Wednesday 8 December 2021

Missed Classic: The Count (in Japanese)

 Written by Morpheus Kitami

There haven't been a lot of Japanese games on TAG. There haven't been any, actually. This is not necessarily due to a lack of them translated into English, but the only big ones released in English by '93 are Murder Club and L-Zone. Why Trickster never covered Murder Club isn't a mystery, it wasn't on Wikipedia's list of graphic adventure games when he started. I don't know why L-Zone got missed in '92 or '93.

Thrilling gameplay in Mystery House

First, a little context. The first Japanese text adventure that is very muddled. At first I assumed that Mystery House, the Sierra game, got ported in 1982 and then people were inspired to write their own. I don't remember where I got onto this track, but I suspect the rip-off of Mystery House, called Mystery House, this one made by Micro Cabin, was inspired by the port, rather than the original version. I'm not sure there's a real first Japanese text adventure, sort of how such things were inevitable in the western world.
A typical Japanese adventure game

In 1983 The Portopia Serial Murder Case was released, the first major Japanese-style adventure game, where instead of doing actions on things or typing it out, you select from a list of options. For some reason that will become clear as you read, this was unimaginably popular in Japan and a good chunk of Japanese games were inspired in some way by it. As a result, actual text adventures never really took off in Japan, though there would be a few titles per year up until the early '90s. (this was all helped by Japanese computers tending towards smut than entertainment) Western graphical adventures would have a distinct niche, but usually ported to consoles and there are very few Japanese attempts at the genre.


The sum total of my knowledge on this company

This was published by Starcraft. While a few companies ported western titles to Japan, Starcraft was the biggest porting adventure and RPGs in the '80s. Originating as a developer for Broderbund on Apple II software, which was relatively popular in the days when native computers required you to build it yourself. After a couple years of developing games for Broderbund they shifted gears and started publishing western made adventure and RPGs games, starting with Mystery House and ending with Legend of Kyrandia 2. Why did they do this? I don't know. I just don't have any information on the subject. Even the Japanese don't seem too interested in saying anything about it. However, I did find something interesting. At least some Japanese versions of these were designed from the ground up. Might and Magic 2 for instance was developed alongside the English versions. I suspect that The Count is original, since looking through the game reveals it doesn't usual the typical Adams three-letter parser.

So, The Count. Scott Adams seems a natural fit to translate into another language. Simple language, simple commands, simple input. Unfortunately, it's 1984 and memory is at a premium. That means that you can't use Kanji, or the most important aspect of the Japanese written language. I know for the MSX you had to purchase a module, and generally speaking games before 1988 were limited in this fashion.

It seems at the very least these pictures are based on the American ones, though they are higher quality, for whatever that's worth

Allow me to explain this screenshot. The bottom line says my location, I'm currently in the bedroom. You'll notice that it's the same as the one three lines above it, because it's also the bedroom. Except it isn't, its when I was in bed, the line above it is rise. The second from bottom line is telling me what's in the room, a bed and window. And the top is telling me I've taken the sheet. You now know everything here. Can you figure out what's missing?

Love the toilet just hanging out in the background

If you guessed directions, you'd be right. The second screen of the game doesn't mention which directions you can go in. The third screen does, but by that point, you probably already know roughly what you're doing. I haven't read any out-of-game materials for these versions, but it seems to me that this was exactly the wrong way to go about it. I didn't show a screenshot of it, but all the English versions have a little screen telling you what you can do in these games, something this doesn't have. Or a help function. And I don't have a stake, just the sheets.

Note the dumb-waiter on the left, its open

The kitchen...cool, cool. I don't understand a word of this, which is also cool. Big oven here. Maybe wall...maybe. Nothing for dumb-waiter, which is unfortunate, since that's how I go through this. No, the word they're using is lift. And you don't go to it here, you just go west. I don't figure out they're using lift until I'm inside the lift. I can't enter the oven yet. I don't know why, it gives me a generic message. The elevator is much simpler, I just go up or down. I wonder if this means I can't lock myself out of the game this way?

What, your pantry doesn't look like this?

The pantry proceeds about as much as I expected, though it is worth pointing out there are two variations on the word garlic, one based on our own, and one native to Japan. They're using the native version.

Hang on a minute, the left wall is exactly the same as on the other floors! I've been cheated!

