Hourai Gakuen no Bouken!

[Discoalucard]

www.hardcoregaming101.net/hourai/hourai.htm

A wacky Super Famicom RPG that takes place in a ridiculous school, hampered by very basic and unbalanced gameplay.

[kingmike]

Actually, the game first became known among hardcore SFC RPG fans in the early 2000s when a different translation group (AGTP released the patch in 2011, on the 15th anniversary of the original release), then called Magic Destiny I believe and now known as Dynamic Designs, got to work on it but disappeared before releasing it.
(MD had gained some attention when they had a few high-profile translations planned: Destiny of an Emperor II NES, Lennus/Paladin's Quest II, Mystic Ark aka 7th Saga II, Taloon's Mystery Dungeon, Fire Emblem: Mystery of the Emblem, FEDA (kind of known after EGM once previewed it and pointed out it was nearly an SNES Shining Force) and Magic Continent Wozz, as well as Hourai)
If I remember, satsu was originally hacking the game, but then he gave up ROM hacking and learned Japanese. At some point after Magic Destiny was long presumed dead from inactivity, Aeon Genesis took up hacking the game but Magic had lost their finished translation, so satsu, having since become proficient in Japanese, retranslated the game from scratch.
In the meantime, MD/DD reappeared and has said they do still plan to eventually release their patch (AGTP had inherited MD's abandoned Mystic Ark script, but had to throw it out because Mystic Ark's programming is incredibly complex to the point that MD's script was unusable for lacking critical information to put the text back in the game properly.
Eventually, DD also released their version of the patch so we got fan two localizations of the game.)

Indeed Hourai is rushed. I've forgotten the specifics but I recall the game has a very exploitable bug regarding stat changes when equipping items. (something like un-equipping stuff then entering a battle would return your stats to the "equipped" values so you can re-equip items to inflate your stats)
I remember as Aeon Genesis worked on the game, I bought a (very overpriced, I quickly realized) original copy of the game and verified this equipment bug he had noticed in emulators was in fact a game bug and not emulation. I don't recall if that was fixed in the Aeon Genesis patch.

[Vokkan]

Really good article, but shouldn't it be mentioned that the game is part of a franchise? It's play-by-mail RPG roots is very distinctive.

[iwant]

Ah, indeed. I remember coming across a "play-by-mail RPG" thing of the same name, but I didn't know the game was related to it. Yeah, we should definetely mention it in the review.

[jjc14]

Iwant said:

To the obvious anime frenzy such as girls in tight gym outfits and the cultural festival with its traditional attractions, the scenario writers added a lot of purely original wackiness, like yjr three student militias constantly clashing to impose their own order, a failed school trip that ends up on an hostile desert island, and even seven mysterious "Wonders" of Hourai to uncover as a sidequest.

(I'm assuming the author's hand shifted over one column on the keyboard there...)

[Gideon Zhi]

Sept 2, 2013 0:35:37 GMT -5 kingmike said:

Indeed Hourai is rushed. I've forgotten the specifics but I recall the game has a very exploitable bug regarding stat changes when equipping items. (something like un-equipping stuff then entering a battle would return your stats to the "equipped" values so you can re-equip items to inflate your stats)

We didn't provide any fixes to the gameplay balance stuff, no. As far as I remember, the bug is actually the opposite of what you describe: the battle initialization code reverts your characters' status to the levels they were at before they had anything equipped, thus rendering weapons and armor 100% entirely completely utterly pointless. That said, there are still a few lingering issues with the hacking in the game that I need to fix one of these days. This is one of those projects that, knowing what's going on under the hood, I'm amazed it works at all and am frankly uncomfortable playing. I feel like it'll break if I look at it wrong.

Also, as far as the various MD/DD history stuff goes, I'll note the following:
-While I was in possession of a copy of MD's Mystic Ark script, I elected not to use it. It's not that it was unusable, but more that some folks didn't want it used. The result is that you have a more faithful and comparatively literal translation (AG's, script translated by Ian Kelley) and a *much* looser script by DD, edited and heavily embellished upon by Wildbill.
-Hourai was originally satsu's hacking project, yes. He had the script translated by a wonderful freelancer called akujin who worked with MD on some of their stuff (he did some of my stuff too!) but yes, he lost it at some point. I ended up offering to hack Hourai for him in exchange for translation support on Ladystalker.

[steven]

D'OH! Just realized after publishing that I forgot to include a link to the HG101 piece. I'll have to rectify that on my next publishing update.

Anyway, I really enjoyed this game, warts and all. If you got some time to kill feel free to check out the review I just wrote for this massively endearing game.

Question: What do you get when you cross Earthbound's zany sense of humor/contemporary setting with Final Fantasy V's job class system?



Answer: The Adventures of Hourai High!



One of the DAMNDEST role playing games you'll ever encounter. Words can't describe how kooky and charming it is. But you know I'll attempt to, anyhow, as well as reminisce a bit about my own high school days along the way. Summer is waning as back to school rush begins to kick in, and though it is flawed, Hourai High is definitely worth a visit if you love RPGs/Earthbound.

Adventures of Hourai High

[hummy]

The game was actually quite progressive in retrospect. I don't know many other games from the 16-bit era with an African American or an LGBT character (though neither really has significant depth to them and the latter is only mentioned once). It might also be worth noting that the game progresses in terms of months and that you get a stat enhancement if the month the game is at is the same as the birthday the player chose at the start of the game. I think that's kind of uncommon, at lesat.

[steven]

Aug 9, 2015 12:07:01 GMT -5 hummy said:

The game was actually quite progressive in retrospect. I don't know many other games from the 16-bit era with an African American or an LGBT character (though neither really has significant depth to them and the latter is only mentioned once). It might also be worth noting that the game progresses in terms of months and that you get a stat enhancement if the month the game is at is the same as the birthday the player chose at the start of the game. I think that's kind of uncommon, at lesat.

Yeah, the African American character (Isaac) is one of my favorites. I can't think of another SNES RPG African American, now that I come to think of it. I feel like there might have been ONE OTHER, but he or she certainly wasn't playable. Isaac you can actually control.

Yes, during your birthday month the game automatically increases your stats up by 1 (including age, lol). You're even treated to a cake and bit where they tell you happy bday we remembered! It was surprising and "touching" when I first saw it. It made the game feel "alive" and yes, I do agree that it was progressive, because playing through it in 2013 it didn't feel like a game made from 1996, if that makes sense. Not for anything technical or amazing, but the dialogue felt so refreshing and "today" (again if that makes sense).

Plus you can play the game through as a male or female. I'll beat it at some point in the future again, and I'll be trying the female route next time.