TAROTICA VOO DOO

[b]Some obscure indie games are beautiful gems waiting to be discovered, and some are just too rough.[/b] [i]TAROTICA VOO DOO[/i] has been developed since 1993 and, unfortunately, it feels woefully underbaked and dated. Everything from the black bars to the unskippable intro just make me cringe. The gameplay is clunky and boring (and glitchy). With three decades of developement - you need to be mindful of the times and make sure to update things accordingly. [i]Really, it's the price that is the deal-breaker. What about this title merits ten bucks? [/i] For those that put more time into this - please let me know if I am off-base, and I would gladly give this another try, but for now it's just not going to happen for me. Reading over the manual should be enough to set off warning signals for anybody. The last paragraph tells you to play the game first. Why wouldn't you state this first? You put the spoiler warning *before* the spoilers. [b]This is a hard pass for me.[/b]

If you like the look of this game you should buy it. Just do it. It took me 2 hrs (which is a good length, didn't overstay it's welcome) and now I can't stop thinking about it so now I'm writing this review for why this might be one of my favorite games in recent memory. You're some person with a sword and shield who, by some coincidence, arrives just in time to a haunted mansion that a plane is going to crash into, occupied by a family, completely oblivious to the danger they're in, that refuses to leave for own safety until you cook dinner for them. That's your mission and basically the entire story of Tarotica Voo Doo. It's completely nonsensical and perfectly complements the experience of playing the game itself, bizarre but engaging. It's a point and click basically? Except it's more like an arrow and spacebar, since space and the arrow keys are all you need to play. Clicking on hotspots of the map, based on the room you're in, usually brings you to a minigame where you press up and down to go through frames of animation, for doing things like opening doors or lighting a torch. Some people will think opening door after door this way is annoying, I think it necessary to make the world feel more tactile, more like I'm walking through rooms than just clicking on the map. Combat is similar to these minigames, controlled with up to go for a stab and down to return to your shield, all based on the rhythm of the enemy's attack animation. Dying is no big deal, it just means restarting the fight, and you'll likely die alot while you try to figure out the timing of the battle. Its not that deep, like the rest of the game's systems, but it's cool to feel out when you can go for that greedy third hit, maybe even a fourth, and oh no you ate ♥♥♥♥ before you could return to your block. Also there is one fight in the game that's actually impossible to tell you to try something else, youll know when. The worst thing I'll say about TVD is that it, true to old school adventure games, likely has at least one moment where youll get stuck, especially if you're not used to how these games work. The worst offender is when you activate something only to have something change in a completely different room. That being said, the game remedies this a little by having a limited number of things to click on, keeping it from being a pixel hunt. And most of the time there IS a strange logic to the puzzles; the one time I got really stumped, near the end, had a solution that made sense in a way that I couldn't get mad. I went into it expecting way worse from a game that started development in the 90s. But anyways the real reason I love Tarotica Voo Doo is for its immersive quality that I don't know if I can describe properly. I felt more like an adventurer in a mysterious dungeon in this than in games that actually have you as an adventurer in a dungeon. Navigating the mansion feels so technical and imperfect, like piloting a rover on Mars, yet moments of it are seen it up close through simple but incredibly charming animations, some of which you push and pull like a flip book. It feels both like it's perfect for the MSX system but also too nuanced to be anything like the games the system is known for. This is kinda gushy but that's how I felt just playing the game. It's old school but in a way actual old school video games never were. Far from perfect, but if it tried to be perfect I'd like it less. Tarotica, with all its simplicity and messiness and jagged edges, has value just as it is.

