Import Gaming FTW Chibisodes is a new series on this channel about cool, interesting or
obscure things related to Japanese gaming that I love, presented in small, bite-sized
segments for your convenience.
In this inaugural episdode, I'll talk about a PlayStation 2 game given out at Japanese
McDonald's restaurants at the turn of the millennium, Hudson's card-sized software format
that came before the PC Engine's HuCards, and a special promotional VHS tape for one
of the Dreamcast's greatest titles.
You gotta believe, this is Import Gaming FTW Chibisodes episode one!
What time is it?
It's Parappa time...well, not quite like this, but more like THIS.
McDonald's is no stranger when it comes to tie-ins with major video game console manufacturers.
If you grew up in the 90s in America, chances are you remember those awesome Super Mario
Bros. 3 Happy Meals.
Same goes for the Sonic 3 Happy Meals several years later...and if you spend way too much
time on the internet like myself, you've gotta be familiar with that bizarre Pakistani Sonic
McDonald's commercial.
Good lord.
The fast food giant has teamed up with Nintendo and Sega on many occasions, but what about
Sony and their PlayStation brand?
If you were a gaming fan in 2001, you were probably more than aware of one of the chain's
biggest video game promotional campaigns ever...well, as long as you lived in Japan, anyway.
At that time, PlayStation 2 themed Happy Meals were available at McDonald's for a short while,
giving center stage to four characters who were sort of the system's mascots of the era.
As you've already probably guessed, one of these was Parappa the Rapper.
The other three were “Piposaru” one of the apes from the Saru Getchu series, known
as Ape Escape abroad, the Final Fantasy equivalent of a loyal steed, the adorable Chocobo, and
what is probably the closest thing to an official mascot the PlayStation ever had, Toro Inoue
from the Japan-exclusive Dokodemo Issho series.
These characters were used to decorate McDonald's meals and were made into collectible toys
and accessories...but who cares about all that, right, what about actual games?!
So in addition to all that, and appropriate to the theme, a free, PS2 compatible game
disc was also given away with Happy Meals, called the Happy Disc.
This promotional CD includes two brief game demos and an original short movie.
The first demo is of Parappa the Rapper 2, featuring what feels like a beta version of
the first level of the game.
In the final release, this stage takes place at an establishment named Beard Burger, but
since the Happy Disc is a McDonald's give away, the restaurant is of course plastered
all over with the Golden Arches.
The way the game plays and sounds in the demo is a little rough compared to
the finished product—take a look and listen for yourself.
The level cuts off abruptly about two thirds of the way through, unfortunately, and there
aren't any extras or options for this demo, other than an explanation of the controls.
The second demo in the Happy Disc is for Piposaru 2001, a Japan-only Ape Escape spin-off title.
Instead of using a net to capture the piposaru apes, in this game you're armed with a vacuum
cleaner, which is used to suck the pants off of the primates.
Yeah, maybe that's why the game never left Japan, the world just wasn't ready.
Anyway, the gameplay is simple--you collect all the pants in a level before a timer runs
out, you're ranked on your performance, and it's on to the next challenge.
Just like with the Parappa demo, the fast food company's connection with the gameplay
is merely cosmetic, with McDonald's structures and items occupying the background, and burgers
replacing the heart power-ups left by pant-less monkeys.
And also like the previous demo, the experience ends abruptly, shortly into the third level,
and again there are no additional options outside of an explanation of the controls.
The small slice of Piposaru 2001 on offer here is really fun, and I'm interested in
picking up the actual game now.
The demo did it's job, nearly two decades after the fact!
The movie presented in the Happy Disc is about four and a half minutes long and stars Japanese
television personality and dance choreographer Papaya Suzuki, as well as Piposaru...or at
least a guy in a mascot costume.
The pair travels to New York City to study up on various dances, consulting with and
learning from street performers, cheerleaders and even members of the world-famous performing
arts show, Stomp.
At the end of the video, the piposaru performs his special dance...The Happy Disc is a neat
little oddity that fans of Parappa the Rapper, Ape Escape, the PlayStation 2, game demos,
or god forbid, McDonald's, should have in their collection.
Its “not for sale” label and promotional goods status hasn't affected its availability,
as it's easily found online or in used media shops throughout Japan, and for cheap—around
a dollar or less.
Well worth it for the piposaru dance alone.
The HuCard is somewhat of a video gaming icon.
The sleek, credit card-sized games were designed for use on game developer Hudson Soft and
electronics giant NEC's joint-produced PC Engine video game console, repackaged as the
Turbografx-16 outside of Japan.
This little system originally hit the market in 1987 and played host to some real classic
games...but quite a few infamous hidden turds, too.
However, the roots of the software technology go back a bit further than the PC Engine with
Hudson's forerunner to the HuCard on the MSX, simply named the Bee Card, an obvious reference
to the company's logo.
Made commercially available in 1985, the Bee Card was the result of collaborative R&D between
Hudson and the plastics division of the Mitsubishi Group.
The Bee Card is often considered the world's first “memory card,” with the capacity
to store 32 kilobytes of information, and is slightly thinner than a HuCard, with 32
connector pins rather than 38.
