Rumour had it there was to be a game for the NEC PC-FX but that
never
materialized.
Only one of the CF games, CF2, was released here in the US by the
people
at Working Designs (now
somewhat closed, RIP). It
achieved
some fame stateside for being one of the first CD-ROMs with decent
voice
acting as well as having been voted by Electronic Gaming Monthly
as the Best RPG of 1992 for any system.
Unfortunately, although WD planned on bringing CF1 and 3 to the US,
they never did.
Anyway, the world of Cosmic Fantasy revolves around four main people
(Yuu, Saya, Van, and Rim), with two cats (Nyan and Pikku) and a robot
cat
(Monmo) playing supporting roles. (Of course, when WD released CF2
here,
they changed a lot of their names.) Many of these
characters are also Cosmic Hunters, which are kind of like a police for
the universe. They may not be as large as the universe, however, as the
CF2 manual states "Cosmic hunters that protect the peace of the Donakri
galaxy receive special mind control training." So, perhaps the Cosmic
Hunters
only police the Donakri galaxy, but I don't know for certain. In any
case,
the Cosmic Hunters spend much of their time fighting Cosmic Pirates.
It may also be a little soap operatic at times, as Saya is Yuu's girlfriend and somewhere between CF3 and CF4, Rim becomes Van's girlfriend. Many of the plot lines are "person A has been captured by person B. Person C loves person A and with the help of persons D, E, and F, must fight persons G, H, and I (who are allied with person B, and so, against person C) to finally get to person A and then defeat person B multiple times." At least, this is so for CF2 and 4 Chapter 2. It almost makes it into CF4 Chapter 1. :)
-Caring for characters
This
may sound old hat, but it is cleverly told through colourful,
well-animated
(for the system) cinemas or cut-scenes, or whatever they're called,
which
are usually in Japanese. However, it is usually fairly clear what is
happening.
In fact, the characters have so much personality that many people
who
played CF2 fell in love with Rim, probably because she was such a
spunky,
energetic character. (And I guess that shower scene didn't hurt her
popularity
much...) Most guys probably consider her their favourite CF character.
BTW, her measurements are: B86, W58, H85. I'm sure somebody wanted to
know
:) .
All in all, I found myself very interested in what the characters do
and it's rewarding to help them go around saving each other, even if I
can't understand everything they say. They even seem to mature from
game
to game, though this may simply be Kazuhiro Ochi's art style evolving
and
is not meant to be a physical change in the characters. Though, I think
it may be both. The two pictures below are both of Van. The left one is
from CF2. The right one is from CF4 chapter 2.
-Some seiyuu
Many people have not asked if there are any seiyuu in CF but there
are.
In fact, there are some familiar names (and voices) in CF. The
following
chart lists all of the characters I could find and their seiyuu. The
links
go to Hitoshi Doi's pages
on them.
Buratsukii (3) |
|
|
|
Pikku (3-4) |
|
Nina (1) |
|
|
|
|
|
Galam Daigo (3) |
|
|
|
Purishira (3) others |
|
Galdo (3) others |
|
|
|
Narrator (2) Tokida (3) others |
|
Gaia (1) Rumaretto others |
|
|
Monmo Annie others |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
others |
|
|
|
others |
|
Pikku (2) |
|
|
|
others |
|
|
|
|
|
||
|
|
|
|
-What's going on now?
Recently, a couple of exciting things have started up.
1) There's a fan translation of Cosmic Fantasy (1) in the works! Headed
by Dave Shadoff, this project will bring us the first Cosmic Fantasy in
English!
2) Dave Shadoff is scanning and translating some Cosmic Fantasy
guidebooks. They are available at GameHackWiki.
3) But now...Sunsoft just purchased Telenet's IP as of December
2009. Will we see CF on Virtual Console? I think so!
Mike Koos for help with some
of the names.
His webpage is Studio
Mako-chan!
Erin Menefee for pointing out
Takada Yumi.
Dave Shadoff for his updates.
(Last updated 09/12/13)
RPG is short for Role-Playing Game. But you
probably
knew that already.
Top
OVA stands for Original Video Animation. This means that its first incarnation was as a video. In this case, it was released as both a video tape and a laser disc. OVA has also been known on occasion as OAV-Original Animated/Animation Video and most people really don't remember off hand which way it's written. I recall someone once said "OVA" is just an egg, but on the back of the CF4 chapter 2 jewel case, it says OVA...
Manga, basically, is a Japanese comic book.
Top
Some of the Japanese-American name changes
Yuu to Cobra
Rim to Babbette
Saya to Sayo
Nyan to Nayan
Pikku to Pico
Larla to Laura (or Lola, in one message.)
Galdo to Vega (Wrongo! I got this idea
from listening to Victor Ireland hinting about CF3 but I was mistaken!)
Monmo to Marley
Dandy to Robert
The Japanese names are used on every page except the CF2
page.
(With the exception of "Larla.")
Top
Seiyuu are famous Japanese voice actors.
Top