Quest 64

Bonus post! I'm super ahead of schedule, so I'm releasing this early.

Not too long ago I was having a conversation with my husband about Quest 64. When I asked him if he remembered it, he said "You're damn right I do! That game was awful!" Damningly, he further stated that "it almost ruined RPGs for me. It was all I knew about RPGs at the time." While I have never played Quest 64 myself, the disappointment and anger in my husband's voice, two decades after the game came out, inspired me to delve into the making of this game.

Quest 64 was developed by Imagineer Co. Ltd. and published by THQ in north America. In PAL regions, the publisher was Konami and, in Japan, Imagineer published the game themselves. It was released on June 1 1998 for the N64 in North America and a couple of months later for PAL regions. Despite being made by a Japanese development team, it wasn't released in Japan until July 1999, for reasons that will become apparent later. The game has a different title for each region. In north America it is Quest 64. In Europe it's known as Holy Magic Century. In Japan it was released as Eltale Monsters (also spelled 'Eletale'). Based off of this info alone, it is obvious that development for this game was a mess.

Development

Quest 64 was developed by a company called Imagineer. Founded in 1986, they are based in Japan. Their website notes that they acquire rights to foreign video games in order to release them in Japan and are paired with Sanrio to make/publish Hello Kitty games. While they still develop games today, it is not the focal point of the company anymore as they have only made three games since 2003. So where do they make their money, you ask? Strangely enough, they have gotten into the renewable energy sector. In 2015 they partnered with two energy stations in Japan. In 2010 they began work in consulting investors. As with all consulting firms, it isn't super clear what they do exactly. What can be said is that video games are on the back burner for them nowadays. As for Quest 64, development began in the mid-90s and the game was announced in June of 1997. Its working title was Crystal Stories. In August 1997, it entered its second stage of development and changed its working title to Holy Magic Century Eltale. It was announced that it would be released in December of the same year. As mentioned previously, the game wasn't released until 7 months later in the US. Interestingly, it was set to come out in Japan in the summer of 1997. Which would have made sense considering Japanese made games usually come out in Japan first. However, the Japanese version was canceled shortly after its western releases. While the Japanese version of the game was eventually released, it was a year later with a whole bunch of changes intended to polish the game. Speaking of debacles, the entire development for this game was a mess. And this was a mess of their own making. Imagineer was attempting to beat Zelda: Ocarina of Time as the first RPG on the system and tap into an RPG hungry market. Sadly, for whatever reason, development took longer than initially anticipated and major parts of the game had to be cut out to meet said deadline. Couple that together with the limitations of the N64 and you have a recipe for mediocrity. I will go over the details of this later. First though, credit where credit is due. Let's go over some of the team members with remarkable careers: Takayuki Kamikura: His role on Quest 64 was executive producer. He held the same position on Doom II, Wolfenstein 3D, Populous, and Populous II. On the latter, he also helped with design. Gabriel Jones: He headed up development for Quest 64. He was also director of development for Dragon Age: Origins and several mid 2000s Marvel games. He's listed as producer on Road Rash 64, 97-98 Madden, and NHL 97-98. Additionally, he has done QA for NHL, Madden, NBA Live, PGA Tour, and FIFA series'. Steve Ryno: Was creative advisor. Ryno has worked as VP of product development on NBA Live, NHL, FIFA, Madden and PGA Tour series'. He also worked production on a whole slew of games in the mid and late 90s. For the most part these are sports and children's games. Greg Gibson (tech assistant for Q64) also worked as producer on many of these games. Tsukasa Masuko (aka Macco): Masuko has a long career in video game music composition and mixing. Many of these games are big name titles. He was head of musical arrangement for Super Smash Bros. on the Wii U. He was audio engineer for Blue Dragon Plus and worked on sound for Heroes of Mana and Sword of Mana. Most importantly, to me, he worked on the early Shin Megami games. Last fun fact: he was also an uncredited composer for Arkanoid. Susumu Watanabe: Field map designer for Quest 64. Watanabe later worked production on Deadly Premonition and Killer7. He also programmed for Gran Turismo 5: Prologue and worked on design for Professor Layton vs. Phoenix Wright. Masamichi Amano (Masamicz): Worked on music alongside Tsukasa Masuko. He has also conducted and mixed Infinite Space, Mario and Sonic at the Olympic Games (2007), Phantasy Star Universe, and composed for Onimusha 3. Donn W. Nauert: He did QA for Quest 64, as well as hundreds of other games, including Croc, MTV Sports games, WWF games, Tiger Woods PGA Tour 2000, just to name a few. Nauert was also producer on Disney games, UFC, WCW, FIFA, Madden, NHL, PGA Tour, and NBA Live. Carol Ann Hanshaw: Her and her husband, Neil Hanshaw, wrote the manual for Quest 64. She is a professional manual writer with over a hundred games under her belt. Hanshaw most notably wrote for DMC 2, Legacy of Kain series, Deus Ex, Syphon Filter 3, Thief II, Ape Escape, Spyro 1 and 2, Tomb Raider: The Last Revelation, Dragon Warrior Monsters, Ecco games, Gex, Jumping Flash!, DOOM, Shadowrun, Sonic & Knuckles, Sonic 2, Sonic Chaos and Spinball, and ToeJam and Earl in Panic on Funkotron. Her husband, while less prolific, has worked on some of the same game manuals with his wife. With development info out of the way, let's talk about some of the ads and previews for Quest 64. These will be in order of date published.

