糸井重里のバス釣りＮｏ．１ 決定版！
Itoi Shigesato no Bass Tsuri No. 1 Kettei Ban!
Shigesato Itoi's No. 1 Bass Fishing Definitive Edition!
Contents
1 Introduction
2 Back of the Box Translation
3 Quick Start Guide Translation
4 Manual Translation
5 Treasure Victory Conditions
6 Let’s Go Fishing! (A 13 part “making of” of the game)
7 Nintendo Press release
1 Introduction
This fishing game was developed by Dice and HAL Laboratories and released by
Nintendo in the year 2000. It is a remake of the Super Famicom game that was
released in 1997. The game is notable for its numerous lure types, and the
simulation of seasonal bass behavior.
Shigesato Itoi is most well known in the west for being the creator behind the
Mother / Earthbound series. In Japan is more well known for his blog, (Hobo
Nichikan Itoi Shinbun, Almost Daily Itoi Newspaper), which has been running for
22 years. He often conducts long interviews with philosophers and scientists,
aiming to make a blog which is uplifting to read. He also owns a publishing
company that produces meticulously designed diaries and “belly warmers”. A true
Japanese eccentric, he is probably the most famous person to have been born in
Gunma prefecture. The main character in game is actually Itoi himself.
Released to try and capitalize on the bass fishing boom of 1999, the game sadly
failed to spark interest in the public. Although its music, sense of humor and
realism was praised, it was also critiqued for its fish being too time consuming
to catch. Some say that Nintendo over estimated its sales numbers and produced
too many carts, as they were often seen in bargain bins. Even now it is easy to
pick up a copy of the game for less than 100 yen in Japan.
ACSII Corporation released a tie in controller with the game, the Tsurikon 64
(literally a combination for the words for fishing and controller). These days,
these controllers are somewhat rare. Mine cost over 3,000 yen unboxed with no
instructions. Boxed controllers cost a lot more. Many of these controllers have
been ruined because of battery acid leaks. Fishing controllers are still
released in Japan, by many different companies.
The characters of the game were drawn and animated by Noriko Hikone and his
wife. Now 83, Hikone wrote the long running Uncle Karl manga and helped animate
many films from the golden age of anime such as Kimba the White Lion.
The game in the first lake was named after the President of Taisho Bank, and
keen fisherman Mr. Akaboshi. In 1925, he reintroduced the largemouth bass back
to Lake Ashi, to help the rivers, lakes and marshes recover where the
environmental balance was destroyed by pollution, overfishing, and the
construction of a dam. The lakes and places in this game have more whimsical and
animal themed names.
I honestly don’t know much about fishing, but my father in law is an avid trout
fisherman. When he gets time off from work he often goes up to the mountains to
fish, even during the winter. According to him, the bass fishing boom of the 90s
may or may not have been caused by the fishing tackle company Shima. They
introduced bass into certain Japanese lakes in order to sell new types of lures.
Since bass are not native to Japan, it was a sport that could only be done
abroad. Bass were imported and offered up in restaurants, but it was thought
that they did not compliment traditional Japanese recipes. The bass population
has continued to thrive, eating small native Japanese fish. Although that boom
has subsided, there are still a few bass fishermen continuing to catch and
release these bass even today.
I have translated the manual and back of the box, including the 7 page bass
fishing dictionary. The numbering system used in the manual is a bit confusing,
so feel free to ignore it. I have included the numbers in case the reader wants
to compare the translation to the actual manual. Before the manual, there is a
translation of the Quick Start guide, which gives you some information about the
lakes in the game.
Then I have listed the conditions to get the 15 secret treasures in the game.
After this I have translated the 35 page “making of” diary. By reading this, you
can learn a lot of useful hints about how to hunt and catch bass, and also get a
feel of what it was like to make a N64 game with Nintendo back in the 90s. I
hope it is interesting to read!
The back of the box
Can you fish according to worm fishing theory?
To the people who played the Super Famicon version,
This game has not only been presented in 3D, we have also made great strives to
present the depth of bass fishing. The movement of the lines, lures and bass are
even more realistic. Although it was hard to make, various ways of playing are
laid out. If you have gotten tired of the previous game, it would make us happy
if you tried this one!
To the people playing a fishing game for the first time with this “Definitive
Edition”
Actually, there are many enjoyable ways to enter the deep world of fishing.
Look, it’s not easy, you can enjoy learning how to fish. As you play more, you
will gradually become better, your worries will disappear, and your enjoyment
will deepen.
To the people who have experienced other fishing games, but are playing this
series for the first time.
If you are someone who fishes in real life, you surely have given up on them,
thinking “Fishing games are all like that…”
However, don’t under estimate our game! In our game the worm fishing is
realistic, do you understand?
Well, well good luck out there! Itoi Shigesato
2 Quick Start Guide Translation
Controls during bass fishing
The controller is your only fishing tool. Please use it well. Please read the
detailed instructions in the game manual. Also, please carefully keep this Quick
Start Guide with the game.
A button – Cast and reel in
B button – Put away your rod.
C Up – Displays the controls.
C Right – Tighten the drag. Opens the Lure Case if you are not casting.
C Down – Turns the depth finder on and off if you are riding the boat and not
casting.
C Left – Slacken the drag.
Start button – Display the Help screen. After you have cast, it pauses the game.
R Trigger – High speed mode
Z Trigger – Displays the Main Menu when not casting. During casting it
delicately sinks the lure.
3D Stick – Move the casting cursor and rod.
A Button and R Trigger – High-speed reeling
A Button and B Button – Low speed reeling.
C Up and C Right – Reel the line in strongly.
R Trigger and C Up – Automatically adjusts the line tension, so you can devote
yourself to moving the rod.
R Trigger and Z – Jacking. Pulls the rod left and right quickly.
3D Stick and B – Slow speed mode
3D Stick forward and Z – Twitching – Aims the rod down and shakes it at fixed
intervals.
1 Cast at a fishing spot!
If your partner at the top of the screen (the frog) has a good expression, and
the “fishing mark” says “OK”, you can fish at that location. Use the 3D stick to
move the casting cursor, and decide a place where the lure will land, the press
the A Button to cast.
2 Once you have cast the lure, reel it back in! Press the A Button to reel.
Special types of reeling are as follows.
With the Z Trigger, Shaking. R Trigger and Z Trigger, Jacking. Forward on the 3D
Stick and the Z Trigger, Twitching.
If you are reeling well, your partner will smile!
Once you have cast the lure, if you use the appropriate action to reel it in
bass will attack it. For details on how to reel please look at the Help menu.
3 If you get a bite, raise the rod! (Pull down on the 3D Stick)
If a bass bites the lure, pull the 3D Stick towards you, to raise the rod, this
will hook the bass.
If you hook the bass well, the fight will begin.
4 Win the fight!
(Use the 3D Stick and the A Button, or C Down or C Right to change the drag.)
Pay attention to your partner’s expression and the sound effects!
Pull the 3D Stick towards you to raise the rod, whilst doing this press the A
Button to reel the line in, and pull the bass. If you partner has a painful
expression, and a sharp sound plays, the bass is in danger of escaping.
Using the C Left button you can slacken the line, and push forward on the 3D
Stick to adjust the line tension.
5 Land the fish! (Down on the 3D Stick and the A Button)
When you have pulled in the bass far enough, the Landing Icon will be displayed
in the top right of the screen. Pull the 3D Stick towards you, whilst rapidly
tapping the A Button to land the fish.
Itoi Shigesato no Bass Tsuri No. 1 Kettei Ban!
Maps of the area around Tsurizuki Village.
We will introduce the map of each area here. There are three lakes you can go to
at first, if you complete Challenges from characters (see page 33 in the
manual),the number of lakes you can go to will increase.
Area 1 Nono Lake (God/Buddha/Sun/Moon)
A natural lake that spreads out in front of the Club House. Nono Lake is
connected to Kakasumi by a waterway, and bass travel between the two. You can
rent a boat from the Boat House but, you cannot fish from a boat at Nono Lake.
Only this area has the Club House and the Shop.
Map Labels (clock wise from the top)
お地蔵さんの洞窟Lord Jizo's Cave
えびとりワンドEbitori Wando (Eel bird Lagoon)
公園ウンドKoen Wando (Park Lagoon)
クラブハウスClub House
まきば岬 Makiba Misaki (Meadow Cape)
ショップ Shop
ボートハウス Boat House
ラブラブさんばし Raburabu-san bashi (Lovely Dovey Bridge)
かかすみへ To Kakasumi
ランプ水門 Ramp Water Gate
ねずあな新港 Nezuana Shin Minato (Mouse Hole New Harbor)
つばめさんばし Tsubame-san bashi (Swallow Bridge)
レストハウス Rest House
太郎岩 Taro iwa (Taro Boulder)
Area 2 Kakasumi (Mist)
To the south of Nono Lake, it is a comparatively shallow lake. Obstructions in
the water are often seen here, and there are many groups of reeds so it is hard
to see fish escaping. The water quality is a little muddy because it is a still
water lake. You can fish from a boat here, but point fishing is also effective.
You cannot drive the boat between Nono Lake and Kakasumi.
Map Labels (clock wise from the top)
ののいけへ To Nono Lake
ねずあな新港 Nezuana Shin Minato (Mouse Hole Harbor)
ランプ水門 Ramp Water gate
ボートハウス Boat House
ラブラブさんばし Raburabu-san bashi (Lovely Dovey Bridge)
溶岩帯 Yougan obi (Magama rock band)
農家下 Noka shita (Below the farm)
モグラの鼻 Mogura no Hana (Mole's Nose)
山猫の巣 Yamaneko no su (Mountain cats nest)
大豆半島 Daizu Hanjima (Soy bean Peninsular)
茶畑下 Chabatake shita (Below the tea field)
レストハウス Rest House
二号水門 Water Gate No 2
小室下のコブ Koshitsu shita Kobu (The cove below the small house)
石臼岬 Ishiusu Misaki (Millstone Cape)
赤松ワンド Akamatsu Wando (Red Pine Lagoon)
馬場川 Baba Gawa (House-riding ground river)
Area 3 Kikitako (Merry Octopus?)
A natural lake, with many lagoons (A place filled with algae and other aquatic
plant life) filled with rugged rocks, the deepest part, at the center of the
lake, is 40 meters in depth. It has the water quality of a spring, so it is very
clear. There are many various obstructions, so the chances of catching bass are
high. Make good use of the boat, and find the places where the bass are hiding!
Map Labels (clock wise from the top)
名差川 Meisa Kawa (Distinguished River)
地蔵岬 Jizo Misaki
豊作ワンド Housaku Wando (Good Harvest Lagoon)
弁慶岩 Benki Iwa (Strong Man's Boulder)
ムサシ岩盤 Musashi Ganban (Musashi Bedrock)
サンセットワンド Sunset Lagoon
タコヤキ Takoyaki (Fried Octopus)
黒土けいこく Kuroito Keikoku (Black Land Valley)
ゴケ浜 Goke Hama (Cockroach Beach)
ききょう岬 Kikyo Misaki (Homecoming Cape)
こまいぬワンド Komainu Wando (Guardian Lion-dog Lagoon)
かがみ川 Kagami Gawa (Mirror River)
小次郎岩 Kojiro Iwa (Kojiro Boulder)
ボートハウス Rest house
In the middle of the lake
金蔵島 Kinzo Jima (Treasure House Island)
レストハウス Rest house
Area 4 Nanairo (Seven colours?)
You can go here if you win a Challenge. A big meandering, flowing artificial
lake. There are many obstructions in the water, such as standing trees, the
places where the rivers make contact are first class locations. Because almost
all the places besides the cliffs become suddenly deep, it might be difficult to
fish there but, please check those places meticulously.
Map Labels (clock wise from the top)
レストハウス Rest house
クマゼミワンド Kumazemi Wando (Cicada Lagoon)
ボートハウス Boat House
しめじ川 Shimeji Gawa (mushroom river)
かわうそ岬 Kawauso Misaki (Otter Cape)
天川橋 Tengawa Bashi (Heavenly River Bridge)
森川橋 Morigawa Bashi (Forest River Bridge)
たこつぼ Takotsubo (Octopus Pot)
豆の木川 Mamenoki Gawa (Bean Tree River)
マムシ岬 Mamushi Misaki (Pit viper Cape)
鷹の巣ワンド Takanosu Wando (Eagles Nest Lagoon)
杉の木ワンド Sugi no ki Wando (Cedar Lagoon)
テングのはな Tengu no hana (Tengu’s Nose)
鬼のげんこつ Oni no gennkotsu (Ogre’s Fist)
Area 5 Kekehara (KK Plains)
If you win a Challenge, you can go here. A lake created by a large dam, in a
mountainous area, it year round water temperature is lower than the other lakes,
and it is out of alignment with the normal seasonal changes. Below the surface
of the water is a sunken valley, so obstacles in the water include, cliffs which
are the old bare surfaces of the mountains and their trees. Also there are
diverse changes caused by the artificial structures such as the dam and bridges.
The presence of very big fish lurking in the water hangs in the air. Before
trying to narrow down a place to fish, check all around the circumference of the
lake.
Map Labels (clock wise from the top)
ふくろの巣 Fukuro no su (Owl’s Nest)
亀のこうら Kame no koura (Turtle’s Shell)
むささびの巣 Musasabi no su (Flying Squirrel’s Nest)
トンガリ Tongari (Sharp point)
ムクゲ谷 Mukuge Tani (Rose of Sharon Valley)
竜神川流れこみ Ryukamigawa nagarekomi (The mouth of the Dragon God River)
カズラの岩盤 Kazura Ganban (Creeping Plant Bedrock)
赤石岬 Akaishi Misaki (Red Rock Cape)
ボートハウス Boat House
２号ワンド The Second Lagoon
竜王ワンド Ryuou Wand (Dragon King Lagoon)
白鳥の瀧 Hakucho no taki (Swan waterfall)
サイの目岬 Sae no me misaki (Dice Cape)
西山川なげれこみ Seiyamagawa nagerekomi (The mouth of the West Mountain River)
がレジワンド Gareji Wando (Scree Lagoon)
(I made my best guess at the nuance of the lake and place names. Perhaps
Kekehara is in reference to the voice actor and musician at Nintendo, Kazumi
Totaka, who also inspirited the character KK Slider in Animal Crossing, a game
which was released a year later? I have provided the names of the places in
Japanese in case they are useful in game. For example a character may tell you
to go to such and such a place. Taro is a very common name and is often used a
name for examples, as John Smith is used in English. Miyamoto Musashi was a
famous swordsman from Japanese history. Dice Cape is most likely a reference to
the developers of the game.)
4 Manual Translation
Pg1-3 Warranty and warnings – contents page (in every manual)
Pg 4-5 Welcome to Tsurizuki Village! (Literally The village that loves fishing)
When you first come to Tsurizuki village there are lots of things you know
nothing about. At that time, please find a page in this guide that you want to
read.
About the Tsurizuki Village
Tsurizuki Village is a place where friends who love fishing gather. Take advice
from these friends, and you can improve your bass fishing ability and compete
with them.
What can you do?
Let’s take a peek at Tsurizuki Village pg 18-30
Matches at Tsurizuki Village pg 32-33
Lets meet Lord Jizo! Pg 34
About the fundamentals of Bass fishing
It is important to fully understand the fundamentals of bass fishing. So, it is
also important to know about the various lakes at Tsurizuki Village.
What are the fundamentals of Bass fishing?
Let’s use the help function! Pg 31
How to get information about the lakes?
Use the help function Pg 31
What can you do at Tsurizuki Village? Pg 20 – 21
Facilities at Tsurizuki Village. Pg 29 – 30
Pg 5
About tackle
Tackle are the tools of bass fishing, rods, reels, lures, lines are the four
types of tackle. When you start the game you are given a set, but you can buy
more at the shop or be given some at events.
I want to buy some! – Shops pg 30
How to make a set! – The tackle box pg 24 – 25
How can I receive some? Challenges Pg 33
How about how to fish for bass
I want to fish as soon as possible!
“First, I want to fish for bass!” – pg 10 – 15
In truth, in order to fish for bass, technique is necessary. If you can’t reel
in bass well, catching big bass is very difficult.
Pg 6-7 How to start the game
We will explain how to start a new game or how to continue a saved game.
1 How to start a new game.
Choose “あたらしくはじめる”!
Correctly insert the cartridge into the Nintendo 64 and turn the power switch
on. (At this time, please do not touch the 3D stick) When the title screen is
displayed, choose “Start a new game.” You will be taken to Tsurizuki Village
club house.
2 Lets enter our name!
At the club house, follow the instructions of the receptionist, Nezumi-chan, and
enter your name. Choose the characters using the 3D stick to move the cursor.
You can press C left and right to change the character pages. When you find a
character you like, please press the A button to enter it. When you have
finished entering your name, select おわる (or press the Start button) to finalize
your name.
Name entry controls
3D stick / L / R– Select the type of characters, move the cursor
C Left and Right – Change page
A button – Enter a character
Start - Move the cursor to the End selection
3D stick / L / R– Select the type of characters, move the cursor
Pg 7
3 What are the conditions of the lakes?
Next select the conditions of the lakes. The differences between Beginner,
Normal and Confident are listed below. In other words the condition of the
lakes, is determined by your ability. You can’t fish big bass but making catches
is easier, or fishing is difficult but it is possible to catch big fish, please
think carefully and choose. When you have decided the lake condition, you will
be given a set of tackle as a present.
You cannot change the condition of the lakes while playing, only this once, so
please think carefully.
The differences between the lake conditions
Beginner – It is hard to catch big bass. The lure range is wide, it is easy to
attract bass that are far away.
Normal – You can catch small to big bass on average. The lure range is narrower
than on Beginner.
Confident – You are likely to find big bass. The lure range is narrow,
attracting bass from far away is hard.
4 Let’s decide the type of fishing!
Last, you must decide the type of fishing, that is to say, the type of fishing
you will do at Tsurizuki Village. Basically, the less you go fishing, the amount
of Acorns (money) that you can receive for fish increases. After you have
decided the type the game set up is complete.
You can change the fishing type during the game.
Continue a saved game
If you have saved a game (pg 28), later you can continue playing. On the title
screen choose つづきからはじめる. The load screen will be displayed, choose the file you
wish to load. The game will continue from the date, time and place where you
saved.
Pg 8-9 Controls
If you can use the controls well, you can get used to life in Tsurizuki Village
quickly!
Controls on the field
On land at Tsurizuki Village, you can walk around and talk to characters and
fish for bass.
A button – Talk, decide
B button – Cancel
C Up – Display the control board (shows all the controls that are currently
possible)
C Right – Displays the lure case. (You can put lures you often use in here.
pg25)
Start button – Display the Help screen (pg 31. When you are a reeling in a fish
it pauses the game (pg 12)
R Trigger – Run
Z Trigger – Display the main menu. (pg 22-28)
3D stick – Walk, choose a selection
Pg 9
Boat controls
At the boat house you can rent a boat (pg30). The controls are basically the
same as on land, but the controls below are also used.
C Down – Examine the bottom of the lake using the Depth Finder (p19)
C Left – Turn the depth display on and off
R Trigger – Turn the engine on and off.
3D stick – Move the boat, choose a selection
When you have cast your line, the main menu, and the control menus cannot be
displayed.
Please look at the explanation about the bass fishing controls on pages 10 – 15
and on the quick start guide.
Feel the response from the bass via the Rumble Pak!!
This game is compatible with the Rumble Pak (sold separately). If you insert the
rumble pak into your controller, when the bass take the bait, your controller
will vibrate. You can feel the impact increasing and precisely control your
actions. By all means, please use it.
If you use the Rumble Pak, please aware of the following things
- Please read the instructions that came with the Rumble Pak
- Before inserting the Rumble Pak into your controller please ensure the
power on the Nintendo 64 is in the OFF position.
- Please take care to change the batteries.
Costs 1,400 yen (before tax)
Pg 10-15 First, let’s fish for bass!
Here the 5 basic steps of bass fishing are explained, from casting to landing a
bass.
Controls during bass fishing
A button – Cast and reel in
B button – After recovering the line, put your rod away.
Basically, if pressed at the same time as any other button, it slows down the
speed of the action.
C Up – Displays the controls
C Right – Displays your lure case
C Left or C Down – Turns Drag mode on or off
Start button – Display the Help screen. After you have cast, it pauses the game.
R Trigger – Basically, press this as the same time as any other button to
increase the speed of the action.
Can be used when reeling in a fish (pg 12)
Z Trigger – Display the main menu (can be used while reeling in a fish. Pg12)
3D Stick – Move the rod
A and R Trigger – High speed reeling
A and B buttons – Low speed reeling
C Up and C Right – Strongly reel the line in.
R Trigger and C Up – Auto Reel Mode on or off (pg 13). When on, it automatically
adjusts the slack on the line for you, you only need to control the rod.
3D Stick and the R trigger – High speed mode
3D stick and B – Low speed mode
When you have cast your line, the main menu, the control menus, and the lure
case cannot be displayed.
Pg 11
A basic explanation of how to control the spinning reel
1 Let’s cast!
When you throw the lure out, this is called casting.
The casting Cursor
When you cast the line, the lure will land here.
When the fishing condition mark at the top right of the screen says OK, if you
press the A button the game will ask if you wish to cast here. Press the A
button again to begin casting. The sounds from the land will decrease in volume
and the sounds from the water will increase in volume.
1 Decide where you want to cast.
Using the 3D stick you can move the casting cursor, and decide where to cast the
lure. It will then sink at that location. When the wind is strong, the wind
direction and strength information will be displayed at the top right of the
screen.
2 Casting
When you have decided where you want to cast, press the A button to cast. The
bass fishing mode information will now be displayed.
Be careful of the bait reel’s backlash! Remember this!
