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Banshee's Last Cry (Kamaitachi no Yoru) out now for 3.99 (Aksys/Spike Chunsoft, iOS)

zeopower6

Member
I need some pointers...

So I've gotten the
Grace kills you and You kill Grace
endings but I can't seem to get anything else, and I feel like I've exhausted my branch points.

Can someone point me in the right direction (without spoiling)?

Try more options after you find the first body.
 
Just got my first bad ending.

Blow to the head in my room when I heard a scream coming out of my gal pal's mouth
. Man I wonder what other endings await for me.
 

Bluestone

Neo Member
A Knicks fan will notice that the 3 girls are Oakley, Mason and Starks. Starting members of the Knicks from the mid 90s.

Oh, and Ruby is my cat.
 
This is so damn good!! Just the simple interaction of turning a page to see what's next is just so thrilling.

I've been majorly unsettled playing this. The use of sound is superb, especially when it's silent and you turn the page only to be bombarded with some seriously unsettling piece of music!

Regarding the translation, it was a great move subtracting the Japanese elements to ensure it's wider appeal. I've told so many people to download this and it seems to be getting some attention from people who I'd never imagine touching it.
 

Anilones

Member
Is there a flowchart available for progression similar to the one for 999? I haven't yet started the game so don't know whether it has the same mechanics with regard to simple choices when playing.
 

Goli

Member
This is so damn good!! Just the simple interaction of turning a page to see what's next is just so thrilling.

I've been majorly unsettled playing this. The use of sound is superb, especially when it's silent and you turn the page only to be bombarded with some seriously unsettling piece of music!

Regarding the translation, it was a great move subtracting the Japanese elements to ensure it's wider appeal. I've told so many people to download this and it seems to be getting some attention from people who I'd never imagine touching it.

I agree and I have done so as well. Not that I wouldn't have done so had they kept the Japanese elements, but I think it was done in such a great way that you can't really tell unless you know this is a localised version of Kamaitachi no Yoru. The fact that they went all the way and "localised" the game's images as well is a really neat touch, and it shows that this is quality work.
 

zeopower6

Member
Is there a flowchart available for progression similar to the one for 999? I haven't yet started the game so don't know whether it has the same mechanics with regard to simple choices when playing.

No flowchart. You just get a grayed out option if you've tried it previously.
 

wrowa

Member
I agree and I have done so as well. Not that I wouldn't have done so had they kept the Japanese elements, but I think it was done in such a great way that you can't really tell unless you know this is a localised version of Kamaitachi no Yoru. The fact that they went all the way and "localised" the game's images as well is a really neat touch, and it shows that this is quality work.

Definitely. I don't think that the nationality of the characters or the location of the game is important to the overall experience. What's important in Kamaitachi? The personalities, a lot of snow and a small inn somehwere on a lonely mountain. Whether that's located in Japan, Canada or Switzerland doesn't matter, since the situation of the game is not specific to any culture.
 

Erigu

Member
I don't think that the nationality of the characters or the location of the game is important to the overall experience. What's important in Kamaitachi? The personalities, a lot of snow and a small inn somehwere on a lonely mountain. Whether that's located in Japan, Canada or Switzerland doesn't matter, since the situation of the game is not specific to any culture.
Which is why I find it sad that it's still considered preferable to americanize the game anyway, actually...
 

zeopower6

Member
Which is why I find it sad that it's still considered preferable to americanize the game anyway, actually...

"Banshee's Last Cry" is probably a lot more marketable than "Kamaitachi no Yoru / Night of the Kamaitachi" imo. I wonder if the decision to localize everything was planned from the start.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Z_46jdmrTo

They seemed to have a tentative title of "The Night of Kamaitachi" when they announced the release in 2012. They mention other titles are also planned for iOS/Android as well.

(Some sales data in that video too!)

JaWtTSw.jpg
 

Bluestone

Neo Member
When I asked myself if the idea of small weasels with scythes strapped to the legs would resonate with a Western audience that has no such myth, I had to answer no.

Furthermore, even the word "weasel" brings to mind shifty Steve Buscemi-like personalities as opposed to something supernatural and scary.

In trying to make a true localization that would capture the essence as opposed to the trappings of the story, I decided Banshee would be more in keeping with the original SPIRIT of the game.

From that POV, I feel that I am actually closer to the reproducing the feel of the original for a Western audience than I would be if I had kept it Japanese. It is hard perhaps to explain, but I feel strongly about it.
 

