better than portopia.
It was fine, had some nice moments. The art and music is really good though. I just wasn't really gripped by the mystery after a certain point. I do think it ended strongly enough but so much waiting for the the protagonist to figure out what you already had really starts making this drag.
Game Review - originally written by Kitsune Sniper (aka Foxhack)
This is a remake of one of Nintendo's most famous Famicom Disk System titles. Famicom Detective Club II tells the story of a nameless fellow (you), who is taken under the wing of Shunsuke Utsugi, a private detective, after he is found on the street escaping from the police. Your character is assigned a case by Utsugi - to locate the person that murdered a schoolgirl near a waterway.
And that's all I can say without spoiling the game!
You play this just like those classic Sierra text adventures: you go around places and ask people questions, check evidence, and dig up clues from within the crime scenes. It may seem tiring at first, but as the game goes on, the story keeps getting better and better.
If you're a fan of detective stories in general, you'll love this game.
(editor's note: I love this game)
This is a remake of one of Nintendo's most famous Famicom Disk System titles. Famicom Detective Club II tells the story of a nameless fellow (you), who is taken under the wing of Shunsuke Utsugi, a private detective, after he is found on the street escaping from the police. Your character is assigned a case by Utsugi - to locate the person that murdered a schoolgirl near a waterway.
And that's all I can say without spoiling the game!
You play this just like those classic Sierra text adventures: you go around places and ask people questions, check evidence, and dig up clues from within the crime scenes. It may seem tiring at first, but as the game goes on, the story keeps getting better and better.
If you're a fan of detective stories in general, you'll love this game.
(editor's note: I love this game)
Grew up wanting to play this game because of the Ayumi trophy in Melee and I am very satisfied now that I have finally played it. Hitomi is the coolest. Pour one out for Yoko Kojima. Ayumi for Smash.
I remember playing this originally years ago when the SNES mini came out and I put loads of roms of fan translated games on it. It very quickly became one of my favourite games ever. The story really gripped me like no other and I've yet to play through the 2 remakes, but this game was something really special. Especially for the era it came out in. Cant recommend it enough.
God-tier adventure game with a killer atmosphere. The gameplay has not aged well, which can make it a hard rec, but for those able to stomach it, you get an enjoyable experience.
Perfect.
i genuinely love the look of this game so much. much more than the switch remake. i felt like a real detective...!
There’s an alternate universe where games like this are ubiquitous and played by midwestern moms on their ipads.
Coming in very late in the Super Famicom's lifespan as a Nintendo Power flash cartridge exclusive, this 16-bit remake of Famicom Detective Club Part II: The Girl Who Stands Behind is something of an unusual game. It was remade on its own without the Part I it's a prequel to, The Missing Heir, and never got a proper retail release. So how does it fare? Surprisingly well, but not without hiccups.
Let's start with the positives. As a murder mystery game, the most crucial metric for scoring the game is the quality of the writing. And it's a pretty decent little mystery, with several surprising twists and turns and decent pacing. The presentation is an enormous step up from the Famicom Disk System original, with some of the best-looking character talk-sprites on the SNES/Super Famicom and great-looking environments. Kenji Yamamoto re-arranged his own soundtrack from the original, and the improvement is night and day; existing tracks are greatly extended with new sections and instruments, and some wholly new music was added as well. It gives the game an appropriately moody and mysterious feel.
As to the negatives... well, it's a faithful remake, mechanically speaking, of a late-'80s adventure game, and it shows. The menu-based progression of investigation doesn't flow as well as I'd like, and you will almost certainly resort to either brute-forcing every menu option or looking up a guide before the end. Neither of those feels good when you'd rather be solving the mystery, but your boy detective is stymied by arcane menu prompts.
Also, the fan translation is just so-so. Not only does it have some pretty obvious typos, but adapting the game to English screwed up the timing on the characters' talking animations, making their mouths flap like crazy. (I assume this has to do with them animating based on the number of text characters drawn on-screen, and English needs more than Japanese, generally.) It's certainly playable, but could be better.
There's a lot to like in this niche corner of the Nintendo library, as long as you come in prepared for the old-school adventure game jank that comes hand-in-hand with it.
Let's start with the positives. As a murder mystery game, the most crucial metric for scoring the game is the quality of the writing. And it's a pretty decent little mystery, with several surprising twists and turns and decent pacing. The presentation is an enormous step up from the Famicom Disk System original, with some of the best-looking character talk-sprites on the SNES/Super Famicom and great-looking environments. Kenji Yamamoto re-arranged his own soundtrack from the original, and the improvement is night and day; existing tracks are greatly extended with new sections and instruments, and some wholly new music was added as well. It gives the game an appropriately moody and mysterious feel.
As to the negatives... well, it's a faithful remake, mechanically speaking, of a late-'80s adventure game, and it shows. The menu-based progression of investigation doesn't flow as well as I'd like, and you will almost certainly resort to either brute-forcing every menu option or looking up a guide before the end. Neither of those feels good when you'd rather be solving the mystery, but your boy detective is stymied by arcane menu prompts.
Also, the fan translation is just so-so. Not only does it have some pretty obvious typos, but adapting the game to English screwed up the timing on the characters' talking animations, making their mouths flap like crazy. (I assume this has to do with them animating based on the number of text characters drawn on-screen, and English needs more than Japanese, generally.) It's certainly playable, but could be better.
There's a lot to like in this niche corner of the Nintendo library, as long as you come in prepared for the old-school adventure game jank that comes hand-in-hand with it.