When casting with the bait reel, there is the possibility of the lure casing
backlash on the line. If backlash occurs, it will take a horrible amount of the
line for the line to settle down (a message will also be displayed on the
screen). In order to avoid backlash, press the A button just before the lure
makes contact with the water, this is necessary to stop the lure from spinning.
Pg 12
2 How to reel with appeal!
After casting, use the rod and lure skillfully, bass can be attracted to the
lure, this is called “reeling”.
At the top left of the screen the lure icon is displayed.
Red – When the lure and line is out
Blue – When the lure stops, or the line is returning
Green and yellow – When auto mode is on (pg 13)
At the top of the screen the distance from the rod to the lure is displayed in
meters.
Under the Lure icon, on the left of the screen the Depth Gauge is displayed. It
is diagram from the surface of the water to the lake bottom. The light blue part
is the middle of the water, the brown part shows the underground. The lure
location is marked with a dot, at the bottom of the gauge the water depth in
numbers is displayed. The colour of the dot displays the hook level (pg 13)
The lure viewing window is displayed in the top left. It shows the current
movement of the lure Depending on the fishing conditions, it will wave and
magnify. It will be displayed until you get a bite.
How reel with unique rods
Basically, reeling is done with the 3D stick to control the rod and the A button
to reel, but we will introduce some unique ways to reel in.
Shaking – Z trigger
Without touching the 3D stick, if you just press the Z trigger, the rod will
shake delicately.
Jacking – R and Z triggers
If you press the Z trigger whilst holding the R trigger the rod will be quickly
pulled to the side.
Twitching – 3D stick and Z
If you move the 3D stick slightly and press the Z trigger, the rod will shake
downwards. If you press the Z trigger rhythmically like that the rod will
twitch at fixed intervals.
These methods are explained in the Help Menu.
Pg 13
Reel according to the lure! Remember this!
It is necessary to match the reeling method to the characteristics of the lure.
If you can do this during reeling, the frog will smile and the lure will be very
appealing to the bass. If you use the auto lure feature (Press R and C Up), you
can reel without worrying about the tension of the line, so you can give
undivided attention to reeling.
3 Making a catch
When a bass takes the bait this is called アタリ(a hit). When the bass takes the
bait, to ensure the lure will get caught in their mouth, you must raise the rod,
this is called アワセ (to match). If you are successful this is called a ヒット (a
hit).
The lure window
When the bass takes the bait the lure window will shake and a sound will be
played, until you make the catch you will not be able to see the bass.
Partner (the frog)
If the bass takes the bait, the frog will look surprised.
Hook level
The colour of the dot on the depth gauge will change when the bass takes the
bait. It will show how strongly the hook is stuck in the bass’s mouth. Blue is
weak, red is strong. If the hook level is strong, the bass will have trouble
escaping, but if it is weak the bass will break free easily. When you get a
bite, the sound will also increase depending on the hook level. See the Help
Menu for more information. The hook level gives you an idea of how easy it will
be to catch the bass. Whilst fighting the bass (see pg 14), even if the hook
level weakens, the colour will not change.
1 When you get a bite.
When you get a bite, the frog will looked shocked, the lure window will shake
and a sound will be played. Also, if you have the Rumble Pak connected, your
controller will shake. If this happens, get ready to raise the rod! If you are
fishing with a worm, and the bass bites it, after waiting for a short while the
hook level will become very strong.
2 Raising the rod
After getting a bite, pull the 3D stick down towards you, to raise the rod. If
you are successful the fish will appear, the hook level will be displayed and a
sound will play. If the bass is strongly hooked, a high sound will play, but if
it is weakly hooked, a low sound will play.
Pg 14
Sound Mark
This mark is displayed when the hook level sound is playing, to inform the
player.
4 It’s a fight!
When a bass is on the hook, it will fight until it is pulled out of the water,
this is called ファイト (fight).
Partner (frog)
During the fight, the frogs expression will change to show the line tension. If
the line tension is high, the frog will cry out. If you do nothing, the line
will break.
Drag Function ( C Left – slacken, C Down tighten)
Whilst looking at the line tension, adjust the line by using C Left and C Down.
If you slacken the line, and pull strongly on the line, the line will extend,
and will prevent the line breaking to some extent.
Lure Window
While you are fighting the bass, if the lure window enlarges and shake, there is
a chance the bass will break free.
If the line breaks and you do not have another lure, you will not be able to
fish.
Pg 15
Pull the bass towards you (3D stick and A / C Down)
To pull the bass towards you, it is necessary to manipulate the rod whilst
reeling in the line. If the bass pulls weakly
The reeling function will gradually increase the line tension. Whilst reeling in
the line, land the bass!
Be careful! (3D stick and C Left)
If the line tension is too high, a chime will sound, lower the rod and the reel
function will lower the line tension. By doing this you can avoid breaking your
rod.
5 At last, land the bass!
If you reel in the bass well, you will be able to catch it. The last part of the
fighting stage is called the ランディング (landing).
Landing Icon
If it is possible to land the bass, this icon will be displayed in the top
right, under the time.
Rod
During the landing, raise the rod as much as possible.
To land a bass (3D stick down and A)
Whilst reeling the bass towards you, prepare to raise the rod as much as
possible. If the landing icon is displayed, repeatedly tap the A button without
delay! If the bass is very big or has a lot of stamina, it will be necessary to
repeatedly tap the A button a lot.
Pg 16-17 How to use the Tsurikon 64
This game supports the Tsurikon fishing controller sold by ASCII corporation.
We will explain how to use it.
Page 16 lists the names of each part, pretty much the same as the standard N64
controller.
Drag lever (the grey lever to the right of the 3D stick)
Changes the drag function. If you turn it away from you, the reeling will become
strong, if you turn it towards you the reeling will be loose.
Handle (the two black handles to the right of the Drag lever)
Use this to reeling in the lure.
Please read the manual that came with the Tsurikon 64 for more information
Tsurikon 64 Customer support line
User support Telephone number
From Monday to Friday (except for public holidays)
10 am – 12 pm and 1pm – 5pm
The address of ASCII support desk in Tokyo.
Pg 17
How to use the Tsurikon 64 when fishing for bass
When fishing for bass, the controls differ from the controls of the standard
controller. When walking around on land and driving the boat, the controls are
the same as the standard controller.
Please look at pages 10 to 15 for the bass fishing controls.
1 Shake the Tsurikon 64 down to cast!
To cast where the casting cursor is located, use the Tsurikon 64 like a rod and
shake it forward and down to cast the lure.
2 Reel in by turning the handle!
The handle manipulates the reel. If you turn it away from you, you can reel the
line in. Also, as is described below, it changes the normal method of reeling in
fish.
Shaking – Press the A button
Jacking – Whilst press the Z trigger, move the Tsurikon 64 left and right.
Twitching – Shake the Tsurikon 64 down at a fixed interval.
3 When you get a bite raise the Tsurikon 64!
When you get a bite, raise the Tsurikon 64. If your timing is good, the fish
will be hooked.
4 Reel fish in with the handle and drag lever!
When the fish is hooked, while adjusting the line tension with the drag level,
turn the handle to reel the fish and line in. When the Landing Icon is
displayed, pull the 3D stick towards you, and repeatedly tap the A button to
land the fish.
When you connect the Tsurikon 64, on the title screen, if you twitch the
controller, the “hit sound” will play (pg 14). If, the sound does not play,
please try shaking the controller a little.
Pg 18 - 30 Let’s take a peek at Tsurizuki Village!
We will introduce things you can do in Tsurizuki Village, how to move around,
and the facilities in the village.
Things you can do in Tsurizuki Village.
1 First, let’s remember how to look at the screen!
From the top left to the top right.
The weather
The date and time
Your partner frog
The water temperature, the wind direction and strength
(The wind direction will be displayed as an arrow. The wind strength will be
displayed in meters per second.
The fishing condition mark.
(If it says OK, you can fish at this location, if not, it will display NO)
The Mini Map is displayed at the bottom right of the screen.
(Your location and direction is displayed with a yellow arrow)
Characters
If the frog at the top of the screen is not moving, you can press A to talk to
characters.
Your partner’s is very important! Remember this!
You were invited to Tsurizuki Village by your partner (pg 29), Kaeru-kun, and he
is your partner. He tells you important things with his movements and
expressions. For example, when you meet another character, if Kaeru-kun is not
moving you can talk to that character, if his expression is mild you can fish
where you are. Also, when you are fishing his expression changes, and has many
meanings (pg11-15).
Pg 19
At the boat house, if you rent a boat, you can drive it. On the boat screen, the
field information will be added, and the Depth Finder can also be displayed.
Depth Finder (C Down)
It displays the situation on the lake bed. Whilst the depth finder is being
displayed, if you press C Left, you can change the depth display. You can see
the situation directly underneath the boat with the Depth Finder. Whilst moving,
it continually displays the situation of the lake bed that you previously passed
over. When you are moving at high speed, the information is displayed at cut
intervals. If you want to clearly see the situation of the lake bed, then move
slowly, if you want to watch the situation of the lake bed, you should stop the
boat.
Turning the Depth Display on and off (C Right)
As is shown on the right, when the Depth Display is set to A (A=Auto=Automatic)
it automatically displays the depth of the lake, up to 18 meters, and
automatically turns on and off. When it is set to M (M=Manual=Hand Operated), it
displays the lake depth to fixed depths (6m, 10m, 18m and 32m)
Engine Screen
When you are riding the boat, if you press the R Trigger, you can turn the
engine and electric motor on and off (see the Bass fishing encyclopedia on pg
36).
For an explanation of the bass fishing screen please see pages 10 to 15.
Pg 20
2 What can you do at Tsurizuki Village?
Well, let’s introduce what you can do at Tsurizuki Village. At Tsurizuki Village
you can move in three ways; by walking, by moving to points, or by moving using
the big map.
Actions 1: Walking and Running (3D stick, 3D stick and the R Trigger)
You can walk in any direction you like on the field using the 3D stick. Also, if
you press the R Trigger whilst moving the 3D stick you can run. On the mini-map
at the bottom right of the screen, the boat house is shown as a square, and any
other facilities are displayed with a circle.
Actions 2: Talk to the other characters
If the frog at the center of the screen is not moving you can talk to
characters.
You can talk to the other characters at Tsurizuki Village. If you get to close
to another character, and the frog is not moving you can talk by pressing the A
button. You can get various advice, information, and a Fishing Contest (pg32)
from the characters.
Pg 21
Actions 3: Entering any facility
You can enter any facility in Tsurizuki Village, if you stand in front of the
door and push the 3D stick forward.
Actions 4: Fish for bass
If the frogs face looks happy and the Fishing Conditions Mark says OK, you can
fish there!
When you are close to the water, or riding the boat, and the frog at the center
of the screen looks happy, and the Fishing Conditions Mark says OK (pg 18), you
can fish at that place (pg 10-15).
Actions 5: Riding the boat
If you can ride the boat, if you rent it from the boat house. You can go in any
direction using the 3D stick, the boat will gradually increase its speed. If you
come close to the land, or another obstruction, the boat will stop. Also if you
press the R Trigger, you can turn the boat engine or electric motor on and off,
so that you can search suspicious locations.
You can also move around using the large map. Please look at page 23 for more
detailed information.
Pg 22
3 Let’s open the Main Menu!
On the field screen, if you press the Z Trigger, the Main Menu will open. On
each menu you can do the following things.
(Whist reeling or fighting a fish, even if you press the Z Trigger, the Main
Menu will not be displayed.)
Menu 1: The Big Map
You can check your current location, different locations and facility, where
your fishing friends are, and also move around using the big map.
The name of the lake you are currently at is displayed at the top of the screen.
If you press C Left or C Right you can look at the maps of other lakes.
The Location Cursor
Light Red – This shows where you are currently. The white part displays your
direction.
Dark Red – This displays a place that you cannot move to.
Yellow – This indicates a place where a facility is.
The Controls are explained at the bottom of the screen.
3D Stick - Move
A – Confirm
B – Cancel
R Trigger – Displays the locations of facilities and your friends.
You can only walk around at Nono Lake! Remember this!
The first places you can go to in Tsurizuki Village are Nono Lake, Kakasumi and
Kikitako. The only place where you can walk around is Nono Lake. At the other
lakes you can move around by using the cursor on the Big Map screen, if the
cursor turns dark red you cannot move to that location.
Pg 23
It’s easy to move around using the Big Map!
On the Big Map screen, move the location cursor to a place where you wish to go,
you can quickly move there. If you press the R Trigger, the location of
facilities and your friends will be displayed, using this you can easily move to
their locations.
Facilities and Friends control board
On the Big Map Screen, the options Facilitiesしせつ and Friends なかまたち are
displayed. If you choose either of them, the locations of the facilities or your
fishing friend’s locations will be displayed.
Moving the location cursor
Using the 3D stick you can choose a location that you wish you move to. Once you
have chosen a location, press the A Button to complete your move.
Choosing Facilities or Friends and moving to their location
Choose either Facilities しせつ or Friends なかまたち, a list of Facilities/Friends will
be displayed. Use the 3D stick to move the cursor and select the
Facility/Friend’s name that you wish to move to. Then please press the A button.
Pg 24
Menu 2: The Tackle Box
The tackle (bass fishing equipment) you are using now, can be exchanged, your
most used lures can easily be taken out, and you can put lures in and out of the
lure case from the tackle box. Using the Left and Right C buttons, you can
switch between the Tackle Box and Lure Case.
The Tackle Box Screen
The tackle that you are currently carrying are displayed as silhouettes, the
tackle you are not carrying are not displayed.
The Lure Case Screen
If you press the R Trigger, an explanation of how to use the lure is displayed.
If you wish to exchange a rod or tackle:
1 How to select a Rod or Tackle to exchange
Using the 3D stick please select the tackle you wish to exchange. You can also
exchange rods in the same way. Select the rod with your cursor and press the A
button, and the rod will be switched.
2 Choose a Rod type
Next, choose a type of rod. There are Spinning and Bait types. For example,
let’s choose a Spinning Rod. Pushing left and right on the 3D stick, select the
type and press A button to confirm.
3 Choose the spinning Rod you wish to use
There are 6 types of Spinning Rod, displayed over three pages. Push up and down
on the 3D stick to switch pages, you can also push C Up and C Down. Above Rods,
a explanation of the Spinning Rods will be displayed. Rods that you can use
(ones that you are carrying) will be displayed with a picture. Select the Rod
you wish to use with the cursor and press the A Button to confirm your
selection, that Spinning Rod will be exchanged with the one you are currently
using.
In order to exchange tackle, it is necessary to buy one at the shop beforehand
(pg 30).
Pg 25
How to put Lures into the Lure Case.
If you put Lures that you often use into the Lure case, you can easily take them
out while you are fishing.
1 Choose the Lure you wish to put in
On the Tackle Box screen, before choosing the Tackle, if you press C Left or C
Right the Lure Case screen will be displayed. The Lure Case holds ten types of
Lures. With the 3D stick, select one lure that is in the case, and press the A
Button. Then, you can put in a new lure in that place.
2 Choose the new type of Lure to put in
There are 4 types of Lures. For example, let’s select a Bait Lure. Then, let’s
select a Hard Lure.
3 Choose a Hard Lure
There are 14 types of Hard Lure, displayed over 4 pages. The method of changing
the pages is the same as with the rods. Whilst looking at the explanation that
is displayed at the top of the screen, choose a type that you like and press the
A Button. Let’s select the Spinner Bait CS, an explanation about it will be
displayed.
4 Choose the new Hard Lure to put in
You can select from 6 types of Spinner Bait CS lures. They are displayed over 2
pages. Lures that you can put in (ones that you are carrying) will be displayed
with a picture. Select the Lure you wish to put in with the cursor and press the
A Button to confirm your selection, that Lure will be inserted into the case.
You cannot mix types of Tackle! Remember this!
There are two types of Tackle, Spinning and Bait types. These are splint into
Rods, Lures and Lines. You cannot mix their types. For example, if you equip the
Spinning Rod with the Bait Line and Bait Lure you will need to exchange the Rod.
Also, Rigs and Worms are sets, so they must be equipped together.
Pg 26
Menu 3: Rivals
Rivals are fish that take owner ship of areas of the lake, regardless of the
type of fish, like fish in a fish pen.
There are a maximum of five fish that can take ownership of areas in the lake.
The Rival Screen
Information from when the fish was caught.
The name of lake it was caught from, the day, date and time it was caught and
the type of Lure used is displayed.
A summary of fish who have territory.
The type of fish and it’s length are displayed. If you select a fish with the
cursor you can see it’s information from when it was caught.
Can you release fish?
If you wish to release fish with territory (to let them go), look at their
summary on the Rivals Screen. Select the fish with the cursor and press the A
Button. Then, when you catch a new fish, the new Rival will be entered into the
rival screen.
Enjoy the Appreciation Mode!
On the Rival Screen, if you press the R Trigger, the Fish Take section of the
screen will be enlarged, this is called Appreciation Mode (when you land a fish,
the Rival Screen will not be displayed.). You can enjoy the elegant forms of the
fish as they swim. If you press the R Trigger once more, you will return to the
Rival Screen.
Pg 27
Menu 4: Carefree Fishing
On the Carefree Fishing screen, you can see various data that has been collected
during your time spent fishing. Information about non-bass fish is not included.
Also, the data is automatically updated.
Types of Bass (Top right part of the screen)
If you press C Left or C Right, you can change between Large Mouth Bass and
Small Mouth Bass information.
The Best 3 Bass (middle part of the screen)
Of the bass that you have caught so far, the bass with the biggest weight are
listed, and their information is displayed. From the top, their length, weight,
date that they were caught, weather on that day, the name of the lake they were
caught at, the type of lure used, and the type of line used are displayed.
Total Data (Bottom part of the screen)
The total data of all Bass caught is displayed here.
What are “Fishing Contests” and “Challenges”
At Tsurizuki Village, you can accept Fishing Contests and Challenges from the
characters of the village (pg 33). Whilst taking part in a Fishing Contest or a
Challenge, the data from those events will be displayed in your Fishing Record.
Pg 28
Menu 5: Saving
Whilst walking around the field, or riding the boat, you can always save at any
time if you open the Main Menu.
The Save Menu
You can choose from one of three save slots. Each slot displays, the players
name, the type of fishing, the Lake Conditions, the Save Date and Time, and the
place where the player saved.
If you save over a previous save, all the previous data will be lost, and cannot
be recovered. Please be careful.
Can I save in the Club House? Remember this!
At the club house, you can register the next day that you plan to come to
Tsurizuki Village. At that time, you can save the game.
Menu 6: The Treasure Chest
Treasure are happy rewards, given to you if you satisfy certain conditions. You
can look at these rewards. Treasure that you have gained is displayed with a
picture. The conditions to satisfy are unknown. Treasures which are shown as a
silhouette, are Treasures with a condition that has a conditional value that is
being counted. You will not get the those treasures until the value reaches a
certain amount. If you select a treasure you have with the cursor and press the
A Button, the treasure will be enlarged.
For how to get Treasures, please look at page 32.
Pg 29
4 Facilities at Tsurizuki Village
There are 4 types of the facility at Tsurizuki Village, the Club House, The Rest
House, The Shop, and The Boat House. The Club House and Shop are only at Nono
Lake. We will explain what you can do at each facility.
Facility 1: The Club House
This facility is like a meeting place for fishermen of the village. If you push
left and right on the 3D Stick you can choose a Menu and press the A Button to
confirm.
Menus at the Club House
はなす Talk – You can talk to characters resting at the Club House. Listen to
useful information about fishing and talk about Tsurizuki Village!
なかま Friends – Invite a friend to go fishing with you. When you are fishing they
will give you various pieces of advice. Also, when you go fishing with them,
various events will occur.
タイプ Types – You can change your type of fishing here. I From the very cheap
“Weekend Type” (週末タイプ) to some very expensive other types are on offer.
イベント Events- You can join some special fishing tournaments. To enter these
Tournaments it may be necessary to enter special passwords that will be
published in magazines. (Famitsu I assume)
よてい Schedule- Choose and register the day that you will next come to Tsurizuki
Village. Depending on your Fishing Type, the dates that you can choose will
change. Grey dates on the calendar cannot be chosen. Once you have registered
your plan, you can save your game.
Pg 30
Facilities 2: The Rest House
レスト means “To Rest”. At the Rest House you can rest at any time, here you can do
these things:
はなす Talk - You can talk to characters resting here. It’s the same as talking at
the Club House.
休けい Rest – You can rest at any time you like (time will continue). You can
choose the hours and minutes you will rest for with the cursor, but pushing the
3D Stick Down. If you press the A Button, time will quickly pass to the point
you set.
きろく Records – The data of the heaviest fish that have been caught at Tsurizuki
Village is displayed here, including their weight and the type of line used.
Using the 3D Stick you can select the line. The name of the person who caught
the fish, the length, and the date and time it was caught will be displayed.
Facilities 3: The Boat House
You can borrow an indispensable Bass Fishing Boat here.
はなすTalk - You can ask the store owner, various things about the lake.
かりる Rent – You can rent an aluminum boat for free here.
Facilities 4: The Shop, BASS STOP 1101
You can buy each type of Bass Fishing Tackle here.
はなす Talk – You can ask the store owner various things about Fishing Tackle.
福袋 / セール Lucky Bag / Sale – You cannot see the contents of a Lucky Bag, until
you buy it. Sales are held from the 1st to the 3rd of every month. We recommend
beginners to bass fishing that they buy a Fishing Set, which contains all the
necessary Tackle for Bass fishing.
ルアー ルール ロッド ライン Lures, Reels, Rods, Lines – You can buy various kinds of Tackle.
Pg 31 Let’s use the Help function!
Using the Help function you can check information and knowledge that is
necessary for Bass fishing.
On the Help screen, you can choose the explanation you wish to read, the
contents are displayed as below.
