Johji Manabe himself thought this game was garbage, poking fun at it (and the miniscule amount of money he, as the creator, received as a licensing fee) in some of his other comics like Caravan Kidd. I enjoy "Outlanders", although part of that is nostalgia, since it was one of the first manga titles I read and collected. It came out when I was a teenager, and while it's not perfect, I have a lot of fond memories wrapped up in that monthly trip to the comic shop, digging through back issue bins, and finally completing the series around three years after I started collecting it. You are absolutely correct that nobody wants to remember this game though. Even I, fan of the comic that I am, played this one for about five minutes and gave up. Further proof that not even the greatest license in the world can salvage a trash game.
I've actually managed to complete this game on an original cart, and it doesn't get any better the deeper you go. The badness honestly compounds in a fascinating way as the game continues. I was following the official guidebook, which despite the game itself being quite linear, is a complete nonsense mess where objectives, maps, strategies, and items are all in different parts of the book making it a chore to figure out where to go next. There's also a part where to continue you literally have to win a coin flip five times in a row to get a required item. If you pick the randomly-decided incorrect option once, you start over. The guidebook also happens to include pictures from every topless scene in the anime, including a full-page shot of the green-haired alien princess bathing on the second page. Clearly they knew what their audience *really* wanted.
I always thought this was about the point in the manga where they've gone back to Santovasku empire. Kahm is taken by her father and Tetsuya is then arrested and sentenced to death. Tetsuya has to save her and the allies all help in the escape. I still need to play through the whole game, but I'm the dork that's read the manga twice, watched the OVA and love Kahm's stupid servant things (the yellow dude in the beginning wearing the blue robe).
I guess this series is paying off in some ways? if there seems to be less than ten minutes of footage of this game on the entirety of the internet that's definitely saying something about this one...
There’s all the side stuff like games from comedians and media personalities, forgotten toy series, various trends in game design and economic forces like a rush to put out crap combined with the economic boom
2:15 these are NOT good character portraits. White smears on Not-Lum’s head don’t read as horns. And Not-Ataru’s eyes are blending into his face Combat reminds me of Xanadu but there’s a lot more to that game
this is definitely terrible licensed shovelware, but it's one of the more interesting pieces of terrible licensed shovelware on the famicom, like City Adventure Touch. it's just so INTRICATELY terrible! Outlanders almost feels like a low-budget MSX game in how basic the gameplay is compared to the complexity of its stats and systems. i also quite like its color palette and the goofy off-model character portraits are really charming. not very good as a video game, but for the kusoge connoisseur, it deserves at least a few minutes of poking, prodding, and giggling at.
(me, a viewer of Jeremy Parish's video series, seeing the name Micronics) HOOO boy. For a Micronics game, this looks unusually smooth, but still... Apparently, there is a translation patch. However, I don't like playing games with a Dragon Quest menu unless it's Earthbound-related.
Johji Manabe himself thought this game was garbage, poking fun at it (and the miniscule amount of money he, as the creator, received as a licensing fee) in some of his other comics like Caravan Kidd.
I enjoy "Outlanders", although part of that is nostalgia, since it was one of the first manga titles I read and collected. It came out when I was a teenager, and while it's not perfect, I have a lot of fond memories wrapped up in that monthly trip to the comic shop, digging through back issue bins, and finally completing the series around three years after I started collecting it.
You are absolutely correct that nobody wants to remember this game though. Even I, fan of the comic that I am, played this one for about five minutes and gave up. Further proof that not even the greatest license in the world can salvage a trash game.
Fun Fact: The English VA for the main protagonist in the animated adaptation of Outlanders is Sean Schemmel. The voice of Goku from DBZ.
I've actually managed to complete this game on an original cart, and it doesn't get any better the deeper you go. The badness honestly compounds in a fascinating way as the game continues. I was following the official guidebook, which despite the game itself being quite linear, is a complete nonsense mess where objectives, maps, strategies, and items are all in different parts of the book making it a chore to figure out where to go next. There's also a part where to continue you literally have to win a coin flip five times in a row to get a required item. If you pick the randomly-decided incorrect option once, you start over.
The guidebook also happens to include pictures from every topless scene in the anime, including a full-page shot of the green-haired alien princess bathing on the second page. Clearly they knew what their audience *really* wanted.
I always thought this was about the point in the manga where they've gone back to Santovasku empire. Kahm is taken by her father and Tetsuya is then arrested and sentenced to death. Tetsuya has to save her and the allies all help in the escape. I still need to play through the whole game, but I'm the dork that's read the manga twice, watched the OVA and love Kahm's stupid servant things (the yellow dude in the beginning wearing the blue robe).
I guess this series is paying off in some ways? if there seems to be less than ten minutes of footage of this game on the entirety of the internet that's definitely saying something about this one...
There’s all the side stuff like games from comedians and media personalities, forgotten toy series, various trends in game design and economic forces like a rush to put out crap combined with the economic boom
2:15 these are NOT good character portraits. White smears on Not-Lum’s head don’t read as horns. And Not-Ataru’s eyes are blending into his face
Combat reminds me of Xanadu but there’s a lot more to that game
this is definitely terrible licensed shovelware, but it's one of the more interesting pieces of terrible licensed shovelware on the famicom, like City Adventure Touch. it's just so INTRICATELY terrible! Outlanders almost feels like a low-budget MSX game in how basic the gameplay is compared to the complexity of its stats and systems. i also quite like its color palette and the goofy off-model character portraits are really charming. not very good as a video game, but for the kusoge connoisseur, it deserves at least a few minutes of poking, prodding, and giggling at.
(me, a viewer of Jeremy Parish's video series, seeing the name Micronics) HOOO boy. For a Micronics game, this looks unusually smooth, but still...
Apparently, there is a translation patch. However, I don't like playing games with a Dragon Quest menu unless it's Earthbound-related.
I think this is Micronics's worst game. And I've played all of them...
That weapon sound is so painfully generic Famicom.