Import games - pearls of wisdom.

Those old stickies are chilling out here.
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Import games - pearls of wisdom.

Post by 3DOKid » Sun Mar 11, 2007 11:00 pm

I guess a lot of people fancy a few imports for their 3DO but they fear the language barrier.

So - I thought I'd go through the Import games I have and rate them on 2 critera.

1) How easy they are for none Japanese speakers to get to grips with.
1 to 5. 1 impossible. 5 Piece of cake.

2) How playable the game is. (Doesn't mean it's good!)
1 to 5. 1 = difficult. 5 fun for all the family. (even the stupid ones)

This may help when you're tracking down a few imports from the location Gir Draxa provided in another post!

In no particular order.

Belzerion.- Lots of Japanese but I got quite far into the game - it's almost self explantaory. Score = 3.
- Probably more fun knowing precisly what is going on. Score 3.

Tesujin returns. (may have had a english language release!)
- Japanese language only counts during the intro. Score 5.
- It's an FPS. If you can't play it, contact a doctor. Score 5.

Taiketsu Rooms!- Minimal speaking. A bit of menu button bashing and you are there. Score 4.
- A bit confusing to begin with but it won't take long to figure out. Score 4

Doctor Hauzer.- Lots of Japanese language. However my blog has a bolstered Dr Hauzer walkthrough that covers the main story parts. Score 4 (with my help!)
- Piece of cake to play. Everyone should! Score 5.

Blue Chicago Blue.- Lots and lots of English, dubbed with Japanese language. Score 1.
- Unplayable as it relies on Japanese text too. Score 1.

Pretty Soldier Sailor Moon S.- Menus are in Japanese a bit of language but no real problem. Score 4.
- Fighting game so it's easy enough to play and the manual, while in Japanese, is easy to extract the moves from. Score 4.

Princess Maker 2.- menus are in Japanese. Language is Japanese. Sadly it's impossible. Score 1.
- No idea what's going on. Score 1.

Short Warp.- Half English - Half Japanese menus. Some of the games require the ability to read the Japanese numbering system - but not all. Score 4.
- It's easy enough to figure out what's going on, eventually. Score 4.

Sword & Sorcery. (Luciennes Quest)- All Japanese language and menus. Score 1.
- You maybe able to play it to a degree without understanding what's going on - but it wouldn't be much fun. Score 2.

Policenauts.- All Japanese language - utterly impentrable. Score 1.
- Progress can be made - but not easily. Score 2.

F1 GP.- Predominately in English. including car customizations. Some of the sub menus are in Japanese however. Score 4.
- F1 racing game - easy enough to grasp! Score 4.

Pyramid Intruders. (did it get an US/UK release?)- Wall to wall English. Score 5.
- Piece of cake to play. Score 5.

Blue Forest Story.- menu's and story in Japanese. Almost impossible. Score 2.
- It's an RPG. Without knowing what to do you can't play it. Score 1.

Ghost hunter series.- Story and menu's in Japanese - however, it's suprising how far you can get not being able to read or speak the language. Score 3.
- Easy enough to play. Pressing the icons and seeing what happens actually works - difficult but not impossible. Score 3. ( Go - on! Import it for the box art!)

more tomorrow!
Last edited by 3DOKid on Sun Mar 11, 2007 11:50 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Post by 3DOKid » Sun Mar 11, 2007 11:03 pm

What I may also do is scan in some thumb nails so you can identify the games when you are browing Yahoo.co.jp or MOJ or JapanGameStock (although they tend to have English version of the titles!)

3DO Kid.

Mobius

Post by Mobius » Sun Mar 11, 2007 11:44 pm

Ooh, very good info for a thread. It's just too bad the import game I want to play the most is Policenauts. :(

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Post by 3DOKid » Sun Mar 11, 2007 11:48 pm

Mobius wrote:Ooh, very good info for a thread. It's just too bad the import game I want to play the most is Policenauts. :(
The PSX version is to be translated! And then all the other versions and finally in 2037 when all the 3DO NVRAM is truly knackered - then it will be released. :cry:

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Post by Trev » Mon Mar 12, 2007 12:52 pm

Thank you 3DOKid!!! This is probably the best Sticky on the forum yet :D Please keep 'em coming.