(I tried my best, but this was an insane list of Katakana. If know anything
about fishing please let me know if I made any mistakes! At least this list
shows you how deep the Tackle system in this game is.)
-About Lures
Hard Lures
Spinner Bait – Slap lures, buzzing lures, Lift and Fall lures, Slow reeling
lures
Bass Bait – Buzzing lures
Rubber Jigs – Pulling jigs, Pot bumps, Lift and Fall jigs, Swimming jigs
Metal Jigs – Jigging jigs, Lift and Fall jigs, Swimming jigs
Minnows – Twitching minnows, Jacking minnows, Stop and Go minnows, Pulling
Minnows
Crank Bait – Slap bait, Bottom Knocking bait, Stop and Go Bait, Pulling Bait
Vibration – Normal reeling, Lift and Fall
Chugging – Twitching, Walking Dog
Pencil Bait – Walking Dog
Rigs
Non Sinker – Twitching rigs, Falling rigs
Spirit rigs – Pulling
Texas Rigs – Bottom bumper, Lift and Fall, Sinking rigs
Carolina Rigs – Jacking, Bottom bumpers
Jig Head – Bottom bumper, Swimming, Jacking
Under Shot – Jacking, Middle of the water sinker, pulling
Worms
Straight worms
Ring worms
Grubs
Long Grubs
Short Tails
Tube Worms
Shark Bait
Puddle Tail
-About Rods
Spinning Rods
Bait Rods
-About Reels
Spinning Reels
Bait Reels
-About Lines
Spinning Lines
Bait Lines
-About the Lakes
Structures
Weeds and Sunken Algae
Longtooth Grouper (クエ)
Jetties
Water gates
Common reeds
Fishing Harbors and River dikes
Breaks
Tetra fish and Masonry
Sunken boats
Water intake towers
Oda and fish reefs
Capes and Horsebacks
Standing trees and fallen trees
Bedrock and cracks
Strategies by conditions
How to fish in Spring
How to fish in Summer
How to fish in Autumn
The closed fishing season in Winter
The first things to do
-About the controls
How to move
How to move the boat
How to cast
How to reel
How to get a bite
How to fight the bass
How to land the fish
How to use the Tsurikon 64
-Ask Mr. Itoi for Advice
What is Tackle?
What is Tackle?
What are Rods?
What are Reels?
What are Lines?
What are Hard Lures?
What are Worms?
What are Rigs?
What is colour?
What is the Drag function?
The Depth Finder
About Bass
I can’t catch Bass
I can’t catch a Ranker
I can’t fish with worms
I don’t want to balance!
I can’t get the fish hooked!
Secrets of the rod
Strategies for different lakes
Strategies depending on the weather condition
Water temperature and Bass
Please check the explanations in the Tackle Box to learn about when and where to
lose each lure.
Pg 32 Fishing matches in Tsurizuki Village
At Tsurizuki Village you can compete in Challenges and Fishing Contests with the
characters of the village.
Get valuable information! How to start a Fishing Contest
1 Go fishing with new friends!
Invite a new friend to go fishing with you. If you have no friends, if you meet
characters on the field you can choose to start a Fishing Contest if you talk to
them. When you do this, the character will explain the victory conditions to
you. After listening to the explanation, you have three hours to win the Fishing
Contest.
2 You can check the passage of time!
Whilst doing a Fishing Contest, on the Main Menu, the Fishing Record option will
be changed to a Fishing Contest option. If you select it, it will display the
remaining time in the contest. If you press C Up and Down you can turn off the
size of Bass. It also displays your opponents expression, if they look upset the
player is winning, vice versa, if they look happy the player is losing. When you
make a catch in the contest the fish will also be display on this screen.
3 If you win the Fishing Contest, you can understand the conditions for winning
Treasures!
When 3 hours pass, the contest will end, and you will move automatically to The
Club House where the results will be judged. Before the 3 hours have passed, if
you wish to end the contest you can do so by returning to The Club House. If you
win the contest, your opponent will tell you about the winning conditions for a
certain treasure. The information they tell you about will be displayed on the
Treasure on the Treasure Chest of Glory screen.
You cannot start a Fishing Contest if you are currently doing a Challenge.
Pg 33 Will your skills increase….!? How to start a Challenge match
1 Invite a friend to go fishing with you!
You can invite friends to go fishing with you. You can invite anyone to go with
you. Some characters are waiting in The Club House, you can talk to them there.
Then you can start a fishing competition with them.
2 Your partner will give you advice!
During a Challenge, the friend that you invited to go fishing with you (your
partner), can give you various pieces of advice about fishing. Also during a
Challenge, on the Main Menu, the Fishing Records option will change to the
Challenge option. It has the same information as the Fishing Contest screen.
3 What are the special benefits of winning Challenges?
If you accomplish the conditions for winning the Challenge go to The Club House
(if the time runs out, you will automatically be moved there). The character who
gave you the challenge will appear, and judge the challenge. If you win the
Challenge you will gain one of the following benefits. Depending on the
Challenge the Benefit you receive will change.
Benefit 1 Special Lures
You can get a Special Lure that are only gained from Challenges.
Benefit 2 You can go to a new Lake
You can go to a lake you have never been to before.
Benefit 3 ???
Perhaps a never seen before good thing will happen to you!
Pg 34 Let’s meet Lord Jizo!
If you meet Lord Jizo at Tsurizuki Village’s Nono Lake, your screen can be
changed.
Lord Jizo is here!
Lord Jizo is in a cave at the north end of Nono Lake. Lord Jizo can change the
way your screen is displayed in the following 4 ways.
Normal Mode – This is the same mode that the game starts in. The lure window is
displayed at a normal size.
Emotional Mode – When you get a bite, the Lure Window will be displayed much
larger.
Full Screen Mode – After casting the lure, until the fish is landed the Lure
Window will take up the whole screen. It is a good mode to improve your lure
moving abilities.
Expert Mode – The lure window will not be displayed. Like real fishing, the
player will have to rely on sounds, vibrations and ripples on the surface of the
water.
Pg 35-42 Bass fishing dictionary
(Many of these words use katakana as Bass fishing is originally an American
sport. Sometimes the English meaning of these loan words was lost in
translation. Sometimes they are direct translations of English, so they seem a
bit reductive when translated back into English. But I have written the Japanese
words in case they are useful during play. I’m not fisher man, so if I made a
mistake please feel free to message me!)
Here we introduce phrases that are related to bass fishing. If a star is next to
the definition, it means that the word can be searched for in the Help section
of the game.
アイレットEyelets
Rings made of metal on the heads of plugs and hooks. You can attach lines
through them.
アクションAction
Lure movement. Also used to describe the stiffness of a rod. Light action means
the lure moves easily, heavy action means that the lure moves sluggishly.
アシReeds
Tall plants that grow in the water of marshlands from spring to summer
アタリGetting a bite
The feeling on the rod when the bass bites the lure.
アピールカラーAppealing colours
Colours that strongly attracts a fishes attention. In reality, the effectiveness
of colours depends on various things like the water quality or transparency.
However, in this game the fish are mainly attracted to unnatural bright colours.
アフタースポーニングAfter spawning
Bass who have laid eggs. Also called Post Spawn Bass.
アプローチApproaching
Getting close to a place where you will cast the rod.
アワセHooking the fish
After getting a bite, you raise the rod to hook the lure in the Bass’ mouth.
アンカーAnchors
Weights sunken to the lake bed to fix the position of buoys.
アングラーAnglers
People who fish. Bass fishermen are called Bass Anglers or Bassers.
糸ふけString slackness
The slackness or looseness of a line.
イミテーション ルアーImitation lures
Bass which look like Bass prey.
ウェードWeeds
Plants like reeds that live in water. Places with reeds have high amounts of
oxygen in the water, and the water temperature is stable. Such places are easy
environments for Bass prey and Bass to live in.
ウェードエリアWeed area
An area in an a lake where many weeds grow.
ウェードベッドWeed Bed
A place under the surface of the water where weeds cluster together.
ウォーキングドッグWalking the dog
One of the representative and basic actions of a pencil bait in the top water.
Shaking the head of the lure left and right whilst pulling.
ウォーターメロンWatermelon
The name of a worm colour. Translated directly, it means “watermelon” in
Japanese, in reality it is a green colour that matches the reeds. When tied to a
black line, the set is called “watermelon seed”.
浮き魚礁Floating fish reefs
A fish reef where reeds float. It is different from a normal fish reef, because
if something is floating on the surface of the water it can quickly be seen. In
this game, there one in south east area of Kikitako lake.
浮きゴミFloating rubbish
Various rubbish floating on the water. Things such as leaves and withered weeds,
or rubbish that people have thrown away. Collects downwind or deep in lagoons.
馬の背Horsebacks
The extended part of capes and islands, where the bottom of the surface of the
water swells up.
These are places where it is easy for bass to stay for a long time.
エッジEdge
Edges of the lake where reeds and weeds grow. Also describes quickly rising
edges.
エレキElectric motor
An electric motor that uses battery power. For bass fishing, it allows you to
move quietly.
オイカワ Freshwater Minnows
Small fish that bass prey on. The OKA lure resembles the pattern of this type of
minnow.
オーバーハングOverhang
Branches, trees or boulders that overhang on cliffs. Bass like to gather in the
cool shade of such things.
オープンウォーターOpen water
Wide areas of water with no structures.
オダ Oda
A small structure made of a bundle of tree branches. They are sunk to the lake
bottom to encourage fish to gather.
落としこむDrop in
A way of approaching a structure or fish you can see, by aiming to land the lure
from a small distance, using a more gentle touch that usual lure casting. Also
used to describe dropping the lure under the surface of the water.
オンスOunce
A measure of weight, written as oz (1 once equals about 28.3 grams.)
カーブフォールCurve fall
Whilst a sinking lure type falls to the bottom of the water, draw a loose curve
in the water in front of you. When you feel the line being pulled, make the lure
fall.
ガイドGuides
Rings on the rod for the line to pass through.
回遊 Seasonal Migration
Discovered in recent years, one aspect of bass ecology. Bass that settle and
inhabit structures and certain areas differ from bass that move around in large
groups in wide lakes.
カウント ダウンCountdown
The amount of time from when lure hits the water, to the time that it reaches
the bottom.
It is a way to count the depth of the lure.
カケアガリTo hang and raise
A place that suddenly slopes, where the water meets a cliff.
活性Activity
How energetic the bass are. It changes depending on various conditions such as
the season.
ガレ場Scree Slope
A place near the shore, where boulders earth and sand suddenly slope up. It’s a
good spot for fishing.
キャスティングCasting
Shaking the rod to throw the lure.
キャッチ＆リリースCatch & release
Releasing a caught fish. It is one of the manners of sports fishing. You should
certainly endeavor to release small fish.
漁港Fishing port
A port where fish are unloaded.
They are structures that are easy for boats that are kept at breakwaters and
river dikes to aim for.
魚礁Fish reef
Structures that are sunk to the bottom of lakes to encourage fish to gather
there.
They are made from concrete and metal. They can come in many different sizes.
切り株Tree stumps
A structure on the lake bed. As the name suggests, they are tree stumps.
禁漁Fishing Prohibited
In this game fishing is prohibited during winter, in December, January and
February.
杭Stakes
Artificial structures often seen on flat lakes, wooden pillars that stand on the
lake bed.
クランキングCranking
A type of bass fishing that uses crank bait.
クランキンスティックCranking stick
A specially designed rod that precisely transmits the action in the water or the
long cast to the rod.
It is effective at hooking fish and bait in deep water.
クラックCracks
A crack in bedrock. Big bass often hide deep in these cracks.
ゲームフェッシング Game fishing
Enjoying fly or lure fishing as a sport. Fish hunted for sport are called Game
Fish.
外道 Unintentional Catch
A fish one did not intend to catch when bass fishing.
護岸Seawalls
A fishing port made by covering the coast in concrete. Bass like staying there.
コンタクトポイントContact points
A place where fish come together while they move to spawning grounds, or a place
where fish gather seasonally.
コンプヌーションルアーComplement Lures
Like attaching pork to a rubber jig, lures with more than two ways to use and
combine baits.
サーフェースSurface
The surface of the water.
サーモクライン Thermocline layer
The area in the middle depth of the water where there is a temperature
discrepancy, a borderline.
サイトフィッシングSite fishing
Fishing where you can confirm the location of the bass with your eyes from the
surface of the water.
サスペンドSuspensions
When fish stay for a long time at a fixed depth in the water.
If you stop reeling in a Suspension Lure, it will stay drifting at that same
depth.
サミングSumming
Adjusting the distance of a throw, directly after casting a lure. It also refers
to preventing backlash from baited reels.
In this game, when using baited reels, when the lure hits the surface of the
water, if you press the A Button, you can avoid backlash.
サンクチュアリSanctuaries
Directly translated, it means holy ground. These places are the most safe for
bass, so they often group there.
桟橋Piers/Jetties/Wharfs
For boats to moor at, bridges that jut out from the coast over the water. Bass
often gather by them.
シーズナル パターンSeasonal patterns
The behavior patterns of bass change as the seasons change.
Also refers to the practice of researching and analyzing the best method of
fishing depending on the season.
シエイキングShaking
A technique of only shaking the end of the rod, in order to shaking the lure.
ジギングJigging
A way of fishing with metal jigs. A way of giving movements to metal jigs.
ジグJigs
A way of fishing using a weighted hook device called a jig. In this game, you
can use metal, rubber and baited jigs.
沈み藻Sunken algae
A weed that grows on the bottom of lakes.
ジャーキングJerking
Putting great impact on the rod, to move the lure abruptly.
The basic technique for fishing with minnows on the top of the water.
シャッド Shad
A lure that looks like a small fish.
シャローShallows
A shallow area of water, a shallow place for fishing.
シャローランナーShallow runner
A lure that appears to swim on the surface of the water.
取水嗒Water intake tower
Artificial structures which are built to suck water from the lake.
浚渫Dredging
Mainly used for construction, when sand on the lake bottom is collected. When
this is done, the holes dug on the lake bottom become places for fish to
inhabit. On very old things in the lake, weeds grow, which the fish love.
ショア－The shore
The shore area of coasts and lakes.
シンカーSinkers
A weight that is used to make the lure sink.
シンキングルアーSinking lures
A type of lure that sinks exactly where it was cast.
スイベルSwivels
A metal fixture device which prevents lines twisting.
スイミング Swimming
Moving a worm of a rubber jig like a small fish.
スィープザフック Sweeping the Hook
One way of hooking a fish.
Once you have got a bite with a Light Ring, or a Small Bait, draw a large arc
with the rod to slowly hook the fish.
スウィッシャー Swisher
A lure with a propeller. Or the propeller itself.
スクール School of fish
A group of fish. When bass group together, it is called a Bass School.
ステディ リトリープ Steady Reeling
Maintaining a fixed speed, the lure with simply be pulled in.
ストップ＆ゴー Stop & Go
Stopping when reeling a lure in.
When the lure stops moving, that is called a Pause, it is easy to get bass to
bite when doing this.
ストラクチャー Structures
Weeds, reeds, boulders, standing trees, various natural obstructions. There are
manmade structures such as fish reefs, stakes, Tetra, water intake towers. A
word with many meanings, but simply means places where bass gather.
スパイラルフォール Spiral fall
Making a jig bait tube fall. Falling whilst turning in a spiral motion.
スピナー Spinner
A spinning sheet of metal attached to a lure.
スピナーベイト Spinning bait
Combining a jig bait with a spinner bait, a type of lure used for bass fishing.
スピニングタックル Spinning tackle
Putting a spinning reel on a spinning rod.
スピニングライン Spinning lines
A special line for spinning tackle.
スピニングリール Spinning reels
A special spool, a type of reel with a spinning bail (a tool to stop the line)
スピニングロッド Spinning rods
A special rod for spinning tackle.
スプール Spools
The part of the reel which rolls up the line.
スプルットリング Spirit rings
A ring that attaches the hook to the lure.
スポーニング Spawning
When Bass lay their eggs.
スポーニングエリア Spawning areas
Places were Bass lay their eggs.
スポット Spots
A place to aim for. The best point is called a Sweet Spot.
スモール A Small
A small mouth bass.
スモールマウスバス Small mouth bass
One species of black bass, their mouth is small, and can pull strongly. They
like to inhabit cool areas.
ずる引き Dragging pull
Pulling the lure slowly along the bottom of the lake bed.
スレた Wariness
When a bass becomes very wary.
スロールトリープ Slow reeling
If you wind the reel slowly, the lure becomes heavy and slow.
底をとる Taking the bottom
The most basic use of things like worms and rubber jigs in bass fishing.
Not moving the lure from the bottom of the lake.
Also, refers to the act of quickly returning the lure to the lake bed between
lure movements
ｿﾌﾄリア－ Soft Lures
Soft lures made from plastic. Also commonly called Worms.
Depending on the changes to the worm, they have various uses.
ターンオーバー Turnover
When the water temperature suddenly changes, fish become hard to catch as the
top layer of the water switches with the bottom layer. This phenomenon often
occurs in autumn.
タイト Tight
When bass stick closely to structures.
立ち枯れ Withered trees
Withered trees submerged in the water.
立木 Standing trees
Seen in places such as reservoirs, trees which are standing in the middle of the
water.
タックルTackle
Tools used for fishing.
タックルボックス Tackle box
A box to keep tackle in.
タナ Tana
The depth at which fish are swimming.
タフ コンディション Tough Condition
When the climate, water temperature, or other environmental conditions rapidly
change, the bass become extremely difficult for anglers to catch.
適水温 Suitable water temperature
Good water temperatures for fish to live in.
テトラポッド Tetra pod
Concrete blocks that are piled up, they are used to break waves. Big fish often
gather by them.
デプスファインダ Depth finder
A device used to find the depth of groups of fish.
For bass fishing, it is also used to find fish shadows and the condition at the
bottom of lakes.
トゥイッチング Twitching
Moving the end of the rod rhythmically, this is a technique to increase the
movement of the lure.
導水管 Water pipe
A pipe used to move water to water intake towers.
倒木 Fallen trees
Trees that have fallen into the water from the shore.
トップ Top
The surface of the water.
トップウォーター Top Water
The surface of the water.
トップウォータールアー Top water lure
A type of lure that swims along the surface of the water.
ドラグ Drag Function
A device fixed to the reel and rod handle, it can reel the line in tightly or
loosely.
トレーラー Trailer
Attaching things such as a worm to lures such as the spinning bait or rubber
jig.
ドロップ オフ Drop off
A place where the coast rapidly drops away. Or a place on a calm flat lake where
the lake bed rapidly drops away.
ナチュラルカラー Natural colour
Opposite to an appealing colour. A lure colour that matches natural plants or
animals in the water.
根がかり Rooted
When the lure gets stuck on a structure in the water.
パーチカルジギング Vertical jigging
A technique used when bass fishing with a jig. Dropping the lure vertically into
the water, then raising it up and down.
ハードカバー Hard cover
A place where reeds or weeds grow thickly. It is easy for the lure to get stuck,
but it is likely there are many bass there.
ハードルアー Hard lure
A general term for lures made of plastic, wood, or metal.
There are many types of top water, crank bait and metal jig hard lures.
場荒れ A stormy spot
A place where someone else has been fishing recently.
The fish may have scattered or become frightened, making them hard to catch.
バイト Bite
When the fish bites the lure.
バイロットルアー Pilot Lure
A lure use to check if fish are in the area or not.
バス Bass
Another word for Black Bass.
バス ポンド Bass pond
A pond or lake where bass live.
バック ウォーター Back water
The place where flowing water, such as from a river, meets a lake.
バックラッシュ Backlash
When casting a bait lure, if the rotation of the spool is faster than the speed
the line is moving, a phenomenon occurs.
The line becomes entangled in the spool.
ヒット Hit
When a fish is hooked.
ヒットルアー Hitting Lure
A lure that is easy to hook bass with. Depending on the weather and the lake,
there are various conditions that hooking depends on, so there is no one hitting
lure for every occasion.
ヒラウオ Flat fish
To intentionally bump the spinner bait or crank bait into boulders and stakes in
an irregular way.
ファーストテーパー Faster Taper
A rod with a bent end.
ファーストリトリープ Fast reeling
To reel quickly.
ファイト Fight
To fight with a hooked fish when reeling them in. Often used when talking about
catching bass.
フィッシングプレッシャー Fishing Pressure
When the bass are very wary, it is very hard to catch them.
ブイ Buoy
An artificial structure that floats on the surface of the water
フォーリング Falling
When a lure falls into the water.
フッキング Hooking
When the bass pull on the hook.
フック Hook
A hook attached to a lure.
プリスポーニング Pre Spawning
Bass who are about to lay their eggs.
ブレイク Break
A place at the bottom of the lake that slants down.
ブレイクライン Break line
A part of the bottom of the water that rises up, a line that is imagined to have
the same depth.
Also used to describe the length and distance of the raised line.
ブレード Braid
A lure on a spinning line, with a spinning plate that looks like wings.
ペイト Pate
Food used for fishing.
ペイトタックルPate Tackle
Tackle used for pate fishing.
ベイトフィッシュ Baitfish
Fishing for bass using smaller fish as bait.
ベイトライン Bait line
A line used for bait fishing.
ベイトリール Bait reel
A type of reel that rotates when it is casted.
ベイトロッド Bait rod
A rod that can attach to a bait reel.
ヘビーカバー Heavy cover
When you cannot see the surface of the water because of the plant growth.
ヘビーキャロライナ Heavy Carolina
A type of soft lure rig. A swinging weight is attached to the line, which is
then attached to the swivel and the hook.
The weights on this rig are heavy, and you can attach them quickly, and they
make the lure move irregularly.
This irregular movement invites the bass to bite.
