Kuusou Kagaku Sekai Gulliver Boy
From Sega Retro
| Kuusou Kagaku Sekai Gulliver Boy | ||||||||||
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| System(s): Sega Saturn | ||||||||||
| Publisher: Hudson Soft | ||||||||||
| Developer: Hudson Soft | ||||||||||
| Sound driver: SCSP/CD-DA (2/6 tracks) | ||||||||||
| Genre: RPG[1][2] | ||||||||||
| Number of players: 1 | ||||||||||
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Kuusou Kagaku Sekai Gulliver Boy (空想科学世界ガリバーボーイ) is a 1996 RPG for the Sega Saturn by Hudson Soft released exclusively in Japan. It ties into a Japan-only anime of the same name. The Saturn version is a remake of the PC Engine version of the game, featuring improved graphics.
Contents
Gameplay
In the game, the player will be guiding Gulliver and his team from city to city, liberating the world from the rule of Spain while chasing after it's leader, Judau. By travelling in the ship Sea Lion, the player will visit different cities in the world, some mandatory for story progression and some optional as side quests.
Gameplay elements and rules
The game is a 2D RPG with battles fought in "first person mode" similar to games such as Phantasy Star. Battles are not random, meaning players see the enemies roaming the screen and they have to touch them to fight them.
The game doesn't show the player how much experience the characters have nor how much they gain from battles. The player only has access to the HP, MP and Level numbers.
Unlike other RPGs, levels don't cap at 99 but go past that number. For the final boss fight, the player will be at around level 260.
The inventory has limited space and items of the same name, don't stack in a single slot. Extra items can be stored in the Sea Lion's vault (the ship). However, the ship isn't available from the beginning of the game. Also, some items in chests are cursed. To be able to use these items, the player has to reach a priest and pay to have the curse lifted. The players have no way of knowing what items they will get, just what kind of item it will be: weapon, consumable or trade item. The curse causes effects like burning and sleep and, sometimes, it makes the walking speed in the map, very slow.
Enemies don't leave money behind like most RPGs. The way to make money in the game is to visit a trade shop, buy an item, and take that item to another city for selling at a higer price for profit. Different NPCs in each city look for different items. The player can not just sell the item to any NPC. Most of the selling takes place in Trade Shops but there are NPCs in regular houses that also buy some of the items. When buying items, the player can refuse to pay what the NPC asks for. By doing so, some NPCs will agree to lower the price of the item.
By buying trade items, players gain stamps. These can be exchanged in the city of Monaco for special items (for example, a healing stone that never runs out)
Unlike most RPGs, the characters don't have equipment. The only exception being the weapon. But these weapons can't (for the most part) be bought in shops. The player has to find them in chests in dungeons. Even then, only 2 of the character get weapons this way. Gulliver, the main character, has a speacial weapon that doesn't change. What changes is the effect it has. These effects are gained by finding extra members for your team.
Consumables don't have a description in the game like most RPGs. There are 2 ways to find out their effect: by looking them up in the game manual or by having one of the team members, Tiger, explain the effect while on the ship. However, Tiger is available in CD 2 of the game, past the halfway of the story.
The game can only be saved at inns (they have an icon with a H on top of them). These inns also offer the possibility to spend the night and heal HP, MP and status effects (except Curse).
However, spending the night at an inn will cost a day (the current day can be seen in the status menu by pressing 
). Certains events happen on certain days so the player should keep this in mind. For example, on day 33, the player gets 3 times the ammount of stamps in the trade shop.
Team Caracters
There are 2 types of characters that will be in the team: main and secondary. Main characters are always part of the team (except when certain events in the story makes them unavailable). Secondary characters can be chosen by the player and swaped.
Main Characters
These 3 characters are controlled by the player and, unless a certain event in the story makes them unavailable, they are alway part of the team. In the final dungeon of the game, these 3 characters are the only ones that are available in your team.
Gulliver: the main character of the story. Judau killed his father and he is out for revenge. His main weapon is the Maken Glove. This weapon can not be changed during the game. However, special abilities can be set to it. He is the more powerful of the main characters and has elemental attack magic (fire, lighting and ice). His fire magic causes Burn (works on bosses) and attacking with ice will void the effect.
Edison: Gulliver's best friend and inventor of sorts. He attacks with machines he made himself. Unlike the other 2 main characters, his MP (called BP) must be replenished by a different items. Average character in terms of HP and MP. He has many useful abilities for supporting the team. Inside the Sea Lion, he installs upgrades for the ship. These upgrades are optional expect for the ice breaker after liberating Casablanca, which is necessary to access the north of the map.
Misty: a girl running from Judau and his Spanish troops. She is connected somehow to a set of 4 blue stones that could bring Atlantis back from the bottom of the ocean and this is the reason why Judau is after her. She attacks with the power of magical rings. Not a very strong character with less MP than Edison. However, her magic is the usual that can be expected from a mage character in an RPG: heal, cure, power/defense up and, of course, elemental magic as well. Her ice magic causes Freeze (works on bosses) and attacking with fire will void the effect.
