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Famicom Detective Club: The Missing Heir and Famicom Detective Club: The Girl Who Stands Behind localized in English for Nintendo Switch, May 14th
- Thread starter Deleted member 10737
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That collectors edition looks amazing, I want it. Maybe there will be a limited release in the states, hopefully.
Insta-bought on day one! I love Phoenix Wright and got similar vibes when I watched the trailer.
Really happy this was announced. I was actually sorta expecting Buddy Mission BOND to be announced, but I'll take this for sure.
I was really (pleasantly) surprised by the game's animation since I'd only seen the screens from the japanese announcement, I was expecting a more static title.
Funny how I went from complete indifference to "this might be my game of the direct"
Funny how I went from complete indifference to "this might be my game of the direct"
$35 each was a bit more then I was expecting, I'll probably only get Lost Heir at launch since it's the game without any English fan translation available for it's original title.
Edit: Just saw $10 discount if you buy the second. $60 for both feels more reasonable.
Edit: Just saw $10 discount if you buy the second. $60 for both feels more reasonable.
Whoh there tiger, Portopia came out in 1983. This was significantly later. It's an important historical title to be sure, but let's not overstate things.
My real hope is that with global releases of these titles, Sakurai can finally realize his dreams of including Ayumi in Smash Bros., as he intended back in Melee.
By the way, from the American website
Famicom Tantei Club 2 was the first game from Sakamoto with the music composed by Kenji Yamamoto of Metroid fame. I'm very happy to see his original work preserved!
Damn that sounds perfect. Already was hyped but this really sells it for me.
AFAIK the Famicom Tanteis were among the first games to take the Portopia model to tell more complex stories with multifaceted characters. Not the origin of the Japanese adventure genre, but a milestone nonetheless.
Its too bad it won't have the Satellaview remake music which was also fantastic and really creepy.
They're definitely heavyweights. Hokkaido Chain Murders (also a Yuji Horii joint) was 1984, Imitation City from Jiro Ishii (who you might know from the more recent 428: Shibuya Scramble) was '87. Snatcher was '88 like Famicom Tantei Club too, though later in the year. Obviously this excludes a lot of eroge games which were fairly shallow but were still aiding the genre's stylistic evolution. I don't mean to diminish them as important games, but I think it's important to make sure we understand the timeline of production properly!
I also think it's worth distinguishing that these games were pioneering in the genre of Japanese adventure games, but not visual novels. In Japan the delineation between these two styles of game is much more robust than we tend to use in the West. Games translator Tom James is out there on Twitter right now:
Are these going to have more fleshed out gameplay than the average Famicom adventure game, which tend to literally just involve looking at and talking to everything and everyone until the plot arbitrarily moves forward?
I don't mind if they are adventure games at all, but it would be nice if there was some actual logic behind them, unlike most Portopia clones.
I don't mind if they are adventure games at all, but it would be nice if there was some actual logic behind them, unlike most Portopia clones.
There was a third FDC game where an older Ayumi Tachibana was the main character but it was exclusive to the Satellaview, a radio add-on for the SNES
As I see other 80s detective games (these games are NOT visual novels!) mentioned in the thread I would recommend everyone with an interest in the genre to check out the Jinguji Saburu series which also originated in the Famicom Disk System. The original stories were remade for the DS and released as Jake Hunter: Memories of the Past (ignore the original DS release as it's missing half the stories).
I honestly think a lot of people slept on that game and it's a real shame as it has oozes of personality and captures that 80s Japanese pulp/noir fiction perfectly. Check it out!
There's also a sequel that was released in the West for the 3DS (Ghost of the Dusk, personally not as good as the DS stories but still solid) and a Switch "reimagining" of Jake Hunter's origins (which I've not played yet).
I honestly think a lot of people slept on that game and it's a real shame as it has oozes of personality and captures that 80s Japanese pulp/noir fiction perfectly. Check it out!
There's also a sequel that was released in the West for the 3DS (Ghost of the Dusk, personally not as good as the DS stories but still solid) and a Switch "reimagining" of Jake Hunter's origins (which I've not played yet).
Had basically lost all hope after Miyamoto said this in 2019 during a shareholders Q&A:
It's awesome that this is actually happening. Can't wait to play these classics.
It's awesome that this is actually happening. Can't wait to play these classics.
I'm not familiar with Imitation City, but I believe both Snatcher and Famicom Tantei (and the Nintendo adventure games developed by EAD) were part of a "second wave" of Japanese adventure games - that is, games that took the Portopia / Hokkaido template and tried to do something more with it, either by introducing paranormal elements or changing the setting to a cyberpunk world.