ゆるアニメーション盛りだくさん探索アドベンチャー レトロPCゲーム特有のほの暗い感じと、ゆるいグラフィックとが融合し、奇妙としか言いようがないプレイ感覚を味わえる 目玉であるアニメーションは、単色かつ簡単な線で描画されているにも関わらず、構図と動きの妙とが噛み合い、何が起きているかしっかり伝わり、見ていて気持ちがいい システム的には、MSXで開発したものをそのままエミュレーターで動かしており、探索も戦闘も十字キー＋スペースキーのみで行うなど、慣れるまで多少とっつきは悪い ゲームバランスにおいては、探索パートは昔気質で、とりあえずやれることを片っ端から試していく感じ。戦闘は↑↓キーの長押しで、プレイヤーキャラの攻撃、防御の姿勢をタイミング良く切り替えていく必要があり、結構難易度が高い しかしゲームオーバーの概念がないため、トライアンドエラーを繰り返しながら進めていく楽しさがある 難点は戦闘難易度の高さ（特に序盤のゾンビ戦）や、システム面の貧弱さ（エミュレーター側のステートセーブでしか進行を保存できない所など）、価格比で見てボリュームが少ないところ等だろうか まあボリュームに関しては、MSX1でフロッピー1枚に収めることを考えたら仕方がないことであるが… 総じて大衆受けするようなキャッチーさはないが、このゲームにしかない雰囲気というものを持ち合わせていると思う 制約の中で最大限の表現をすることに美学を見いだせる人は是非プレイしよう

2010년 후반기에 느끼는 80년대 콘솔의 투박함. 타로티카 부두는 MSX풍의 어드벤처 게임이다. 플레이어는 비행기에서 먼저 불시착한 청년이 되어 항공기가 떨어질 저택에 기거하고 있는 가족들을 설득해 무사히 탈출시켜야 한다. 이 과정에서 넓은 저택을 차례에 맞게 돌아다니고 퍼즐을 풀고 적들을 상대해야 한다. 방향키와 버튼 하나만을 활용하는 단순한 조작의 게임이고, 단순한 조작감으로 인해 플레이어의 상상력과 퍼즐을 풀기 위한 고민이 더욱 들어가야 하는 게임이다. MSX 감성의 구현을 위해 단 한 명의 개발자가 5년에 걸쳐 개발해낸 게임이다. 게임의 모든 부분을 직접 구현해낸 것인데, 특히나 손으로 직접 그린 애니메이션과 인터페이스가 묘하게 정겹게 다가온다. 참고로 MSX 에뮬레이터 기반으로 만들어진 게임이기 때문에 퀵세이브와 퀵로드를 통해 자유로운 세이브/로드가 가능하다. 꼭 그게 아니더라도 워낙이 짧은 게임이라 감만 좋다면 별도의 세이브 없이도 한 번에 게임을 클리어할 수도 있다. 굉장히 투박한 느낌의 게임이다. 손으로 그린 애니메이션과 인터페이스도, 한없이 단조롭지만 미묘하게 중독성 있는 단일 배경음도, 방향키와 버튼 하나만 사용하는 단순한 조작법도, 막막해보이기만 한 게임플레이도, 모든 것이 투박해보인다. 철저히 MSX 감성에 맞춰진 게임이니만큼, 누군가에게는 굉장히 성의없게, 혹은 굉장히 불친절하게 보일지도 모르겠다. 하지만 타로티카 부두는 바로 그 점 때문에 가치있는 게임이 된다. 투박하고 제한적인 그래픽과 애니메이션은 플레이어의 상상력이 들어갈 충분한 공간을 제공해준다. 한없이 단순해 보이는 게임 화면이지만, 게임이 최대한 해당 공간 안에서 답이 나오게 설계가 되어있기도 하고 보기와 다르게 힌트도 잘 갖춰져 있어 해답을 고민하며 퍼즐을 풀고 이야기를 진행해나가는 재미 역시 상당하다. 투박한 게임 화면 때문에 호불호가 꽤 갈리겠지만, 일단 게임을 시작하면 몰입도만큼은 그 어느 게임에도 결코 뒤지지 않을 것이다. 고전 콘솔 게임이 지닌 투박함과 상상력의 가치를 현 시대에 다시 전해준 소중한 게임.