Ah...I see. I can see mallet, down and closet door, but I don't see vent anywhere. Might be there, might not, not important. Big question...the door, can I enter it yet? No, but it gives me a unique message. I'ts starting to shape up that it's the actual game, which is good. Not looking forward to picking the lock to be honest though. I'm also wondering about that item limit.

I wonder if the reason for the text is that this room is so empty?

Oh, good, more text. This is original. Dracula catches humans and puts him in his dungeon. Iron something and the floor. Let me explain the issue here with reading this. Japanese usually works without spaces and tries to use as many kanji as possible. They do this for reasons I won't explain. This doesn't, because space is very expensive in 1984 and using all those kanji requires space. So this game does what usually doesn't happen and puts spaces between words. Except that the particles, your "the" "is" and so forth, are attached at the end of words. This is tricky if you know a word, if you don't, it's not fun.

Note the area to the right of the sheet, where it covers the wall, which has changed, undoubtedly thanks to technical limitations

Okay, to get down to the pit, I need to tie the sheet to the iron rings. Except that I don't quite get what here I'm supposed to type at first. I see something called "tetsunowa" which I assume means iron something, so I type tetsunowa wa. This seems to me quite stupid, but eventually I find out that "wa" in addition to being a particle, also means ring. I wonder how many other objects that are causing me trouble are like this.

You really did this, huh?

Wait, what? Talk about making an already pointless screen more pointless. Anyway, this particular screen proves very difficult, mostly thanks to minor incompetence on my part, and incredible incompetence on the porters part. I don't usually type Japanese symbols, and I kept getting mo and ma confused. Since this is very much a guess the verb kind of day, that's not good. Nothing I do seems to shed some light here. Well, I know that there's a torch here and even lighting the match seems to do nothing. Light it, nothing happens, and leave.

"Dang ! The torch has burned the skin of the sheets !

Consequently, you have burnt to death dang..."

Let's recap this puzzle, if I were a Japanese man in 1984 without any knowledge of text adventures, I would have to assume I could tie the sheets to the iron rings, go in the pit, assume that there's a torch in the pit, take that torch, NOT light the torch, and then go back up. I don't see any way you could legitimately figure out how to do this. Light and burn seem to be treated as different words. Light isn't working while burn seems to be a success. And it is a success, there's no question about that.

It's not something you would notice during normal gameplay, but the bottom line goes a few pixels up from left to right

Going back up to the gate, there's the postcard, the door...and I guess the bell and the crest factor in somehow. Not really important, since we know that Dracula does horrible things in the dungeon. The postcard seems to have missed the joke in the English version, and Yorga might be in here assuming "youga" is supposed to be him. Taking the postcard automatically gives me the clip. Time to unlock that door.

That vent looks more like a window than a vent

"Regrettable, nevertheless, you lack the tools to pick the lock"

It takes me some time before I figure out some combinations of words that get me any response. Trying to open the door, the game asks me which one. I also have to extensively search through a dictionary just to find the right word for lock and picking a lock. Okay, I guess I have to drop the postcard. No, that drops the clip too. I can't remove the clip from the postcard, either. I have to take the clip when I have the postcard in my inventory. I'm starting to feel like I need to end every paragraph with "no, I'm not kidding you."

Middle line after the last command, big word? The medicine vial, and yes, I had to type that

I almost quit trying to open the door. However, this time it isn't the developers fault, it's definitely me and the dictionary I'm using. I should know how to say open by now and my (physical) dictionary should include verbs under open, but silly me, I don't, and it doesn't. You can't do any of the tricks you could in the original, the clip needs to be precisely in my inventory. Unfortunately, inventory limits are in play, and it's far more brutal here. When I get inside I can't get the vial, which is something I should be able to do, since I don't have the stake. The medicine works straight from the bottle, which is as little a plus as I'm ever going to get.

You know I couldn't leave without going for the lowest form of entertainment

Since I have some time before nightfall, I decided to check out the rest of the rooms. From a returning player's perspective there's nothing much interesting here. I can't get a response from trying to go into the gate or the toilet. And just using the directions didn't help much either. Oh, well. The burning torch allows me to see at night, so clearly something funny is going on in the pit.

Not sure why they bothered with the lens since they never bothered with mentioning the sunlight

One of the issues I had with the door downstairs is that when I try to open a door, it asks me which one. As there was only one door in the original game, this perplexed me. Eventually, I figured out you could close the dumb-waiter's door...if you wanted to. You also have to open the door to the oven, which doesn't work before nightfall. There's nothing telling you that sunlight or heat is inside the oven or anything. With the metal file, the first day and thus most of the gameplay is complete.