By the way, do you have some articles on the history of Japanese adventure games? I gathered everything I know reading some translated interviews here and there (this one is great for FamiTant) and from some forum posts.
Speaking of other Japanese genres often related to adventure games and Sakamoto's older games, the translation of Tokimeki High School is slowly but promising getting closer to completation.
Huh, I was only aware of the remake of the second game on the Satelllaview.
The remake was for a completely different service, Nintendo Power, which was a download cartridge you took to kiosks rather than downloaded via satellite connection.
The SNES was a completely different beast in Japan, huh?
Is it possible this is only getting localized because of Covid and Nintendo needed games to publish? Surprised it wasn't announced when it first got revealed.
Really cool to see this getting localized! I wish it was more than just English, but given Miyamoto's recent comments, it wasn't every likely. A future remake of BS Tantei Saga could still happen depending on sales and fan interest, much like BS Archanean Saga getting remade for the second DS Fire Emblem game.
So many of these kinds of games get called Ace Attorney-likes or visual novels primarily because of a lack of historic reference/perspective on these genres in the West. That will improve over time, but it helps to make these distinctions now too.
Essentially, visual novels are themselves an evolution of much older command-based Japanese adventure games based on PC-original games from the early-1980s like Portopia/Okhotsk, Enix/Square-published adventures like JESUS and The Death Trap, as well as procedural detective adventure series like J.B. Harold and Jake Hunter. Famicom Detective Club owes a lot to Japanese PC adventures of that vintage, albeit streamlined and expanded for console play. These SFW games co-existed and developed alongside erotic adventures which, over time, shed their mechanical trappings until very little game-y bits were left. This also ties in with Tokimeki Memorial revolutionizing the dating sim, once a PC-bound curiosity, and introducing stat-heavy systems to these genres.
So many of these kinds of games get called Ace Attorney-likes or visual novels primarily because of a lack of historic reference/perspective on these genres in the West. That will improve over time, but it helps to make these distinctions now too.
Imitation City was basically Snatcher before Snatcher, albeit lacking in production values since Data West had way less resources to provide than Konami. This kind of experimentation beyond detective procedurals existed on the PC-88 and competing Japanese PCs as early as 1984, I'd argue, with anthology adventures like Enix's Again (produced by the writer behind the GD-Leen light novels), The Death Trap doing pulp military-setting action, and both Zarth and Micro Cabin's Eiyuu Densetsu Saga using scanned-in anime artwork for the first time.
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Oh, I remember reading about that service before. I didn't know the remake was offered through it rather than the Satellaview, though.
Lot's of people gushing about this game and some are saying it's an adventure game and not a visual novel which intrigues me. Guess I'll be giving the first game a try when it releases.
It's not a point-and-click adventure like that era of Sierra/LucasArts game, let alone the few Japanese titles doing something like that, but expect plenty of menu interactions, managing inventory and evidence, etc. This plays more in line with procedural detective/mystery games than just advancing text or something more gimmicky.
It's basically proto-Ace Attorney, minus the courtroom segments
damn! well that's cool - i'm guessing the first was the famicom translated one i'd not played yet?
had a blast with the latter, looking forward to a replay!
Sounds awesome because I'm currently on an adventure/exploration/puzzle game mood lately (currently playing Call of the Sea) after playing Outer Wilds and Return of the Obra Dinn and this game seems to be scratching that itch. I can't wait to try this game out.
For those interested in the history of Japanese Adventure Games and the history of the genre distinctions being discussed in this thread, I recommend reading this informative GiantBomb blog post. It's is a good overview of the genre and the splintering of the VN subgenre. It also cites this Yuji Hori & Rika Suzuki (RIP CiNG)i interview which is another interesting read in its own right. It talks about how they were introduced to adventure games (all roads lead to Roberta Williams) and they muse about the future of adventures from their 1987 perspective.
Some things never change, heh:
Of course the Japanese style of adventure games has its own distinct style compared to their western counterparts (tend to be in 1st person, generally easier puzzles, more dialogue), much like with rpg's and other genres. Although there's far more overlap than difference and over time they've become increasingly similar to one another, I feel. As the Japanese stuff has fleshed out the puzzling and the Western stuff leaned heavier into narrative.
Some things never change, heh:
Of course the Japanese style of adventure games has its own distinct style compared to their western counterparts (tend to be in 1st person, generally easier puzzles, more dialogue), much like with rpg's and other genres. Although there's far more overlap than difference and over time they've become increasingly similar to one another, I feel. As the Japanese stuff has fleshed out the puzzling and the Western stuff leaned heavier into narrative.
I mean, it's all the same for the general public. I'm a big VN and ADV fan, I certainly know the difference between them, but in the West, I don't see the issue in calling these games visual novels.
