Japanese game versions

[Dude]

I was thinking of getting the Japanese version of Picross, but I don't know what to expect. Besides text and audio being a different language, what kinds of changes can I expect when compared to American games?

[hashiriya1]

I was thinking of getting the Japanese version of Picross, but I don't know what to expect. Besides text and audio being a different language, what kinds of changes can I expect when compared to American games?

If you're talking about all games in general, this is too broad of a question. Little things like sprite changes to big things like plot re-writes/omissions/additions/censorship. One example of many: look at Bionic Commando for the NES. The Japanese version is called "Hitler's Resurrection" and it has him on the cover. There are so many games from NES to PS3 where a lot of changes were made when the game made the trip over the Pacific.

As far as Picross is concerned, I doubt much was changed other than the language.

[Dude]

I was thinking of getting the Japanese version of Picross, but I don't know what to expect. Besides text and audio being a different language, what kinds of changes can I expect when compared to American games?

If you're talking about all games in general, this is too broad of a question. Little things like sprite changes to big things like plot re-writes/omissions/additions/censorship. One example of many: look at Bionic Commando for the NES. The Japanese version is called "Hitler's Resurrection" and it has him on the cover. There are so many games from NES to PS3 where a lot of changes were made when the game made the trip over the Pacific.

As far as Picross is concerned, I doubt much was changed other than the language.

I think I'd stick with the puzzle genre. Say if you're playing Scrabble or some game that requires letters/numbers, would it be in Japanese? I'm not talking about the instructions or box but in the gameplay itself.

[Breetai]

I think I'd stick with the puzzle genre. Say if you're playing Scrabble or some game that requires letters/numbers, would it be in Japanese? I'm not talking about the instructions or box but in the gameplay itself.

You are VERY unlikely to find Scrabble in Japanese. For similar games, of course they are in Japanese unless it's an English learning "game".

Puzzle GAMES are pretty much the same everywhere. Bomberman is Bomberman, Tetris is Tetris, Puzzle Bobble is Bust-a-Move (name change, but same game), Puyo-Puyo is Puyo-Pop/Dr. Robotnik's Mean Bean Machine/Kirby's Avalanche (again, same game with an altered name), Columns is Columns, Magical Drop is Magical Drop, etc.

Sometimes menus are in Japanese, sometimes they are in English. It shouldn't be too difficult to figure out either way.

The only genre that really presents language problems in Japanese retro gaming are RPGs.


There are sometimes graphical differences, like Hashiriya said. Sometimes Japanese games do not have the same censorship (sex, violence and religion) that US games have (blood in Japanese Samurai Shodown vs. "sweat" in the US version). On the NES/Famicom, some Japanese games have better graphics/sound (i.e. Contra, Castlevania III, etc.). The sound on Japanese SMS games is also usually better, do to an extra sound chip not found in the US/EU SMS.

[Para]

You'd be surprised how much English text is in Japanese games. I have a few hundred Japanese games and I can play pretty much all of them without the language barrier becoming a problem, minus very text heavy RPGs.

Check out this video of gameplay from Mario's Super Picross (Super Famicom). The game is very playable as long as you grasp the basic concept of of picross.