From Wednesday, October 4, 2023, the anime “16bit Sensation ANOTHER LAYER' has started broadcasting. This work features the beautiful girl game culture that flourished mainly on NEC's PC-9801 series of personal computers before the release of Microsoft's OS "Windows 95", and includes various PCs and game software released in the 1990s. appear.
This article is a companion project that focuses on the culture and gadgets that are a bit more popular than home game consoles. The writer is well-versed in the history of computer games, and is an author of the bishoujo game magazine ``mega storeRyo Morise, a writer and translator who is also a former writer for ``16bit Sensation ANOTHER LAYER'' and also participated in the setting research for ``16bit Sensation ANOTHER LAYER''.
The impact of “Classmates”
In the first episode of ``16bit Sensation ANOTHER LAYER'', the main character, Konoha Akisato, is triggered by a certain game software package and travels back in time to a past era.
The game software was the Bishoujo game ``Bishoujo game'' for the NEC PC-9801 series released in December 1992.classmate” (elf). In this article, we will go back to the time of release and look back at this scene, which was briefly depicted in the anime. I would like those who remember this to recall their memories. I want you to imagine the people who don't.
At the time, a hard plastic case was becoming the standard for certain types of game software for the PC-9801. When you peel off the vinyl seal that seals the mouth and open it wide with a clicking sound, the first thing you see is a not-so-thick manual, a manufacturer's catalog, a user registration postcard, and This is a user support request form. When you take them out, you'll find nine floppy disks numbered alphabetically from A to I.
At the time, there were two types of FD media used by the NEC PC-9800 series: 5.25 inches and 3.5 inches (the latter in the anime), and ``Dokyusei'' was also released in both media. Although the physical size of the media is different, both have the same capacity of 1.25MB (for 2HD), so the number of sheets is the same, 9.
When you insert disk A of the nine disks into the FD drive of your computer and turn on the power, you will hear the familiar 98 series startup sound, followed by the internal memory count, and then a low, growling loading sound. The sound resonates, and beautiful graphics reminiscent of a picture frame are displayed.
At this time, if you insert only disk A and start up, a prompt will appear and you will notice that a unique loader called "ELFDOS.SYS ver 3.06" is used to boot the program. With the exception of some manufacturers, it will be a while before it will be necessary to separately prepare MS-DOS (basic software made by Microsoft, a distant ancestor of today's Windows) to run game software. .
Now, before the title screen is displayed, a small window appears in the upper left corner of the screen, allowing you to select "color monitor/monochrome monitor." By 1992, the era of black-and-white televisions was far gone, and the monochrome displays and green displays that existed in the early days of the personal computer era were long gone.
Still, this option was necessary for PC-9801 games at the time. That is,At this time, the LCD screens installed in the PC-9800 series notebook computers, popularly known as the "98 Notes," were still monochrome.. Although it was possible to express 8 levels of shading, in order to display the 16-color CG clearly on the 98 Note's monitor, it was necessary to switch to a special color scheme.
Next, select “Desktop/98NOTE/Hard Disk”.
To play this game on a floppy disk, the B disk must always be inserted into the B drive. Desktop models at the time basically had two drives (models with only one drive would appear a little later), but the 98 Note only had one drive, so the hardware features were I had to use it to enable the RAM drive and copy the contents of the B disk to it.
The third one is a declaration that the game will be played while installed on the hard disk drive (HDD) (unfortunately, it did not automatically detect this). By this time, HDDs had reached a price range that even students could afford, although they were still only a few tens of megabytes in size. In addition, for games that require more than 5 or 6 FD media, an increasing number of them can be installed on the HDD in order to avoid frequent media replacement, which sometimes spoils the feeling of immersion in the game.
The same is true for this work, and by copying the program recorded on the C disk to the HDD where MS-DOS is installed, and executing this, it was possible to transfer the contents of the FD to the HDD. "Why don't you just copy all the files in the FD to the HDD?" I see, there certainly existed game software that was installed on the HDD using that method. However, all of the media used in this work, with the exception of the C disk mentioned above, were uniquely formatted, and the files could not be read directly from MS-DOS.