ペンシルベイト Pencil bait
A cylinder shaped lure that looks like a pencil.
ポック Pork
A lure made from leather.
ホット スポット Hot spot
The where most of the bass in the lake seem to be.
ホットベリー Pot belly
Bass with pot bellies.
ボトム Bottom
The bottom of the lake.
ボトムトレース Bottom tracing
A technique of dragging the lure along the bottom of the lake. Called a Dragging
Pull.
ボトムバンプ Bottom bumping
A technique of jumping the lure along the bottom of the lake. It is an effective
way to use the rubber jig and worms.
ポンピング Pumping
A technique used when drawing a very strong bass towards you. Fan the rod down,
and then slowly increase the slackness of the line.
マイグレーション Migration
When fish move in groups in order to find food.
ますめ Dim light
The dim time in the early morning and evening.
Bass lively look for food at this time, and can often be caught in the shallows.
However, during winter this is not the case.
ミノー Minnow
A lure that looks like a small fish.
ラージ Large
A largemouth bass.
ラージマウスバス Largemouth bass
One species of black bass, it’s mouth is bigger than the small mouthed bass.
ライトリグ Light Rig
A light fishing rig. It can be used to make precise movements when the bass are
not very lively.
ラインアタリ Line hit
When you see that a fish has taken the bait. Especially when the lure is falling
to the bottom of the lake, and the line begins to move, when the line moves you
can judge that the fish has taken the bait.
ラインスラック Line slack
When the line is slack.
ラインブレイク Line break
When the line is broken.
ラトル Rattling
Small metal balls inside a lure, which rattle and attract fish.
ランカー Lunker
A big bass. Generally, this refers to a ball longer than 50cm.
ランディング Landing a fish
When you successfully pull a fish out of the water.
リアクションバイト Reaction bite
When the bass reflexively attack the lure.
リグ Rig
A fishing device or hook.
リザーバー Reservoir
Not just a lake built in nature, also refers to lakes at places like Dams, which
were developed by human hands.
リップ Lip
A small sheet of metal on the end of a Minnow Plug or Crank Bait lure.
Depending on the size and angle, the speed that it falls in the water changes.
リトリープ Reeling in (literally; retrieving)
When the reel winds in the lure.
リパーチャンネル River channel
The place in the river that is submerged, or the remains of a river, where water
still remains.
Because the water flow is good, it is an easy to place to catch bass.
リフト＆フォール Lift & fall
A repeating technique, after the lure touches the water, lift the rod then let
it fall again.
リリース Release
To let the fish return to the water after catching it.
ルアー Lures
Fake prey used to catch fish.
ルアーローテーション Lure rotation
A technique used to discover the right lure to use at a location. Rather than
using the same lure all the time, you should change the lure, and find the best
lure to use in that condition.
So that the bass at a location do not get used to the same lure, you should
continually use this technique.
ロッド Rods
A tool used to catch fish.
ワーム Worms
A lure made of soft plastic. Lately, it got its name from a resemblance to
worms.
For example, there are plastic worms and soft worms etc.
ワンド Lagoons
An inlet, a gulf. A natural earthen structure.
Pg 43 Staff Credits
Here ends the manual translation.
5.Treasure Victory Conditions
As is stated in the making of, this game has no official ending. However there
are 15 treasures to collect. Some of the treasures, such as beating the village
champion could be considered beating the game. If you get all of the treasures,
nothing happens. So don’t worry too much about them.
Each treasure has certain conditions to meet. The conditions are hidden to the
player and can only be learned by doing fishing competitions with other
characters. To save you doing all the Fishing Competitions, here are the victory
conditions for each Treasure.
Record King: Break the Lake Records.
Top Water King: Catch 50 bass with a top water lure. (Using the buzz bait,
pencil and popper baits. Quite tough)
Release King: Release 100 bass. (Not counting non bass fish)
Worm King: Use worms to catch 50 bass.
Hooking King: get the highest hooking ranking 50 times.
Lunker King: Catch 50 bass, 50cm or more in length.
Tsurizuki Village Champion: Beat the current Tsurizuki Village Champion.
(Difficult)
Fishing Contest King: Complete 4 Fishing contests.
Casting King: Cast 200 times in one day. (Takes a long time)
Unintentional King: Catch all the non bass fish. (Blue gill and catfish)
Lure King: Collect/buy all types of lures. (All colour variations and sinkers)
Root King: Catch the hook on the lake bed or weeds 50 times. (Easy to do)
Scattering King: Scatter the bass 50 times. (Line breaks don’t count)
Acorn King: Collect 50,000 acorns. (Can be done in a typical weekend)
The King of 10,000 steps: Walk 10,000 steps in one day. (Start walking from
dawn)
6.Let’s Go Fishing!
This is a 13 part report that Mr. Itoi wrote at the time of the game’s release.
It includes a long round table interview with staff members, and gives you an
idea what it was like to make a game at Nintendo during the late 90’s. It’s
about 35 pages long and goes into the game in great detail. There are a lot of
useful hints for catching and hunting bass. I hope it is interesting to read.
Itoi often refers to himself as “darling” in the text. The original can be found
here
https://www.1101.com/nintendo/nin10/
Contents
Pt 1 - Trying to do everything that we could not do in the previous game.
Pt 2 - Making a surprising game for people who know about fishing.
Pt 3 - We realized all of our dreams for the game
Pt 4 – Filling in the fishing knowledge gap
Pt 5 – OK! Let's compete against other fishing software!
Pt 6 – The importance of the Lure
Pt 7 - The rules of not being able to make a catch.
Pt 8 - I want the game with the depth of the world of bass fishing .
Pt 9 - We will teach you many tricks.
Pt 10 - The final goal is to be successful.
Pt 11 - Strategies from Kuma-san and Usagi-chan
Pt 12 - How we made the music of the game.
Pt 13 – Interview with the artists, Hikone Norio and his wife Mafumi
-Let's go fishing!-
Part 1 Trying to do everything that we could not do in the previous game.
“Itoi Shigesato's bass fishing No. 1”, which was released for the Super Nintendo
in 1997, is now back on the Nintendo 64.
Produced, of course, by your darling, me. I couldn't tell you about the
development on the Hobonichi blog, but I was making this game for a long time.
The day has finally arrived when we can tell you the whole story. The prototype
is almost completed, and we are in the final run for release this spring. Oh,
the announcement of the release date has arrived from Mr. Takehisa, Nintendo's
public relations office.
Finally, the release date is decided as March 31!
You will soon be able to enjoy realistic fishing that greatly exceeds the
previous Super Nintendo version. There’s about two months left before you can
enjoy the fun of "guessing the whereabouts of the bass" that you can't
experience in other games .This time, in addition to the help mode that is good
for beginners, it also supports a fishing controller. It’s not only for bass
fishing fans.
Stay tuned for a game that will excite even those who have never fished bass!
I'm Shigeto Itoi, the game producer .I knew that bass fishing was a "game with
rules" and I couldn't change them. First of all, there are many ways to enjoy
fishing, but most of the time, I'm only make catches with a lot of luck. As you
can see from the newspapers, most people have experienced fishing. I'm sure
about 70% of people fish all over Japan. Every year, a large number of people,
about 10 million go fishing.
However, with a slingshot, you can catch a fish if you are lucky. In the end,
when it comes to skill and being bad, children can often catch rainbow trout,
and "I can catch fish easily!" they say. Yeah. That's why it's interesting and
fun. That's the kind of fishing we used to do when we were small.
However, as I learned from the beginning, bass fishing was imported to Japan
later and it had a set method, and that it was very easy to remember and convey,
and it had a logical background. You know. When I learnt about it, I thought
that Americans went about everything like they did at "NASA". "NASA" went to
space with their logic.
When you pursue a bass, it’s like a war. Often, people who are fishing say, "I
like fishing…" and "sometimes it's nice to watch the water without thinking
about anything" but that’s not bass fishing. That was my first surprise. I
didn’t know that it would be the same as for studying for an examination. But
then I felt like "Hey, the more you study, the more you accept,". If you want
to take it, you study. It has that same burning feeling. I think there are kinds
of fishing that are similar to ordinary work or studying . I knew that it was an
information war, a technique war, and a game with rules that allowed you to
compete in various ways, so I thought this was a big deal. I applied my
advertising know-how to bass fishing. I've been doing advertising work for a
long time, so to speak. I've been doing a lot of work to sell and talk to people
I've never met. Then, there’s no relationship between me and those people.
Especially when it comes to advertising, it doesn't matter to the customer
whether I'm making a product or not . I don't know if I 'm systematically
thinking about how many people see a poster and how many people are touched by
it. I was wondering if bass fishing was like that. The fact that advertising and
lures are similar to bass fishing is so interesting.
Then, I thought that this know-how of advertising could be applied to bass
fishing. At the same time, my know-how of bass fishing is like a degenerated
muscle because I have spent all my time working...Thinking of your brain as a
degenerated muscle is a strange way of thinking, but it is like a degenerate
neural circuit. Bass fishing was going to re-inspire me. I became addicted to
fishing.
Think about this example, if you put a drink in a vending machine for 120 yen
lots of people will buy it. But if you go deep in the mountains, bears won’t buy
your drink. The bear doesn't want to drink canned coffee. Even if it did want to
drink, it doesn’t have the money and doesn’t know how to buy it. Oh, this wasn't
about bears. It’s no good to put vending machines in the mountains. One way to
sell a drink is to make it delicious, but that is not enough. What if I put it
next to a better drink? Alternatively, what if the vending machine is dirty,
surely drinks sell better in polished shiny machines? How about including a
picture of the drink, what happens if you describe the drink in advertising. The
hottest thing is to put your vending machine in a place where lots of thirsty
people pass by.
It's a marketing idea, it's a basic idea of advertising. So even if you write a
really good copy, it doesn’t mean things will sell well. In the same way, if you
keep your writings in a it in your notebook and show no one, no one will read
it, so you can’t convince anyone. It is the same with the media. The popularity
of media is determined by its speed of reporting and its range of content.
Going back to fishing , throwing a lure so hard that the fish flee, or waiting
still in a place with no fish is the same as placing a vending machine in the
mountains. ..First of all, the fun of bass fishing begins with the phrase
"That’s the wrong way to do it". Even if you have the best lure, you can't catch
without knowledge. A person who just started fishing might not notice this.
So when I fished for the first time on New Years in Bali, I fished with the
wrong lure on a 200 meter shallow beach with other people. I woke up in my jeans
early in the morning, and I threw my lure so hard, and I wondered, "Why can't I
catch anything?". Kami and her child were watching me. I was doing such a silly
thing, but it was only about half a month since I started fishing, at that time
I was trying to catch a sea ??bass.
First, maybe there were no sea bass nearby, so I was mistaken from the
beginning. Even if I was in a place where sea bass gather, I was using the wrong
lure, so even I wanted to catch one, I wouldn’t be able to. The more you think
about what kind of fish you can get and what kind of things you have to do, the
more chances you have to catch a fish. The more you know, the better your arm
will go.
I wanted to make a fishing game that says, "If you do this, you will get better
at fishing." So, for example, if you really want to fish, just for the sport,
going fishing in winter is very expensive. In other words, there are few chances
to fish, but if you still want to fish, go. So, if you know all about when and
where you should go fishing, you may still not catch much. After all, not making
a catch as a professional is not a big deal. In other words, unless it's a
tournament, when I can't catch fish, I don't fish.
When I first played Master Tsuteyuu Sawamura's Bass Pro, I was told “There are
fish in this game that have never been caught.”
I thought “That’s a little hard to believe”. I was surprised to learn a lot
about fish ecology from that game. The more you remember, the more you know.
It's a game where you can catch and you can compete. That’s one of the reasons
why I got into bass fishing first.
I thought that I could reproduce the same thing in a game, and made the game
"Shigesato Itoi's bass fishing No. 1). So that's why the Super Nintendo version
has to be realistic. Rather than just making the name game with a random number
generator, I think that the player should be able to make a catch when they fish
with knowledge and make inferences.
I put a lot of information into the game for this reason. Master Sawamura’s game
is still nice, even if it is a bit sloppy, it’s a game you can still enjoy. I
think a lot of people who bought it were satisfied.
So I wanted to make a fishing game that I could play with .There are many
fishing games. However, after all, there are many unfounded fishing games. I
wanted to make a well-founded fishing game. I made the super famicom version.
Then, we wrote on the box, “if you do this, you will be able to really fish
well”. So, I wanted to make a super realistic simulation game.
The production of the game went really well. It was really well received by
those who knew about fishing. How beautiful the graphics are... I thought it was
really good that I didn't choose another method of displaying the screen. I had
that confidence. I was confident that I wouldn't be afraid to chase the real
method of fishing. But I also thought that there were many more things I could
do while I was making it. What were they?
There is the movement of the lure vertically and horizontally in real fishing,
and you can also move vertically and horizontally when controlling the rod.
Since the first game was in two dimensions, it can only be expressed in pseudo
perspective. It was a shame that I had to express it in that form .
Let's get closer to real fishing and make a more enjoyable game.
When using polygons, you can express depths three-dimensionally; it will become
closer to actual fishing. I was making the second half of the first game I felt
depressed that we didn’t use polygons more. So I thought I would make a new
game. That’s the main point of my motivation. When I made "1", I couldn’t get
closer to real fishing . Now that I can do it, there's no way I should stop. I
mean, I wanted to play the game myself.
In a sense, I had a dream that I could make a game that I could enjoy more than
real fishing. Mr. Iwata was behind the program, so I was confident from the
beginning. This time we have two special staff members who are persistent enough
to really fish. Not just me. We had two people who seemed to keep keeping notes
while fishing.
There are two people who were thinking excitedly, things like " the lure moves
like that". "No fish come at that time". They were thinking so persistently that
it was very emotional for me. The staff who made the game, did so with the
intention to do things that we could not do in the first game.
Next time, I will continue with this self interview. Please look forward to it!
- Let's go fishing -
Part 2 Making a surprising game for people who know about fishing.
The game was released on March 31, 2000. The whole game was introduced at the
"Next Generation World Hobby Fair" held in Makuhari, Tokyo the other day. There
was a long line for the demo play using the dedicated controller. If they caught
a bass of 40cm, they could participate in a tournament held on stage. But there
they realized the skill of the staff at Nintendo.
I thought about the question, "What kind of fishing do I want to do?" I think
that fishing is really good, and that mastering the mysteries of fishing is like
shogi or mahjong. In other words, it is important to thoroughly fight. You
become better and better at playing "pretend war" in the form of tournaments.
Suppose there were person A and person B. Suppose they have the chance to fish
at the same place. But if they have different fishing abilities, there will be a
difference in result. This time, let us say that they have the same ability to
fish. But if you had a fast boat, that would get you there faster. Then, let's
assume that both of them can surely land the lure at the same small point. Mr. B
caught a fish instead of Mr. A. The reason is that Mr. B. shows his power to the
fullest after thoroughly studying all such things from the change of the
weather, the passage of time, and the actions of other professional fishermen.
Fighting at a fishing spot where such a person wins is what makes fishing the
best.
To explain it even more, I think that practicing mahjong is like spending money
at gambling place. It's a bad comparison, so it is necessary to have a place
like a tiger's hole or a tiger mask to master the mystery of fishing. I'm not
sure. If you're in a situation where you either catch or die, you'll be become
good at fishing.
The level of desire for fishing between the general public and professions is
not the same. If you fish yourself you will notice this. In other words, even if
you buy the same tools as professionals and work on the same schedule as
professionals, you won’t be able to keep up. A professional is a person who
literally eats fishing. That person and I are eating at different places, to be
more specific, I don't even have time to go fishing.
But I really like fishing. It’s really fun to go fishing, but I can’t keep up
with professionals . But I like fishing. In the meantime, being “a poor person
who can understand what professionals are saying” has become a lot of fun. There
are spectators who nod when professional baseball players say something very
advanced .That's what Kabuki calls "a master”. Thanks to the people who watch
well, the sport develops. Also, I like fishing very much and I'm not
professional, but I know how great a professional is, but I sometimes talk with
friends and try leisurely fishing on land without going out on a boat. It was a
lot of fun for me to go out and try so hard, each time with my own selfishness.
"Hey, who made these games" I want to make something that makes people ask this
question.
I played in tournaments, I was winning and losing matches for a year, it was so
funny I wanted to cry. But I thought it was weird to say “I need to do this!”.
Even though I don’t have my own car, I also had ideas to make an F1 racing game.
I want to race other cars, and drives as hard as I can. Tournaments were the
main focus of the first game, but this time I took the plunge and went back to
the point of "fun" instead of playing war. We were overwhelmed with advance
technology and programs. But I tried to create a real place that would make
people ask “who made this game?”.
The origin is in TV. When you turn on the TV, you can see comedy and song
programs through the power of this awesome machine. It makes you wonder, “Could
I make a TV?”. I wanted to make a game like that. It’s hard for me to make
things. I wanted to make a game that even people who did not know about fishing
would be surprised by. So that they would ask "Did you make this kind of thing?"
I wanted to make a game for children, that would make them say "If you are a
fisherman, you can catch more.”, But children also say “I want to play a fishing
game that even I can play.” “Give the controller to Uncle Itoi!” “Eh! How did
you catch that?”, “It's because Uncle knows about fishing.” I made it to create
that kind of situation.
Is fishing so deep? That’s already in the game. That is the biggest part of this
version. The most disappointing thing was that I wanted it to be completed in
the middle of winter. In winter, I don't actually fish for bass. Even if I don't
play other games, I wonder if I can fish for a while? I feel like that
sometimes. Even if I work until 5 in the morning, I still feel like “I’ll just
fish for 30 minutes and go to sleep." I wanted to make a finished version this
time and give it to everyone.
Since there is a real thing called fishing, the structure of the game is the
same as making a game of shogi. The key to making a game of shogi is how smart
you can make a machine routine, such as "when a piece is played here, do this"
The same goes for fishing, and you can really reproduce what professionals are
doing up to this point. In reality, there is already an algorithm. Since you
just reproduce it, you don't need much time and effort.
It worked well and we moved quickly in that sense. But it still took a while.
By the way, I think it's no good to say it has made a billion yen or boast about
things like that. I want to say it was hard to make this game, but in a sense, I
also want to conclude the opposite. And if the game isn't interesting, it's
useless. I hope it makes you say that fishing is amazing.
Next time is the final part of myself interview.
Please look forward to it!
2000-02-03-THU
-Let's go fishing-
Interview with Shigesato Itoi
We realized all of our dreams for the game
The final interview with your darling producer.
The reality of this game is to reproduce everything from the behavior of the
bass, even their unreadable nature .Since fishing is a reality, it’s hard to
make it realistic, especially for people that like fishing.
First of all, if you're fishing on a lake, you can see the scenery. Then the
fisherman might think “I shouldn’t fish here" That person has a reason to choose
that place. So, if you try it and it's no good, you'll be convinced by the
realism of the game. If you follow your thoughts and make a catch you’ll also be
convinced.
In order to do it in a fishing game, you have to arrange it according to the way
you fish, the season, the place, and the actual experience of fishing. It's also
possible to say that "fish in this season cannot be caught this way" . The
reason is that the fish called bass are very effected by ecology. So at certain
times, fish of a certain size should spawn.
I've programmed the lure to "slap". But when you’re moving a lure, you think
you're just winding the reel. I think fishing is done by winding and pulling.
But that's not the case. For example, as for the “crank bait", when the lure
dives, the lure receives water resistance when it touches the water. It should
tap against the water, and move strangely and unexpectedly. Who wants to
reproduce that in a game? I’m an idiot right? But I have to do it.
Bass are a fish that eat baitfish. They are divided into three types. Baitfish A
is swimming well and cheerfully. Baitfish B is weak and will die soon. Baitfish
C are dead. Bass will eat the baitfish that are easy to eat, like baitfish B
first. Bass eat living weak fish. Next they will try to eat a fish that escapes,
like baitfish A. They will chase them. Last they will eat the dead baitfish. If
I was a fish I would want to eat easy to eat live fish. A lure is meant to
resemble the movement of a fish that is likely to die. The bass takes the fish
that says “I’m dying, but for now I’m still alive…”?We were able to program this
into our game.
I wanted to make the difference in weight of lures understandable to those who
are new to fishing.
Nowadays, in the world of fishing, there is a mechanism called a "down shot rig"
for catching " lean" fish, which is the best for both amateurs and
professionals. This puts a weight on the bottom, and a needle and a lure on it.
It shakes a little bit above the bottom of the lake, and makes a motion that
says to other fish “I’m alive, but only just…” The other fish think it won’t try
to escape, so it’s easy to eat.
However, if we wanted to program it so that it could be viewed and reproduced
visually, the challenge would be great. If there are aquatic plants nearby, I
want to show them too. We did all of that to reproduce the “Down shot rig”. It’s
really in the fishing world, so let's put it in the game.
For example, there is a lure called a "rubber jig" that weighs 1/2 ounces in
water. But it sinks differently from a 3/4 ounce rubber ring. The speed is
different. Let's put in that kind of thing. I want you to enjoy the fact that
such things are calculated and reproduced. For those who haven't been fishing, I
have to make them feel, "I feel like this lure is a bit faster..."
So the fisherman has a momentary movement when he has to move a heavy lure and
sink it to the bottom. Different weights make it move completely differently.
You can enjoy the difference in these ways of fishing. The first thing you want
to do is enjoy it. You can control the movement of the rod and feel the response
of the fish by using the fishing controller.
The controller was released by ASCII's. There is a technique called Twitching,
to move the rod in small increments while winding the lure in order to lure the
fish , but there is also such a movement of the lure called “jerking". We made
it possible to move the lure with the rod in large irregular movements. If you
buy the controller separately, you can reproduce the movement these realistic
movements. I think this is very interesting. Well, there are often times when
you can't fish without this kind of fishing, so by all means, I would like you
to buy the controller for it! Also you can feel the response when a fish is
caught and you are rolling it in. You can feel the weight of the pull when you
wind it. The weight of a strong fish pulling is also felt. You can still enjoy
the game to some extent with a normal controller, but please play with the
fishing controller if you can.
