Emit series and other English language visual novels...

[Deleted]

So I was browsing around Segagadomain. What an addictive site checked it out after infernalcombustion mentioned it.

Now one thing I realized regarding the Japanese Saturn is that it has one too many mahjong, Idol dating/perving/minigame, and visual novel/adventure games. And I mean TOO MANY visual novel games. Honestly they seem like the easiest "game" to make. Maybe we should revive our Saturn project idea as a visual novel using Yart's stick drawing art

Any way

There seems to be a unique subgenre of these visual novels/adventure games that were designed to teach English..and these had full english text and dub. Now this looks like something martinii would know about, now since these games are in English..I am surprised at the lack of import reviews and faqs for these games. Surely there would be fans somewhere but I couldn't find any. Which leads me to conclude that either 1) very few know about these games, or 2) They are absolute arse...but if they were arse...surely someone would have ranted about it on a blog!

One series that stood in particular was emit, has something to do with time travelling, has three games.







Another one is the Dark Hunter series, has two games



So thoughts? experiences? martiniii ?

[martiniii]

Nov 19, 2013 12:08:44 GMT @virtuamuser said:

So thoughts? experiences? martiniii ?

Whoops, I don't know what it is I said, but I didn't mean to come off like I was an expert. Pretty much all I know about Japanese Saturn titles I learned from either the Segagaga site or from the 26 that I've played myself. Sadly I don't know anything about these games except they seem to be uncommon, since I'm pretty sure I've never run across them in my many hours of browsing Japanese Saturn games.

They do sound like very interesting releases, and I'm definitely going to have to keep an eye out for them now! I'd heard of the EMIT games before, but had no idea they were bilingual. I think I took one look at the covers and just said, "Eh, looks like another adventure game", which are of course inaccessible to non-Japanese speakers as a rule. Anyway, it'll be worth trying one of them out, if only to see if I can learn a little Japanese. (You'd think I would have picked some up from watching a certain Japanese TV series undubbed four times over, but all I got was "Shootjo", and I still have no idea how it's spelled.)

Thanks for posting about this, VirtuaMuser.

[Deleted]

Nov 20, 2013 23:25:40 GMT martiniii said:

Nov 19, 2013 12:08:44 GMT @virtuamuser said:

So thoughts? experiences? martiniii ?

Whoops, I don't know what it is I said, but I didn't mean to come off like I was an expert. Pretty much all I know about Japanese Saturn titles I learned from either the Segagaga site or from the 26 that I've played myself. Sadly I don't know anything about these games except they seem to be uncommon, since I'm pretty sure I've never run across them in my many hours of browsing Japanese Saturn games.

They do sound like very interesting releases, and I'm definitely going to have to keep an eye out for them now! I'd heard of the EMIT games before, but had no idea they were bilingual. I think I took one look at the covers and just said, "Eh, looks like another adventure game", which are of course inaccessible to non-Japanese speakers as a rule. Anyway, it'll be worth trying one of them out, if only to see if I can learn a little Japanese. (You'd think I would have picked some up from watching a certain Japanese TV series undubbed four times over, but all I got was "Shootjo", and I still have no idea how it's spelled.)

Thanks for posting about this, VirtuaMuser.

You would also be interested to know that this series also appeared on the 3DO. Hence why I mentioned you, should have made that clearer I know you're our resident 3DO man

[martiniii]

Nov 20, 2013 23:37:34 GMT @virtuamuser said:

Nov 20, 2013 23:25:40 GMT martiniii said:

Whoops, I don't know what it is I said, but I didn't mean to come off like I was an expert. Pretty much all I know about Japanese Saturn titles I learned from either the Segagaga site or from the 26 that I've played myself. Sadly I don't know anything about these games except they seem to be uncommon, since I'm pretty sure I've never run across them in my many hours of browsing Japanese Saturn games.

They do sound like very interesting releases, and I'm definitely going to have to keep an eye out for them now! I'd heard of the EMIT games before, but had no idea they were bilingual. I think I took one look at the covers and just said, "Eh, looks like another adventure game", which are of course inaccessible to non-Japanese speakers as a rule. Anyway, it'll be worth trying one of them out, if only to see if I can learn a little Japanese. (You'd think I would have picked some up from watching a certain Japanese TV series undubbed four times over, but all I got was "Shootjo", and I still have no idea how it's spelled.)