Those are some nice mountains

The sheets are returned, but that's the only good news. After opening the window I have to go window, whereas everywhere else was move commands. That's about as far as I can get. I can tie the sheets to the bed, but that's it. There's no new noun in the room, and looking at the sheets just tells me they're tied to the bed. I try writing a lot of things it could be, but none of them work. I briefly look through the file with a hex editor again, but at this point I haven't the slightest bit of enthusiasm for the game.

************************

This was not a good port of the game, but it is interesting in terms of game design. Usually, we only get to see what happens if a game is good or if it's bad. Remakes usually change puzzles enough to make it a less direct comparison, or just change around the graphics. Ports, when they're failures, don't change gameplay around. To see something that does is a unique opportunity. To see how the state a great game reaches is more fragile than we think.

Take, for instance, the verbs. While the original wasn't perfect, in most cases it had a pretty solid selection of words it understood. This...doesn't. Now admittedly, this is a language barrier issue, maybe there's a reason why only one variation of burn or open works. While both the originals and these ports were released close to the others in the series, there's a sense that the original had quite a bit of testing, while this does not. I have good reasons for this.

In the original there's only one door. There is no confusion with the phrase open door, because there is only one door. In this version, there are 3 or 5, depending on if you count the lift doors multiple times. It's just busywork. There's no reason for it, since you're never going to want to close the lift doors. You even have to open the gates outside if you want to get killed by the crowd, which just feels like a strange change.

But take aside the language barrier and you still have issues. The game doesn't give information out very well. Obviously there's the issue with the sheets and directions, but the graphical images are used as a sort of crutch for the latter. Except that only applies sometimes. Without knowledge of the original game I probably would have gotten lost. Compare that to even the graphical remake of the original, where you could always see any directions you could go in.

In some cases, these issues could just be me being dumb, but it is worth pointing out that I spent some time looking this game up in Japanese and got nothing. Now, we lack most period magazines, so that isn't fair to bring up. But I've seen a bunch of Japanese sites, and they talk about other games. A lot of other games. Including contemporaries of this game, other text adventures, other foreign text adventures and even a few references to Adams other games. Not The Count, not at all. I think that's most danging evidence of all about this game.

Puzzles and Solvability

It was obvious going in this was going to suffer considerably compared to the original, because while it has the same puzzles, its so much worse trying to solve them. The game gives you so little to work with, it's maddening. Even looking at objects offers little help.

Still, it's the same game I fell in love with, it's just that without the way the game presented the information to you it feels so much worse.

4

Interface and Inventory

Everything about this was incredibly frustrating to use. Five lines of text and that's all you get, no looking back either. It takes a good 10 seconds for a picture to load in, and it doesn't go away if you type. Given how much more important the pictures are compared to the text, I question why they didn't leave out the location name.

3

Story and Setting

The original tried to be show, don't tell in its story-telling, where the plot is never actually told to you, just heavily implied. This mostly goes for the same thing, but at times randomly starts talking about how Dracula is kidnapping people and putting them in his dungeon. It feels oddly forced.

2

Sound and Graphics

The only sound is an error sound whenever I hit backspace on nothing.

Okay, I sort of glossed over the images, but they're basically just the original images you might find in the Atari or Apple II version. Certainly, they're higher res, and in some cases that's very helpful. However, they're still showing something incredibly bland to look at. These all use a heavy dithering to imply shades of colors the machine didn't have. You can see this most easily in bricks, no dithering for the parts that are supposed to be bright, dithered for the rest.

In some rooms dropping items causes them to pop up in strange places.

2

Environment and Atmosphere

It's about the same as last time, though I must admit the atmosphere is a collection of strange, strange things. From that unique feeling of playing a Japanese text adventure, to having to guess the verb in Japanese, to getting incredibly frustrated in Japanese.

1

Dialog and Acting

None.

4+3+2+2+1/0.6 = 20

Let's just take a point off there, for making a bad show of it, making the final tally 19.

I don't really know if I'm going to cover any more Japanese text adventures. This was not fun. This isn't an experience I'm keen to repeat. I've sampled a few random Japanese titles over the past month, just briefly checked them out, and the parsers ones were usually in English. Curiously enough, Starcraft, the company porting western games into Japanese, is the only one who bothered with that. Though I have a small sample size, one of them even got translated into English. Whether or not I do play any more of these, I'm going to stick to something in a language I fully understand for the foreseeable future. 

