70s films and the Famicom: Daikaijyu Deburasu

In terms of cover art, my favorite Famicom cart (at least out of the ones I have - 636 and counting) is a little-known game called Daikaijyu Deburasu. I don't particularly like the game itself. Its a strategy game in which you control an army tasked to defend Tokyo from a giant monster which has been hatched from an egg that fell into the sea from outer space (a good review of the game in English can be found here). Good story, but I'm not a fan of the strategy genre, so I don't really play it.

What I love about it though is this:
This is very retro. Actually, it was very retro when they made it 20 years ago. So now it is, like, "double retro" or something.

Oh wow, I just blew my own mind.

Anyway, I like it because it looks like something taken out of a movie poster from a Toyo film from the 70s. Which, coincidentally, is what I bought today and oh so want to share with everyone. As Famicom collecting dovetails nicely with the more general retro-Japanese-nerd-stuff collecting genre, I hope you won't mind the momentary detour from the regularly scheduled Famicom content of this blog.

I was wandering around Omocha Souko this afternoon. They have a substantial non-gaming section that sometimes turns up a few gems. A new box full of junk in their toy section caught my eye and in it I found a bag containing these:
They are a bunch of postcards produced by Toyo and NTV in the early 70s and a poster for the movie Godzilla vs. Megalon, released in 1973. They were in pretty rough shape, but for 200 yen for the lot (about $2), how could I say no?

Japanese films certainly had some extraordinary, if odd, heroes and villains in the 1970s. Here we have Gari Gari and Bero Bero lovingly depicted in front of the backdrop of....a....generic gray studio completely bereft of any decor:
Its not entirely apparent from the photo if they are meant to be fighting or engaging in some sort of mating ritual. Gari Gari seems to be biting Bero Bero's head while Bero Bero impotently tries to fight back with his double tongue, which couldn't have been much of an effective weapon.

Here we have Sanda fighting a giant octopus in a very epic-looking scene:
And I think this is Ultraman, though there are so many Ultraman rip-offs out there that I'm not sure if this is him or one of the rip-offs. Whoever he is, he is dealing with a creature known as Giradorasu:
And here we have Mekanigongu in an as of yet undefined relationship with a rather pleasant looking helicopter:
What I really love about these postcards from the point of view of a Famicom collector is that they provide an excellent visual window into the shared cultural experience of the makers of many of the Famicom's great games.

The guys who made Famicom games in the 80s had, as children in the 60s and 70s, been raised on films in which these were the heroes and villains. This is reflected in a lot of Famicom games, not just Daikaijyu Deburasu. Its not hard to see the roots of some Famicom characters in these cards - Donkey Kong for example would have fit in nicely in any one of these movies.

Anyway, I really like these cards. Actually, I like them so much that they almost make me dislike my copy of Daikaijyu Deburasu.

I mean, these things are so campy and cheaply made that they fall into that "So bad they are good...no, make that awesome" category. These films were so poorly made that they are legend. The "goofs" section of Godzilla vs. Megalon at IMDB for example contains entries such as:

"Obvious wires in numerous monster scenes."

and

"The Jet Jaguar suit that is kicked back and forth by Megalon and Gigan is empty - the arms flail and bend at the wrists, showing that there is no one inside."

The kind of sloppy stuff you would expect to see judging on the quality of the postcards and posters above.

The Famicom Daikaijyu Deburasu cover though? It actually looks...kind of professional. Which, in a weird way, makes it less charming than the ridiculously bad art in some of these postcards.

Oh, what am I saying? I still love this game's art. It is, after all, the perfect companion piece for my new old movie postcard collection.

Back in the USSR: That's where Famicoms Are

Its been suggested that I include some posts about actual Famicom games on here, and seeing as how this is a blog about the Famicom I think that is sound advice. So here is my first post specifically devoted to a single Famicom game (I did do one on Star Wars games, but that was about 3 games really): Gorby no Pipeline Daisakusen.

I'm not very good with reviewing games from a game playing perspective so I won't do that here. This guy already beat me to it anyway, seems like he's got it all covered. So, you know, just go over to his sight to read about the contents of the game itself. Basically its a puzzle game in which random pieces of pipe fall from the top of the screen and you have to match them up to create a continuous pipe across the screen.

The only thing by way of review of the game that I'll add is that I hate the fact that it doesn't have a multi-player mode. It is the type of game that would have been ideally suited for it (a la Dr. Mario).
Anyway. If I had to rate my favorite media appearances of Gorbachev's birthmark, I would rate his appearance on this cover at number 3, just slightly behind its appearance in his official White House photo from 1987:
And a million miles behind its appearance in the opening sequence to the Naked Gun.

Still I like its appearance on this game's cover a lot. I was a bit intrigued by it, in fact. How on earth did a Soviet leader get a video game made of him in the evil, capitalist West while he was still in office?

The Japanese Wikipedia entry for the game offers some guidance. According to that, during the Perestroika period Gorbachev became something of a pop idol in Japan, and the word "pipeline" was used in relation to the diplomatic strengthening of Moscow-Tokyo relations. So they decided to make a game using both concepts: Gorby and pipelines. The game is about the construction of a water pipeline, which had no parallel in actual Soviet-Japanese relations.

According to the entry, in order to use Gorbachev's likeness the game's makers had to apply to the Soviet embassy in Tokyo for permission. In a frustrating example of how unreliable Wikipedia can be, this assertion isn't footnoted so I can't go and read more about that. I think it would make quite an interesting story.

I did some perusing of Japanese blogs, but they more or less say the same thing as whats on the Wikipedia page. I did like this blogger's use of the phrase "ソビエチックな雰囲気" (which I'll translate as "Soviet-ic aesthetic") to describe the kind of Russian-themed puzzle games like this one and Tetris though. So it wasn't an entirely wasted effort.

There is another somewhat intriguing element of the cover of this game. Hidden behind the game's title is what looks to be a Space Shuttle rocketing through the skies:
This of course has nothing to do with the game, which is about making a water pipeline. I seem to remember reading somewhere that during the 80s the Soviets had made a copy of the Space Shuttle, but never actually flew it, so maybe that is what it is? Strange thing to just pop in there though.

The other cool thing that I like about this game is that it was never released in the USA. Why it never got released on the NES, I have no idea.
Oh, right. Them. Poor souls missed out on a good game though.