In any case, select the media in this way, and then select the former option of "Start from beginning/Start from middle" that appears. When you set the player character's name (only hiragana/katakana can be used, the default name is "Takurou"), the main character's monologue is followed by a 3-character kanji title "Classmate", and the main game begins. be.
The night before the release
``Classmates'' was a work for which there was very little prior information.
It was first introduced in a PC game magazine at the time called ``Comptique” (Kadokawa Shoten/at the time) November 1992 issue, and it was probably a bag-bound corner that only sold software for adults. It was just a year-end news report with three event CGs and a few captions, and it didn't really delve into the content of the game. The following December issue contained articles with a similar amount of information, but strangely enough, at this point, there was still no ``technopolis” (Tokuma Shoten, discontinued publication in 1994) and “computer paradise” (Mediax, discontinued publication in 2014) and other magazines that cover game information in this genre did not feature even a single line.
However, the discerning PC gamers who check magazines for information on new titles were already buzzing with anticipation that something might happen.
First of all, the publisher is a full-fledged 3D dungeon RPGdragon knightIt was Elf who had already become a hit maker in the series. The company was founded in April 1989 by staff members of Kirara Co., Ltd. (predecessor of F&C Co., Ltd.), including Mr. Masato Hiruta (planning and scenario), Mr. Jun Kanao (programmer, later CEO of TamTam Co., Ltd.), and Mr. Toshihiro Abiru. (Original artist, later representative of Mink Co., Ltd.) is a manufacturer started by three people, and many of the early titles were created by these three people as the main staff.
Regarding the company name "Elf," Mr. Hiruta, who became the representative director, is known to have said in an interview, "I named it after the long-lived fairy tribe (elf)" (PC Paradise, December 1992 issue). , it seems that Mr. Kaneo actually suggested it at a banquet before the launch because he thought it sounded good. It is said that the financial situation continued to be difficult for a while, but the ``Pinky Ponky” (described below) became a hit, and soon he was releasing a series of popular works. Among them, "Dragon Knight", the first of which was released in November 1989, was a series that succeeded in attracting regular PC gamers, who had previously ignored bishoujo games, into regular customers of the Elf brand. Then, released at the end of 1991, “Dragon Knight III' was one of the few titles at the time that was released for adults and the general public at the same time.
Second, from the event CG published in the magazine, it was clear that Masaki Takei was in charge of character design or original drawings.
I would like to add some information for young readers who are not familiar with the atmosphere at the time. Mr. Takei belongs to Madhouse, an anime production production company known for its high animation quality, and is involved in the animation film ``space-time traveler"(1986),"labyrinth story” (1989), as well as “monster city” (1987, assistant animation director) and the 1990-91 OVA “Record of Lodoss WarHe was a talented animator who was active in the anime industry and was in charge of the original illustrations up to the 9th episode of the anime.
After leaving Madhouse, he spent a large sum of 550,000 yen to acquire a set of PC-9801DA and entered the game industry.Graduation” (Japan Home Video), which was already well known.
A full remake in 2021, with a rose flower and the title logo placed in the lower left of an illustration of three commemorative photos taken from student life stacked against the background of the profile of a girl with a somewhat melancholy face, which is typical of the main heroine. The famous double-page ad for ``Dokyusei,'' which was also used at the time of its release, finally appeared in a magazine in the January 1993 issue of Comptique, which was on sale on December 8, just one week before the release. It is.
In the summer of 2023, Studio Ghibli's new theatrical animation ``how do you live' has become a hot topic for not releasing any advance information other than a single poster depicting a person wearing what appears to be a heron costume, but while watching this news sideways, the author said, ' I fondly remembered the situation just before the release of ``Classmates''.
Of course, production costs and sales are literally orders of magnitude different from movies, but the reason behind this title becoming a mega-hit title that eventually sold over 100,000 copies is due to the trust placed in the manufacturer and its staff. I think it can be said that they have something in common in that they both felt the same way. perhaps.