There are animal characters in the game who are fishing too, they have different
characteristics. Some of them are relaxed. Some of them can't live without
winning a tournament, they can’t move forward. You can simply enjoy fishing or
you can fish seriously. We include all the dream-like things that we were
saying, "I wish I could do this". I want you to enjoy it all.
The story of producer Itoi is over. Next time, is a production staff round
table. Please look forward to it!
2000-2-00-WED
-Let's go fishing-
Discussion with the production staff Part 1
We started by closing the gap between the production staff who have never fished
and supervising staff with over 30 years of fishing experience. We had a
round-table discussion with "Dice Co., Ltd." who are the game production staff,
and Mr. Kuratoshi, our fishing adviser, they had a hard time making the game!
Participants
Kuratsune Yoshiaki
He worked on the previous game. A fishing advisor he lives in Kansai. His job is
to bridge the gap between actual bass fishing and the game.
Akihiro Saito
Co-representative and director of Dice Co., Ltd. In charge of the overall
direction. The second person who intelligently processed the requests from Mr.
Kuratoshi.
Akihiko Koseki
President and producer of Dice Co., Ltd. "I was responsible for complaint
processing and problem solving. We are worked with heart breaking daily
problems!" He did so energetically!
Masahiro Abeki
CG designer of Dice Co., Ltd. At that time, he was the only angler at Dice. This
person is in charge of the fish in the sub-window.
Yoshiyasu Murano
Graphic designer of Dice Co., Ltd.“I was in charge of the field design of the
ground and topography.”
Yuji Kawarada
Designer of Dice Co., Ltd. “I'm in charge of sub-windows, tackle boxes, 3D
effects, splashes, and lure animations.”
Tetsuya Notoya
Of Hull Research Institute Co., Ltd. In charge of production progress, packages
and manuals. "My job is to work with Mr. Tsunekura and everyone at Dice."
Yutaka Takehisa
Product Manager, Planning Department, Nintendo Co., Ltd. In charge of promotion.
Even now, he is a busy traveler who goes all over the country.
Shigesato Itoi
The game producer.
--What kind of stage is this game in now (February 2000) ?
We had them gather in the mouse meeting room.
Saito:
I just want to get the bugs... I just want to… (laughs).
Kuratsune:
We don’t have so many. For example?
Koseki:
It's over…(laughs).
Takehisa:
It won't come out!
Notoya:
(Seriously) We are now in the stage of correcting any problems.
Takehisa:
It's going to be released on March 31st.
(Itoi, appearing late)
Itoi:
Well, yesterday, I brought home a ROM. This game is amazing. I realized that
fishing is really difficult.
Saito:
People who like fishing and can play with this software happily. That's how
interesting it is.
Itoi:
That's right... suddenly I stepped into the core part of the game (laughs).
Koseki:
Aren’t we a bit microphone-conscious? Let's start from the beginning
What kind roles does Mr. Kuratoshi have?
Koseki:
Mr. Kuratsune found various issues. We thank you for molding it into shape.
Kuratsune:
To tell the truth , the people at dice had no one with fishing experience except
Mr. Abeki. I knew nothing. So we started by going fishing together. I wanted to
know the movement of the lure and the movement of the fish when programming . So
I decided to go to a training camp at Lake Biwa. The camp isn't a serious thing,
it's quite a defocused camp (laughs).
Saito:
It was a training camp, what were you doing?
Kuratsune:
It's strange to think about later. The camp was based at a fishing hotel on the
shores of Lake Biwa .
Itoi:
Kuratsune-san reserved the hotel. He’s a person who does a lot of things.
Kuratsune:
That’s true. There are always fish in the pool there. I wanted to make the
movements of the fish, the movements of the lines, etc., closer to their actual
movements, so it was decided that we would film at such a place and experience
it with everyone. Well, I went. However, on that day, it was raining, and when I
thought about film, the pool was cloudy.
Koseki:
Lake Biwa was also cloudy.
Kuratsune:
I couldn’t even shoot with the camera.
Koseki:
The fishing tackle shop in Kyoto had a huge aquarium, so I talked about going
there, but he said, “If you put a white plate on the bottom, you can see it very
well."
Kuratsune:
I was forced to shoot there...
Koseki:
Moreover, I was thinking of filming underwater, but it was pretty cold in August
It was raining. On Kurasune-san's instructions, I dived but I said," I can't
see anything!" I was told "Okay, go up" and it was hot, I just said, "I’ll dive
again."
Abeki:
You pushed yourself, and I dived again!
So, the result of the camp…….
Abeki:
The lure itself was pretty good.
Koseki:
Pretty good, Mr. Kuratsune, did you film yourself?
Itoi:
You're trying to make the story interesting. Look at the realism of this ripple!
Kuratsune:
Soya. The movement of the rod and the sinking of the line were different for
each rig.
Koseki:
If you didn’t get results, you'd be in trouble because your travel expenses will
be wasted
Saito:
The results of the camp were actually great. I knew that the line was going to
sink, or that if we got a bite at that time, I could see the ripples. For those
of us who didn't know fishing, it had the biggest effect. Also, I felt the
atmosphere when I was fishing. It’s a lake, but the sound of the waves is noisy
when approaching the shore, and I didn’t understand that till I actually went
there .
Koseki:
We hadn't fished except Abeki. So the first of request from Kuratsune-san, was
“let’s have that kind of fishing”.
Kuratsune:
So there was a knowledge gap at the beginning. We talked about various things,
but I was not able to understand.
Abeki:
It's like I had to interpret and explain to everyone.
Koseki:
I've been involved with it since the Super Nintendo version, so I knew about
fishing.
Kuratsune:
But in the past, lots of things were taken out of the first game. Now that it's
in 3D ...
Itoi:
The differences between 2D and 3D, are like the differences between "ponjan"
(children’s mahjong) and ordinary mahjong. Doraemon pictures are used in Ponjan,
which are totally different from real mahjong tiles.
Kuratsune:
That's why I think there were lots of confusing things in the first game, "what
is that?" people said.?
Koseki:
They did. To be honest, I knew that but I thought I could only keep up with
Kuratsune.
How did you first fill the gap?
Kuratsune:
We had the fishing field from the previous game. I actually made a
three-dimensional model with clay. From that time, I think that I had already
envisioned the world of 3D, a realistic fishing world. There are mountains, and
there is a flow.
Kuratsune:
I've had 30 years of fishing experience, and I've been looking at various
fishing situations, so this was a place I longed for.
At that time, it was the beginning of the bass fishing boom, so less information
was available. What kind of place is good, what kind of places have fish, and
where do humans think "I want to fish in such a place " ... such a thought is
easy to embody in a game, so as it took shape, I got very excited! But those who
have never fished, “Why don't you have a tree here?" or “Why don't you have a
slope into here?","Why is there an artificial structure here?" don't understand
that. We were closing that gap. So the quickest thing is to go to a fishing
spot, but when you actually went to a lake, you said, "There was something like
this there." The difference is that "I actually tried fishing there”. You won’t
know unless you make a catch. However, it is harder to catch at the lake, so
it's a good thing that it’s a "large place”. It’s very difficult to share that
experience.
As for actual fishing...
Koseki:
We all went.
Abeki:
I like fishing, so I invited everyone. I did that a few times.
Kuratsune:
I know you've learned so much now, right?
Saito:
You can understand everything just by looking at the scenery. If you look at the
lake, you can see the terrain without water.
Kuratsune:
We were gradually talking about the technical aspects of fishing, and there are
times when I was surprised. But there are still gaps in knowledge because there
are parts that are not in our real experience. I think it's unusual for people
to get to this point only with pictures and text.
Itoi:
It was the best way to educate ourselves. Using this method, shall we make a
game called "Introduction to Stocks"... (laughs).
Kuratsune:
I didn’t expect that knowledge gap to fill .But we studied and filled it in. It
was really hard.
Kuratsune:
The production team gave instructions. There were sometimes conflicts between
those instruction and improving the accuracy of fishing in the game.
Abeki:
Let's say you have a stage where you should make a lure .We usually look at
lures and research, so while thinking "it's not really like this", but
considering the limitations of the game, we also felt “I may not be able to do
more.” There are times when I feel like I am losing. Then, Mr. Kuratsune says,
“This is still useless," and it burns, "To convince the fishermen, I have to do
more." "Please let me do a little more."
Itoi:
For example, games tend to be made up to the point that a fish-shaped lure moves
naturally like a fish .However, in actual fishing, fish cannot be caught by
"moving naturally" .You have to think about non-linear movements, such as sudden
shocks, irregular movements, bumps and other unexpected movements. It’s
something that fishermen know is vital to fishing , but when you bring an
amateur fishing , they think that the fish bite depending on how "cleanly" you
move the lure . ..However, in reality, the fish bite at the point of "how
dirtily the lure moves." It hasn’t been in other games, even if they knew. When
you sink a lure more and more, and apply force to get rid of it, it is called a
"slap", but it makes a strange movement. There is a movement that fish make when
they seem to be dying, how would you say it, they move in a straight line, like
a jump.
It's hard to program, it's hard to express in pictures, and it's not enough to
just make some irregular movements and apply them. We have to give each lure a
different move.
Saito:
At the beginning, the movement of the lure was being animated. I thought, based
on the number of staff members and the fact that we had to make lures one by
one, we would not complete the programming. I made a lot of flat animation
patterns, falling patterns, swimming patterns and so on. Then, when I watch
them, I said “This is no good." That was the biggest conflict.
I decided to throw away all the animations, and then program them properly
calculated by gravity, water resistance, and resistance when hitting an object,
and use that to program the movement. That was the first and biggest
development.
Next time, I will deliver the continuation of this discussion. I think you can
listen to a lot of secrets of the production.
2000-03-03-FRI
-Let's go fishing-
Discussion with production staff Part 2
OK, let's compete against other fishing software
Continuing from the previous time, we had a round-table discussion with the
production staff, Dice, and Mr. Kuratsune, who is our "fishing supervisor". We
can understand the movement of the lure in the water in this game, but this is a
quick and comfortable movement of the controller! What kind of hard work did we
when making the program? That's right, we had a tough time.
Saito
“It took a half a year to change the program...it was long. I decided to shift
the movement of the lure from animation to programming, so I decided to prepare
a dedicated programmer. This time, it became a matter of how to program the
movement, but even if it simulates the nature, the amount of work would be too
large. Therefore, based on Kuratsune's knowledge; "this and this pattern is in
the same direction...this lure shape is different, the basic movements are the
same, “
I programmed the lures in more detail. The animation was working properly for a
while. It took nearly half a year to dismantle the game and create lure
movements in the program .
Koseki:
I showed my work half way through and Mr. Kuratsune got angry! (laughs)
Kuratsune:
No, I'm... (laughs) You can show me halfway. If you can see it, you have to say
"no". I didn't expect everyone to complete their work to their satisfaction. I
was just doing nothing. “That's useless!” said Demon Director Kuratsune!
Saito:
So we are going to roughly classify it, but we will add individual treatments
for each lure. It will be the task of the player to find out what is most
important for this lure. I couldn't do that without Mr. Kuratsune. In the
discussion from the Super Nintendo version, we added that "this movement and
this movement must be reproduced in this lure ".So, after actually adding it, I
showed you again. Someone said “No, this part is not yet enough", and the
discussion continued for a while.
Itoi:
The lures with a worm are called sinkers, so there’s gravity and resistance all
over it. I told you to reproduce it all.
It's not limited to lures.
Saito:
That's right. The movement of fish was also very important.
Kuratsune:
It wasn't always the case, but there was a reversal. For Carolina Rig device,
you pull a light tube worm with a line behind a heavy weight. I was often told
my in-game lure was “useless!” I struggled with a light object overtaking a
heavy object, and nothing happening underwater. There were times when I said "I
can't do it anymore..." . But I would be in trouble if you didn’t ask me to do
it. There are so many different types of lures.
Koseki:
That's right. Each has its own challenges.
Abeki:
First of all, I categorized them as I mentioned earlier, and added the rough
movements. After that, I met Mr. Kuratsune again, one by one, “One ounce of
weight will fall at this speed ", "This is a little faster", etc., while
verifying each one with Kuratsune and me. Underwater, there is a debug mode in
the program, and a lure’s falling speed is fixed by directly modifying the
program. I continued for so long I thought it would last forever. Basically, the
lure also works with the program as it did before, but there are places where it
could not be done only with programming, and about 1/3 of the work is with
animation. Not everything is programmed.
Kuratsune:
In response to Mr. Itoi's comment earlier, the lure’s anomalous movement. That’s
a comment that applies to all kinds of lures .
Does each of them require a video of their unusual movement?
Koseki:
That's right.
Kuratsune:
I wish I could go into the water and become a lure and explain it, but I can't
do that (laughs).Then, assuming I was in the water, I rotated the video, I had
the lure, and I said, "It moves like this!" I did it one by one. For example, a
crank bait comes out, but when you hit an obstacle, a normal crank bait slides
laterally and hits it flatly, flipping it’s tummy and returning. And other,
reverses it’s rotation when hit. We have to do both in our game! That’s what I’m
talking about.
All of the Dice members:
"DO IT!" (laughs).
Kuratsune:
Isn't that right?……(laughs). The same goes for spinner baits.
?
Abeki:
There are three movements for the flat pattern.
Kuratsune:
There is no game like this anywhere, is there?
Itoi:
(With a soft voice) I don't think I'll make it.
Kuratsune:
(loudly) I don't think you will!
Koseki:
That's right (laughs).
I was wondering how we observed and reproduced the movement of the lures in the
water
Koseki:
I bought an aquarium for that purpose. That was a big event for us. This is one
of the things I want to brag about (laughs).
Koseki:
It's a huge aquarium! Length 180 cm, height 60 cm, depth 60 cm.
Kuratsune:
It's a casket size.
Saito:
It was a big deal to buy that.
Abeki:
There are actually eight types of worms, but when you usually fish I wonder what
they are doing. I wonder if this worm is working this way. However, when I
actually move tried it in the aquarium, it was different from my imagination.
That was a new discovery. “This guy moves so fast!?” and “Eh? Are they this
slow?!” We were able to test our assumptions.
Koseki:
At first, there was only a small aquarium. But that has its limits. Somehow it
has to be big. But it's hard to sell. Moreover, even if it is large, it cannot
be an aquarium with partitions.
Itoi:
You even bought an aquarium, a team with a lot of money buys quite a lot.
Koseki:
I bought it even though I don't have any money! (laughs).
Ozeki
I'm glad I bought the aquarium
Itoi:
But how do you use it? Some people buy it to understand that "fish are cute,"
and some people only use it to understand the rough movements of lures. However,
in the case of dice, we often "stare" at more practical parts, such as changes
in lures due to water resistance and how fish eat. When I said, "I bought an
aquarium," he said, "I bought a better aquarium."
This time we have a real rivalry (laughs).
Itoi:
"My aquarium is much bigger! There are no seams." However, the level of what I
wanted to do was different. If you know someone in every team, you would have
thought that, but I've given up. Even if they say, "I will disclose my
know-how," they won’t do it.
Saito:
The ones made just with animation are not inferior. I was able to make a better
lure movement than other fishing games that are out now. But they are just
different.
Itoi:
Alright, let's try and make a better game than other fishing software!
Everyone:
Let’s do it!
Kuratsune:
I used to work with fishing tackle in the past, but I was also involved in
product sales and product development. At that time, I was working with a bass
player to classify which lures could and could not catch certain fish. Even with
crank baits, there are various things that you can and cannot catch. So, I
removed the ones you couldn't catch and putting in the ones you can catch. So,
even for me, the target value for this game was high.
Koseki:
Kuratsune:
That might be annoying, or maybe regretful.
Abeki:
No, it’s not a regret. The fact that Mr. Tsunekura said "I can't do it anymore"
and "I can’t do that" is what leads me to this moment. Perhaps, on the way, I
may have compromised.
Koseki:
I also asked, "Isn't this bad!?" Many times I thought, "Isn't it good anymore?"
Kuratsune:
And I did something silly. I actually reached the point where I could not do
anything more. As Abeki says ,the day came when we reached the limit of the
NINTENDO 64 game consoles. I said, "OK." I can't say anything anymore. So I
thought, "What's next?" There is still something. In real life when you cast the
rod, the speed at which the lure sinks and the speed of the game are different!
I feel a lot of discomfort there, so this time I can see the actual movement of
the lure in the sub window, but in actual fishing, it is invisible. .. How long
does it take to drop to the bottom when casting a jig head rig that weighs
1/16th at a depth of 4 meters? This is true for people who actually fish, and
some people are count it properly. Some people remember it. So, in this game,
rather than the problem of counting time, we should cherish the weights and
buoyancy effects we achieved with the lures.
Kuratsune:
The winding up when winding is also slightly different. When I actually cast it,
fell to the bottom, and rolled out the spinner bait, I slowly rolled it with a
dead throw, moderately fast. I changed the speed for each of the controller's
"slow", "fast", "normal", and all the lures.
Kuratsune:
If they were made uniform at the same speed, some lures would be strange. So
again, it's going to be great. At that time, I and Abeki corrected the numbers
in the program directly.
Abeki:
I was worried about that part, and on the contrary, I was able to recognize that
I had to do it because I was thrust into it by Mr. Kuratsune ."Okay, I've come
this far, so let's do it."
Kuratsune:
The movement of that lure was the limit for the NINTENDO64.......I have more
things to do, though… (laughs).
Itoi:
There is a point where you have to give up on creating realism, but where do you
give up? If you give up early, it will be a game where you can catch by just
hanging the line in the water. I think most people will think “I don’t really
like.” Some say there is a difference between the needs of Olympic anglers and
the general public. But, the truth is that all anglers want to go to the
Olympics. I want people that want to fish to buy this game.
Kuratsune:
That's right. Mr. Itoi made such an order from the beginning. So I couldn't
compromise.
Itoi:
You have to catch a lot of fish! If they start giving up, they won’t buy it. I
don’t have a connection with that kind of customer.
In that way, even if there is a market, it is a small and compact market. It may
be similar to shogi software. You can quickly make a game where it is easy to
beat a computer opponent. You just have to make your computer a fool. I'm also
trying to compete against other fishing games. It seems that they are fighting
for the players that "give up" (laughs).
Koseki:
But at one point, Mr. Itoi declared, "This time the theme is lures." I said I'll
remember that. That was very impressive for me.
The lure’s became real, and felt more comfortable than the real thing. That kind
of thing is very big. There is really no other fishing game that makes such an
effort.
Next time, I will deliver the continuation of this discussion. Please look
forward to it.
2000-03-10-FRI
-Let's go fishing-
Discussion with the production staff Part 3
Arguing about fishing techniques is part of the game. That's why lures are
important.
A roundtable discussion with the production staff, about the "lure problem" at
the core of the game. You can understand why "lures" are important for fishing
games by reading this round-table discussion!
Kuratsune:
There are two things Mr. Itoi said he wanted to achieve when we started
developing this game. “If people can’t go fishing in real life, they can be
satisfied by fishing in this game.” Also, "In the real world, there are places
where professionals are competing, so leisurely. There are even Sunday Anglers
who are fishing with professionals. It is difficult to satisfy professionals
because their world of fishing is fundamentally different, but let’s try to find
the right balance between the two worlds. Let's do that.” The point is that the
player is satisfied, so whether you are a person who has knowledge of fishing or
a person does not, it is a game that helps. In other words, it is "real”. In
order to make those two real, I had to become a demon director. You can't see
how lures and fish move in water, when you're fishing. It’s a skill to learn
those things.
Kuratsune:
You talked about rubber jigs, but you often see "bottom bumping" in fishing
magazines that explain how rubber jigs work .
However, I didn’t understand by the illustration alone, and the flare suddenly
spread out to due to the buoyancy, it didn't stay in the water like the
illustration. Everything underwater is affected by the movement of water.
Kuratsune:
Fishing is something that everyone wants to do with lures. People move them
quite hard. Many people think that trying to move them is important to lure
fishing. But actually, it's important to stop. It’s easy to forget. In reality,
due to various factors, like artificial pressure Lake Biwa is a hard lake to
catch fish on. After casting, the worm sinks. I suppose there are algae in the
water. Then everyone tries to move their lures immediately. However, nothing
happens...it's difficult. If you are fishing on a boat, the boat will move. It’s
very difficult to wait for fish, whilst maneuvering the lure and imagining where
the fish are exactly. But if you hang in there and wait patiently, the people
around you won’t make a catch (because they are moving) but you will.
It happens often. There are times when people do not know that their lures are
stuck. When it's stuck, you can’t hear much. Then you end up looking at the line
of the guy behind you. I’ve experienced that kind of silly thing (laughs). Well,
you can see that the underwater conditions are not what we imagine. I also
wanted to include that kind of thing in the game. I thought it was important to
do that. So I thought to include that. When you are learning how to wind the
reel in, and the worm looks appealing to fish, the frog character that teaches
you smiles. When the worm looks bad to fish, he doesn’t smile, so the playing
can realize “Oh the worm doesn’t look appealing if I wind like this.”
Abeki:
So whether the frog smiles, is down to whether the fish is biting.
Saito:
That's right. Basically, lures have an “appeal value” according to the action of
the fisherman. Then, in this game, the bass come when the appeal value exceeds a
certain level. As a way to convey this in an easy-to-understand manner, if the
lure looks good the frog will smile. However, as Mr. Kuritsune said, "The appeal
is still there," even if the frog isn’t smiling. It’s really close to "smiling”.
