Sqoon

[Discoalucard]

hg101.classicgaming.gamespy.com/sqoon/sqoon.htm

Sqoon is a sidescrolling submarine shooter. It's an early game by Irem whose name rung a bell, but I couldn't remember why. Then I realized it's one of those games that pops up on pirate FC carts/consoles all the time. What I didn't realize is that it was actually released in the US, too.

[Shellshock]

I have never seen this in a pirate cart/compilation (and there were plenty in South America), so awesome find! Specially since I love Irem submarine games. What the hell is up with so many sub shooters in this company?

Again, hats off to this find.

[Setzer]

I had no idea it was so frequent on pirate carts - heh, I literally wasn't aware of the game existence until I saw it on an ebay auction.

[CRV]

Apr 2, 2009 23:43:55 GMT -5 Shellshock said:

Specially since I love Irem submarine games. What the hell is up with so many sub shooters in this company?

The game was actually developed by Home Data. Of course, I don't know if the sub thing was Irem's idea.

[Shellshock]

Apr 3, 2009 8:32:43 GMT -5 CRV said:

The game was actually developed by Home Data. Of course, I don't know if the sub thing was Irem's idea.

Did I miss that in the article?

[Setzer]

No, I didn't mention Homedata, I just supposed it was one of Irem's internal team, instead I see they did something with Namcot too. Has the game been published before or after on other platforms?

[CRV]

Apr 3, 2009 10:13:08 GMT -5 Setzer said:

No, I didn't mention Homedata, I just supposed it was one of Irem's internal team, instead I see they did something with Namcot too. Has the game been published before or after on other platforms?

I don't think so.

Home Data was later renamed Magical, which is still around.

Both Sqoon and Tetsuwan Atom (published by Konami) contain a similar text string:

"COPYRIGHT 1986 HOMEDATA ALL RIGHTS RESERVED madokakina!"
"COPYRIGHT 1988 HOMEDATA ALL RIGHTS RESERVED madokakina!"

[dire51]

I remember seeing this in the old Nintendo Player's Guide, the one that had all of the maps of Rygar and The Goonies II. I think I've seen the actual cart once, though.

[Deleted]

Nice article; it's one of those games most people looked at as kids but passed over during their weekly run to the supermarket, Phar-Mor, or now-defunct video store.

I'm also glad I'm not the only one who got a dark and foreboding feeling from it; really, it's quite depressing if you sit and think about it. Reading the story disturbed the shit out of me as a kid (then again, I was scared of the Slime Pit toy for about a year, and still get creeped out by Indianapolis local celeb Sammy Terry's voice).

[pennywise]

I know I'm several years late to the party on this, but I have tidbit that adds to the submarine mythos of the game.

I did a comparison between the Japanese and American versions of the game and found the usual text differences. But the biggest difference was that some ending text was removed from the American version. Basically there was some text at the bottom of the sea floor that said "Please accept this Sunfish Badge." A likely reference to this:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMS_Sunfish_(81S)

[Joseph Joestar]

I got a copy of it for Famicom last year, the comic in the booklet is really amusing too.