Erigu

Member
"Banshee's Last Cry" is probably a lot more marketable than "Kamaitachi no Yoru / Night of the Kamaitachi" imo.
I'm sure it is. It's still a state of affairs that I lament. Like those US remakes of recent non-US movies, if you will.


When I asked myself if the idea of small weasels with scythes strapped to the legs would resonate with a Western audience that has no such myth, I had to answer no.
Well, sure (although I'm not sure banshees are that much more resonant ^^).
Then again,
neither kamaitachi nor banshees are particularly relevant in the end
. I think Kayama's Ôsaka-themed antics, for example, would have been more of an obstacle for a Western audience.
 

LiK

Member
My only pet peeve with the game is that they describe what my companion looks like in the first page. Why not keep her vague? Why describe her hair color? My companion is not blonde!
 

Ocaso

Member
When I asked myself if the idea of small weasels with scythes strapped to the legs would resonate with a Western audience that has no such myth, I had to answer no.

Furthermore, even the word "weasel" brings to mind shifty Steve Buscemi-like personalities as opposed to something supernatural and scary.

In trying to make a true localization that would capture the essence as opposed to the trappings of the story, I decided Banshee would be more in keeping with the original SPIRIT of the game.

From that POV, I feel that I am actually closer to the reproducing the feel of the original for a Western audience than I would be if I had kept it Japanese. It is hard perhaps to explain, but I feel strongly about it.

Sounds reasonable to me. Localization is a tricky balancing act, particularly when dealing with myths and cultural issues. Looking forward to reading this.
 

Shurayuki

Member
Well, with this thread you guys did it, since I used the 14 days PS+ trial from Japan anyways to get Steins;Gate and Chaos;Head in case I ever get a Vita, and lookie here I already had Kamaitachi no Yoru from an earlier trial (it's still free with plus). Gonna try it now, doesn't seem too hard to understand with my shitty Kanji knowledge so far.
Might be worth it for people on the fence waiting for android (Bankslammer yo~ ;D).

IS blonde.

Erigu said that because the Japanese game mentions in that scene how Mari's (her jpn. name) "black hair can be easily seen on the white ski overall she's wearing" (or something to that effect).
 
Might be worth it for people on the fence waiting for android (Bankslammer yo~ ;D).

nooooooo I can do this!
I'm already playing it vicariously through a friend who I forced to get the game!

I have my PSX copy from PS+ and played a bit of it but I think I'd rather wait until the Android release so I can experience it in a language I can appreciate better.
Maybe a playthrough of the PSX version can come later for language practice.
 

Shurayuki

Member
nooooooo I can do this!
I'm already playing it vicariously through a friend who I forced to get the game!

I have my PSX copy from PS+ and played a bit of it but I think I'd rather wait until the Android release so I can experience it in a language I can appreciate better.
Maybe a playthrough of the PSX version can come later for language practice.

Haha well that works too.

I really need one of those modern phonamajings, Android, the BlueStacks android emulator for pc has let me down so far.

It's so funny this got realeased just as the game got mentioned a lot in the "Will we ever get a proper detective game" thread. Would love to see some sort of mini-soundnovel boom.
If we could get translations of those games in the screenshot above that would be ace, have the Wii version of 428 somewhere but never even played it, immediate kanji overload.
 

Goli

Member
Haha well that works too.

I really need one of those modern phonamajings, Android, the BlueStacks android emulator for pc has let me down so far.

It's so funny this got realeased just as the game got mentioned a lot in the "Will we ever get a proper detective game" thread. Would love to see some sort of mini-soundnovel boom.
If we could get translations of those games in the screenshot above that would be ace, have the Wii version of 428 somewhere but never even played it, immediate kanji overload.

Well, there is a smartphone version of 428... Aksys, you know what to do! O:
 

Yirba

Member
My only pet peeve with the game is that they describe what my companion looks like in the first page. Why not keep her vague? Why describe her hair color? My companion is not blonde!

When I was asked to name the characters, I thought I'd be clever and name them Tōru and Mari. I certainly wasn't expecting the Japanese girl I was visualising to be blonde!
 

Shurayuki

Member
When I was asked to name the characters, I thought I'd be clever and name them Tōru and Mari. I certainly wasn't expecting the Japanese girl I was visualising to be blonde!

