Osomatsu-kun: Hachamecha Gekijou

[Melf]

When the Mega Drive debuted in Japan in 1988, it began a long run of quirky Japanese games based on franchises most westerners had never dreamed existed. It's understandable then, that most of these series never left the Land of the Rising Sun. Take the platformer Osomatsu-kun: Hachamecha Gekijo, or Nonsense Theater in English, for example. Could you imagine anyone on your street playing this instead of Golden Axe or Ghouls 'n Ghosts? We can't either. Still, it's something to check out, at least out of curiosity. Read our full review, and then go check out the manga and see what you've been missing for the past fifty years or so.

[PHANTOM2040]

Interesting game. I wonder how many games I still don't know exist for the genesis.

[Aarzak]

I believe this was the 4th ever Mega Drive title and the last to be released in 1988 (after "Space Harrier II", "Super Thunder Blade" and "Altered Beast").

Osomatsu-Kun is a manga/anime which dates back to the 1960's. At the time of the game's release, a 2nd TV series (which also debuted in 1988) was running (with music composed by Yusuke Honma, who'd later go on to score "Yu Yu Hakusho", another anime series which has Mega Drive games based on it), which is what the game was based off of.

The game has nice color and parallax (at least in the outdoor portions), much more impressive than for example Keith Courage. But the games sucks buttcheeks otherwise. Not the kind of game the MD needed early on (and the games were so scarce in the near-year leading up to the Genesis' U.S launch, months would go by without any new releases!)......."Beast" was the best of the first four MD games IMO, the others are trash.......especially "Super Thunder Blade".

Anyways, hear's a less-than-10 min. runthrough this crappy game. Imagine paying what, the equivalent of $60-$80 for just 5-6 minutes of gameplay:

[vintagegamecrazy]

Seriously what a dud! I don't know a thing about the anime it's based on but that was one piece of crap short game. I'd be pissed if I bought that back in the day as it seems like you'd have to try really really hard to have a game over in that game as even the player just plowed though the game and took all the damage he wanted and still didn't have a problem.

Lamo

[john8248]

Whoever did that speed run has put some serious time in on the game. It's non-linear levels require a lot of trial and error. All in all, Osomatsu-kun is a non-Western title that can be imported for a very reasonable price. Recommended for fans of obscure platformers and quirky, manga-style stuff.

[Phosis]

Whoever did that speed run has put some serious time in on the game. It's non-linear levels require a lot of trial and error. All in all, Osomatsu-kun is a non-Western title that can be imported for a very reasonable price. Recommended for fans of obscure platformers and quirky, manga-style stuff.

That's the thing. If you want to compare, there are people who can run through hours of gameplay in minutes once they figure out the perfect way to get through. I would challenge anyone to actually try playing through Osomatsu; it is actually quite hard in the beginning, mostly due to the fact that you will have no idea where you are going. So while there are "5 or 6 minutes" of gameplay, as I stated in my review those 5 or 6 minutes take a long time to master. However, the game does get a lot easier near the end, basically since your weapons are powered up every time you defeat Iyami.

I gave it a 5 because I didn't find it awful to play, and because I am playing other games right now that are worse than Osomatsu, and certainly deserve an even lower score. Length is not the major issue here, it's more tedium of gameplay. Since the game is one of the very first released on Megadrive, I think it deserves a bit of slack considering the high quality of graphics and sound, and the fact that behind a relatively short difficult game is some very average, but not totally mind-numbing platforming.

(But yeah, if I had payed sixty bucks for this thing, I would be pretty irked. It was worth the six dollars or so I payed on Ebay, and I will probably play it again sometime just because I like the presentation so much.)

[goldenband]

I don't mean to pick on Phosis, but I have to say:

I would challenge anyone to actually try playing through Osomatsu; it is actually quite hard in the beginning, mostly due to the fact that you will have no idea where you are going.

I just beat this game on my second attempt -- by which I mean that it was the second time I've played the game, ever. The first time I played for 15 minutes until getting a "game over", and the second time it took 20 minutes to beat it. It's one of the easiest games I've ever played on the Genesis!

I didn't even figure out how to use the items until I was almost at the end of the game, and my only item use was a throwaway during the final boss fight that didn't affect the outcome.

The only curveball in the stage design is that you want to fall down at almost every opportunity, which is a cute reversal of the normal paradigm -- usually pits = death, and higher ground is the key to making progress, but here it's the other way around. Otherwise the looping, etc. is nothing a NES veteran won't figure out in five minutes, having seen it before in games like Dragon Power (let alone Takeshi's Challenge) (let alone Super Mario Bros. World 8-4!).

Sure, it controls OK and is strenuously Japanese in its humor. But though it's entertaining for a few minutes, ultimately Osomatsu-Kun: Hachamecha Gekijou is, quite literally, the pits. 3/10.

(What are the items supposed to do, anyway? Is there any alternate ending, i.e. besides the one depicted in the video linked above? And is the ending text "めでたい めでたい"? I don't recognize the rightmost kana.)