MSX Bee Cards were produced in relatively limited numbers, with only seven games using
the format released in Japan, mostly Hudson's own titles, but there were a few more releases
outside the country.
To play the games a special adapter called the Bee Pack was required, which houses a
single card and fits into one of the MSX unit's standard cartridge slots.
The artwork on Bee Cards face up in relation to how they're inserted into the system, the
opposite of normal PC Engine HuCards, but similar to SuperGrafx ones.
Bee Packs were available to purchase separately or bundled with the first Bee Card title,
Yakyuukyou, or Baseball Craze.
Only 5,000 sets of the latter were produced, though a standalone version of Baseball Craze
was also published for retail sale.
I wouldn't recommend it without the Bee Pack, though, because the game kind of sucks.
Thankfully, I do have another Bee Card title that's pretty great, which you've already
seen—Takahashi Meijin no Boukenjima, the classic known worldwide as Adventure Island.
The decision to bypass the already established cartridge format of the MSX and create an
all new one to sell on the system might seem strange, but I suppose the reasoning behind
it was that it was much cheaper to manufacture cards over carts, with profits from the technology
over the long run covering development costs.
And I guess for buyers, the slim cards seemed pretty cool and were a lot less bulky than
the cartridges and cassette tapes that software was distributed on at the time...even though
they came in large boxes like a majority of MSX games.
Bee Cards weren't exclusively used on the MSX, as they were also utilized as telephone
cards, and while I have no personal knowledge regarding these, the technology was apparently
used in PC-98 series computers and the Atari Portfolio palmtop computer, presumably as
memory expansion cards.
The Bee Card may be the first of its kind, but it wasn't the only card-based software
format of the era, nor on the MSX.
Sega's My Cards for use on the Sega SC-3000 and SG-1000 and later for the Mark III and
Master System, were sold starting in 1985, the same year as the Bee Card.
They're very similar to Hudson's proprietary format, and they too were even manufactured
by Mitsubishi Plastics.
The most noticeable physical differences between the two are the number of pins on each and
how they're arranged.
Closer in appearance to the Sega My Card is the Astron SoftCard from Electronic Software,
an MSX format which was primarily sold in European territories that also required a
separate adapter to run.
The intentions of the companies behind these card-shaped games all seem to have been the
same—save money and provide a compact software solution to gamers.
In addition, these formats are all similar in that they never really caught on with consumers
and don't seem to have achieved much financial success—well, except for the HuCard, of
course.
But today, for collectors and people who just love games, they're really cool pieces of
gaming history that should be considered for collection.
Bee Card games aren't too hard to find, but they're a bit pricey, just like everything
related to the MSX.
When you see this swirl, orange or blue, what's the first game to pop into your mind?
Sonic Adventure?
Soul Calibur?
Crazy Taxi?
Space Channel 5?
Skies of Arcadia?
OK, you get the point.
There are so many amazing, original titles on the Dreamcast that people instantly think
of when they see the system's unforgettable logo.
But if one game more than any other was to represent the console as a whole, I think
it would have to be Shenmue.
At the time of its release, it was the most ambitious and costly gaming project ever,
and whether you ended up loving it or hating it, you had to admit that it was at the very
least an impressive undertaking.
When I got the game on Christmas morning in the year 2000 and popped it into my Dreamcast,
I was immediately and firmly in the camp of “loving it.”
But you're not here to listen to my personal memories gushing over the game—there's enough
of that out there.
No, you're here to hear about the video tape you saw in the beginning of this segment.
The What's Shenmue?
VHS tape was given away at Japanese video game retailers to customers who purchased
Dreamcast systems or software.
I'm not completely sure of the exact numbers and dates, but it seems Sega produced 100,000
of these tapes for the promotion that took place in the middle of 1999, most likely in
August, a few months before the game's Japanese release.
The tape's running time is just under 30 minutes, with footage and narration going in depth
into the many features of the game, such as combat mechanics, the QTE system and how realistic
the game's world and characters are designed.
It even goes so far to illustrate realism that it chronicles a day in the life of one
of the minor NPCs, cigarette store owner Haru Hirata.
Do you remember her?
Several scenes from an early build of Shenmue II are shown, as well as a few things that
were ultimately cut from the final game, such as the ability to cycle around Dobuita on
a mamachari bicycle.
All in all, the video is put together really well, and I can only imagine just how hyped
people who viewed it in the months up to Shenmue's release must have been.
I could go on and on about the contents of this VHS tape, but I don't really need to,
as it's available for viewing in full online, and with English subtitles.
For Shenmue and Dreamcast fans who want a physical copy, though, here's some good news,
as it's quite a common find online, and can be had for just a small fistful of yen.
I'm not sure if Shenmue changed RPGs as it proclaims in its trailer, but it surely made
an impact on the lives of many who played it.
Aside from this video tape, there was another “What's Shenmue?”
promo item that's a bit more well-known...but maybe I'll talk about that another time.
Well, that's all I've got for the first episode of Import Gaming FTW Chibisodes...I'm hoping
to do quite a few more of these kinds of videos in the future, so stay tuned if you liked it.
As always, this is Jimmy Hapa—thanks for watching, and take care.