The only game by Miki & Fujiwara Production I know of is Ultima Exodus (MSX), and I find no correlation at all.Originally Posted by CRV
Takeshi 'Honami' Yasuda did music on Ultima 1 (MSX), though.
I do however find some correlation with Super Runner (MSX), though it seems to be Pony personnel.
Have you looked at other ports of Ultima than NES and Famicom?
I am quite convinced. I think I'll submit that to Mobygames.
Well, besides Yasuda and Arimoto, everybody seems to be from the same developer. Just take a look at these credits. I've put an asterix next to everyone I've associated with Miki & Fujiwara/Opera House/whatever.
http://gdri.smspower.org/iscocredits.txt
It would seem Hitoshi Sakimoto was contracted to them as well.
My current theory: Miki & Fujiwara Production started out as a two-man operation. When it grew, it became Opera House.
We have looked at some of the MSX ones, haven't we?
Oh, I thought that you meant games that actually credited M&F Pro. I haven't come around to reconstructing such a company. I have just thought of it as ISCO calling up freelancers whenever it needed a game.Well, besides Yasuda and Arimoto, everybody seems to be from the same developer. Just take a look at these credits. I've put an asterix next to everyone I've associated with Miki & Fujiwara/Opera House/whatever.
http://gdri.smspower.org/iscocredits.txt
As for ISCO, it seems that there are some credits in Classic Road 2, but I haven't seen them. Have you?
Musicians are often freelancers since they want to retain rights to their own compositions.
Have you found any references to Opera House outside of Breaktime?
Sorry, I meant MSX and NES.We have looked at some of the MSX ones, haven't we?
Interesting that these "freelancers" also worked on Pony Canyon games together.
I have a program installed called "NJWIN - NJStar CJK Viewer," which lets me view Japanese characters. It was in either the Classic Road or Classic Road II ROM where I saw "YMOH.S." But I couldn't copy and paste anything useful, just garbage as usual.
I know Sakimoto was a freelancer, but he seemed to have a contract with "this group."
No, not yet. But I can't point out anybody in the Break Time credits who doesn't appear to be with "this group" or Pony Canyon. With FC Ultima IV, produced by Newtopia, I can point to the producer Yasuo Hattori and say, "Hey, he's from Newtopia."
There were those PC-98 ports that were apparently by JH1NRR and company.
NOTE: I've added GB Bubble Ghost to iscocredits.txt
Oh my god! I had never though that they would put SJIS straight into a SNES ROM!I have a program installed called "NJWIN - NJStar CJK Viewer," which lets me view Japanese characters. It was in either the Classic Road or Classic Road II ROM where I saw "YMOH.S." But I couldn't copy and paste anything useful, just garbage as usual.
Here's what I found:
Code:Classic road II (SNES): ----------------------- STAFF The Original Plan ????? (Yoshihiro Hanaoka) The Original Game ????????? (Progress co., Ltd.) Programmer ???? (Satoru Miki) Chief Graphic Designer ????? (Hiroshi Akagi) Composer ????? (Hayato Matsuo) Sound Designer ?????? (Hitoshi Sakimoto) Game Designer ????? (Masaaki Furuya) Blood Data ???? (??? ???) ???? (Katsu/Masaru/Suguru Satou) Graphic Supporter ????? (Atsuhiro Gunji) ????? (Kunihiko Nishikimi/Nishimi) ???? (Project leader/supervisor) ????? (Shigeki Saka) ????? (Hiroaki Iwano) Test Player ????? (Akinori Aika/Ouka/Ouga) ????? (Masato Ishii) Special Thanks ???? (Noboru Matsuzaki) ????? (Junko Watanabe) Dialect Adviser ????? (Shuusaburou Matsuoka) Director ????? (Hiroyuki/Hiroshi Furui)Draw your own conclusions, I'm going to bed now.Code:Classic road (SNES): -------------------- Original idea: Progress co., Ltd. Original work: Yoshihiro Hanaoka Director: Hiroshi/Hiroyuki Yasui Assistant director: Tetsuya Shinotsuka/Shinozuka Program: Satoru Miki Graphic design: Hiroshi Akagi, Yasuaki Mizutani, Atsuhiro Gunji, Kiyoto/Seijin/Sumito Yoshimura Graphic support: Kunihiko Nishikimi/Nishimi, Tomohiro Ueno Sound design: YMOH.S, Hayato Matsuo Sound support: Tsukasa Tawada Project manager/supervisor: Shigeki Saka, Hiroaki Iwano, Hidetoshi Uchida Special Thanks: Yoshiaki Iwasawa, Kouki Minami, Shunji/Toshiyuki Nishizawa, Kaku Maetani, Masumi/Makoto/Tadashi/Atsushi Morio, ??? Oozeki, Katsu/Masaru/Suguru Satou, Sadahiro Harada (Three of these worked with marketing for Victor/JVC around the same time) Game design: Masaaki Furuya Supervisor: Tsutomu/Osamu/Atsushi Okabe
Good work. Here we see Furuya, Miki, Gunji, and Akagi together again.