29 comments:

  1. >the only big ones released in English by '93 are Murder Club and L-Zone.

    Later English fan translations exist of The Portopia Serial Murder Case, Metal Slader Glory, Jesus and Akira (all originally made by 1993), to name a few. But I don't know TAG's stance on translations made much later, even if they're otherwise accurate to the original. Princess Tomato in the Salad Kingdom had an official English release in 1991; Snatcher, originally made in 1988, also had one, although in 1994 (one of the versions with a completed story BTW; the original PC-88 and MSX versions are unfinished).

    Here is a list of Japanese adventure games from 1993 or before listed on VNDB with existing English versions, sorted by user-generated score: https://vndb.org/v?q=&ch=&f=043gjaN18027412gen74_0b2-K8ERJu&s=34w

    VNDB is quite picky on what it includes so not every adventure game is there, only what qualifies as a visual novel.

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    1. I was thinking of computer releases. Nobody, to my knowledge said anything about fan translations or console games or fan translations of console games. I guess I technically put a point in favor of fan translations, since the version of Hurlements I played was patched, both to English and in general.
      That said, I have checked the main game list for years up ahead and most Japanese games have their English-translated release as the year rather than the original release. With that (uncertain) stance in mind its possible that Snatcher could be a mainline game next year. Possibly, I'm not in charge of that.
      (also I'd question VNDB's picky status, since they do include Mystery House, which is definitely not a VN of any kind)

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    3. VNDB famously removed 13 Sentinels: Aegis Rim (which caused quite the stir on the site) and lists only the first two of the Zero Escape games. Mystery House has graphics and textual narration, which I guess is enough to technically pass their criteria... for now.

      Since it'd be a pity to miss out on Japanese game history I'd favour playing according to original release date, except in cases where the English port is clearly too different (EVE Burst Error for example has its translation on Windows with enhanced graphics). The better solution would be to have a TAG reviewer with good enough Japanese to play the "actual" versions.

      Lastly, is the "PC only" rule from Trickster era enforced any more for main games? Snatcher's official English version especially exists only on console.

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    4. We've never removed the "only PC" rule from main games,and I guess even in Missed Classics we have never played console games. Of course, rules can always be changed, but we'd probably first have to have reviewers eager to play console adventures.

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    5. Speaking of Eve Burst Error on PC-98, just earlier today I managed to get it to a technically playable status on the SuperSakura engine (kind of ScummVM for visual novels)... should be pretty interesting once the autotranslator goes in.

      Somehow I feel like visual novels aren't really adventure games, to the degree that beyond a passing mention they really should be chronicled on a blog of their own. Well, there are at least two such already - vndbreview.blogspot.com and advgamer.blog.fc2.com, although I can't read that one.

      And I recall we had a discussion here in mid-2018 about scoring criteria which touched on whether and how to evaluate visual novels...

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    6. >I feel like visual novels aren't really adventure games

      There exist games that fit both genres (especially early ones), they aren't mutually exclusive in my view. But I agree in that I wouldn't want "pure" VNs to have much of a presence here either. I used VNDB because of its thoroughness and search features (allowing me to provide a list of originally-Japanese titles with the "interactive adventure game" tag), despite the site being for a somewhat different genre and even noting so. Ultimately I believe/hope the "clearly an adventure game" and other inclusion rules are sufficient to keep this blog focused.

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    7. @Laukuu:Ah, I didn't see the grandfather clause, that makes sense as to why they have those actual text adventures in. That said I think outside of the enhanced remakes, US release dates should be kept. Admittedly, that's out of a selfish desire to see Cosmology of Kyoto as a main game rather than any real reasoning.

      @Ilmari:I wouldn't say eager, but I'd be okay with playing a console adventure.

      @Kirinn:Since you probably know more about the subject than I do, are there any pure VNs in English at this point in time? Because I feel like the reason why nothing much has been said on it is because it isn't going to be an issue until there's one in the main games. Even though I'm interested in Japanese adventure games, that's it, I don't really care for the pure VN kind. Since they don't really feel like games and I don't care for the writing in most.

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    8. I believe Laukku actually knows more about the breadth of VN titles, I'm just carrying out amateur surgery on them. :D However, scanning through VNDBReviews' game of the year lists from 1980 to 1993...

