At the time when the Tamagotchis were making a mess in the playgrounds next to the Pokemon and this at the dawn of the second millennium... Well, on the Dreamcast we had Seaman, well almost, because in Europe it will be absent but noted 16/20 in Japan with these almost 400 000 copies sold without counting the limited Dreamcast series which goes with it. You understood it, it's time to talk about fish on this 1st of April and to start this year (the 1st of April was decreed as the 1st day of the year by the King of France Charles IX and it was like that before the Christian era) with a Dreamcast in your hands.
A bit of history and Cocorico!
In the 1930s, Dr. Jean-Paul Gassé, a French biologist, was sent to Egypt. His mission, to search for a creature that he considered to be the "omnipotent messenger of the gods". He received information that a local fisherman had caught a mysterious fish with a human face (no, it was not Madonna's latest face-lift).
Gassé manages to recover some eggs from this unknown species. Back in France, he tried to hatch the eggs and raise them, but they all died. However, he writes a thesis between the report of these strange fish and the diffusion of "Pastis", forgiveness of knowledge during the period of the third dynasty. Without any proof, the scholar is discredited.
On February 15, 1999, parts of Gasse's diary and notes were found in the Masuda family's warehouse in Matsuzaka City, Mie Prefecture, Japan (but not the Pastis bottles). Professor Kendare Takahashi, managed to raise eggs in captivity... Finally you have understood the scenario, let's talk about the game!
This title is a curiosity that hasn't been translated into the language of Molière because it uses microphones and therefore makes an international adaptation more complex. You only have two choices : Japanese or English depending on the Japanese or American version and you had to wait 9 months for the US version which doesn't have any interaction with the VMU (on the Japanese version, your bug will look at your memory card and ask you questions).
But in fact, what is Seaman?
Well, an absolute graphic simplicity... an aquarium!
After an exciting start where you have to adjust the temperature, oxygen, lay your egg and wait...
... You will finally be able to start playing with the birth of multiple offspring. The eyeballs will come out and join the edge of the aquarium wall.
And then the fun begins. Your main inhabitant of this environment, your venerable Nautilus fish will eat these young cherubs (reference to Jules Verne or the dead Sega CD-32X project!).... Who will devour from the inside, the said fish! Here the game takes on more importance, not because of the cinematographic reference linked to the horror of the thing but because of the evolution of the species.
And yes, your venerable creatures will become fish with a human head (which is none other than the face of the programmer Yoot Saito). Well, there is still this antenna dominating the head of our fish or rather a kind of straw, because our merry men will eat each other in a vampiric way by sucking the blood with their predominance.... At the end there will be two of them left! (I stop the cinematographic references)
This barbarism is good! Your friendly tenants allow us to enjoy this Roman Arena show for free. If there is one thing to remember, it is that eating your fellow creatures makes you smarter. YES! For the time being, you will have to be satisfied with a dialect of simple words and incomprehensible blabber. However, after the digestive phase, the pronunciation of sentences and memories of your fellow creatures will evolve considerably. In short, the dialogue begins to be established!
And our monsters will continue to grow and ask for (a cricket cage for example). Yes, the evolution is done by the food! There you can choose his name and many other things even better your little ones will give you advice, tell you anecdotes, in short real interactions and a good complexity. You will even be insulted if you neglect your role as a parent.
The time of evolution!
As the aquarium grows, it becomes a problem, especially when the legs of the amphibians appear and you are soon forced to invest in a terrarium for your two companions.
Stupid investment, when after a reproductive act worthy of encrypted TV channels after midnight, the evil dies and the female enchanted to bring forth life gives up the ghost in turn after the birth. In short, a family with a heart!
Now you have the balls and that's good, the eggs will hatch and then surprise!
The offspring will be born directly with a head but also a tadpole body and above all they will keep their voice and their adult intelligence. What to offer long discussions and additional insults!
Now we have super-intelligent beings that will quickly eat each other up! I love the evolution of species.
There are two left, you got it! When they grow up they become frogmen who will have to water from time to time (not with money, to have peace) but with water to guarantee a good humidity to his frogmen.
And then you can release them in the nature and create a hell of a mess for the occasion. The latter will thank you and will not hesitate to give you good advice before leaving you.
But how to play it nowadays. Actually, it is not so complicated if you lack the love for languages. Modern tools like "Google translation" allow for interesting and sufficiently slow games that will require application and care.
In the end, the multiple skills you learn will allow you to be an ideal spouse who is perfectly trained for parenthood, or so it seems!
Article by Romain Villez
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