Not sure who or what Progress Co., Ltd. is, though.
I checked Kyûyaku Megamitensei today:
Several familiar names there.Code:Kyûyaku Megamitensei (SNES): ---------------------------- General Producer H.YOKOYAMA Producer Y.NIINO Chief Director T.KAI Co-director M.TAKAHASHI Character Design K.KANEKO SoundComposition MACCO TITLEIllustration NORIMASA MATSUSHITA Main Programer YOUDERNG Main Programer Y.TAKASHIBA Visual Programer C.TOKUHIRO Programer H.FUJIWARA, S.MIKI Scenario Plan M.FURUYA Scenario Plan J.WATANABE Chief Designer K.YOSHIMURA Designer A.GUNJI, H.AKAGI Designer Y.MIZUTANI, S.SATO Designer T.IWASAKI, M.IKENAGA Sound Composer YMOH.S ImageIllustration R.TOBE Marketing S.AIHARA, M.IDEN, T.KOMATSU, F.ISHII Marketing N.KAWAI, K.YAMAMOTO, T.HANYA, S.MINOWA Thanks to Y.ASADA (NAMCO Ltd.), Y.TSUYUKI (NAMCO Ltd.) Thanks to K.OKADA, H.IWANO, Y.KOJIMA, T.MARUYAMA Thanks to E.SHIOTA, Y.EBIHARA, K.HISADA, T.TAMURA Special Thanks to NAMCO Ltd. Presented by ATLUS Ltd.
Checking Super Hockey '94/Super Ice Hockey brings up all the usual suspects:
I also ran a check on Numbers Paradise. The game text was readable half-width kana, but no trace of any credits, bar that MOMOI TOSHIHIKO reference in plain ASCII.Code:Super ice hockey (SNES): ------------------------ SUPER ICE HOCKEY STAFF EXECUTIVE PRODUCER S.YONEZAWA GENERAL PRODUCER S.AKUTSU PRODUCER T.FUJIOKA (FROM ESPAL) PLANNER H.OHARA PROGRAM NEKO, S.MIKI, H.FUJIWARA, Y.OGASAWARA GRAPHIC A.GUNJI, CAP, Y.MIZUTANI, N.ISHIGAMI MUSIC YMOH.S, H.MATSUO DIRECTOR S.SAKA ASISTANT DIRECTOR H.IWANO, H.UCHIDA ART DIRECTION K.OBI (FROM ESPAL) THANKS FOR H.SHIMIZU, MR.CHAWAN-YA & MR.FUJIKAWA (FROM JET THUNDERBIRDS), MR.MIYAKE (FROM LE BAL), SHIGERU.O
Do you know where to find that quiz game they did for the SFC?
Shijou Saikyou no Quiz Ou Kettei Sen Super?
Found it at ROM World fairly easily.
Thanks again for the credits.
More ISCO stuff here:
http://vgrebirth.org/games/search.asp?developers=1444
We've learned that ISCO didn't really seem to develop anything, but there are some games where they apparently just did graphics and movie work. Did they do any of that in-house or did they outsource that, too?
Do you have any proof that the company behind all of said games is Micronics other than the Raiden Trad screenshot?
Y helo thar.
Bloody Warriors and Mottomo Abunai Deka also say Micronics on their title screens, plus there's shared credits, and common sound effects (pause tone) and coding issues (jerky scrolling, sprite tearing, music desyncing).
That said, I'm not entirely convinced that Athena or Ikari II were done by them. Most of the others are all but definite, though, in my opinion.
HYPER THREAD BUMP
I was talking with crv last night and ended doing some tracing and searches on the sound code used in these games. The results were that we can more-or-less confirm that all of these games were done by the same company:
'89 Dennou Kyuusei Uranai
Athena
Bloody Warriors
Daiku no Gensan 2
Ikari Warriors
Ikari Warriors II
Jongbou
Kaguya Hime Densetsu
Kaiketsu Yanchamaru 3
Miracle Ropit's Adventure in 2100
Mottomo Abunai Deka
Ninja Kun Ashura no Shou
Outlanders
Shin Satomi Hakken-Den
Stick Hunter
Thundercade
Tiger-Heli
Twin Cobra
Zoids
Zoids 2
Every one of these games uses one of a handful of variations of the same sound code. Notice this confirms several argued games (Daiku no Gensan 2, Miracle Ropit, Ikari II, Ninja Kun) as well as adding several new ones (mostly RPGs). I haven't had a chance to delve into any of their earlier games yet, though...
