actual history, the culture and people in the game bear a resemblance of what was mid-1500 ancient Chinese. All these materials were presented in a Dragon Quest-like game rule and interface. Players started the game as a youthful good-for-nothing level 1 character, in a poor village that offered little else than most basic equipments. The wilderness was filled with monsters that players must kill to gain experience levels, thus enable them to proceed to other areas, and thus proceed the plot.

The game featured standard VGA 16-colored 640x480 screen, complete with party-members, round-based combat, full-screen sprite animation, various monsters, Chinese-styled AdLb music, sound effects, animated spell effects, as well as full Chinese interface, which was a great hit in Taiwan's computer game market at that period.