Thanks for posting about this, VirtuaMuser.

You would also be interested to know that this series also appeared on the 3DO. Hence why I mentioned you, should have made that clearer I know you're our resident 3DO man

Ah, I see. I'm afraid I know less about the 3DO's Japanese releases than I do about the Saturn's, but a quick search of the 3DO Zone forums reveals that there are at least two regulars there who have the games. Methinks I'll post there to see if I can get some opinions.

Also, I did a bit of checking around and found EMIT is available for at least two other consoles as well. Though the individual volumes weren't released for the PlayStation, the system did get the "EMIT Value Pack" (released on the Saturn as "EMIT Value Set") which is all three volumes bundled together. And the series was also released on... the Super Famicom. How the heck does that work, anyway? [Goes and looks up this video on YouTube.] ...Okay, apparently the Super Famicom versions have no sound on the cartridges themselves, and instead were bundled with audio CDs which, if you insert the discs into a CD player have a receiver peripheral plugged into the second controller port on the Super Famicom, will play the correct audio files as you play. Wow. I don't know which is more shocking: That technology like that existed, or that game developers were still using such a convoluted setup well into the era of CD-based consoles.

As a bit of trivia, according to GameFAQs dates, the versions were released in the order of Super Famicom, Saturn, 3DO, PlayStation. All three volumes of the Super Famicom version came out at the same time as volume 1 on the Saturn, each volume of the 3DO version was released 3-5 months after the corresponding Saturn volume, and the PlayStation bundle wasn't released until after the last volume in the 3DO set.

[mancity]

So the question is, are any of these 'games' actually worth playing at all?.....

[NeoGeoNinja]

Great info there btw!

Very interesting to learn of Saturn before 3DO releases and that rather magical sounding SNES set-up! Both contrived and very cool

[Deleted]

Thanks for researching that info Martinii

That SNES set up is convoluted! but very interesting too, in terms of how a completely separate device could sync with the game script, audio-wise. Also you say "a CD player", so basically ANY CD player would do? interesting. It sounds like something SEGA would dream up but I guess Nintendo could be just as convoluted if they wanted to

I hope the games..or I should say...the story....is good enough because these are very inexpensive. A quick browse shows prices around the $10-$15 range.

[martiniii]

Well, I've landed me a very reasonably priced copy of EMIT Volume 1. The seller actually had copies of Volumes 2 and 3, but I figured I should try Volume 1 first before I decide it's worth getting the entire series. (However, that same seller also happened to have... Angel Paradise Volume 1! My FMV puzzle collection is complete! At least until I uncover the existence of another one. )

So yeah, I'll certainly be posting here with my thoughts on EMIT. Probably a review as well, at some point. For starters, the back of the manual has a little English/Japanese dictionary with over 200 words and phrases used in the disc. Very handy.

[redtail]

I own both volumes of Dark Hunter. I'm planning on making a video fairly soon.

[Deleted]

That's really cool guys! Looking forward to your thoughts

Interesting you found Vol 1 Martinii, my last search (around the time I made the thread) only showed listings for Vol2 and Vol 3. I know there is a limited edition boxed set of it too.

I really hope the game turns out good, I'd love to try a Saturn visual novel ha ha.

[martiniii]

It's not really a visual novel or a movie. It consists of animated stills with full voice acting (which can be set to English or Japanese at any time), accompanied by some multiple choice exercises, also with full voice acting (though only in English). So yeah, unfortunately there's no interaction with the story.

The accessibility is very good... I was worried when I saw the main menus are in Japanese, but I checked the manual and it includes English translations of the main menu items. After that, it was a simple matter to find the option to put all the menus into English. The menus in the game proper all use either English or universal symbols, so no problem there.