If you know fishing, then you can judge that. "I'm not smiling, but it’s still
good." That is why there is a clear difference in fishing results between those
who know fishing and those who do not.
Abeki:
For example, there is a lure called a "Popper", and when you make it twitch and
it makes a clicking sound, the frog smiles. But it is very important to stop
moving too. The fisherman moves the popper to appeal to the bass. You can fish
only by twitching, but people who then stop moving can make a catch. I've put a
lot of that into this game. If you think about it, you will be able to get
better results. But if you stop moving when the frog smiles you might not make a
catch. So the idea is stop moving just before the frog smiles. This "appeal" is
a difficult thing. I've told you that the lures are based on real movement, but
in the game, it is necessary to give an appeal value to each movement . Even if
you do the same movement, the appeal value will change with each rig and lure
combination. A lure with one rig might have a low appeal value. The fishing
action is very subdivided. It was necessary to work on adding appeal values ??to
all movements such as stopping, floating, and sinking .That's another huge
combination. That’s why Abeki is playing around with the parameters and giving
an appeal value to the lure. It took about a year.
Koseki:
Once, there are so many lures that I can't make them, so I suggested it to Mr.
Itoi that we make stand alone addition just for using worms!
Abeki:
You didn't know what kind of reaction you’d get, so you were half laughing half
serious. Obviously it was "NO" (laughs).
Saito:
Well, now I can laugh and talk, but sometimes it was so hard, so much time had
passed since we started. We often said “Let’s stop this.” For example I made
about 10 lure plans, and I wanted to stop, in the end only one was allowed.
Abeki:
Even that wasn’t the end… Even the other programmers managed to settle down, but
the lure didn’t move well.
Mr. Itoi told me that it was okay, but I had some time left, so I asked the
programmer to make some changes. That fixed it a lot. Everyone at Dice tried to
make things to the best of their satisfaction.
Why is the lure the point in this game?
Itoi:
It's hard to say because elementary school students may read this.
Kuratsune:
Oh?
Itoi:
In other words, it's the relationship between men and women.
Everyone:
Wow (laughs).
Itoi:
LURE means "to seduce" and "to attract”. In other words, it flirts with fish.
It’s a pervert. Lure fishing is about catching fish. Then, you have to think
that flirting itself is "a wonderful technique." Don't say, "It worked because
the lure flirted well."For example, Kimura and Seihiro. Imagine, you two went
out to try and find a girlfriend, and you say Kimura-kun was successful.
If someone said “Oh, that’s Kimura, he is really popular”. That’s a boring way
to say it. If you said “Kimura is really good at hitting on women” people would
say “What!”. That’s like fishing. Games that don’t attract the attention of
everyone are useless. You have to talk convincingly. That’s how lures work too,
you have to use them convincingly. If we say “I’m just a popular person” is not
a good explanation. We should think “Oh, why did you do this?!" For example,
when you turn to the side, and the angle makes people want to say "Wait!"
Itoi:
I used to think that I should have smoked silently in order to get popular.
Everyone knows that that is the most interesting thing about fishing. But they
don't say it. Even if you say "fishing is interesting", if you make a fishing
game without knowing what is interesting, you will create something like a
catalog of good girls .There are so many fish, you won’t notice the beautiful
ones. It’s kind of like Seihiro looking at a women's magazine .But what we want
is not women's magazines, but a more direct relationship. So I thoroughly study
how fast the sinking speed is and what the other person likes. Well, it's the
same as the relationship between a man and a woman. Communication is the axis.
Otherwise, I wouldn’t want to put my name in the game title either. It's like
the sea fishing game at the arcade, "Oh, pull!" It's so fun, so this time we're
also using the rumble pak, to help us.. The most frustrating thing about the
previous game was that its appeal was limited, because it was two-dimensional.
We wanted to finally do something more stylish. I wanted to make it my own
textbook for fishing.
Are there other games that have worms in them?
Abeki:
There are some games, but the impression they make is weak.
Takehisa:
There are many types of lures among other fishing games. However, each has
little individuality and is treated more like a group.
Itoi:
I think the early Mahjong games did not show the computers hand. Now you can see
the hands of the computer if you want to. Its more painful to lose, because you
know the program isn’t cheating. So, when I played our game myself, I thought
I’d play it without looking at the sub window. It shows you a lot of information
about how it is underwater. Because my sub window is actually in my head.
Abeki:
There is also a mode in which the sub window is not displayed.
Itoi:
I can’t help looking at it, if it is there. The idea was the same when I made
the Monopoly game, it hid the money, and you can hide how much you have from
other players. That’s closer to the real game.
This was deep……. The staff who have never been fishing are overwhelmed by the
depths of the sport and other fishing games. Next time, we will deliver more
deep (but interesting) stories !
2000-03-17-FRI
-Let's go fishing-
Discussion with production staff Part 4
The rules of not being able to make a catch.
You shouldn't be able to catch it at all, but sometimes you can. All of that
kind of fun is included in our game.
On the day this roundtable was recorded, the programmers were still doing minor
corrections at Dice headquarters .
This time, we will start by talking about music!
Koseki:
Our programmers are doing a lot of programming day and night. I would like you
to write about their effort on your blog!
Itoi:
Of course! If the programmer's skill is not good, this game will not be realized
at all.
How many people are there?
Koseki:
At first, we started with two people, and now we have three. It was decided that
"the lure is important in this game", so
we asked a programmer who likes fishing to be introduced, and we also had an
excellent programmer join us to form a team of 5 people. So I was working on it
for about a year. It was right that our lead programmer loves fishing. We made a
program to show you, and you were encouraging about it. Lots of the programmers
who didn’t know anything about fishing, how no choice but to use their
imagination. They often asked if the movements they created were correct. We had
to show it to you with anxiety. Sometimes we were told it was “useless” and we
felt like we were being beaten! The programmers...director… Everybody tried
hard, but especially the programmers who can't come today.
Itoi:
It’s like you all died! (laughs)
Koseki:
That's not true! (Laughs)
Itoi:
Our musician Yu Yamaguchi, did a great job!
Takehisa:
His music was very popular when we showed the game off at an event.
Takehisa:
Even at Nintendo, people were saying “This song is so good! I hope it sticks in
my head!” When we exhibited the game at an event, we showed the game without
sound. But it was too quiet, so at the next event we played the music. People
were humming along and more people gathered to look at the game.
Saito:
Does all the music have that same quality? What kind of music should you play in
an exciting scene of a fishing game ? That was a difficult decision. Ordinary
rock stuff would be boring. It’s always in games.
Itoi:
We had Mr. Yamagushi, but other professional musicians helped too. When they
joined they didn’t know anything about fishing or fishing games. They bought
something different. Mr. Yamaguchi also went out to Lake Yamanaka together to
experience fishing. At that time, he thought, "Oh, this is what it means to
fish!" Up to that point he didn’t know if he was fishing well or not. He
actually caught a fish out there. I thought Yamaguchi would love fishing. I was
happy.
Abeki:
And, behind the scenes, there were two another advisers, Mr. Tsunekura in the
west and Mr. Umihito Saito in the east of Japan. We received various bits of
advice from them, but... sometimes, their opinions were a little different
(laughs).
Koseki:
But since the head director is Mr. Kuratsune, we went along with him, but we
were caught between him and our two advisors again and again!
Itoi:
That's right. We and everyone at Dice had a hard time!
Abeki:
If they have similar opinions, we can find a middle ground. But if they are
completely different, we were worried. “What should we do? How should I
interpret this?”
-For example?
Abeki:
An angler has the basics of fishing, but his experience and way of thinking
changes the way he fishes.
Even with lures, they will think different lures should be used at different
times.
Itoi:
Both have deep experiences, so they have very different opinions. Opinions about
the relationship between seasons and places and the distribution of fish will
also be different.
Everyone who is fishing is different.
Itoi:
But even if you use a different fishing method, it might work. What kind of
orders did you have from Mr. Kuratsune for the ground and terrain that Mr.
Murano created? Mr. Murano, at Dice, reduces the number of standing trees .
Kuratsune:
Actually, there were more opinions about the terrain than the lures. However,
since the lure was eating up all the memory, I couldn't say anything. People
often reminded me about the memory, so it would have been terrible to say
anything right? So, it was awkward. We put in a reservoir, there hasn’t been one
in fishing games so far . So I tried to make one. But then a rival game did the
same thing, but it was a little different.
Kuratsune:
The game is thick with trees...Well, I'll reduce the number soon!
All:
(Laughs)
Kuratsune:
The number of trees is decreasing, I’m relieved! I’m sure you've never seen a
fishing spot like that.
Abeki:
No I’ve never seen a place like that, but it’s hard to fix. The processing speed
slows down! The “too many trees” problem!
Kuratsune:
People were talking about it. “Why are the numbers of trees decreasing” “Now the
trees are suddenly getting too thick!” “This big tree doesn’t look realistic!”
(laughs) Surely, there was a mutual compromise in the design of the reservoir
this time?
Abeki:
I certainly wanted to put a few more trees in. I just couldn't do it.
Kuratsune:
Even the one connected lake that we designed was divided up!
(Everyone laughs)
Kuratsune:
That was the most painful thing. Actually, the entire lake was designed
firsthand from the total water flow from upstream to downstream. It controls
many elements of the lake. From the high part of the mountain to the low part,
it will control the positional relationship of the fish. That's why I designed
it comprehensively with macros. It was all cut. When I saw that, I went totally
blank. “What is this!?!?!”
Itoi:
You feel better now though.
Kuratsune:
I feel better, but I don't know. I exploded.
What did you mean by being cut? The current field is...
Kuratsune: It was integrated. Like American lakes...
Itoi:
It was a series of beads.
It seems that they are connected to the next lake by a sluice or a waterway.
Abeki:
I realized that it was quite difficult due to various problems .The four lakes
were separated from where they were all connected.
Itoi:
The short story is that Kasumigaura and Lake Biwa are connected.
Itoi:
At first, they were connected as a matter of course. It was more convenient for
the players. If everything is connected, the boat can travel forever? Realism is
important, but we shouldn’t be too strict.
Saito:
That's right. I was always sandwiched between making it a fun game, and being
realistic. Ordinary people would not be able to fish if it was simply a “fishing
simulator” . It's boring. They wouldn’t feel like fishing. We want them to think
"Let's catch a little!" Finding a balance was very interesting though.
Kuratoshi:
As a result, we are not simulating an actual lake.
Kuratsune:
If you do that, it's not fun. After all, it was difficult to bring out the
uniqueness of the lake .So, at some point it's ridiculous.
I put in migratory bass. Well, it's a new theory that came out a few years ago,
but apart from the native fish and seasonal fish, there are a group of bass
that move around a lot in Lake Biwa. When the people at Dice heard about this
they wanted to put it in, and I was forced to…
(Everyone laughs).
Kuratsune :
Moreover, even if you've been chasing after migratory bass, you’ll only be able
to meet them at certain points. I’m not a fisherman, and I have a limited
ability to follow them by boat. Anyway I tried to simulate various things while
recalling my experiences of migratory bass. While thinking like this, I thought
“I am the god of this lake."
(Everyone laughs).
Kuratsune:
Truly, I don’t think so, I don't know anything (laughs). However, the game does
not reflect the basics of ecology, so the migratory bass move the same as the
normal bass that you encounter in a lake. But that increases the processing
time.
Itoi:
It's just numbers in the game.
Saito:
Kuratsune-san's logic is that if you reproduce it correctly, it will help people
catch fish. But it’s a bit boring. Coincidences or beginners luck, should be in
the design more than I thought. That’s where we struggled. Theoretically, "when
you do this, you can make a catch this way”, but it is boring. In life sometimes
you can’t make a catch even if you follow the rules, and vice versa. It is
difficult to make a game like that.
Itoi:
The game software I'm developing now is incredibly real ,and I can't make a
catch in it. That’s my fault!
Saito:
There are Easy, Normal, and Hard modes. I can't quite make a catch on "hard”. If
you play on hard, it's close to real fishing. There are many big bass!
Itoi:
I caught a 59 cm.
Everyone:
Oh!
Itoi:
It's probably bigger than the one Kin-chan caught.
Kanazawa (Hobonichi blog staff):
But I caught a 59 cm small mouse bass.
Itoi:
…Huh!
Everyone:
(laughs)
Itoi:
.....I also caught a catfish (laughs).
Kuratsune:
I can't say the size, but there are monster bass. Putting them in the game was
also difficult.
Itoi:
Woo!
Kuratsune:
Well, the new Japanese record was set on Lake Biwa recent , "70 cm or more!"
Even I got excited about that. Someone said to me, "What are you saying, you
have never even caught a fish!?" I heard that story from a local fisherman at
Lake Biwa, so I believed it. Putting monsters in the game is a way of trying to
reproduce the setting of that old fisherman’s stories. "You guys can't catch a
big bass, even if you're fishing in such a place . They are over there… “he
said. I thought I couldn’t catch them, but surprisingly he said children often
catch them.
Saito:
I'm sure that even if I studied hard, I still wouldn’t be able to fish the
monster bass in our game.
Kuratsune:
But when we release the game, there may be people who say “I caught one!”
Itoi:
I think I can catch it… I'm not sure...
Next time, while counting down to the release, we will deliver with a lot of
information that you cannot miss!
Mr. Koji Yoshida played our game! He is the number one bass pro in Japan and
operates a bass fishing tournament organization in Kasumigaura, Ibaraki
Prefecture.
From the World Bass Society Official Site
I have an elementary school daughter, but she was basically prohibited from
playing video games. I don't want her to be a child who can't play outside.
However, when we moved from Tokyo to the countryside (Kasumigaura), I didn’t
have to worry about that because there are lots of places to play, so lately I
have been letting her play games.
This game seems to be a detective game, but there is no criminal , or search for
treasure, it’s a search for fishing. It’s about the enjoyment of reasoning. It
has been made so that it you can’t see the fish underwater, even when you are
fishing.?
It is the same as actual fishing because you have to infer which lure should be
used and what kind of fishing should be done depending on the season and
location. It’s interesting to think for yourself and take action to find the
bass.
I is nice to apply that kind of thing to actual fishing, but there are few
people fishing this way. For example, when I read fishing magazines, it's
interesting to think about what the author is trying to convey. It's interesting
to think about what the creator of this game was thinking.
I’m not good at playing games, but when I grabbed the controller, I got crazy,
and started trying to use my fishing experience in the game.
2000-3-24-FRI
-Let's go fishing-
Discussion with production staff Part 5
"We'll do that?!" I want the game with the depth of the world of bass fishing .
This roundtable discussion is really about the tricks of the game. It is a must
read for those who want to aim for a big catch.
What are the actual bass movements that are incorporated into the game ?
Kuratsune:
The spawning behavior of the bass is included. (laughs). Someone said "I want
you to stop making that“ because it’s not realistic. The lake in the game is
open during winter, and the bass season starts in March. In short, fishermen
considers a strategy for the behavior of the bass that includes their spawning.
So I wanted people to even have to about that. (laughs)
Kuratsune :
As a pattern, first the bass are in a sanctuary-like area off the coast, then
they go up to the shallows, via a cape , spawn, and then descend from the
shallows. We put that behavior pattern in the game, and slightly randomized the
calculations. For example, as the temperature rises the bass try to reach the
shallows. That detail is also included (laugh). So it was difficult to make.
Moreover, the timing of spawning is different between the lake in the lowlands
and the lake in the mountains . Because the air temperature and the water
temperature are different. For example, bass in the mountains are more likely to
lay eggs than at the lake in the lowlands. Will some players use this
information to use real tournaments?
In this game, the bass know the contour lines of all the lakes. The position and
movement of basses are based on contour lines. For example, the first group that
lay eggs in spring, gather at the cape of the reservoir. Basses gather in such
places.
Then, for example, in the case of flat lakes, the spawning occurs in a large
shallows, but in the case of reservoirs shallows are often narrow. ..Even if the
bass gather there, the shallows are very small. For fish, spawning in a small
area is a competition for survival, because there is no other choice. This is in
the game. Even if you fail, it's still fun. That is darling.
Itoi:
I don't think it's easy for people who play games to understand. However, if you
misunderstand the difference between a lowland or highland lake, it will be a
big pain for the player. So you can make a lot of mistakes in one day. It’s
amazing. There are a lot of things that you can do as soon as you find out
certain things.
There are three levels of difficulty. Does the difficulty mode cause a
noticeable hit/miss when searching for a bass ?
Itoi:
Yeah, in each difficulty mode, are you reducing the number of fish?
Saito:
The number of fish does not change, but if you do not tempt fish with the lure
well, you cannot make catches in the hard mode.
Saito:
The range of field of view for the fish to recognize the lure is wide in easy
mode. However, in easy, even if the fish are far away they will still notice the
lure. As the game difficulty gets harder, the field of view of the fish becomes
narrower, so it’s harder for them to see the lure.
Abeki:
Even though I’m so familiar with the game, there are times when I can't make a
catch...
Saito:
Bass’s have areas of control. In short, the distance that the other fish get
close to each other changes depending on the difficulty. “I’m a big bass, don’t
come near me!”.There is a large area of ??control for large basses. And the
lines also effect the field of view for fish. The finer the line, the easier it
will be for fish to see it, and vice versa. The thinner the line, the higher the
probability of catching a big one.
Abeki:
But it's easy to break the line...
Saito:
It's nasty (laughs).
Kuratsune:
But that's true of fishing, right?
Itoi:
That's true, so it can't be helped.
Kuratsune:
I have no choice but to do so in actual fishing (laughs).
The easiest way to catch fish is in Easy Mode. Is the field of view of the fish
wide and the area of ??control narrow? That means the fish are closer together
right?
Saito:
It's a case by case. It depends on the thickness of the line used and the type
of structure. So widening the field of view of a small bass will make it easier
for the lure to pass within the field of view of the fish. Then, even if the
lure passes through the control area of the big bass, small bass will come from
a distance. That's a priority.
Abeki:
Also, since there are more small bass, there are many cases where even if you
try to catch a large one, a small one will take the bait first.
For example, one place has 10 basses, and only one of them is a big one. You
cast many times, then you catch 3 small basses. If you keep looking for fish,
will you eventually be able to catch the big one?
Saito:
At the bottom left of the screen is a fish finder. That kind of equipment can
also be used. But it is still going to be hard. Assuming that the lure has an
appeal of 100, if you fish the same lure many times at the same place, you will
have to appeal more and more to the fish. In other words, the appeal level will
decrease, so you have to extend the appealing time. Therefore, even if you feel
that there are big bass nearby, the small bass will come first. So you need to
keep fishing to get that big bass.
Kuratsune:
It's tough that fish get used to the lure.
Saito:
Catching on fish in a group will obviously lower the appeal of the lure, making
it harder to catch fish. Some people will move to another place at that point.
But if you're convinced there are big bass there, keep exploring and keep
fishing in the same place. For example, it is possible that migratory bass will
come.
Kuratsune:
For example, if you could hit a roundabout bass with a bone after fishing on a
reef, it wouldn't be interesting. On the other hand, even if you actually go to
a fishing reef, an pass through the bass’ narrow range, and don’t cast there,
you won’t be able to make a catch.
Saito:
In that case, a fisherman with a lot of knowledge might not make a catch.
Kuratsune :
If you look at the map on a small scale, you might think “the bass will pass
through here.” Using that knowledge you might be able to find migratory bass.
But the bass are also moving, and you might only be 50 cm away from the bass and
it might not see your lure. So this resembles actual fishing.
Itoi:
It’s the same in real fishing. Even though you made a plan for the day to with
the conviction that bass will pass through here, in the end the sun went down
and you don’t catch anything.
Kuratsune:
Besides, migratory bass are smaller. The small fish move first, and while you
are catching them the big bass move away.
Oh, there is no game like this! It’s too deep! It’s in sync with the depth of
the world of bass fishing .Next time we will play the game whilst talking about
it.
The commercial for the game has been airing on TV since March 10th. Did you
know? I went to the shooting location and interviewed the performers. In order
to express playing with the controller, they were filmed in front of a white
background.
Here is a fishing controller signed by Takashi Fujii, a set of software will be
given to 5 people by lottery. If you wish, please send an e-mail to OO
,specifying your address, name, age, and phone number . Please also be sure to
request a bass fishing gift as the email title . We will accept emails until 1
pm on April 7th. (Shipping will be in May)
2000-03-31-FRI
-Let's go fishing –
Production staff round-table discussion 6
We will teach you many tricks.
After all, you have to actually play the game. So, this round-table discussion
is mostly about playing the game. I was able to hear lots of tricks, hidden
techniques.
Itoi:
So far, I’ve talked about structures that can be seen or the terrain of the
whole lake, but there is another thing that cannot be seen. You can use the fish
finder to see the bottom of the lake.
Kuratoshi:
For example suppose we find a rectangular fishing line. How we attack depends on
the position of the boat. If you want to lengthen the contact point with the
fish, move the boat to a position that looks for the vertical length line. If
you pull the lure across the reef, there will be few contact points, which will
result in different fishing results. The fishing finder displays the bottom of
the lake in real time, so if you find a reef, you will have to search north,
south, east, west, and grasp the shape of the reef, and then fish.
Itoi:
In theory, this game means that Kuratsune, who is the fishing advisor for this
game, is the best player in Japan, right?
Kuratsune:
That's true in theory, but I can't catch anything (laughs).
Itoi:
Why? (Laughs)
Saito:
That's because it's random. If you can see the theory and then just catch, it’s
boring. I made it so that would not happen.
The other day, I asked Mr. Takehisa to tell me the location of the “wreck”.
Takehisa knows various secrets. Then, when I looked for the sunken ship, I found
that the lure traced the sunken ship diagonally in the sub-window where the
water was reflected , so I fixed the boat position and traced the sunken ship
vertically. I can see it in the water.
