Disgaea: Hour of Darkness (2003) — Release Date, Cheats, Price & Requirements

Disgaea: Hour of Darkness

Disgaea: Hour of Darkness is a tactical role-playing video game and the first game in the Disgaea series. Battle gameplay takes place on a map divided into a square grid. The player controls a squad of…

90 30 January 2003

What Disgaea: Hour of Darkness is

Disgaea: Hour of Darkness is a role-playing (rpg) game developed by Nippon Ichi Software and released in 2003. It was published by Atlus USA. It is available on PlayStation 3 and PlayStation 2.

The premise, in the publisher's words

The story of Disgaea opens with Laharl rising out of an open coffin in his room. Etna, one of the castle vassals, is standing next to him, surrounded by various weapons. She explains that he has been sleeping for two years, far longer than he intended, and his father, King Krichevskoy, has died. Laharl vows to reclaim the throne, and, after consulting with Etna and his other vassals, goes to Vyers' castle. After defeating the demon Vyers, who refers to himself as the "Dark Adonis" and is renamed "Mid-Boss" by Laharl, he meets Angel Trainee Flonne. Flonne had been sent to the Netherworld by Seraph Lamington, the ruler of Celestia, to assassinate King Krichevskoy (who was already dead)…

Description from the publisher · source

How it plays

It is played from a bird view / isometric perspective. Its themes are comedy. It is a single-player game with no multiplayer component.

Where it sits in the Disgaea series

Disgaea: Hour of Darkness is the first of 27 entries we hold in the Disgaea series. The next entry was Phantom Brave in 2004. Its critic score of 90 is 12 points above the series average of 78. That makes it the highest-rated entry in the series.

See all 27 Disgaea games in release order →

How it was received

Disgaea: Hour of Darkness holds a critic score of 90 out of 100. That places it above 92% of the 3,813 rated role-playing (rpg) games in our database, which average 73. Games released in 2003 averaged 69, so it scored 21 points above the year average.

What it launched against

Disgaea: Hour of Darkness launched on 30 January 2003, within three weeks of Final Fantasy Tactics Advance, SimCity 4, NASCAR Racing 2003 Season and Unreal 2: The Awakening. It reviewed better than 2 of the 4.

Released around the same time: Final Fantasy Tactics Advance, SimCity 4, NASCAR Racing 2003 Season, Unreal 2: The Awakening.

Cheats and codes

We have not confirmed any working cheat codes for Disgaea: Hour of Darkness yet. Rather than reprint a list we have not tested, this section stays empty until one is verified.

Know one? Send it in and we will test it →

Disgaea: Hour of Darkness — frequently asked questions