Dreamcast Typing of the Dead: Japanese vs. US

[jasonbar]

Howdy-

 

I've got a sealed Typing of the Dead game & a sealed keyboard for Dreamcast, both Japanese. I'm not sure if they're factory sealed or re-sealed by a store for used sale, but I don't want to open them up if I can't use them anyway...

 

So, my questions are:

 

1 - Does the Japanese Typing of the Dead game use English words, or just Japanese words?

 

2 - Does the Japanese keyboard work with the US Typing of the Dead game & a US Dreamcast? Are there actually 2 different keyboards, or was 1 keyboard used for both countries?

 

 

Pics at: http://s242.photobucket.com/albums/ff97/infernolab/forsale/dc/ (last 2 pics on that page).

 

 

Thanks,

-Jason

[Nall3k]

This is difficult, being a Dreamcast collector myself I feel I can give some imput. I have imported games (Border Down, Ikaruga etc)... Border Down has english text within the game, Ikaruga does not. So whether or not a Japanese game has english text can vary from game to game.

 

Now regarding your keyboard. More than likely it will not work on your NTSC-U Dreamcast (I'm basing this off of the DC lightguns). Pal and NTSC-J lightguns do not work on NTSC-U Dreamcasts.

 

So I would assume two things, the first being since the game is Japanese, it more than likely has Japanese text because I doubt Sega would sell a typing game in Japan with english text... As for the keyboard, I would assume based off of the lightgun hardware that it won't work on your Dreamcast.

 

I hope that helps.

Edited July 26, 2010 by Nall3k

[98PaceCar]

The Japanese PS2 version of Typing of the Dead actually does use our alphabet, but the words are Japanese. Makes it quite a bit more difficult, but it's still playable. I believe that the PS2 release is identical to the DC release, so I'd assume the DC would still use our alphabet.

[Video]

Huh? Most Japanese stuff actually uses the same characters we do (on account of using the symbols would be far to complicated, as there are tens of thousands of them instead of just a couple dozen)

 

I doubt you'll be able to use it on the US DC though, unless you have a region chip or something. I think one of the gamesharks or something could "fake" it, but I never have tried outside of PSX, and it was shodddy at best.

[jasonbar]

I finally tried this out.

 

As far as Typing of the Dead goes, the Japanese keyboard works fine on my US DC, but I have trouble finding punctuation quickly and, the space bar is teeny weeny, as on Japanese computer keyboards. I'm getting a US DC keyboard soon.

 

Both the US & JP versions of Typing of the Dead work fine w/ the JP keyboard & a US DC. The JP version is pretty easy at first, but then the words/phrases to type get looooong & don't have spaces in them & are super hard to type. I was disappointed to hear the same awful English voice acting in the JP version--I was hoping for some energetic Japanese audio. =( Both versions have the appropriate subtitles during the cut scenes.

 

 

Bottom line: awesome game--love it!

 

 

Thanks,

-Jason

 

 

PS--I'm using a Utopia boot disc to play imports on my DC