Saito:
If you fish like that, the chance of making catches will increase. The staff who
are making this game, are fishing with that kind of strategy. Their knowledge is
amazing. (laughs)
Itoi:
That's right. In reality, even if I knew that the position of the boat had to be
kept while the wind was blowing, I couldn’t do it. It’s a hard thing to do...
I’d think “I'm going home” (laughs). However, playing this game isn’t hard on
your body, so your brain can completely work on improving your skills. If you
don't feel tired, you can do everything you want to do when you go fishing.
Kuratsune:
Even if you use a fish bite, you have to be careful. In autumn, the rubber jig
is eaten up, just like in real life.
Abeki:
Also, when a bass swimming half way between the bottom and top hits the line it
will cause a ripple. A ripple appears on the surface of the water to let you
know the fish has been hooked. You can see it by looking closely at the line.
Kuratsune:
In summer, when a bass swimming half way between the bottom and top bites a
sinking lure a "punching" ripple appears on the line. There is no sound, but you
can see it by looking at the line.
Abeki:
There is also "deformed hit" when fishing with worms. The worm has a strange
shape. You can tell by looking at the worm.
Saito:
The point is that when the bass is poking the lure when the line is under
tension, that hit can be felt at hand, so I made a "punch" sound. On the other
hand, if you get a bite when the line is slack, the worm deforms and the worm
moves. You won't hear a "bump", so you won’t know unless you look at the worms
or lines. The more you learn about worm fishing, the more fun it becomes.
Abeki:
The worm fishing in this game is interesting. Everyone had various hardships.
Kuratsune:
Also, there are various orders for fish production, and there are smaller stages
such as small bass, medium bass, and large bass. What is the difference in fight
depending on the size of the fish? The way the camera is shown is different.
Even if you fight, there are movement patterns. How to pull it in, the speed,
how much the fish is hooked. If it's a big fish, it feels like a big shock. I'm
doing all that directing of video.
Abeki:
The movement of a big fish looks sluggish, but it has power. The small bass is
light and quick. There are fish with various skeletons.
Kuratsune:
So, there is a difference in weight depending on the skeleton. The shapes are
all different. Even at the same length of 47 cm , the skeleton and body height
are different for a 1300 gram fish and a 1800 gram fish. So when you catch it,
you actually say , "Oh? It's thin?" We included this in the game.
Abeki:
The scales have different patterns. There are several stages.
Kuratsune:
Well, I really wanted to add the difference between the Florida bass, the
hybrid, and the large mouse, but I stopped doing that because it would be too
much (laughs).
Itoi:
I wanted to do that too…
Kuratsune:
When I was playing this game in the editorial department, Mr. Itoi was watching
me from behind, and he said my play was “useless”. I felt kind of weird being
watched, but I knew he was watching my fishing. He can tell what kind of guy I
am from my fishing. (laughs). My personality comes out perfectly…
Itoi:
That's true (laughs). One of the staff members enjoyed fishing big groups of
fish, like he was doing agricultural work. I like fishing like that too. It
looked like you were taking a break after working so hard, and I saw your
personality coming out in your play.
Kuratsune:
I can't fish. I’m a pinpoint player. So I'm the type of person who quickly jumps
from one fishing spot to another. We know there are fish in a certain area, but
they seem to move randomly. Takehisa got angry at the beginning of development..
"Kuratsune-san, please show me how to make a catch!”
Takehisa:
I made the lake, but when I tried playing it… I felt “Oh sorry…” (laughs)
Saito:
However, the combination of various elements has created a place where there is
always a big game somewhere.
Itoi:
Oh! It's that’s a nice line (laughs).
Saito:
If you can find such a place, you can catch big fish.??Is it really pinpointing?
There are structures and conditions such as where the capes overlap which are
good for catching fish. there are place where the layout of the terrain and the
structure happens to overlap under good conditions .There are several such
places. There, you can catch fish right away.
Itoi:
Can you make a catch now?... I want to see him do it (laughs).
Saito:
Well, I don't know if it's going to happen soon, but there is definitely a place
where big fish gather. Shall I try?
(We turned the game on and began to play)
Itoi:
Let's go down the mountain. (A technique to remember the position of a good
place in fishermen's terms. When a place directly below the ship is good,
remember the buildings and mountains visible from there so that you can go to
the same place next time.)
Itoi:
I see. How many meters is the deepest part of the reservoir?
Abeki:
It's about 20 meters. Lake Kikiko is the deepest.
Saito:
It's about 30 meters deep.
Kuratsune:
There's a ridiculously big rock in the deepest part of Lake Kitakita .10 meters
down.
Itoi:
Did Lord Kuratsune put it down there?
Abeki:
It's quite difficult to find.
Itoi:
A bass took the bait!
Kuratsune:
It’s small…
Itoi:
Nice, Oda. ( A fishing tool with a bunch of tree branches tied together)
Abeki:
We caught the bass!
Kuratsune:
How long is it?
Abeki:
It's about 60 cm. It has no pattern.
Itoi:
That's huge.
(the line broke)
Everyone :
Ah!
Saito:
The greatest feature of this game is that the bass are not visible. That's where
it's overwhelmingly different from other fishing games.
Abeki:
That's definitely more interesting! You have to look for them.
Saito:
I wanted to make a game where even if you couldn’t see the bass, it was still
fun to fish. It was the most difficult thing to do.
(Another bass is hooked)
Saito:
Don't force the line, let it play, and it'll come to you.
Itoi:
Well, it's powerful.
(The line broke!)
Everyone:
Ah!
Notoya:
I really like the full-screen lure mode. It's very easy to play with.
Editorial department:
How do you do that?
Itoi
There is a Jizo statue in the cave here.
Nototani:
There is a cave above Lake Nonoke and a Jizo statue is there. You can go to the
cave with the large map. Then, you can talk to Jizo-san and switch to a mode in
which the entire screen is an underwater image, or a mode without the sub
windows.
?
(A big bass is caught)
Everyone:
Wow, hey!
Itoi:
It's 66.6 cm. Let's take a photo there. Hold hands! Even 40 cm is huge, this is
the real thing.
Kuratsune:
Let's take a look at the full screen mode.
(The mode in which only the sub window is displayed on the surface)
Itoi:
Ah, this is good. It feels good. It’s easy to focus on the lure.
Takehisa:
Many people like this mode.
Itoi:
It’s a waste to just look at this in the sub window . This mode is good.
Next time, I will try to talk to another staff member as the discussion
continues. Please look forward to it!
2000-04-07-FRI
-Let's go fishing-
Discussion with production staff Part 7
The final goal is to be successful.
Is there a goal for the game?? Where is the big bass over 80 centimeters
lurking??? This is the final round of this round-table discussion, which goes
into solving various mysteries. There is also an introduction of the staff who
could not attend!
There are many things that were difficult to finish. However, Mr. Saito said
that they were all completed . Are there other things that you would like to do?
Saito:
In terms of graphics, I’m putting a lot of effort into expressing the terrain
and the background, but I would like you to appreciate that as well. I think
that it’s not a photographic reality, but it's a good painting .After all, sound
and sound effects have a great deal of weight . This time, I’m using a quarter
of the total ROM capacity for sound.
Mr. Koseki:
Really everyone. Thank you, Mr. Yoshiaki Kurakone, “God of the Lake”. The way
the camera follows is changed for each lure .For example, in the case of a
sinking lure, the camera looks upwards as it falls.
Abeki:
I'm thinking about which camera angle makes the lure look the coolest.
Saito:
And the biggest difference between hard and normal mode is that the frog at the
center of the screen smiles. However, sometimes when the game is tough it
doesn’t smile. It doesn’t smile if the colour of the lure does not match the
season, time or weather. It won’t smile unless you change the colour of the lure
to match the colour of the lake or weather. In normal mode the frog will laugh
if you do just this.
Itoi:
How many hours can you enjoy this game for? It’s more than a role-playing game.
You don't have any goals in this game, but what is your ultimate goal? Finding
the secret lake with the biggest bass…?
Saito:
The final goal? I will catch a bass that is over 80 centimeters.
Kuratsune:
That's right. It’s about finding a bass over 80 centimeters .Every lake has a
bass over 80 centimeters.
Itoi:
The ultimate goal is to be successful at fishing, infinitely.
Saito:
However I didn’t want to make this game have an ending. For example, moving is
easy because I didn’t want to stress movement. Rather than focusing on clearing
something, the main part is to “enjoy fishing”. So the ending should be
relatively easy.
Is there an ending?
Saito:
Yes, there is an ending. It’s a challenge, and it doubles as a tutorial, and
difficult tasks are given, you will gradually clear them, and at the end, there
is a fishing battle with an "Oyaji".
Are there lakes with big bass?
Saito:
You can only go to three lakes at the beginning, but as you complete the
challenges, you will eventually be able to go to various lakes. The more lakes
you can go to later, the more likely you are to catch big bass. There was a
lonely feeling of fishing on your own in the last game, similar to other fishing
games. However this game is about fishing with partners. The frog is always with
you. You can get that kind of feeling from this game. Also when you drive the
boat, you can meet other characters fishing with their boats. You can meet the
locals, and decide what kind of fishing you’ll do that day.
Itoi:
Hey! I didn't say anything about those characters! These characters are to keep
you alert. To things easier for elementary school students to understand, we
have to have characters they can relate to. For example, if we want them to read
Dr Stephen Hawkin’s books, we could call him Uncle Stephen. This is the same
thing.
Kuratsune:
It’s fun to look at the game from their perspective. I learned that I like using
spinner baits like the rubber jigs, and I came up with new strategies. Mr. Itoi,
you like quite non sinking baits.
Koseki:
Worms are really fun in this game too.
Kuratsune:
That’s such a typical Koseki thing to say…(laughs)
Itoi:
He didn’t know anything about fishing at all. Even when I am fishing, I do not
say "worms are fun".
Koseki:
Worms are nice. You can fish deeply with them.
Itoi:
It's amazing to have people learn that just from the game.
After this round-table discussion, we hope that Mr. Kuratoshi ,who is also a
"fishing supervisor" and "the god of the lake ", will be able to tell us about
the "basket that will enable you to catch fish". Look forward to it soon!
I will introduce other staff who could not come to our meeting. Ms Yuko Nakamura
and Ms Mariko Yamada. The beautiful women team. Mr. Kawai and Mr. Kato. The
beautiful men team! ? Mr. Yamada, was the main programmer . Mr. Nozaki, was a 2D
sub programmer. Mr. Muramatsu, who became a professional fish swimmer. “We all
worked hard on the game!” they said.
Yuko Nakamura and Kato;
We worked on the 2D screens and NPCS, anything that is not solid. We also made
Mr. Itoi’s face in game.
Mariko Yamada
My job was to make the original data of the frog's face animation in 3D, and to
make houses or "treasures" in 3D.
Hiroaki Kawai
I placed models such as rocks and grass made by the graphics team all over the
map. I also dug up and raised the terrain. I arranged the fish and adjusted the
bite conditions of the fish. The most difficult part was working according to
Mr. Tsunekura’s requests.
Takashi Kato
I designed the 2D screens. I generated general and natural things in 3S polygons
using 2D information. It was difficult to make them match every time they
changed. There were times when we had to replace all of our work in response to
changes in the project.
Mr. Tomohiro Sato
I created all the CG of the fish when caught. I made and managed piles, rocks,
houses, reeds, etc. My job was to make things as real as possible, whilst
considering the maximum performance of the NINTENDO 64 .For example, if a lure
falls on a rock, make it look as realistic as possible.
Yutaka Yamada
I was the leader of the five programming teams. Even though it wasn't tough, we
were all adults, so we worked together to survive. Making a series of dynamic
models such as lines, reels, and arm movements while the fish were fighting,
were the most difficult parts. I had never fished before, but I studied at a
camp at Lake Biwa.
Tatsuya Nozaki
I am a sub programmer. Basically I was in charge of the whole 2D program. Such
as the store, receptionist, tackle box, etc. The most difficult part was the
tackle box.
Toru Muramatsu
I adjusted the movement and fishing conditions of the fish. I created the
conditions of the fish swimming and escaping. It combines 500 movements and
changes little by little. I completed a little of difficult requests. I am proud
to still be adjusting all the numbers! It was hard making the fish move, I
stayed up all night.
Shuichi Aikawa
I was in charge of planning, specification creation, scenario integration, and
debug management. I converted the requests from our adviser Mr. Kuratsune into
the specifications that can be done with NINTENDO 64. It was hard, but it was
fun to hear the deep theories of bass fishing .We had a hard time with the
programmers because they included too many specifications. I am grateful to Mr.
Muramatsu for adjusting a huge amount of items.
2000-04-14-FRI
-Let's go fishing- SPECIAL EDITION
Strategies from Kuma-san and Usagi-chan
For the official Famitsu Magazine tournament
The official Nintendo Famitsu Magazine family tournament for the total weight of
bass caught is now being held!
For those who have achieved excellent results, there are plenty of valuable
prizes such as Mamiya Opie's reels and gold fishing controllers. Of course,
participation prizes (via lottery) are also available, so feel free to
participate. The tournament is open until Friday, April 28th.Hurry up and buy
the 3 magazines to see the details! (Application forms are attached to the 3
magazines)
During this tournament, the readers of Hobnichi blog also have an increased
chance to win thanks to this guide! Kuma-san and Usagi-chan have given you
various hints! Please read this carefully and catch a big bass!
(Supervised by Mr. Kuratsune, the god of the lake)
Usagi-chan:
Eh? Is there a tournament? Can I joint too???
Kuma-san:
Of course you can. How is your fishing going?
Usagi-chan-chan:
I caught a 40-centimeter bass recently... but I can’t catch anything bigger than
that. Kuma-san, tell me the trick!
Kuma-san:
Alright, I understand! My technique is Yuzuriza, the lake lion! I will support
you so that you can win the tournament.
Where are the bass at this time?
Kuma-san: During the tournament period, the control of the bass's spawning
pattern is the key to winning or losing.
Usagi-chan-chan:
If you go to the spawning area you can catch bass. The basses move in the lake
every season.
Kuma-san:
Yes. Before spawning the bass gather once at a cape (typically) and move towards
the spawning sties. Finding out where and what the bass are doing is an
important strategy to catch the big guys.
Usagi-chan:
Where are the spawning places?
Kuma-san:
The bass spawn in the shallows.
Usagi-chan:
Well, I'm not sure. Kuma-san, please explain using the map.
?
Kuma-san:
Alright. Look at this figure. First of all, the four capes (A, B, C, D) on this
lake attract attention as gathering places.
Usagi-chan-chan:
I've heard that there is a bass at a cape in spring.
Kuma-san-san:
The bass typical gather at a cape before heading to shallow water as the water
temperature rises in their winter sanctuary.
Usagi-chan-chan:
Well then, let's aim for a cape!
Kuma-san:
However, the basses, after staying there once, wait for the temperature of the
water to rise and move to a location closer to the shallows.
Usagi-chan:
Where?
Kuma-san:
The shallow places to the left and right of a cape, places with a sloped bottom.
Furthermore, there are some structures... standing trees, dead trees, stumps
(rocks, bedrock, ditches, artifacts, etc.) which are first-class places for bass
fishing. After this, the bass will go to the shallows and start spawning.
Usagi-chan-chan:
The shallow places near a cape…But there are many different types of cape. I
wonder if there are many basses near the big cape.
-Practice is important!-
Kuma-san:
That’s how they move. But the underwater situation that needs to be
investigated. The break line (the line where the depth of the water suddenly
begins to deepen from shallow water) is wide and there are many bass in big
lakes at places like that. Point A is such a place.
Usagi-chan-chan:
I see... But Kuma-san-san, don’t the bass go somewhere again later in the year?
Kuma-san:
That's right. This tournament is set on "April 5th". It’s a bit before when the
bass gather to spawn, but it’s also not the time for bass to gather at shallows.
So the location of bass is a delicate thing.
Usagi-chan-chan:
Wow, I'm confused...Tell me where they are!!
Kuma-san:
The interesting thing about bass fishing is that I don't know for sure .I can't
say "they are absolutely here!" My expectation is that the bass gather on the
left and right sides of capes before going up to the shallows. It’s likely that
they will be waiting around the break line near the spawning area, or places
where there a structures (standing trees, rocks, stumps, bedrock, etc.)
Depending on the surrounding terrain, the water depth may be between 2 and 4.5 m
(The Dam lake has a high topographical difference, so the depth of the fish may
change depending on the weather conditions of the day). It is easy for bass to
gather there!
Usagi-chan:
I see! I'll try those places. You can catch a really big bass there!?
Kuma-san:
That may be true. If you're aiming for a big bass, the point is to get in early.
Usagi-chan-chan:
After practicing in advance, I'm going to enter the competition.
Kuma-san:
It's about practice. Collect information such as where to fish, where you can
fish, what lure the bass reacts to, what the condition of the bass are, what
time of day you can fish, etc. Keep it organized. Then, assemble a fishing
strategy in advance of the day of the tournament.
Usagi-chan:
You sound like a bass pro! It’s the same as an actual tournament! Alright, I’ll
find a point where I can be sure that I can fish!
Use the fish finder!
Usagi-chan:
So how do you do that in "practice"...?
Kuma-san:
Oh (laughs).The practice method starts with grasping the topography of the cape
and its surroundings with a depth finder.
Keep looking for where the break line is around the shallows and what structures
lie off the coast.
Usagi-chan-chan:
Is a fish finder okay in deep lakes?
Kuma-san:
In a lake that suddenly becomes deeper from the shore like a reservoir (dam
lake), it may be so deep that the bottom cannot be seen with the fish finder. In
such a case, you need to guess from the surrounding scenery and the topography
and then apply the depth finder to the topography to make the image clearer.
Usagi-chan:
You can see the shallow areas by looking at the scenery.
Kuma-san:
Yes, shallows can be guessed from hints in the scenery. For example, if the
shore is rugged rocks, it can be expected that the rocks are rugged in the
water. If there are a lot of stumps on the shore, it can be expected that there
will be stumps submerged in the water. It's a good idea to make such predictions
and then actually investigate the underwater conditions to learn more about the
bottom terrain.
Usagi-chan:
It sounds like a treasure hunt!
Kuma-san-san:
In practice, let’s do that before actually fishing. When practicing, it's better
to look for points and test lures than to aim to catch a lot of bass. I think
it's better to set a goal to find lures that are likely to be effective and how
to use them.
Usagi-chan:
What kind of lures??
Kuma-san:
For example, there is a suspender lure that can be stopped in the middle layer
of the water. But how long is the pause time (rest time), and what depth and
size can you catch? Such things are important to find out on your own. That’s
how you gain experience and fight in real tournaments. More information can be
drawn from the lake, finding a confident pattern in practice is the big
difference in winning and losing.
Usagi-chan:
I’m burning with enthusiasm!!!I will do my best!!!
Kuma-san:
That's the spirit! (laughs) After that, mental strength is also important. Even
if you gain confidence in practice and find a
super-A point, you might be hit psychologically before you land the first big
one. You might think “I don’t like this place anymore.” That's a trap. There is
a possibility that you will make a big catch if you just wait a little more.
When it comes to making catches, it's important to have the mental strength to
carry on fishing with confidence .
Usagi-chan:
Thank you, Kuma-san! I want to catch one over 60cm!!!
According to Kuratsune, there is definitely a strong strategy that can win top
prizes .If you can find it in practice, it will be a fierce battle, for a fish
that weighs more than 10kg! By all means , please join the “Weekly Famitsu”,
“Monthly Famitsu 64+”, and “Monthly Famitsu Bros.” magazine contest!
2000-04-17-MON
-Let's go fishing-
Interview with Yu Yamaguchi & Tadashi Ikegami
How we made the music of the game.
The sound track of the game is by the group Manual of Errors, featuring artists;
Gary Ashiya, Midori Okamura, and Tadashi Ikegami from Hall Laboratories. I asked
Mr. Yamaguchi and Mr. Ikegami about how this music, which is said to “keep your
head on”, was created!
You are both in different companies, so how did you go about making the sound
track?
Ikegami:
We worked together, but not in the same place. Tokyo and Yamanashi are quite far
away.
Yamaguchi:
But since we have the internet, the exchange of information was smooth.
Ikegami:
There are many ways to make these kinds of things these days. But in this case,
the production of music was finally completed by Mr. Yamaguchi. Before that, I
made a sound source...
Yamaguchi:
After all, I was the first person to make music on the Nintendo 64. So I
borrowed a tool. But I cannot use it perfectly. I had to give some of the work
to Mr. Ikegami. At that stage, we exchanged files many times.
--What files did you exchange?
Yamaguchi:
Musical instrument files. The 64 is a cartridge type console. Think of an
instrument in that cartridge. We have to create the sound of that instrument. At
first, I couldn't adjust them correctly.
Ikegami:
It's called sampling, but the sound of an instrument is recorded in the same way
that it is recorded on a cassette, and it's a mechanism that sounds like an
synthesizer . To make the instruments I received the files from Mr. Yamaguchi,
remade them and sent them back. Also, about twice, we came together to work
directly.
How many constraints are there?
Yamaguchi:
There are so many. In other words, only the sound that enters the cartridge can
be input. That’s why there are 24 songs in total, but every song must have a
common sound. It’s like hiring an orchestra and asking the orchestra to play all
the songs.
Ikegami:
It’s often mistaken, but the music in a game isn’t about creating the "sound
itself," but about creating the “sound mechanism." The game console makes the
sound when playing a game. That’s what is different from ordinary music
production.
Mr. Yamaguchi, you have made music for various other game companies. What's the
difference?
Yamaguchi:
With other companies, there is a limitation on the memory of the timbre in each
song, but you can use different sounds if the song changes. So you can make a
completely different type of song. We can’t do this on the 64. If you change the
sound of one instrument, one member of the orchestra will be replaced, and it
will affect other songs. You have to change all the data of the other songs. So
at the end, there was a memory shortage, so we had to change one sound to reduce
the file size. Then we opened all the performance data of other songs that used
that sound, and adjusted the volume and performance information of each of them.
