Manual Stimulation BONUS: Hello Kitty World sticker sheet

I'm a sucker for games, especially old Japanese games, that come packed with sticker sheets.

Sadly, I don't own too many of these treasured goods. In fact, I can only think of four examples at the moment: Detana!! TwinBee, Loopop Cube: Lup Salad, PoPoLoCrois Monogatari, and Rhythm Tengoku.

Four examples other than the one I'm discussing and highlighting in this very post, I mean.

Funnily enough, I didn't even realize I owned this sticker sheet until I pulled my copy of the 1992 Famicom game out of the closet to scan its instruction manual.

To my utter surprise, stuck inside the pages of the Hello Kitty World manual were the stickers you see here.

Truth be told, I'm a bit miffed this precious sticker sheet focuses entirely on Hello Kitty, aka Kitty White.

Granted, she's the star of the show--er, game--and this sheet only contains eight stickers, five of which are pretty darn small, so the lack of any Mimmy or Tippy stickers makes some sense.

Something that makes a lot less sense: none of these stickers directly refer to Hello Kitty World. (Erm, except the one at the top.) It's almost like Character Soft, the publisher of this Balloon Kid knockoff, just took a few existing Hello Kitty illustrations and slapped them onto the sheet you're ogling now.

All that said, I'd rather get a sticker sheet than not get one, so please don't take what I've written so far to be serious complaints.

See also: scans of the Detana!! TwinBee, Loopop Cube: Lup Salad, and Rhythm Tengoku sticker sheets

Manual Stimulation: Hello Kitty World (Famicom)

I've been a huge fan of Hello Kitty World ever since I first became aware of it well over a decade ago.

This isn't because I adore Hello Kitty, mind you. Although I think she's cute enough, I'm hardly obsessed with her or anything of the sort.



I am slightly obsessed with the Character Soft-published Famicom game that stars Kitty-chan (as well as her sister, Mimmy), however; or at least I've been obsessed with it at various points in the last 10 or so years.

The reason: it's basically a re-skin of one of my all-time favorite GameBoy games, Balloon Kid.



OK, so this Japan-only release from 1992 is more than just Balloon Kid with Alice's sprite swapped out for one that resembles the iconic Sanrio character. It's not a whole lot more than that, though.

For example, the playfield in Hello Kitty World is, or appears to be, much larger than the one in Balloon Kid. Also, the former seems a tad slower than the latter, though that, too, may just be an illusion.



Sadly, I can't tell you how Hello Kitty World's story, which is shared with readers of the game's instruction manual via the pages that precede this sentence, differs from that of Balloon Kid, or even if the two differ at all.



Speaking of the Hello Kitty World's manual, the spreads above and below explain this game's controls, start screen, and more.



And the next two pages of this instruction booklet discuss Hello Kitty World's dearth of collectible items.



I believe the following spread further educates players about how Hello Kitty World works, but feel free to correct me if I'm wrong.

The Great Gaymathon Review #56: Hello Kitty World (Famicom)

Game: Hello Kitty World

Genre: Platformer

Developer: Mario Co., Ltd.

Publisher: Character Soft

System: Famicom

Release date: 1992

According to this 2011 article by Wired's Chris Kohler, Hello Kitty World was made by the folks at Nintendo (under the guise of Mario Co., Ltd.--with Mario Co., Ltd. being a joint venture between the Kyoto-based gaming giant and an advertising company known as Dentsu). That makes sense on a number of levels. For starters, there's the fact that Hello Kitty World, at its heart, is a console-based re-skin of Nintendo's should-have-become-a-classic GameBoy title, Balloon Kid. Also, there's the fact that this game is as fun and polished as can be--qualities that I consider to be part and parcel of pretty much every game Nintendo's ever produced.