Ads and Previews

Quest 64 was previewed early on in the very first issue of N64 magazine, back in April 1997. At the time the game was still going by its working title, Crystal Stories. They note that the working title for the Japanese audience was Holy Magic Century Eltale. While excited for the first RPG on the N64, the article mentions that "its characters and locations certainly seem typical of a thousand SNES role players." They further state that the game should last around 40 hours and that "...more importantly...it's nearly ready for release. In fact, Crystal Stories ought to be out in Japan this summer." Of course, in hindsight, we all know that wasn't true.

N64 took another look at Quest 64 three months later in its fourth issue. They announced there would now be three characters in your party. The first was the main character, who the player would name. The other two in your party would be a princess name Nina (your healer) and a pirate named Cozi. Once again, the magazine gives a more tempered view of the game and story by saying: "While the storyline in Holy Magic Century could hardly be said to be revolutionary, anyone who's enjoyed any other Japanese RPGs, from Breath of Fire down, will be more than happy here."

In December of 1997, GamePro previewed Quest 64. Of it, they note it was "hoping to beat Zelda to the shelves as the first role-playing game for the Nintendo 64" and that it "...teleports gamers into a magical 3D environment filled with spells, riddles, and enemies." All aboard the hype train! As for the main character, he has a name now. It is Shanjaque. Yeah. Maybe they should have continued to allow the player to name him. Granted, it is more creative than the name they eventually settle on for English speaking audiences.

Computer and Video Games magazine published a preview in its February 98 issue. At this point, the battle system was more fleshed out. The author found it to be "the most impressive element" of the game. While the game has the standard random battles, you aren't taken to a separate screen to fight them. Instead, an area around the player is cordoned off and you fight battles within it. This is nothing super exciting today, but at the time it was, I'll admit, pretty innovative. CVG also mentions "the glorious 3D environments", which were looking pretty good by this point.

A month later, Edge magazine also featured a preview of Quest 64. They state: "Now that the PlayStation has the definitive RPG in the form of Final Fantasy VII, the N64 has some ground to make up. Along with Nintendo itself, Imagineer is taking up the baton..." They, like all other publications, note the uphill battle against Zelda: "With Zelda: Ocarina of Time hitting shop shelves in the same quarter, Holy Magic Century could find itself cold shouldered by consumers." With speculation on its future success against the behemoth Zelda out of the way, they go on to say that the graphics were looking amazing and comparable to Mario 64. GamePro covered Quest 64 again in May of 1998, just ahead of its June release in the US. They are hyped; "If Quest 64 continues its impressive development, it could be the large-scale character adventure Nintendo 64 owners have been salivating to embark upon." At this time, the game was supposed to have over 100 characters to interact with, more than 50 spells to use, and seven cities to explore. Here is the most interesting part of the preview though: "Japanese gamers will be able to get their eager RPG-starved mitts on Holy Magic Century sometime this December... Imagineer are already talking with UK publishers about releasing the game over here. All things well and good we could get it as soon as January next year." This is curious as the game was released in Europe ahead of schedule in late 1998 while the Japanese release wouldn't happen until mid-1999.

Reviews and Reactions

So, how well was the game received? I'm sure you already know. Once again, I'll be splitting this section up into graphics, sound, gameplay, and overall scores. I'll also give my personal opinion on what went wrong with Quest 64 at the end.

Graphics: 64 Magazine called the visuals "simplistic but effective" and noted the "...vibrant use of colour." The game ran smoothly with clipping being "...almost non-existent." GamePro on the other hand was less impressed and thought the backgrounds seemed "...lifeless and uninspired." They elaborated by saying: "the main character is well illustrated, as are most of the enemies, but the spell effects look like they flew straight in from a Saturday morning cartoon." It is worth noting here that the spell effects were updated for the Japanese release. Nintendo Power didn't agree with GamePro on the spells, though. Of the graphics they say: "the animation of enemies during battle is another highlight, and each magic spell is portrayed with animation, as well." They also found the world "attractive" with plenty of "...beautiful places and towns to explore." Lastly, the reviewer for Gamezilla said that these graphics are what they "expect out of the N64" and that "...the world is all 3D and very colorful." Overall, they liked the graphics the most, going so far as to say that they were "...the best part of the game."