At Hal Lab, where Ikegami-san works, he usually does that by himself. However,
this time it was our first time to outsource the composition. Surprisingly. So I
borrowed an internal tool, not one that another company uses.
How did you get the request? Is it something like "There is such and such a
scene, so make some music like this? "
Yamaguchi:
Dice the production company contacted us.
Ikegami:
The Super Nintendo version of "Shigesato Itoi's Bass Fishing No. 1" was also
co-produced by us and Dice. I made the last sound track.
Yamaguchi:
I also had an old relationship with Dice, and I worked with them many times.
Ikegami:
It was then that I met Mr. Itoi for the first time.
Yamaguchi:
You didn't meet in Yamanashi?
Ikegami:
We had a meeting called a “training camp.”
Yamaguchi:
Right? I can't remember it because it was so long ago (laughs). This time Mr.
Saito of Dice had some ideas of what he wanted the music to sound like. He
called it “ Italian B-movie soundtrack” music. It's a type of music called
lounge music recently. He specifically mentioned Moricone and Travaoli.
Sometimes the music fit their imagination. But sometimes there were
discrepancies between Mr. Saito, Mr. Itoi and I. Especially the “bass fight
scene” music. I had a hard time with that. I made about 6 songs. Only one song
is used.
Ikegami:
Actually, even in the previous work, I had a hard time with the fight scenes .I
made about 7 songs and used 2 of them.
What does that mean? Mr. Yamaguchi, you don't fish much?
Yamaguchi:
Yes, that had an effect on the music. My first “fight scene composition” was
like music for a fighting or action scene. It had a fast tempo and a feeling of
excitement. But between Mr. Itoi and Mr. Saito, it was “too light". Mr. Itoi
said think of "Born to be Wild" or Steppen Wolf. I mean that kind of heavy old
rock. I didn't understand why he said that. It feels so bassy when the fish
bounces around and the reels are spin .Is that "Born to be Wild"? I don't know.
So I went fishing at Lake Yamanaka. The fish didn't bounce much, and I got a
better idea of their weight when caught. It wasn't a bus feeling. It was
actually heavy. I thought as much, but there is a difference between catching a
real fish and catching a virtual one. Mr. Itoi was probably thinking about real
fishing when he described the music to me. I made the song whilst playing the
game and thought “I want faster music!”. I thought about both, and it was hard
to decide. In the end it caused my production to slow down. At first, I had Gary
Ashiya, a member of the team, make it for me, but he got stuck. He said, "I
can't make any more!"
It wasn't easy. Is the finished product closer to the "actual feeling of
fishing"?
Yamaguchi:
I think, after all it is a game. But I didn't want to think about nerds.
Did you enter the world of bass fishing nerds?
Yamaguchi:
Right. I didn’t want to make something that only fish nerds could understand. Is
it better to have fun playing games?
In the end, I chose the one that fits the grammar of the game , but it's a lot
different from what I initially had. At first, I was trying to create a
partition of data, and have other people write songs. Gary Ashiya, a musician
from Manual of Errors, and Midori Okamura helped. In the end, they made about
half the soundtrack.
How did you assign the responsibilities of Yamaguchi-san, Gary-san, and
Okamura-san ?
Yamaguchi:
It depended on the tune. Gary makes music that matches a scene. It’s the movie
music part. Gary's songs play at the lake sides. Okamura-san writes bright pop
music, which is used on the title screen and in the rest house. I did the rest
(laughs).But I couldn't make it without Mr. Ikegami.
Ikegami:
I was wondering if there would be crazy requests. At first I thought it would be
more difficult.
Yamaguchi:
You could use the computer, right? I didn't think we could use it at first.
Ikegami:
Should we record the songs on a tape recorder. Should we play the score? We were
saved because there was another person who could make the data. At first we
thought about requesting help from an external composer. When I was working at
Hall Labs, Mother 2 was being created. I asked Keiichi Suzuki for a song from
Nintendo. The sound of the game was very popular. Mr. Iwata, who was the
president of our company at the time, said that he wanted to do the same thing
as that game, and to surpass it. So I said "I will try" with this bass fishing
game. So at first I was wondering what to do. There are many difficult stories
about outsourcing. Keiichi-san didn't have that kind of reputation, but in
general, I heard sometimes people have a difficult time outsourcing music. After
all, sometimes you have to ask musicians to do something different. We have the
game constraints, sometimes they make us happy, but in many cases they do not.
Asking an outside person may result in rudeness. So I hope people who
understand that kind of thing. What if they do not, and understanding is lost,
will the relationship get worse ? ? I was worried.
Do some musicians find that rude?
Yamaguchi:
I'm sure some people think it's rude. I’m already thinking that I can't make
music without such restrictions(laughs).
Ikegami:
But I don't think there is manufacturing without restrictions. Even the
expression of music has the limitation of sound.
There is no such thing as being able to do anything in an orchestra. So I
thought that the hardware constraints of the game were the same, but at the
beginning I didn't know what kind of person we would ask, so I tried to simulate
the situation.
Simulate the situation?
Ikegami:
I wondered if the artist lived in the mountains of Hokkaido without faxing or
calling. If that was the case, we couldn't even write the score. I wondered if
they would create the music on DAT and then we would have to make the data from
that.
Yamaguchi:
There are no such people (laughs). We won't ask them!
Ikegami:
Mr. Saito if Dice said from the beginning that he didn't want the music
“game-like”. At first he wanted to have people from different fields in games.
However, Mr. Yamaguchi knew too much about the game . It was easy for him to
work on it.
Yamaguchi:
I came and looked at the game (laughs) I said “It would be better if it was more
“game-like”!” (laughs)
Ikegami:
Someone told me, "This is what a PlayStation soundtrack is like." I was
surprised. Creating music for games is both about “composing" and “creating
data. For example the sound effects. Birds, cicadas and all that. I also did
that on the previous game. But I wanted to express the "feeling of fishing" with
sound. Reproducing that kind of thing was a job only for me, different from my
work with Mr. Yamaguchi .
Yamaguchi:
Mr. Ikegami really saved me by doing the sound effects .
Isn't the music of the game often BGM or SE?
Yamaguchi:
That's right. I also know a musician named Kotaka Matsumae, one of my buddies,
and he also has a huge library of sound effects. I often work on music and sound
effects as a set.
What made you split the work this time?
Ikegami:
This time we were requested to make compositions. In the end, Mr. Yamaguchi
entered the data. Thankfully!
How many sound effects are there in this game?
Ikegami:
There are a few. There are between 150 and 200.
Is that few?
Ikegami:
Yes. In a large-scale game, I have never heard of a 1000 sound effects, but
there are hundreds usually.
Yamaguchi:
As Mr. Ikegami said, making music for a game is both “composing" and “creating
data." It is useless unless it is focused on creating data. This is because the
games console can only make certain sounds. The old NES had three sound
channels.
It could only play up to three sounds at the same time.
Yamaguchi:
That means that you have to compose in three notes. You couldn't make a song if
you didn't understand the data. It’s been evolving gradually, and now it's
possible to make songs normally.
The past lacked creativity.
Yamaguchi:
On the contrary, I'm interested in making music with only three sounds channels.
There is a method that Koichi Sugiyama took with "Dragon Quest", to dare to make
music with only three sound channels. He used Bach. Bach’s music is structured
so that only a single note is played .It's great that he chose that.
Is the total music of this game about one normal CD worth of music?
Yamaguchi:
No, I can't say so, because the tracks all loop.
What is a loop?
Ikegami:
It means it repeats. The game decides how many measure of performance to repeat
and how.
Yamaguchi:
Imagine ABC. The performance data ends at C. If you tell the machine "Return to
A" after C” the music will repeat.
Ikegami:
Since the data for playing that sound is put in the game cassette, it sounds
like a score. It means that Mr. Yamaguchi has repeated symbols in the score .
Yamaguchi:
We had the ideas of what the soundtrack should sound like, but the graphics
changed a lot from when we started making it. At first it was a just a world
filled with characters drawn by Noriko Hikone. That's why we started making
pastoral songs. However, because of Mr. Itoi's influence... (laughs) the game
became more and more realistic. The idyllic sound didn't fit at all. Mr. Saito
of Dice said, "I want you to make fashionable movie songs.” At first I thought,
“But that doesn't fit. What?” But Mr. Saito had the final game in his head.
Norio Hikone's characters combined with a realistic world.
When you say the sound track is complete, does that mean the console limits have
been reached?
Yamaguchi:
Well it's both the quality of the song and the completeness of the data. In the
case of the 64, it is decided when the tone is first decided .With a
PlayStation, I try to complete the song while reducing the sound size to its'
very limit .The most problematic issue this time was the "polyphony” limit. The
number of sounds that can be played at the same time is fixed. About 20 I think.
Ikegami:
The 64 is a strange game machine, there is no sound chip. The sound is generated
in the same place as the graphics. The graphics are a heavy load, so the sound
they can't draw on much power. On the other hand, the sound is something that
must be done every frame and cannot stop. Graphic and sound trade off for
computer performance. Therefore, there are some restrictions on the amount of
sounds that can be generated. We negotiated with the programmers as Dice.
First, do you decide a tight budget allocation?
Ikegami:
It’s hard to understand how much processing the program will be needed at the
beginning. But with Mr. Yamaguchi's music and my sound effects, there is a
minimum amount we wanted to create. We asked them to please not exceed a certain
amount. Later Mr. Yamaguchi and I allocated an possible and affordable number of
sounds and the waveform capacity. We achieved many things that were impossible
in the last game. The reason is that this time, we were developing our own
driver for sound effects .Normally, a sound effect is a one shot, a mechanism
prepares a waveform for the length of the sound effect and plays it. But if
there are as many wave-forms as there are sound effects it will eat up memory.
We used SEML. Sound effect markup language. It is a mechanism that plays a sound
effect by writing a script .
So you can play one bird's voice and make many birds sing, without having to
record many different birds voices or loop voices. After this mechanism was
developed we could save memory. I didn't want to have any unnecessary problems
with the soundtrack. Even so, it made Mr. Yamaguchi suffer a lot.
Yamaguchi:
No, I didn't have that much trouble.
Ikegami:
No, I think I would have gotten angry and given up if you weren't there!
Yamaguchi:
On the contrary, I think you were always doing your best.
Ikegami:
Also, the tools were pretty fundamental. Previously, I composed with a
Macintosh, converted the data, and loaded it. It was necessary to feed it into
the machine first. I couldn't play what I made right away. So I made a tool that
allows me to play 64 MIDI's directly. It was very well received any my sound
staff also used it. So when I brought it to Mr. Yamaguchi, he said, “This is
cool.". At that time, I thought, "The game will be manageable!" Before that, I
couldn't make a single sound effect unless I used a big workstation .
Yamaguchi:
It was easy for me to decide the instrument first . It's kind of like an
orchestra . However, due to Mr. Saito's request, I needed to make a rock-style
song for the fight scene. I also needed to adjust songs according to requests,
remove unused sounds and improve the quality of the sounds we chose. We then had
to revise all the information of the songs. For example, to thin out unimportant
sounds due to the limit on the number of sounds... I did a lot of this thinning
work.
Ikegami:
I got an email from Mr. Yamaguchi. "It's pretty interesting job thinning the
soundtrack “ I'm glad he is that kind of person (laughs).
Mr. Yamaguchi
I have a lot of game work these days, but there are people around me who find
our game interesting. They said “The graphics are hot!”
Next time is the final part of our “making of”. Please look forward to it!
2000-04-21-FRI
- Let's go fishing -
Interview with Hikone Norio and his wife Hikoneko Mafumi:
Hikone Norio was an indispensable artist who drew the cute animal characters for
our game. What kind of person is drawing these pictures, and how are they
drawing them? I visited Hikone's studio and we talked about various things.
Our game is set in a fishing village where you can go fishing with your
characters.. Where did these characters come from?
Hikone:
At first we were request to make certain kinds of characters. I drew them on
that basis. In the previous game, I was in charge of package illustrations and
commercial images, but this is the first time that I got to draw the characters
that appear in the game.
How are you connected to the world of games?
Hikone:
I drew the character Uncle Karl for the crisp brand Meiji Seika.
"Uncle Karl"!
Hikone:
That's right. "Uncle Karl" is my work, and in a game we made for them, the
characters have to plow a field and build a farm. When I worked on that, the
graphics were still rough.
The amount of information games hold has changed as a result of NINTENDO64 . The
graphics became 3D. This game is about moving your characters into a world with
such depth .
Hikone:
Yes, at first I wondered if it was ok to put my 2D characters into a 3D world.
For example, how would their shadows look? But once we devised it, we got used
to it.
With your characters, I feel that it makes it easier for beginners to enter the
fishing world .Could you tell us how these characters are going to be completed
?
Hikoneko Mafumi:
At first, we didn't know much about the game, so we started by creating
characters as we were told .
Hikone:
But in the process of creating a game, there were trials and errors, such as the
number of characters needed to increase, and conversely, we did not need some
characters. I want to just create the characters and leave the animation to
someone else. But when I saw the first sample, I thought "I want to do this
myself".
Do you mean as an animator?
Hikone:
That's right. Usually, I'm just an illustrator, I leave the animation to a
specialized person. There are people with 40 years of experience in animation
working in the industry. But I thought, I want to have consistency between my
pictures and the animation, so I want to do it myself.
Is there a difference between creating normal animation and animating on the
Nintendo 64?
Hikone:
It is said that the Nintendo 64 requires 6 pictures (videos) to repeat one
operation. Usually animation uses 8. The most basic movement is "walking", but
even when you take two steps, eight pictures need to be drawn. But on the
Nintendo 64 only 6 are needed, I didn't ask why, but that’s the way it is. So I
drew 6, but I'm used to 8, so it was difficult. It doesn't mean we just omit two
pictures, we have to re-drawn the whole movement into six actions. However, once
I got used to it, I felt a sense of pleasure that I could still feel a sense of
movement with a smaller number of pictures.
The animation was your main job, but was it awkward that the main theme was
fishing this time?
Hikone:
Well, I knew about walking, but I didn't know about fishing. So I thought that
it would be better if we used an animator who understood fishing well .However,
even if I did the fishing action, it only meant drawing three pictures at a
time, so it didn't matter much whether I was good at fishing or not.
Hikoneko Fumi:
We gave Dice a hard time, we asked them about a lot of things we didn't
understand. Mr. Ozeki from Dice gathered a lot of materials and lent us some
fishing videos. We made a rough animation draft. We drew 5 pictures of an
Octopus character.
Hikone:
This is the octopus. It is an octopus that Mr. Itoi holds. In this way, I drew 5
roughs and the best one was chosen. In the end, it became an octopus without
clothes.
You drew a lot of cats too
Hikone:
We came up with some candidates. The character's personality was so interesting
that it was my first request, so I enjoyed working it. It was easy to work on
something warm and has a good character. This character has a strange
personality. It was interesting to draw.
Hikoneko Mafumi:
Mr. Ozeki gave us some ideas for the characters:
Kuma-san (Mr Bear)
He can't refuse anything. Even if he had tackle, we would still buy a set of 10
from a door to door salesman.
Usagi-chan (Bunny)
She is relatively good at fishing and enjoys it, but she wants to catch more. So
she is serious in many ways.
Neko (Cat)
He insists that fishing is based on 8 beats, and fishes to music. He fishes for
sport more than leisure. If he works up a sweat catching a fish he doesn't feel
like he needs to catch more that day. He is refreshed by his fishing results.
Tanuki (Raccoon Dog)
I thinks and fishes quite seriously. He often thinks of his fishing progress and
forgets to sleep and eat. A fishing addict who thinks it is more important to go
fishing than spending time relaxing.
Kitsune-san (Mr. Fox)
He owns a one-stop shop for people who want to rent boats. He is pursuing the
legendary huge "Black Bass" that can only be caught on a full moon night . He is
an eccentric character who always shows his anger about Pattern Fishing by
saying “Don’t believe in the dark clouds.” I believes in his own methods, he has
a narrow minded personality.
Inu (Dog)
He is loyal but is very poor at keeping time and working with others. As a
result he rarely joins groups and usually fishes alone. He often catches fish
that he did not intend to, so others often call him the cruel name “unwanted
fish hunter”.
Wow, they are great! The completed game is written according to this PR material
"Kuma-san:
I'm a calm , care free type, and I'm always aware of my friends in the village.
My bass fishing skills are average
Behind that, there were such hidden personalities.
Hikone:
Because the cat likes music, we made his walk slightly different, making him
walk with a sense of rhythm. There was also a character who had a very
disgusting personality, who was definitely not the kind I would like to drink
with! He ended up not making it into the game, which made me happy.
In the world in which you draw, you do create the characters in this way too?
Hikone:
Characters are naturally created. For example, "Uncle Carl" has been around for
over 25 years, but the character is more complete now than he was at the
beginning. At first, I didn't think it would last so long, but I drew it just to
make one commercial, but as it became a series, it became popular. It was just a
matter of putting one human uncle in the animal world. After that, the frogs
were very popular, and the penguins appeared in an advert for Suntory. The
personalities of my characters become complete in that way. However, it was fun
and easy to draw characters with proper personalities from the beginning this
time.
Your animation works have been credited to both of you jointly. Have you been
working together for a long time?
Hikone:
We have been married a long time, from the time we worked at Mushi Productions
(laughs) I guess it was around the time that we worked on “Kimba the White Lion”
She was an animator, and she liked doing the colouring...she used to paint with
paints, but now she uses a mac. These days the paint quickly looks moldy. I
don’t know how to use a computer, so I handed her the hand painted ones and she
coloured them again on the computer. Recently she also made our homepage.
What kind of things are you working on now?
Hikone:
I'm drawing a calendar for next year. We have been working on it for a long
time. Also the story of Karl has continued. Then, I will draw the pictures for a
picture book that will be published next year... Ah, before that, I will have a
solo exhibition in Aoyama in November of this year, so I will draw new works for
that.
Hikoneko Fumi:
Are you worried that you can’t do it? (Laughs)
Hikone:
I have already reserved the gallery! (laughs).I have to do it.
Thanks to the characters drawn by the Hikone family, this game feels very warm.
If you're going fishing, it’s better to have some fun friends.
By the way, this is the last part of our making of.
I will tell you the results of our fishing tournament soon. Next time we will
talk about “The Legend of Zelda!” please look forward to it!
2000-04-28-FRI
7.Nintendo’s official press release.
Here is Nintendo’s official press release for the game. I have translated it
from Japanese. The original can be found here.
https://www.nintendo.co.jp/n01/n64/software/nus_p_nibj/index.html
Bass fishing No1 definitive edition!
Released on March 31, 2000. Recommended retail price 6,800 yen
Detect the whereabouts of a fish, choose a lure, and catch them!
Since the "bass fishing" is properly created, there are no "lies" in this game,
you can enjoy "real fishing", which sets it apart from conventional fishing
games. Anyway, the movement of the lure is real. You can move it with your 3D
stick. Of course, depending on the environment, such as the location,
temperature and season, the type and color of the lure, the ease of fishing, the
size of the fish that can be caught, and the type of fish will change.
You can enjoy fishing freely where you want to and where you think you can,
instead of being “forced to fish" at a certain places as in the past fishing
games.
A dual camera system for fishing while watching the water at the same time
The water camera displays the information necessary for fighting (line, rod tip,
whereabouts of fish). The underwater camera confirms the lure's appeal and
displays the movement of the bass. Simultaneous display improves the ease of
playing the game.
Realistic and smooth nature simulation
I was keen on fishing and noticed that the morning mist was fine, it started to
rain, and then it became dusk. In addition, you can enjoy the feeling of a 3D
space where you can walk around freely, than the previous game. Maybe you don't
want to be in a city as you progress through a game?
Compatible with the industry's first hoisting load type fishing controller the
"Flying Con 64"
For a more realistic and full-scale experience of bass fishing, we have also
created the "Flying Con 64" which is the first controller to replicate to the
reel winding load. The hoisting load and vibration will vary depending on the
size of the fish and how you fight. In addition, jerking and twitching are
possible with the "Flying Con 64". There is no doubt that you can enjoy more
realistic and authentic bass fishing!
Of course it also supports the "rumble pack"
Can't you enjoy the game without the "Flying Con 64"? That's not true. The
"rumble pack" is also supported so that you can feel the realism of bass fishing
even with just a normal controller. You can enjoy the realistic feeling of the
movement of the bass being transmitted to your hand.
*All screens are under development.
It's not just about fighting with the bass...
Not only will you enjoy fighting with the bass, but you can also infer changes
in the location of the bass due to changes in the season. You can enjoy thinking
about such things as "Are there bass here?" "I will be able to fish with this
lure?" Not only is the game fun, but also the theoretical part of fishing
("There are bass there and you can fish if you do this way") is realistic and
authentic.
"Help mode" for beginners
“I'm new to bass fishing, so maybe I don't know how to play...” Do you have such
anxieties? Of course, there is a help mode for beginners in bass fishing, and it
is possible to learn bass fishing while actually enjoying the game. People who
have been thinking "I'm interested in bass fishing but it seems difficult" can
get started with this software.
Let's go fishing with "heartwarming" characters!
This time, you can go fishing with the characters created by "Hikone Norio",
whose work was popular in the previous game. If you talk to them, they might
give you some advice?
The real pleasure of bass fishing? Boat fishing can be done anywhere you like!
Boat fishing is indispensable for bass fishing. You can also fish on an aluminum
boat in the game. Manipulate the aluminum boat to your favorite place and fish
where you want to... The unsatisfactory boat of the previous game has been
improved and made more realistic. It is fun just to drive the boat.
*All screens are under development.