Beyond the fact that Hello Kitty World is a Nintendo-made title, though, why should you care about it--especially if you're normally averse to anything featuring the nauseatingly cute cat made famous by the folks at Sanrio? Let's go back to Balloon Kid, the GameBoy cart I mentioned earlier, shall we? If you've never played that 1990 release, imagine Balloon Fight's "Balloon Trip" mode turned into a multi-stage platformer. And if you've never played "Balloon Trip," well, imagine a platformer that scrolls from right to left and that features a protagonist who relies more on a pair of balloons for getting around than her own two feet.

Playing this game is as simple as can be: while on the ground (sans balloons), you can jump (with the A button) or inflate balloons (by pressing down on the d-pad). While in the air, you can control your flight by pressing left or right on the d-pad and by pressing the A button (which causes you to flap your arms and helps you gain altitude). Oh, and pressing the B button while in the air releases your balloons so you can scamper around on the ground (assuming there's any beneath you).

Although you'll spend most of your time hammering the A button while playing Hello Kitty World--so you can avoid pesky enemies and obstacles, of course--you won't want to forget about the B button, especially during the every-other-level boss fights, each of which are both easier and more enjoyable if you fly above and then dive bomb said baddies.

Given all of the above, I'm guessing all of you (or at least a few of you) are wondering if I prefer this cute and colorful console release to its portable predecessor. To be honest, I don't. I like the art style used in Balloon Kid more than the one used here, plus I'm pretty fond of Alice, the star of the GameBoy title, while I'm not much of a fan of ol' Hello Kitty. That said, both games are well worth playing, so feel free to go with whichever one superficially appeals to you most.

See also: Previous 'Great Gaymathon' posts

What a shocker: Hello Kitty World's box and cart are as syrupy sweet as its in-game graphics

I wasn't on the receiving end of any tricks yesterday, but I did receive the wonderful treat seen in the photos below.

For those of you who can't read Japanese, the game that serves as the focus of said photos is Character Soft's Hello Kitty World for the Famicom.

More information on this helium-filled platformer can be found in this previous blog post, by the way.

Also, for a few more photos of Hello Kitty World's box and cartridge, check out my Flickr photostream.

Other than all of that, expect a "Great Gaymathon" review of this Japan-only title to be published in the next week or two.

I'll bet you can't guess which game I bought in the place of Xenoblade Chronicles

Did you guess Hello Kitty World for the Famicom? I'll bet you didn't!

I see those side-eyes some of you are shooting in my general direction, by the way. I understand. Hello Kitty World probably seems like a strange choice for an off-the-cuff pick-up if you've never heard of the game.

Actually, I shouldn't call this purchase "off the cuff," as I've had my eye on Hello Kitty World for some time now. Still, I wasn't planning to add it to my Famicom collection anytime soon.

That changed pretty quickly, though, when I saw a complete-in-box copy of the game on eBay a few days ago. Long story short (I know, too late), I ended up getting it for a song.

Anyway, back to Hello Kitty World and why I was so keen to acquire it: Have you ever played Balloon Kid, Nintendo's Balloon Fight follow-up for the GameBoy? If not, it's a forced-scrolling platformer that hit store shelves in North America in 1990.


                                           A zoomed-in view of Hello Kitty World

The game feels a lot like a much-expanded version of Balloon Fight's "Balloon Trip" mode, to tell you the truth, as it tasks players with collecting the balloons left behind by the protagonist's kid brother (who was accidentally sent airborne while attempting to create a "balloon rainbow" that would cross the sky) while avoiding birds, fish and other obstacles that will cause her to plummet to the ground. (She grabs a couple of balloons and uses them to chase after her little bro, you see.)

Now, if you took the game described above, replaced Nintendo's characters with Sanrio's main claim to fame and then re-released it as a Famciom cart, you'd have Hello Kitty World.

My interest in said game makes sense now, doesn't it? If not, please take a minute to watch this video (which shows both Balloon Kid and Hello Kitty World in action).

As for Xenoblade Chronicles: Don't worry, I still plan to pick up a copy of this highly regarded Wii title--although I likely won't do so until after my birthday. In the meantime, I guess I'll just have to acquaint myself with the above-mentioned Character Soft creation.