Got the game… doesn’t run so hot on Vista though. Slightly okay on XP… but there’s some screen distortion. Trying to load a Win98 virtual environment. All characters have voice acting - including Shinichi. The voices seem to fit everyone. From what I’ve gone through so far: the game has no additional content (i.e. a new girl or more story paths). It’s just the regular Nocturnal Illusion upgraded.
They’ve been active for a long time, actually. Remember that their older games, Maple Colors and Ayakashi were not released under the Apricot name, but released under the CROSSNET banner (Apricot definitely worked on them, though).
And I think it has more to do with the fact that CROSSNET no longer exists =P
No music (but the voice acting works). Text box background sometimes doesn’t show, but the words still do, so the ability to read them depends on the colors of what’s being shown on the screen. Just realized I haven’t tried the 98 compatibility check box… might do so this evening. I’ll take a few screen shots and upload them.
Screenshots of the errors I’m running into, when the game is ran on XP or Vista 32-bit (won’t work at all on Vista 64-bit).
First obvious is the text itself. Either the words show up in the middle of the screen, or when it shows up at the bottom it’s not black color (and has a “clipping” of the main screen).
Second is the paper doll… it’s not “centered” correctly over the text box and hovers incorrectly.
On a sidenote: as far as the gameplay is concerned, it’s EXACTLY like the DOS version. Same order of options to follow… same story pace. HOWEVER the English translation of the game, isn’t exact… they seem to have simplified or ignored things. Not ultra major - but interesting. I suppose it’s not really censorship, but how it was translated.
Still looking for my Win98 installation disks… so I don’t know how it looks in Virtual PC yet.
Either the artist retraced over everything, or the artwork in the 98 version is what he originally drew, before it was downgraded for the limitations of DOS.
Most likely my last update on this, unless someone has a question they want me to answer.
Not much luck on improving the WinXP and Vista 32-bit running. The music won’t play due to SB16 errors (Sound Blaster drivers). The crazy text thing appears to be avoidable, if you set your screen resolution below 1024 x 768… however it doesn’t always work. A bit of a hit or miss issue. Attempting to use the “98 compatibility” option, causes a memory error crash.
Having said all that…
The game runs perfect using Windows 98 SE under Virtual PC with the default hardware installation (no extra drivers needed). However you’ll need something like NJSTAR Software for the Japanese fonts to show correctly - indeed to even install it (because the installer uses Japanese). Screenshots below show it all.
On a sidenote: the music in the Win98 game is waaaaaaay superior sounding to that found on the Nocturnal Illusion OST (which supposedly contains the Win98 version). No idea why that is. However it was a great surprise. As far as instrument syth goes: Better than the DS and equal to the Wii.
I am very VERY interested in this. I wish I could afford to import it… I remember patching the original game, so a remake holds a lot of interest to me.
Would a fan-translation version be possible, given we have the original game?
Does the music play for you under XP? I’m wondering if the music thing is an XP issue, or something with hardware.
I’d assume so. The game engine is rather similar to the original DOS version. Given the age of the title - and all the software around for that era - a computer wiz could take the old English DOS version and transfer it over. However some stuff would need tweaking around… there’s the whole ahem editing of Red Hood and Arisa.
It was around $40 from them, according to one source.
Won’t run at all, on the 98 compat mode…
I can actually get that XP distortion to show on Win98, if I minimize and then maximize the game window… has something to do with the display.
Ah the infamous Red Hood and Arisa scenes… that was really quite annoying actually… at first i wondered why the extended “black scenes” till i came across the answer. It’s just really awkward having those edits there…
Would be nice to have an actual re-release w/ this version (hint: JList ppl xD) and w/ the full version w/o the edits xD Anyway no orders till pay day (ie. 2 days @_@)… thanks to this thread this month has been my most expensive month in eroge orders xD
Oh and what exactly goes wrong if you try to run the renewal on XP? =( XP is usually pretty good w/ old 95/98 games and i find a good chunk of my ye olde stuff usually runs fine on 95/98 compat or DOSbox @_@
The more I read the error codes, the more I think it has to do with the way DirectX functions on XP versus Win98. They’re not exactly the same: and these differences apply to NI98. Barring that: it might be how the display drivers are interpreting things. I know for a fact, that the music issue is driver related: keeps giving SB16 errors.
