Trivia
The Tengai Makyou games are supposedly written by the western 18th century historian "PH Chada" who makes appearances in most of the game's manuals. Paul Hieronymus Chada is the pseudonym of Hiroshi Adachi. "P.H." stands for "Prince Hiroi" [Japanese: "Hiroi-ōji"]. "Adachi" is the anagram (reverse) of "Chada". As an in-joke as he is credited as the main responsible for the goofy cultural misconceptions of the world of Jipang.
Contributed by
Kaminari 
(1285) on Sep 05, 2007.
The country in which most Tengai Makyou games (except The Apocalypse) take place is called Jipang. Except the addition of supernatural elements and many anachronisms, Jipang is pretty much the same as medieval Japan. The modern word "Japan" is actually based on the word Jipang, which was the way European adventurers of Middle Ages called this country. This word, in its turn, comes from the Chinese riben, which means "the origin of the sun". The Japanese also use this word to name their country (nippon or nihon in Japanese pronunciation).
Starting with this very first game, all Tengai Makyou games have an English alternate title Far East of Eden, which appears on game covers and as a sub-title for the main title. Contrary to a popular opinion, "Far East of Eden" is not the translation of "Tengai Makyou". Tengai Makyou can be roughly translated as "Magical Border Outside of the Sky".
"Tengai Makyou: Ziria" comes with a thick manual (72 pages) that contain not only story summary, character introduction, gameplay explanation, etc., but also a comic-book intro to the game, and a whole "Making Of" section that introduces the developers and shows how the game was made.
Beside being the starting point of one of the most successful and long-running RPG series and of semi-humorous RPGs in general, "Tengai Makyou: Ziria" holds another record that will never be broken: it was the first role-playing game (and one of the first games generally) that came on a CD ROM.