Sound:

Honestly, none of the reviews really mentioned the sound all that much. When it is mentioned, reviewers say it is mediocre at best and downright irritating at worst. Nintendo Official Magazine says the sound was "nothing much" and that "the tune that follows ya around will have you turning down your TV." Nintendo Power reflected this sentiment by saying "the walk-around music doesn't add much, and the footfalls are very irritating." Lastly, GameSpot weighs in on the music: "the game's music is varied throughout the game. It's of the cutesy music box variety for the most part." Certainly, no one was impressed by the music. This may be due, at least in part, to the rushed nature of the game. On the website The Cutting Room Floor, several users have dove into the code for the game and found many remixes and unused scores. It seems like just another thing that didn't quite get finished.

Gameplay: Here we go down the rabbit hole. This is truly where the game fell apart for a lot of reviewers. 64 Magazine's tagline for its review: "if you ever wanted to live in a fantasy world, be warned - this one's as dull as the real one!" For the reviewer, the title and main character are indicative of the kind of game you are going to get: a simple one. With apologies given to any 'Brians' reading, they state that "...it's hardly the most stirring name you could find." They aren't wrong. My personal opinion is that the publisher thought it best to change the main character's name in order to appeal to a youthful American audience. This was a bad move as it only served to further simplify an already simple game. As for the NPCs, the reviewer thought they looked rather nice, but that "...they don't actually DO anything." They then mention the preview they featured before the game's release: "some months back, before the game was finished, developers Imagineer said that there would be other characters who could join the hero in his quest. Hmm, guess they never got round to putting them in. Brian has to face all the dangers of the world on his own, which is a bit of a bummer for an 8 year old." I would like to take time to note that Brian's original age was supposed to be 12. I imagine they changed the age to appeal to a younger demographic; once again serving to simplify the game. They also note that the combat system has been simplified to a point where it was no longer engaging. As for the puzzles the game was supposed to feature (to make it competitive with Zelda), they never materialized. This goes for many elements of the game: "There's a lot of wasted space that could have been put to better use - rooms with nothing in them, characters who don't do anything, vast areas of land with no purpose that take ages to run across. Had the designers not been so keen to make a real(ish) world, they could have created one that was interesting instead. Even the text-only adventures of old were more involving." Overall, 64 Magazine gave the game a score of 56%, saying it was "too simple for adults, too boring for kids. A major disappointment."

It seems other reviewers were on board with 64's overall sentiment. GamePro starts their review by stating that "selling an RPG for the Nintendo 64 should be one of the easiest things in the world", but that gamers need to wait for Zelda before they can play a true RPG. They go further, calling the gameplay "elementary" and the story "boring". They also note that there is no treasure to collect and no real shops in the towns. Apparently, the shops only sell one item, which is usually bread. Their conclusion of the game: "When Zelda is released, Quest will be as easily forgotten as last Wednesday's lunch." While harsh, they were certainly right.

Hyper Magazine, a UK magazine, called the game "RPG lite". They reflect the disappointment of the GamePro and 64 Magazine's reviewers by saying the game "lacks depth and a compelling reason to play and is probably best suited to very young gamers." Overall they game the game a score of 65%.

N64 Magazine does a great job of comparing the finished product to the game they previewed months earlier. Right out the gate, they note that the game had been canceled in Japan with a release there being "unlikely." Next, the main character's name: "yes, he really is called that and, no, you can't change the name." Remember, one of the previews stated that the player would be naming the main character. Not sure why they scrapped that idea myself as it sure wasn't a new concept. Additionally, they note that the battles are far too frequent, a complaint other reviewers shared, and that 90% of the text has nothing to do with the quest mentioned in the title. Even so, they gave the game a final score of 71%. Not really reflective of their review, but there it is anyways.

The reviewer for Nintendo Official Magazine seems to be the only one that enjoyed the game. Make of that what you will. They thought that the game looked "stunning" and it was well suited for younger RPGsters." While they do note that the game will be a breeze for older players, they still thought it was "top enjoyment" and "...a hoot from start to finish." They gave it a score of 84%. Nintendo Power, on the other hand, agreed with the rest of the reviewers: "Quest 64 could use more variety, more tasks, more items, more side plots and more puzzles. The constant fighting can become tedious quickly." They even went so far as to say the game didn't qualify to be called an RPG because it lacked so many of the classic elements that make up the genre. In conclusion, they game the game a 6.3 out of 10.