So Mari is a ganguro, very suspicious, the secrets are starting to be lifted!
 

luokyl

Member
I thought I had the true ending
"Mr. Jones"
, but then the game kept going and I got the
Ms. Jones is a man with man legs
ending.... what the hell is going on? Was that the true ending that I got and why has my game turned into a sit com?
 
Well, there is a smartphone version of 428... Aksys, you know what to do! O:
That would be amazing. In that case though, short of deeply changing the game, they'd probably have to stick to the very Japanese nature of the game.

Not that I'm complaining about the localization of BLC though, it works flawlessly and at no point did I find myself thinking "yeah, that's obviously a Japanese game transposed to the West". It feels pretty natural, which is the point of localization.

Speaking of which, does anyone know what all the references where like in Japanese in
the spy story
?
It mentions stuff like
9/11, the US/Canadian border and international intelligence services

I'm really tempted to try to put a flowchart together.
 

zeopower6

Member
There are a handful of typos/random letters that should not be there so far. Will corrections be in a future patch?

http://i.imgur.com/bkh7d77.jpg
Random snippet from the
occult
arc (do not click unless you are okay with seeing some part of a later ending)

I want to try to help with a flow chart too if possible... At least with options and stuff.
 

LiK

Member
I thought I had the true ending
"Mr. Jones"
, but then the game kept going and I got the
Ms. Jones is a man with man legs
ending.... what the hell is going on? Was that the true ending that I got and why has my game turned into a sit com?

Sounds like one of those joke endings. I didn't get that one.
 

Link1110

Member
Hmm... The text seems to have been modernized. I doubt they were checking times on their phones or having the internet in a SNES game.

It's pretty cool so far, though I just got the first threat.
 

Erigu

Member
does anyone know what all the references where like in Japanese in
the spy story
?
If I remember well, Mikimoto was CIA, the Kayamas were Mossad, the three girls were SDECE (should really have been "DGSE" at that point), Midori was an Asian double agent, and the others from some Japanese counterintelligence agency (... well, of course, the hero was nothing).
 
If I remember well, Mikimoto was CIA, the Kayamas were Mossad, the three girls were SDECE (should really have been "DGSE" at that point), Midori was an Asian double agent, and the others from some Japanese counterintelligence agency (... well, of course, the hero was nothing).
Yeah,
I'm French and 35 but SDECE didn't ring a bell, it's been defunct since 1982. I guess even when the game originally released it was an anachronistic reference.
 

zeopower6

Member
Hmm... The text seems to have been modernized. I doubt they were checking times on their phones or having the internet in a SNES game.

It's pretty cool so far, though I just got the first threat.

Well, I'd imagine they had some kind of net connection back then, just not DSL, lol.
 

daxgame

Member
with a release on Android devices to follow.

awesome! I've been waiting ages to play this as it was never translated
 

ULTROS!

People seem to like me because I am polite and I am rarely late. I like to eat ice cream and I really enjoy a nice pair of slacks.
Not available in my country. :/
 
I think that one is a sequel that has no relation to this one, plus I think that the PS3 version would come out before the Vita one, lol.

Oh, I thought it was just a remake/port but it seems like there isn't much info about Shin Kamaitachi Yoru so I was probably reading descriptions for this game and got confused.
 

zeopower6

Member
Finished the novel. Are there any other games out there like this on ios?

There are a handful of visual novels, but I don't really know if they're 'mystery'-type visual novels... most of them tend to be lovey dovey and/or are really badly translated.

Oh, and hopefully this sells well enough that they are able to release more~
 
When they talk about whether the killer was inside or not say the killer was already inside, then select the option that says something like "No, that's impossible", afterwards they talk some more and they ask how he could have gotten in, select the option that says something about the front, afterwards you have to name the killer, input "Mr. Jones", afterwards they ask how he could have broken the window, it was the snow, then there's a struggle, I'm not sure what the other options do but I chose the one that's something like "Don't worry about me and hit him!" or something like that, then charge against him when Grace and the others are holding him off.

Also, omg this scenario with Ms. Jones lol.

I feel like a moron, I blindly guessed this, but for some reason I thought the
victim was recognized truly as mr. Jones
. I should be more inquisitive and doubtful.
 

hamchan

Member
Finished it for the first time today and am now playing the NG+ stuff. It was pretty awesome, totally recommend it.
 
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