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Post by Gir Draxa » Mon Mar 12, 2007 4:28 pm

3DO Kid, if you have a space to put them, I can provide you with the covers library from the Collective. Pretty extensive.

Drax
CEO of The (in search of a home) CD-i & 3DO Collectives

Just slightly behind at being ahead of our time!

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Post by 3DOKid » Mon Mar 12, 2007 8:47 pm

Gir - I'm not the guy with the space. Devin is your man. I think covers would help, with the English translation. People would know what they are after. It would be great!

When I volunteered to do more tonight btw, I forgot I would be in France. :roll: so, err, so, umm, more import goodness on Thursday.

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Post by 3DOKid » Thu Mar 15, 2007 8:38 pm

Miss Yamamura suspense Kyoto murder case.
Lots of spoken and written japanese. Score = 1.
About as far from import friendly as a game can get. Score = 1.

Royal Pro Wrestling.
All the menus are in Japanese, as is the manual. Can be a little confusing. Score 4.
It's a wrestling game. Having a manual helps ;) Score 3

Macaroni Town.
All Spoken and Written Japanese. Score 1.
It's not a game. Or at least I don't think it is. Score 1.

Debut Pure.
Nice animation. Great graphics. Lots of fun. If you speak and read Japanese only. Score 1.
It's a stats game. The stats are in Kanji. Go figure. Score 1.

Paddock Note '95
Horse racing stats game. made for the Japanese market. Score 1.
You can't play this if you don't read the lingo. Score 1.

idol janshi su-chi-pai special.
You have to know how to play Mahjong. Japanese mahjong at that. The wikipedia entry is actually pretty informative and I managed not only to play but play and win. Score 3

Insektor Wars.
All in Japanese as I recall. Score 2.
Easy enought to play by using trial and error. Score 4.

secure fuumin no omochabako.
All japanese language. Score 1.
Some sucess is possible - although the naggig doubt that you haven't played the entire game remains. Score 3.

Moon cradle.
all Japanese language. Requires a japanese 3DO player too. Score 1.
impossible to play. Score 1.

Winning post.
Another horse racing stats based game. Score 1.
Impossible to play even with guessing. Score 1.

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Post by Trev » Wed Aug 29, 2007 10:31 pm

Time to evict the nest of spiders that have made their home in this web that used to be a sticky .... :wink:

I don't have too many imports, but I highly reccommend 'Ultraman'. 'Sailor Moon' is also a decent import fighter as I recall, although my copy seems to be hiding on me. 'Virtual Stadium Baseball' is also pretty good, and although it is playable, I don't reccommend "Insector War' Oh, and last but not least 'Doctor Hauzer' is a must have!

P.S. We need your import expertise 3DO Kid!

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Post by Trev » Fri Sep 07, 2007 8:44 pm

Thanks to '3DO Experience' I now own a copy of Pyramid Intruder, a Novastorm like shooter (in full english) that is good fun!

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Post by Trev » Sat Jun 07, 2008 9:40 pm

-
Last edited by Trev on Sat Jun 07, 2008 9:46 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Post by Trev » Sat Jun 07, 2008 9:44 pm

This sticky hasn't been touched in ages, but that means I've been able to grab a # of imports in all these past months.

Mentioned Ultraman & Sailor moon in the last post. Yu Yu hashuko is another import 3DO fighter. My least favorite of the 3, but it is playable and is okay.

Autobahn Tokio & F1 Gp are 2 import racers. Autobahn is good. F1 gp is not.

Battle Pinball (I forget what exactly it is called) is a game that I thought i'd like more than I have. Easy to play, but kinda dull.

Nice Body is worthless, especially on an NTSC machine.

And finally, Royal Pro wrestling is pretty fun

I'll add more games as I acquire them ... or as I find ones I already own but have forgotten about.

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Post by NikeX » Tue Jun 17, 2008 4:15 pm

What is The Little House - and why is it not on 3DOKids blog?
I like the cover ot this "game" (?).

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Post by Trev » Tue Jun 17, 2008 10:50 pm

I don't own that title, but I am trying to keep this thread active by posting brief thoughts on imports I own and have played enough of. I still have quite a few to go, as well a new batch that should be arriving in the next few weeks.