Yes, even though there was little advance information, ``Dokyusei'' sold explosively from the first day, and remained at the top of magazine rankings in the same genre for several months afterward. The bishoujo game magazine "Megastore" (by Byakuya Shobo at the time of its launch) was launched in March 1993, a little later than other magazines, and the top of the ranking probably reflects the sales situation as of the beginning of February. ” is indescribably symbolic.
It is still talked about that the startup file (when installed on the HDD) for ``Classmates'' was ``NANPA.BAT''.
Originally, this work was planned as a pick-up game. PC games based on pick-up (girl hunting) have a long history, dating back to a time when games for the general public and beautiful girl games were still harmoniously mixed together. After that, "dragon questIn April 1985, Enix (at the time), which was to make a huge leap forward with the release of ``TOKYO Nampa Street” was released for PC.
For the manufacturer Elf, pick-up was a theme that held strong feelings. Elf's first hit was the pick-up game ``Pinky Pon'' released in August 1991, which had been silent for a while since its establishment (according to an interview at the time, sales in the first month were 360,000 yen). It was 'Kii'. The story of this work is that the main character, Akira, who calls himself the "pick-up demon king," takes on five beautiful girls (a takoyaki vendor at a school festival, a nurse, and a tutor) who appear in order to win his first points. The goal is to successfully woo the players without losing 100 points, and aim for the "reaching point" as a game.
Despite the short production period of 35 days, the scenario written by Elf representative, director, and scenario writer Masato Hiruta was over 500,000 characters long, and the high-tension conversations between the characters, who may seem a little too eccentric, are a must-see for so-called otakus. From the game user's perspective, it felt like having fun chatting with a girl. Akira's character can be said to be the prototype for the main characters of later Elf works (particularly Hiruta's works).
Mr. Hiruta's original idea was that ``Doukyuu'' would be a scaled-up version of ``Pinky Ponky,'' which became Elf's breakthrough work, and would feature more than 50 heroines and a series of pick-up girls over 40 days. It seems that it was a work with a weak story that repeats itself. However, an unexpected synergy occurred here. Mr. Hiruta fell in love with Mr. Takei's character designs, and after narrowing the number of heroines down to 14, he decided to take a major turn in the direction of carefully drawing out each individual's story.
Mr. Hiruta later recalled, ``It wasn't until some time after the game's release, when I saw the fan calls from players, that I realized that we had pioneered a completely new genre of 'dating simulation games.''' Ta. KONAMI has released “Tokimeki Memorial' was released in May 1994, nearly a year and a half away.
However, he must have been aware of this to some extent when he fell in love with the heroines drawn by Takei, and the strange lack of advance publicity and the fact that he was labeled as a "non-genre" because they could not be categorized into existing genres. I think this is because the manufacturer had a sense of pride in having created something new. (Unfortunately, Mr. Hiruta has not appeared in public for a long time, so I would like to confirm this.) I can't do it).
Uniqueness of the game “Classmate”
The player of "Classmate" becomes a high school boy who attends Sensue Gakuen, and from August 10th to August 31st, that is, 21 days of summer vacation, Yabuki town (which has more entertainment facilities than Sensue town) adjacent to Sensue town where the main character lives. The story progresses by running around (often), encountering characters including the heroine not only at school and home but in various other places, and having conversations with them.
There is a concept of time in the game, and characters other than the main character also move from place to place according to their own schedules. Players gather rumors from other characters such as ``Mr. ●● seems to show up at ●● every day at ●●'' to understand the heroines' actions, and increase their likeability by accumulating conversations and dates. It is.
The movement phase on the field has an action RPG-like feel. However, the time and favorability systems are simulation-like, and actions in specific locations and interactions between characters, including the heroine, are based on a command selection system similar to an adventure game. This combination isclassmate 2"or"UnderclassmanIt was followed not only by the Elf series such as ``, but also by some love simulation games from other manufacturers.
``Classmates'' as a game has two objectives. First of all, meet the heroine of your dreams, have a heart-to-heart connection (= set a flag), and go as far as you want. If it were a traditional romantic bishoujo game, the ending would have started at this point with a staff roll, but this is not the case with this game. The condition for reaching the ending is to confess your love to the heroine on August 31st, the last day of the game, and reach the goal with your beloved heroine.
