The game being Dragon Quest 5.
Which could also be called, "My Tragic Life and Important Wife".
Because boy howdy.
The main character doesn't have a tragic backstory.
Because there's never a backstory for him.
The game starts when he's born.
And follows him through all of the pain of his 30 years of existence.
Of which I should point out at the end of the game, he's 22.
8 years, petrified.
Found by treasure hunters, sold.
All of them, on a rich family's lawn.
Six of them on the side, from being knocked over in a frenzy from the abduction of the child.
There's very few fades to black.
Which implies that the hero is conscious during this entire period.
The petrification ends eventually.
When the retainer of the Hero's father arrives...
With the hero's now 8-year old children.
It's a narrative about a guy who gets the most impressive cosmic uppercuts in a single game that isn't trying to be edgy and STILL manages to grit his teeth through it all and never give up.
Oh his 30 years of existance, 8 of it is as a statue.
10 of it is as a slave.
He watches his father sit down and die to the hands of weaklings.
Should the father resist, the actual threat will kill the hero, his son.
His mother was abducted by demons the day he was born.
He never got to watch his children grow up because he was turned to stone while rescuing his wife.
Who was abducted shortly after their children were born.
And yet.
Despite these impressive examples of the universe flipping the hero the bird.
The game keeps a fairly upbeat tone.
And it doesn't fall into the 'everything is terrible' trap.
It demonstrates all of the little things and the big things that make a person perservere.
Which makes the dire points actually have impact.
One of the emotionally toughest points in the game.
Comes from being handed a magic artifact that doesn't work.
And looking at a painting that is said to take you to the place that you want to be most.
And so he does.
And it's the beginning of the game. In the small town he grew up in.
The farmer is complaining that the cold will make the harvest bad.
The alchemist recently returned from being stuck in the local cave.
About this time, a younger hero is off in the land of the fairies, saving Springtime.
This was the last point in his life before he truly knew loss, or pain.
And then he sees his younger self.
Who is innocently carrying the artifact that does work.
He asks to see it.
And switches the working, for the non-working.
So that when the villain that murders his father crushes the artifact, it won't be the real one.
His actual mission.
As he returns the false one to his younger self.
All he can say.
"No matter what happens, never give up."
And watches his younger self trot of with his pet tiget-kitten.
Knowing that within a week, he'll watch his father die and spend the next ten years in slavery.
The real kicker comes from the fact that when you're in the beginning of the game as the young hero, you speak to this guy who wants to see the golden orb.
And you probably forget about it.
Until that moment.
At which point you remember everything that's happened over the course of the game.
The narrative is -very- well paced and toned.
It manages to be a very emotional experience for an early Super Famicom title.
It was made in 92

Yeah, this is what the game looks like.
Bright colors; simple, cute sprites.
Really, it's kinda Earthboundy.
It even does the Earthbound thing of traveling in the epilogue to many places you've been and letting you walk around and talk to the people you've met along the way.

Also.
I mentioned "Important Wife".
The subtitle of the game in the DS version is "Hand of the Heavenly Bride".
And this is actually a player decision.
You have a choice on who to marry.
It's not just one scripted character.
In the original, there's two.
In the DS version, there's three.
And each of them have completely distinct personalities.
And are mechanically different.
There's a point in the game after the marriage where the wife will collapse while traveling.
She's fine, just tired.
When you arrive at your destination.
Turns out, you've had a pregnant woman in your party, helping you fight monsters.
There are -very- few games that give player-control over a pregnant character.

The game is the first in the series to allow you to recruit monsters to your party. While Megami Tensei did this before, I can promise that DQ5 was played by -way- more people and inspired far more at the time. Series head Yuji Hori has stated that DQ5 is his favorite game in the series.

Bianca and Flora are wonderfully written characters. Most would probably assume that that a narrative that comes down to a major decision about which of two women will be a bride would frame them both as hostile about the matter. This is not the case. Bianca and Flora hit it off immediately and become really close, to the point that whichever is not picked is entirely willing to help the other into the dress. The one not picked will never complain about not being chosen and are entirely fine with the way things play out. Both are willing to allow themselves to be abducted by demons to keep their children safe.

Quoth wikipedia regarding the PS2 remake: "In 2014, Sony Computer Entertainment conducted a poll with over 10,000 Japanese fans, where Dragon Quest V was voted the favorite PlayStation game of all time, the fourth best game that impressed "more than a movie or a novel", and the sixth most wanted remake."

DQ5 has one of the best written and mature narratives ever made. There isn't a single thing that is trite about it. This combined with being a major influence from it's innovations as well as doing things that most games don't do, all in a well-made, colorful package, I say that it should be at least Rank 3.