Secondary Characters
These 7 characters are available as the fourth member of the team. They can be swapped and it must be done at the Sea Lion (when exiting the ship, a message will ask if the player wants to add one of these characters to the team or not). Unlike main characters, these are controlled by the CPU and they don't level up per se: their current level is Gulliver's level. Since the moment the player finds the first secondary character, they are always available except when fighting on the sea (only the 3 main characters fight on the deck of the ship) and in the final dungeon of the game. Some of these characters also have extra functionality when inside the Sea Lion.
Steel Bat: the first seconday character of the game. Heals 1 team member, has weak attacks, blinds enemies and informs of their weaknesses (if the enemy has any). Inside the Sea Lion, asking for the "Good News" gives the player a hint on where to go next. Asking for "Bad News" offers topics on the story so far (useful when the player stops playing for a long time and forgets what had happend so far)
Big Mouse: many kinds of attacks. Somewhat strong for the time when the player finds the character. Inside the Sea Lion, he has a shop where the player con buy consumables and sell items.
Hammer Eagle: all physical attacks. He is the strongest character in the game. Doesn't heal allies.
Pink Tiger: some regular physical attacks and some abilities for inflicting bad status to the enemies (most of the times, she misses the status magic attacks). Inside the Sea Lion she explains the effect of every item in the game (the game manual only has a handful of items descriptions)
Iron Kong: strong attacks and also heals the entire party. Inside the Sea Lion, he offers a free inn. However, this inn can't be used to save the game, only to heal.
Crazy Horse: regular physical attacks but also has abilities to buff the status of party members. Inside the Sea Lion, he sells booze to get the characters drunk.
Magi Mammoth: the opposite of Eagle, Mammoth is all about magic attacks. His action bar charges at slower rate than any other character in the game. Since he attacks with elemental magic, he might accidentaly void the effects of Gulliver and Misty's magic (Burn and Freeze respectively).
Maken Glove Minder
Gulliver doesn't change weapons. He sets a special ability to his Maken Glove. These abilities are gained by recruiting new secondary characters (except for the final Minder). When recruiting a new character, he/she will give Gulliver a disk which must be inserted inside the lion statue in the Sea Lion (next to Edison). After inserting the disk, the ability is unlocked and the player can pick and swap among the unlocked specials. The game starts without speacial abilities and once an ability has been chosen, the glove will always have one set. That is, abilities can not be removed, only swapped.
These abilities activate at random by using the attack command (using the magic command won't trigger the effect)
Sonic Mind: attacks all enemies in a single action for half the damage of a regular attack. Given by Steel Bat.
Gold Mind: attacks a single enemy with extra power and also steals money. Given by Big Mouse.
Eagle Mind: attacks 3 times in succession (similar to the consumable that grants the same effect except Eagle Mind never misses and can't be blocked). Given by Hammer Eagle.
Lover Mind: attacks with normal power but also steals MP from the enemy. Given by Pink Tiger.
Aura Mind: attacks with normal power but also steals HP from the enemy. Given by Iron Kong.
Freeze Mind: attacks with normal power and puts the enemy to sleep (can be woken up with any attack. Sleep is not the same as Freeze even though the ability is called "Freeze Mind"). Given by Crazy Horse.
Axe Mind: halves the HP of the enemy. Given by Magi Mammoth.
Dragon Mind: a burning phoenix that does about 4 or 5 times the damage of a regular attack. This is the only Minder that's not given by a character. In the final dungeon, right before the last corridor to the final boss, there will be another lion statue. After leaving Venice, Gulliver is given a certain disk the the regular Minder Loader (the lion in the ship) won't accept. By inserting that disk in this lion, Gulliver aquires (and is automatically set) the Dragon Mind.
Magazine articles
- Main article: Kuusou Kagaku Sekai Gulliver Boy/Magazine articles.
Promotional material
Physical scans
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65 |
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| Based on 6 reviews | |
| Saturn, JP |
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  Cover
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 Spinecard  Disc 1  Disc 2 |
Technical information
- Main article: Kuusou Kagaku Sekai Gulliver Boy/Technical information.
References
 NEC Retro has more information related to Kuusou Kagaku Sekai: Gulliver Boy
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- ↑ File:KKSGB Saturn JP Box Back.jpg
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 https://sega.jp/fb/segahard/ss/soft_licensee2.html (Wayback Machine: 2020-03-20 23:05)
- ↑ Consoles +, "Mai 1996" (FR; 1996-0x-xx), page 138
- ↑ Famitsu, "1996-03-29" (JP; 1996-03-15), page 1
- ↑ Joypad, "Juin 1996" (FR; 1996-0x-xx), page 91
- ↑ Saturn Fan, "1996 No. 10-11" (JP; 1996-04-26), page 80
- ↑ Sega Saturn Magazine, "1996-05 (1996-03-22)" (JP; 1996-03-08), page 226
- ↑ Sega Saturn Magazine, "Readers rating final data" (JP; 2000-03), page 13
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