This is where the uniqueness of the work ``Classmates'' lies.
Regarding the "confession" that is directly connected to the ending, only one person can choose. However, when it comes to raising each heroine's likability and bringing them to a state just before "confession", it is possible to capture up to 11 heroines at the same time by following a schedule that is like threading a needle. The reason why ``Dokyusei'' maintained its popularity over such a long period of time was due to this element of intensive gameplay.
At a time when the Internet did not exist and there were not many users of personal computer communication, many players relied on exchanging information with close friends and the timetable strategy memos that filled graph paper and loose leaf. It was like trying to solve a highly difficult puzzle.
And of course, he was able to spend the summer vacation without confessing to anyone, and without paying any attention to the heroines. There was a high degree of freedom that allowed for the ``everyday simulation'' style of play, allowing players to spend their 21 days of summer vacation however they wanted (albeit with a somewhat limited range of activities). This may have been unexpected for Mr. Hiruta and the other Elf staff, but there were many players who found enjoyment in this aspect of the game rather than trying to get into it, and this increased the popularity of this work.
In fact, I first came into contact with this series from the sequel, ``Dokyusei 2'' (1995), and although I had heard about the first work, ``Dokyusei,'' through magazine information and reviews from friends, I had no experience with the series. It was after that that I played.
As a result, the impression is somewhat diminished, but it is still a game that simulates the last winter vacation of student life (the in-game period of ``Classmates 2'' is 3 weeks from December 16th to January 6th). ,"especially For some reason, I got into bondage play, went to random places, had highs and lows, and ended up sleeping all day at home on a date when it looked like something was going to happen. It made me feel proud of the species. It's a matter of youthful inclination. Of course, as a gentleman, I naturally took on the challenge of attacking everyone at the same time (``Classmates 2'') and 11 people simultaneously (``Classmates''). Although it felt like I was trying to persuade people about the timetable, I remember feeling a sense of accomplishment.
In addition to NEC's PC-9801, ``Dokyusei'' was ported to the SHARP became an unprecedented blockbuster, selling over 100,000 copies for the first time in history.
It was later ported to home game consoles such as the PC Engine and Sega Saturn, and was released as a rental advance in 1994.Classmates at the end of summer” All four episodes became a pioneering OVA software based on a bishoujo game. A remake version for Windows with system adjustments and full voice support has also been released repeatedly.
Regarding the first PC version, the game content is basically the same for each model version, and the CG is also almost the same, but the X68000 uses YM2151 (OPM) and the FM TOWNS uses YM2612, both of which use sound sources without SSG. Since it was installed, the BGM has been greatly arranged. If you are a player who played the PC-9801 version at the time, I would like you to listen to the BGM of these other models if you have a chance.
“16bit Sensation ANOTHER LAYER” linked project column list
- Chapter 1:This article
- Chapter 2:The PC bishoujo game industry in the 1990s and the “Saori Incident”. The birth of adult games and “Sofu-Lin”
- Chapter 3: Introducing the microcomputer “PC-98” series, which was called the “national machine” (Part 1)
- Chapter 4: ``Shizuku'', ``Kata'', and ``ToHeart''. The birth and spread of visual novels
- Chapter 5: The impact of “Windows 95”, the end of the PC-98 era, and the rise of bishoujo games. PC-98 series explanation (second part)
- Chapter 6: “Beautiful girl games” that blossomed in PC software. Its home game console port version Arekore
- Chapter 7: Sotomi and Nakami from Windows-era bishoujo games such as "Kegausei", "Kata", and "EVE Burst Error"
- Chapter 8：Who comes to mind when you think of “sister”? 1980s-2000s “Sister Character” Consideration
- Chapter 9: A "sexy game" from the early days of the PC. It required a high degree of imagination on the part of the player, which coincided with the birth and development of the PC.
- Chapter 10: Explaining the dawn of "sexy games" developed by various manufacturers for PCs (microcomputers) in the 1980s (part 2)