Lastly, Gamezilla's review was from the view point of a gamer that had never played RPGs. They note that "people who are into RPGs probably won't like it, but if you have never played an RPG before and have felt intimidated by the other games that are out there, this is your chance." Overall, they give the game a positive review. Now for (more of) my personal opinion on the changes made to the game and what went wrong. To distance myself from the hype of many of the previews, I'm not sure the game was ever going to be comparable to Zelda: Ocarina of Time or FFVII, but they clearly had bigger plans for this game nontheless. So what happened? I think many of the gameplay and story elements had to be cut because they were running behind schedule (note the timeline of the previews. At one point they were about 6-12 months behind schedule). This may have been because, like a lot of flawed games, there were too many ideas and hands in the pot. The game may have even been scrapped a couple of times, which often happens to troubled games. All this resulted in a dilemma: push back the game and complete the vision for it, or simplify it in order to beat Zelda as the first RPG on the N64. They chose the latter. On The Cutting Room Floor website, it is obvious from the junk code that a ton of stuff was taken out. Additionally, we know that there were supposed to be other characters in your party. The princess Nina was turned into an NPC called princess Flora and the pirate Cozi became an NPC called Kiliac (also a pirate). Lastly, the limitations of the N64 did not help this game. It could never be a Final Fantasy to begin with because there just wasn't enough room on the cartridge for that kind of epic.

Lastly, my two cents on the Japanese release. It is quite odd for a Japanese developer to not only release their game elsewhere first, but to then cancel the Japanese release altogether. Granted, they did eventually release it there...a year later, with changes that were meant to polish up the game. The first boss now deals less damage and all bosses also give both HP and MP after being defeated, while they only gave HP in the NTSC and PAL versions. The Japanese version also has new music, better graphics and designs, as well as an extended ending. I think most of these changes were made because they knew a Japanese audience would have less of a tolerance for a lackluster RPG. I mean, this is the country that popularized the modern RPG for god's sake.

Modern reception

While Quest 64 didn't get much love back in its day, it has a bit of a cult following today. On one forum I found, a user asked if there are any more games like Quest 64. They said it was one of their favorite RPGs, despite the terrible plot. Several other people weighed in, also noting their love of the game. One user gushed: "Oh my god....easily one of my top games on the N64! I still have my cart for it! /nostalgia."

In a thread on Gamefaqs, titled "Quest 64 wasnt a bad game", the OP thinks that the game isn't bad, it is just bad at being an RPG. Which, honestly isn't a terrible point. The game isn't broken and it does have some interesting ideas, which several users also make note of.

Lastly, Kotaku has published an article titled "I Still Enjoy Watching People Play Quest 64". For the author, Quest 64 invokes some of their best childhood memories. Honestly, all of us can relate to this in some way. Maybe the game isn't Quest 64, but we all have terrible games we feel nostalgic for. I have tons of nostalgia for Spice World and Rugrats: Search for Reptar myself, even though those games don't have the best reputation.

Canceled Sequel

Clearly, Quest 64 never got a sequel due to its poor critical performance. However, there seems to have been one in the works, according to an article from Nintendo Fun Vision. It was in development from 1998 to 1999 and would have been set 100 years after the first game. In the second game, players would have been able to choose either a female or male character. Unfortunately, Imagineer ran into financial trouble and had to cancel both Quest 64 II and another game titled Desert Island 64. Sadly, the only thing that remains from the sequel are a few pieces of art.

While Quest 64 is mainly remembered as a mediocre/terrible game, it should also be remembered as a game that deserved better. It had so much potential, but like many other games it was ruined by corporate interference. Despite this, it has intensely loyal fans to this day.

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NOTE: I lost my sources due to an error (won't happen again!). I have re-added what I had saved in my blog bookmarks folder. There may be a source or two missing. -https://www.steamgifts.com/discussion/MScXZ/does-anyone-know-of-any-other-games-like-quest-64 - https://www.unseen64.net/2009/11/28/quest-64-ii-2-n64-cancelled/ - https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/boards/916387-nintendo-64/75407403 - https://kotaku.com/i-still-enjoy-watching-people-play-quest-64-1825752720 - https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/boards/997614-nintendo-3ds/67252767 - https://archive.org/stream/NEXT_Generation_29#page/n55/mode/2up - https://web.archive.org/web/20010620041542/www.gamezilla.com/console/reviews/q/ quest64.asp

- https://tcrf.net/Quest_64

- http://www.nintendo64ever.com/Tests-Nintendo-64-Game,138,Holy-Magic-Century,1.html - http://www.nintendo64ever.com/Nintendo-64-Game-Previews,138,Holy-Magic-Century,1.html - https://twitter.com/retrogamegeeks/status/1054333688220139521 - https://www.ebay.com/itm/STARFOX-64-Original-1997-print-AD-N64-game-promo-Nintendo-of-America-advert-/283517550024?oid=273651841930 - https://reviewfix.com/2018/05/quest-64-the-rpg-that-could-have-been/ - https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/boards/631516-wii-u/66926279 - https://web.archive.org/web/19980610223514/http://www.imag.demon.co.uk/image.html - https://www.imagineer.co.jp