Disgaea: Hour of Darkness, known in Japan as , is a tactical role-playing video game made by Nippon Ichi for the PlayStation 2 game console. It was published in North America by Atlus, and in PAL regions by Koei. It was later re-released for the PlayStation Portable with extra content, and again on the Nintendo DS. It's about a demon named Laharl, another demon named Etna, and an angel named Flonne. It has two sequels called Disgaea 2: Cursed Memories and Disgaea 3: Absence of Justice, though the characters in this game are not the main characters in those games. It's linked to a game that was out earlier called La Pucelle: Tactics, and later games that were made called Phantom Brave and Makai Kingdom: Chronicles Of The Sacred Tomb that have Disgaea cameos. It has an anime called Makai Senki Disgaea.

Plot

Setting
The game is based in a place called the Netherworld, where demons live. The game also goes outside of the Netherworld to Celestia, a place where angels live, and Earth.

Characters
Major playable characters
Laharl - The main character. He's a young demon who wakes up after a two year sleep and finds out his father, King Krichevskoy dies, and has to work to become the King of the Netherworld.
Etna - Laharl's vassal. She's a young demon who helps Laharl along the way. She liked King Krichevskoy, and is critical of Laharl.
Flonne - A cherub who is sent from a land called Celestia by the Seraphim Lamington to assassinate King Krichevskoy, but finds out he's already dead. Flonne is obsessed with love, and decides to follow Laharl around to find out of demons can feel love.
Captain Gordon - A human who is sent from Earth by a man called General Carter to defeat King Krichevskoy and stop an invasion, along with his sidekicks Jennifer, a pretty blonde, and Thursday, a robot who looks like the robot from Lost in Space. He's the 37th Defender of Earth. He tries hard to complete his mission, but is not very smart.
Jennifer - Captain Gordon's sidekick. She's a pretty blonde, but is actually very smart, and built their robot Thursday.
Thursday - A robot. Was built by Jennifer, and helps her and Captain Gordon.
Kurtis - A man from Earth who dislikes Gordon and thinks of himself as a true Defender of Earth. He lost his wife and son in an explosion and 70% of his body. He is sent by General Carter to the Netherworld, and fights Gordon.

Non-playable characters
Seraphim Lamington - A Seraph who sends Flonne to kill King Krichevskoy.
Vyers (midboss) - A high-class demon who Laharl battles. Laharl gives him the nickname "Mid-Boss", to make fun of him by saying he's not good enough to be a real boss. He runs into Laharl through the whole game and fights him.
Archangel Vulcanus - An Archangel who is annoyed by Lamington's actions and that he sent Flonne intead of him to kill Krichevskoy. He works on his own, trying to kill Laharl, Etna, and Flonne too.
General Carter - A General from Earth who sends Captain Gordon and later Kurtis to the Netherworld.
King Krichevskoy - Laharl's father, and the King of the Netherworld before he died.
Big Sis Prinny - A Prinny who is one of Laharl's vassals and looks out for Laharl.
Baal - A demon who is sometimes called the "Lord of Terror". He's the strongest being in Disgaea.

Gameplay
Disgaea starts in a castle where the player controls Laharl. He or she can buy weapons, armor, accessories, and items, cure their team at a hospital, go to a place called Item World, go to a place called the Dark Assembly, or go to another place through a portal.

Battle
The main gameplay is a turn-based strategy role-playing game. The characters start from a blue portal on the level, and the player can take up to ten people out for a battle. The level is on a grid, and each character can move a certain number of spaces. The player can do many things after they are out of the portal, like attacking, defending, or throwing someone.

Items
There are many kinds of items like weapons, armors, accessories, and help items.

Character types
There are two main kinds of character types - human-shaped characters, like Humans, Angels, and Demons who look like humans, and Monster characters, which are demons who do not look like humans.

Item World
The Item World is a world where the player can send the characters into an item. The levels in the Item World are randomly made, and at every ten floors, there's a more powerful enemy and an exit. The more floors the player goes to, the stronger the item gets. In Item World, there are also characters called Specialists. If one of the player's characters kills them, they are captured, and make the item more powerful in some ways. For example, if the player captures a Gladiator, the item boosts the attack power of who's holding it.

Dark Assembly
The Dark Assembly is a place where Laharl can go to propose a law, which include a law that gets more expensive

Reception
The PlayStation 2 version of Disgaea got an award from IGN for "Best Game no one Played" in 2003.

Versions
PlayStation Portable: The PlayStation Portable version of this game is called Disgaea: Afternoon of Darkness.
Nintendo DS

References 

2003 video games
Atlus
Nintendo DS games
PlayStation 2 games
PlayStation Portable games