I think 3DOKid owns a # of games that aren't listed on his blog. Maybe he'll take requests for his next reviews? :)

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Post by NikeX » Wed Nov 19, 2008 11:25 am


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Post by Trev » Fri Nov 21, 2008 3:40 am

But what is it?
Still no clue ... a kid version of Dr. Hauzer maybe? You know with puppies and gumdrops instead of deathtraps? :lol:

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Post by NikeX » Mon May 11, 2009 10:35 pm

And so it goes and so it goes and no one knows.

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Post by 3DO Experience » Tue May 12, 2009 1:13 am

I have this. It's not really a game it's a floor planner for the 3DO so you can design a house as far as I can tell. It's all in Japanese and not very interesting. But here's the title screen for you.
Image
"Wait. You don't have a bag of charcoal in your gaming room???"

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Post by Trev » Tue May 12, 2009 4:26 pm

Anything like the Life Stage? Btw, nice to see this thread get a bump ... I'm gonna start posting here again soon.

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Post by 3DO Experience » Tue May 12, 2009 10:19 pm

Not as far as I can tell. You do get some shots of the outside and such but it's very text heavy and I can't seem to do much not knowing what it all says.
"Wait. You don't have a bag of charcoal in your gaming room???"

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Post by NikeX » Thu May 14, 2009 10:07 pm

Thank you 3DO Experience. So, a floor planer. To design a house
sounds very interesting. It think it's the cutest 3DO game cover I've ever seen. It is so outstanding! Just a house! A old little house! No spaceship-vs-ultradragon-mystery-woman. It won't leave my mind! Is it possible to plan your house without being able to read japanese? I mean, it reads "LITTLE house". But thanks again. Maybe, sometime, in human history, we're going to see a youtube clip of it (in the year 7000).

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Post by TripHawkins » Sun Jun 14, 2009 4:10 pm

Thank you 3DO Kid for this, I was looking for a resource like this.

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Post by Trev » Sun Jun 14, 2009 7:24 pm

Here are my thoughts on a few more imports ...

Master of the game
- (correct translation?) Collection of Japanese board games from Sanyo. Othello was the only one I knew.

Montana Jones - Uneven mix of genres w/platforming sections being the highlight. Animated Indiana Jones like critters

Murphy's Law (Murphy's TV) - Full English dialogue option available. But is it a game? Seems strictly informational to me ... at least so far.

Neo Organic Bioform
- Verdict is still out on this tough, but unique game. I'll keep plugging away at it and update as warranted.

Takeru - Digital comic book is non-interactive. Interesting artwork.


Coming soon ... more!

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Post by mattyg » Sun Jun 14, 2009 10:27 pm

I have "Master of the Game" indexed as "Games Master" as this seems to be the more preferred translation - - incidently good ole Wikipedia has this one mentioned (as well as others that aren't) as a prototype :oops:
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Post by Trev » Sun Jun 14, 2009 11:19 pm

mattyg wrote:I have "Master of the Game" indexed as "Games Master" as this seems to be the more preferred translation - - incidently good ole Wikipedia has this one mentioned (as well as others that aren't) as a prototype :oops:
If I had the time I'd check (& fix as needed) every 3DO reference on Wikipedia ...

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Post by 3DO Experience » Mon Jun 15, 2009 12:31 am

I use a couple books and a few web translators and what I've worked it down to was The Master's Game or Games Master. Looking at it now 'Game no Tatsujin' looks more like 'Master of Game'.... maybe someone's wife should translate some Japanese titles for us. *hint hint*
"Wait. You don't have a bag of charcoal in your gaming room???"

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Post by Trev » Mon Jun 15, 2009 3:50 am

Would be good to get an exact translation as slight variations like this have the potential to confuse, especially if we are ever going to get a full list of Japanese imports. So, our nominees are ...


"Master of the Game" (Trev)

"Games Master" (mattyg)

"The Masters Game"/ "Games Master"/ "Master of Game" (3DOExp)


Arrgghh! :twisted: They are all so close!


Please help us Mrs. 3DOKid!

Madroms

Post by Madroms » Mon Jun 15, 2009 9:40 pm

Master of the game must be the correct translation.

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Post by 3DO Experience » Tue Jun 16, 2009 4:09 am

I'll wait for Mrs.3DOKid's translation.
"Wait. You don't have a bag of charcoal in your gaming room???"

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Post by Trev » Sun Jul 05, 2009 9:47 pm

Still waiting ...

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