      There's a "Mio no Mystery Adventure" which is at least partially in English. "Kidou Senshi Gundam - Gundam Daichi ni Tatsu", "Princess Tomato" and "Snatcher" of course, "Hoshi o Sagashite", "Samurai Sword", "Akira", "Cobra" and "Cobra 2". There's a Phantasy Star VN adventure or two...

      There are some Champion Soft/Alice Soft titles: "Little Princess", "Little Vampire", "Gakuen Senki", "Intruder", "Crescent Moon Girl", "Dangerous Tengu Legend", "Dr Stop", "Prostudent G". Their DPS series doesn't count, they're basically just a slideshow. (https://alicesoft.fandom.com/wiki/Translation_project)

      And at least 10 things noted as "Adventure" games by Enix, some of which are surely available in English. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Enix_home_computer_games)

      I believe Fairytale's Dead of the Brain 1 or 2 has been fan-translated, and would probably be the most interesting for this blog... perhaps a Halloween special?

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    9. Hah, I wouldn't call myself a VN history expert either, as I only know what I've learned from online discussions & articles and VNDB browsing, but this could just be my impostor syndrome talking. That said...

      >are there any pure VNs in English at this point in time?

      Pure VNs didn't mostly emerge until the mid-late 90s, Leaf was the first to use the term: https://www.giantbomb.com/leaf-visual-novel-series/3025-4357/ And they were inspired by Chunsoft's sound novel series: https://www.giantbomb.com/sound-novel/3025-2567/ Of which only Otogirisou (1992) had been made by 1993, and even then has no English version; based on YouTube footage it indeed seems like a pure VN.

      >Dead of the Brain 1 or 2 has been fan-translated

      The first one, but that's a machine translation.

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    10. Regarding Dead of the Brain, it should be noted that it hasn't been "fan translated" as much as "had someone make some educated gueses at what was being said in them". There was some considerable drama when it was discovered the "translated" script didn't match the original Japanese one all that much, that I believe ended in the "translator" deleting his Patreon and disappearing from the Internet.

      So that's not the best one to go for.

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    11. Oh dear. Well, maybe I should prioritise adding support to Fairytale titles so those games can be properly enjoyed.

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    12. To be clear I'm talking about when I say pure VNs, I am talking about the kind like the sound novel series, the ones that are CYOAs with basically twenty pages of text between choices. I think, having only heard of most of those titles, is that they still have adventure-style gameplay, albeit greatly simplified.

      If I remember correctly, the drama with Dead of the Brain happened because the guy did three translations in three months, and didn't fess up about machine-translating them. I remember reading in the aftermath that it was a shame since there's not much proper translating on those platforms. Properly compiling and decompiling games so that the English text can actually fit in the game is the issue I believe. That's also why Mizzurna Falls on PSX didn't get a proper translation right away. I'll probably play it DotB Halloween, you know, when I get a better understanding of the language.

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    13. The way your typical "pure VN" works is that whenever you choose a path in its cyoa-style gameplay, the game adds or subtracts points from multiple hidden stats. In addition to normal branching paths where you're given a list of options to choose between, there are also a lot of invisible branches where the game will check how many points you have in one or multiple stats and then send you down the corresponding path. Since all of this is hidden from the player and certain paths will require very specific routes throughout the game to activate, the gameplay is less about solving traditional adventure game puzzles and more about trying to unlock secret optional plot twists, chapters and endings by experimenting with the choices you get. (a lot of them also have a stat that's permanently increased to 1 when you first beat the game, meaning that your second playthrough will suddenly have a number of new choices pop up in places where there weren't any before, with one choice sending you down the "normal" path you originally got forced into, while the others give you new replay-only chapters that can sometimes alter the plot heavily).

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    14. @Ilmari There are one or two console games that I hope to play as Missed Classics, but my take has been that we should be conservative with them. We have more than enough adventures to play as-is, but "important" games should get the benefit of the doubt.

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    15. If nothing else, the likes of Snatcher could get a chance for being a main game via Panthro's Law. It's too late for Portopia to be a main game (unless you count the dates, 2006 and 2010, of the fan translations, or play the Japanese mobile versions released in the 2000s) but it's certainly important enough to deserve coverage as a Missed Classic.

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    16. I'm definitely interested in covering it when I get a better grasp of the language. Seems to me that's slightly important since the game was originally on home computers.
      Checking 'em, it seems to me that the Famicom version of Portopia is considerably different than the original, much along the same line as a Sierra game and their PnC remakes. Hmm...