强烈推荐！ 游戏告诉我们：根性(毅力)是通关所需的重要品德，油管是教会你通关的唯一方法。感谢那位直播游戏的韩国大叔！ 推荐理由： 复古，不单指画面，解密提示有限，战斗靠根性，这些经典游戏曾有的特质在当今市场已经被打上了“不友好“的标签。对比起那些手把手教你穿装备的游戏，玩家从零开始完成一个谜题，艰苦奋斗打倒一个敌人，所能收获的成就感是巨大的。

The story behind the development of this game is rather cute, much of which is outlined in the wonderful design document it comes packaged with. Development started in 1993 for the MSX as a hobbyist undertaking and reached a presentable state around 1997, where it was intended to be shown off at Comiket. Sadly, Ikushi Togo's disk drive crashed, causing a dramatic loss of the machine language source code and other data. After a lull of many years where Tarotica Voo Doo would lay dormant, an old demo rom was eventually showcased at Comiket in 2014 and received such tremendous support and praise, the developer realised he had to see the game through. Rather than taking the comparatively easy route and developing the game with more modern tools, they instead stuck to their guns and rewrote the game completely from scratch, once again for the MSX. A self-imposed challenge that paid dividends - Tarotica Voo Doo operates under its hardware restrictions with such clear clarity of intent, filled with design quirks rare and unseen in games old and new. Where the visual style is indeed crude; being the product of mouse-drawn pixel art, it complements the uniquely tactile control scheme to the point where it feels like flicking through charming flipbook animations - watching the mansion map fill out in the same vein as a growing doodle on a bored schoolkid’s workbook margin. The developer has expressed that they find games less interesting when actions are automated, and Tarotica Voo Doo’s puzzling and combat incorporates an utterly fascinating control scheme that demands deliberate movement and interaction. It’s no surprise to me that the developer has their eyes on getting a project to the Playmate system. I wanted to be a little vague, this is a 2-hour game that deserves to be played and appreciated. I swear to god I think this mansion has left an imprint on me.

Cute, but short. Disclaimer, this is a point-and-click adventure game built on MSX-era gameplay and the graphics are completely hand drawn. If neither of these are appealing, this may not be the game for you. The fun is in figuring out what needs to be done and the results of your actions. The initial premise is pretty goofy and points you at the overall tone of the game, an airplane is about to crash into a mansion and your job is to convince its occupants to evacuate before impact. Although you'll fight dogs and monsters along the way, the focus of the game is solving puzzles while interacting with the household. The interface is very simple, just the keyboard arrow keys to move a cursor and spacebar to select. Interacting with most objects involves pressing up and down to toggle between ON and OFF states. There is a map in the center and a cinematic window on the top right, but there is no traditional menu outside of this. While this can be criticized as being lacking in gameplay features, it is the result of highly focusing on an experience that harkens back to older games. There is a primary map for navigation in the center and a few windows on the side for animations, only the necessities. As a result of this, the game doesn't have a built-in save function and it is necessary to use the emulator's save states. However, the game is only a little over 1 hour in length, so you may not even need to save. I really enjoyed the animations and how they portrayed the lives of the mansion's inhabitants in contrast to you breaking into their home. Since I didn't grow up playing any MSX games, it is interesting to play something that is clearly from a different generation. I haven't looked at it, but the game also includes a document that details development of the game and technical specifications. Development that focuses on electric circuits rather than dedicated video game engines brings us back to the dawn of programing. All in all, I recommend this title due to how unique it is compared to whats currently available and my preference in aesthetics, but know that one playthrough will only take about 1 hour. You'll only get a bit of enjoyment from this title if you do not have any interest video game development from a generation where games only had 4 colors, 1 sound effect and maybe 2 soundtracks.

はっきり言うと雰囲気ゲーで張り切ってプレイすると怪我するゲーム。 ほぼ映像作品と言っても良い、一時間程度で終わるゲームプレイ（このゲームの性質上仕方ないかもしれないが・・・） 「パソコン黎明期、MSXってこんなだよ」知りたい人にはプレイする価値はあるけど、それ以外にはノーセンキュー ゲームって進化したんだなとつくづく実感した

WEPLAY上就玩到了，给人的映像非常深，画面和音乐虽然简陋但是特别有魔性。推荐！

Short (took me about 2 hours), strange and quite charming. The wobbly animations are lovely :) Worth a try if the screenshots look appealing to you.