I think I'll save further comment for a review, since it shouldn't take me long to write one. This is because, as it turns out, the game is very short; I went through it all, exercises included, in a little over an hour. I will say, though, that for software which is supposed to teach English, EMIT has a startling amount of Japanese-specific etiquette and such. For instance, I don't know how it is in other countries, but for the past three decades in the USA, suggesting that a teenage girl (especially one whose waist is barely wider than her arm) needs to watch her weight has been a big no-no. I watched the scene discussing the protagonist's diet torn halfway between amusement and horror.

[Deleted]

Apr 10, 2014 0:44:01 GMT martiniii said:

It's not really a visual novel or a movie. It consists of animated stills with full voice acting (which can be set to English or Japanese at any time), accompanied by some multiple choice exercises, also with full voice acting (though only in English). So yeah, unfortunately there's no interaction with the story.

The accessibility is very good... I was worried when I saw the main menus are in Japanese, but I checked the manual and it includes English translations of the main menu items. After that, it was a simple matter to find the option to put all the menus into English. The menus in the game proper all use either English or universal symbols, so no problem there.

I think I'll save further comment for a review, since it shouldn't take me long to write one. This is because, as it turns out, the game is very short; I went through it all, exercises included, in a little over an hour. I will say, though, that for software which is supposed to teach English, EMIT has a startling amount of Japanese-specific etiquette and such. For instance, I don't know how it is in other countries, but for the past three decades in the USA, suggesting that a teenage girl (especially one whose waist is barely wider than her arm) needs to watch her weight has been a big no-no. I watched the scene discussing the protagonist's diet torn halfway between amusement and horror.

Looking forward to that review thanks for sharing your impressions!

How much did your copy set you back?

[martiniii]

Apr 10, 2014 1:04:17 GMT @virtuamuser said:

Looking forward to that review thanks for sharing your impressions!

How much did your copy set you back?

About $17, but that was with free shipping from Japan, so after factoring in the other two games I got from the seller with free shipping, I'd say I was charged about $5 for EMIT Vol. 1 itself. It's definitely not a title you want to spend more than $10 on, due to its limited content.

[Deleted]

Might work out cheaper if I ordered the complete set, I'll wait for your review before I decide

[martiniii]

I was just putting the last touches on my EMIT Vol. 1 review when it occurred to me that it might help my evaluation of the story if I saw the later chapters. So I downloaded an ISO of the 3DO version of EMIT Vol. 2, simply because 4DO is my absolute favorite emulator.  And after all, the 3DO version must be virtually identical to the Saturn one, right?

Wrong. So very, very wrong.

Okay, first of all, if you've watched the videos of the Super Famicom version on YouTube, you'll have noticed that there are long, awkward pauses during dialogue. I assume that this is because each segment of dialogue is on a separate audio track so that the player can "rewind" scenes, and it takes the receiver peripheral and CD player a couple seconds to select the track and get it playing. Now, as you'd expect, when you select a chapter on the Saturn version, the game just loads the whole chapter into RAM, allowing the scene to play out smoothly with no pauses.

The 3DO version doesn't do this. Instead, it just reads the scene off the CD as it plays. This eliminates loading times, but makes it so that the long, awkward pauses of the Super Famicom version are back, and now appear in between every single sentence!

There are a couple of other differences. I immediately noticed that the main menu has four choices as compared to three on the Saturn. After putting the menus into English, it turns out that the fourth choice is a built-in memory manager. (3DO owners will know what I'm talking about, but it's a redundant feature for the Saturn.) Next, a curiously trivial improvement: When you answer an exercise question correctly on the Saturn version, you see this screen:



3DO owners, on the other hand, are treated to this:



...I just know that someone's going to borrow that one for their avatar.

That's as far as the differences go with EMIT Vol. 2. But when I went to confirm that these differences were also in place on the 3DO version of EMIT Vol. 1, I not only confirmed that they are indeed, I found the biggest difference yet. Vol. 1 on the 3DO has five items on the main menu:



"English game" sounds like it's going to be just the usual content with the English voices preselected, right? Wrong. It seems Koei decided to add in an actual game to the disc! I couldn't immediately figure out how this game works, since there's very little explanation in the game itself, but basically you control two cops on a city map in an attempt to catch criminals. Hopefully the screenshots below will give a vague idea of what I'm talking about. I wonder if this game was retained in the PlayStation version or if it's a 3DO exclusive?