|
|
|
|
奇々怪界
©Taito Corp. 1990
Release : 1990-3-27 (¥5500)
HuCard (4 Mbits) TP02009
Action game
|
Kiki Kaikai is a top-down action game by Taito and conversion
of the arcade game of the same name originally released back in 1986. The main protagonist
is a cute little Japanese shrine maiden called Sayo and her duty is to rescue
seven benevolent gods (the seven gods of fortune) from the Dark World. But in order to do so,
she must find all the keys guarded by seven vicious demons. Each stage is populated by
creatures borrowed from Japanese mythology and folklore, but Sayo Chan is
not going on her journey empty handed! She possesses Shinto magic powers
and has two weapons at her disposal - her duster magic wand is quite effective in close combat but her
long range prayer cards are definitely the meat of the game. Flying ghosts,
skeletons and zombies don't stand a chance against fully-powered prayer cards
and Sayo can upgrade them in many ways. Powerful magic prayer beads can also
be collected along the way and can destroy everything on screen in the
blink of an eye (press I and II simultaneously to release them).
Finally, the game is far from linear and later stages branch out into
multiple paths. Kiki Kaikai consists of seven stages and is single
player only.
|
Kiki Kaikai (aka Pocky and Rocky in the west) was an arcade game
originally released by Taito in 1986 (picture on the right). The game was ported to several home
systems of the time such as KiKi KaiKai (MSX, 1987),
Kiki Kaikai - Dotō Hen (Famicom Disk System, 1987),
Kiki Kaikai (PC Engine, 1990) - the last two are however different than the
arcade game. Sequels followed for the Super Famicom :
Kiki Kaikai - Nazo no Kuro Manto (Super Famicom, 1992) and
Kiki KaiKai: Tsukiyo Kayako (Super Famicom, 1994). A special episode was
also released in 2001 for the Game Boy Advance and simply called
KiKi KaiKai Advance (aka Pocky and Rocky with Becky in the west).
Kiki Kaikai was also part of
Taito Memories Jōkan (Japan Only - Playstation 2, 2005), Taito Legend 2
(west only - Playstation 2 & XBOX, 2006) and Taito Memories Pocket (Playstation Portable, 2006).
Interestingly, a game called Kiki Kaikai 2 developed by Starfish was in the making
in 2007 but was later cancelled - it was released instead as Yukinko Daisenpuu
(aka Heavenly Guardian in the west) for the Playstation 2 and Wii.
|
Game Staff (Copied from the end credits) :
|
Game Designed by
Yuji Koga
Characteor Designers
Keishi Ito
Yoshihisa Akashi
Tohru Kawaishi
Yuji Koga
Programmers
Jun Chan
Kuwa Kuwa
Kag. H
|
|
Special Thanks to
Y. Ishida
Satohchan
Nishimura
Youichi Ito
Yabusaki
Lady Misato
Orihasam
Bandoh
Ishii Pon
H.S2K
|
|
Directed by
Ojamamushi
Taito Corporation
|
|
O
M
A
K
E
|
|
|
|
|
Click on picture to enlarge |
|
|
|
LK
|
|
cosmos99
|
P
O
V
s
|
|
I clearly remember playing the arcade version of Kiki Kaikai
back in the 90's and, as a teenager, I absolutely loved it. The
cartoony graphics and Japanese folklore settings definitively oozed charm
and character. But what about this PC Engine port? Well,
this version is acceptable but it is incredibly hard and extremely repetitive.
All the stages look alike and you soon have this feeling of seeing the
same things over and over again. Additionally, while the graphics are not exceptional, they are
somehow close to the original arcade game. Finally, I wished Taito
would have introduced a two-player simultaneous option in this port...
well, both the arcade and Famicom Disk versions featured
two-player alternating modes (The Famicom game introduced
Sayo's friend Miki-Chan) and it seems that Manuke
the raccoon only came much later for the Super Famicom system...
but it still would have been nice.
All in all, Kiki Kaikai is a nice little game
but I personally much prefer the Super Famicom versions
that came later.
|
|
Here is another diabolically difficult game... it got me really interested at
first (it's a mythical game after all), the "trainer" mode gave me the opportunity
to finish it (thanks the Flash Card ^^), and what a disappointment that was,
the game is not as beautiful as I imagined, it is repetitive and bosses are a pain
to beat... even cheating (infinite life cheat) still didn't make the game any
more enjoyable... 'Bof quoi' !
|
|