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    17. Yeah, I don't think using fan translations is a very good idea. Not only would you be rating the game's writing and puzzle design based on some random person's presentation of it, you'd also be gambling on this random person translating accurately instead of just guessing and rewriting all over the place. Which happens more often than people tend to think.

      If you're using an official translation, even if it's flawed, you're at least judging an actual product an actual company released for sale.

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    18. With famous enough games there exist reputations for their translations and it's possible to research which one's considered best (or least bad), be it fan or official. And sometimes there is no official translation in the first place or it's for a much later remake, and I wouldn't want to delay important foreign games by decades.

      Again though, the ideal situation would be for a reviewer to play their game in the original language, especially if there's no translation close to the original release year.

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    19. I don`t know why, but i allways picture Reiko as a japanese descendant (maybe cause Reiko sounds japanese to me). If this is correct (which i`m sure is a far guess) maybe she knows the language`and be willing to play one of these games you are discussing.

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    20. The unfortunate truth is sadly that such translations "reputed to be good" are generally judged by people that only speak one of the languages on how they read in a vacuum, not by people that know both languages sitting there comparing the two scripts side by side to see how the actual translation is.
      The target audience for translations are people that aren't able to understand the original, after all.

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    21. Possibly, but not always; when YU-NO's remake was released in English in 2019, people with Japanese knowledge were quick to point out the abundant errors in the official translation and that how the older fan translation is more accurate and polished. The visual novel community has more people understanding Japanese than usual and discussions of translations with them involved pop up every now and then. (Then there's Legends of Localization, which is a site all about analysing Japanese-English game translations - although it hasn't IIRC really done translation comparisons of adventure games yet other than a superficial one on Danganronpa.)

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    22. Not super familiar with that game, but that would be an instance where two separate translations existed for the same game, so even people that only spoke English would be able to tell that they differed in spots. When only one translation exists, it's very uncommon for people to sit down and compare the translation to the original to check for inaccuracies.
      Even those other "translations" done by that Dead of the Brain guy had been around for a while before someone actually started comparing them with the original and saw how bad they were, and before that happened the guy had been getting a lot of praise.

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    23. Dead of the Brain isn't a very famous game, and I'd be completely fine with skipping minor games like it when nothing is known about the fan translation quality. But even its poorness got exposed sooner or later.

      What I'm getting at, is I hold that a handful of games like the first Clock Tower (foundational survival horror game) or even Policenauts (by the famous Hideo Kojima) are too important to utterly disregard or overly delay even though they only have fan translations. Way more people have played those for way longer and I've never heard about any deal-breaking issues.

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    24. ...you know, I've never actually played Policenauts. Maybe I should offer to cover it if nobody else is willing, so it can at least be done in its original form.

      (I don't think the original PC-98 version even HAS a fan translation).

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    25. I find the discussion about whether or not fan translations are worth using is slightly amusing underneath an official translation that I considered a travesty.
      That said, while fan translations are sometimes very, very bad, more official translations tend to have issues. At least publicized issues. And its been like that for longer than we've been alive, and will go on long after we're all dead. There has been much said about translations of The Bible, The Divine Comedy, and basically all of Russian literature. Ultimately, we are forced to play the only experience we can, unless someone's crazy enough to learn another language just to play some video games.
      Also, to a certain extent all translation alters the original experience, especially if the original has any form of comedy. See, Asterix, Sgt. Frog, Star Wreck, and Case Closed. Actually, Case Closed is a good example since its a mystery series that frequently brings up things that requires knowledge of the Japanese language, and its translations both official and unofficial have seen mixed success on that front.

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  2. I remember playing a Japanese port of Scott Adams' earlier Voodoo Castle, which seemed like a fairly straight port of the English original (though with enhanced graphics I think... never played the graphical version in English), and looking it up it seems that one was by Starcraft too. Odd that this one was done so differently.

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    1. Interesting, so its not a sure thing that they change the games they port. I'm pretty sure the port of Mystery House they did is just a hi-res upgrade, and Las Vegas is supposed to be a straight port, with graphics of Softporn Adventure. I have to wonder, why do it to this one then?

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    2. It wasn't ENTIRELY identical (just like their The Count port, it didn't list all possible directional exits per the Scott Adams standard), but it was close enough that nothing else jumped out at me as having been changed, and I had very little trouble beating it.

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