Additionally, I've been able to confirm that Commando was done in-house at Capcom, as it shares sound code with *takes deep breath*: 1943, Bionic Commando, Destiny of an Emperor, Gun.Smoke, Higemaru Makaijima, Ide Yousuke Meijin no Jissen Mahjong, Legendary Wings, Mega Man, Mega Man 2, Pro Yakyuu Satsujin Jiken, Section Z, Strider, Trojan, and Willow.
I've yet to find anything meaningful in Elevator Action, Ghosts 'n Goblins, or Onyanko Town yet, but that's simply because they use a (surprisingly more efficient) sound driver that's harder to track.
Efforts to find any SNES games they've done other than Raiden Trad and Acrobat Mission have thus far proven futile. I also like the suggestion that they did MD Atomic Robo Kid, but there's probably no possible way of confirming that one.
I would be more conservative and say that the sound routine is made by the same people.
Fair enough. Still, the fact is that basically all that popped up were games that either were already known or believed to be by Micronics, or games that look and feel like their work. Of course, then one could argue that only similarly talentless companies used this sound system...
Unlike with later hardware, also, it seems that each developer came up with their own sound routines on the NES. There doesn't seem to be anything like SMPS or GEMS on the Genesis, or something like MusyX for a more modern equivalent. Capcom had their own sound routines, Konami did, Nintendo did (probably quite a few different, actually), Aicom did, etc...it seems to me like a perfectly viable way to find potential who-done-what candidates. Not much outside of code analysis can be done in these cases where credits are largely nonexistant, short of tracking down the people who actually made them.
Of course if fortifies the thesis that one developer was behind it.Fair enough. Still, the fact is that basically all that popped up were games that either were already known or believed to be by Micronics, or games that look and feel like their work. Of course, then one could argue that only similarly talentless companies used this sound system...
On the other hand, wouldn't Yuzo Koshiro have used the same sound driver while working for different companies, even though his driver had become the standard one at Falcom?
I can't speak for his earlier work but I can say that on the MD this really wasn't the case for him specifically.
Revenge of Shinobi uses a standard Sega system (pre-SMPS).
Streets of Rage uses a modified version of SMPS.
Streets of Rage 2 uses a completely custom system.
Streets of Rage 3 and Beyond Oasis (both of which credit Ancient) use a system developed at Ancient.
I'm not sure what Slap Fight MD uses as it didn't run in MESS when I tried it. It's possibly the same as SoR2.
Every game developed by Konami uses one of three engines used only in Konami games. Every Tecnosoft game uses the same engine. Every Koei game uses the same engine. Every Micronet game uses the same engine.
Conversely, all four games Jesper Kyd scored used the same engine even though they had different publishers and developers. Same with Brian Schmidt (though many credit Visual Concepts). Same with Matt Furniss (Krysalis).
I'm...not really sure where I'm going with this. Still, many third-party companies had their own sound engines used company-wide. Licensed, wide-use sound engines (GEMS springs to mind) tend to be identifiable by being used in a wide range of games by different developers.
...man, am I typing a lot today.
In Matt Furniss's case, most games will say "Sound by Krisalis" or something similar. He worked together with Shaun Hollingworth (both working at Krisalis), who wrote the sound drivers. Apparently there was a lack of competence in writing good sound drivers for the Megadrive in the industry, if you look at how much work Krisalis got.
Interesting about Koshiro, I didn't know that he would use a Sega routine.
I guess I'm not surprised that Commando was developed in-house at Capcom, but one game missing from this list is 1942. Did you guys check that one? Not that it's terribly important, or that there's really any question whether or not Micronics produced it (listen to the pause tone-I think that's fairly convincing evidence), but I'm just curious.
Yeah, I found a few more snippets of code (init and sprite routines -- not sound stuff) that linked virtually every game in my list above as well as 1942, Elevator Action, Exed Exes, Ghosts 'n Goblins, Onyanko Town, and Son Son. I think at this point we've found probably all of the games they made on the NES. I'll just c/p from IRC as that's easier...
[Dimitri] Anyway, I found init code shared between 1942, Elevator Action, Exed Exes, Onyanko Town, and Son Son.
[Dimitri] And I just found another bit of code that's shared between a bunch of games.
[Dimitri] code shared: 1942, '89 Dennou Kyuusei Uranai, Elevator Action, Exed Exes, Ghosts 'n Goblins, Ikari Warriors, Jongbou, Miracle Ropit, Mottomo Abunai Deka, Ninja Hattori Kun, Ninja Kun Ashura no Shou, Outlanders, Son Son, Stick Hunter, Super Pitfall, Tiger-Heli, Twin Cobra, Zoids
[Dimitri] And this is in-game code.
And to think I always blamed Capcom for those abortions. Well, Trojan is still their fault, right?
http://review-site.net/developer/xo.html#オペラハウス
Seems I may be right about Miki/Fujiwara. The company is Opera House. The list at SIT Developer Table is a rather odd one, being mostly PS2 games, but the last game on the list is Classic Road for the Super Famicom.
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