Preview Once Upon a Time in Japan: Earth Developer: Abborado Studios Publisher: TBD Genre: Adventure Release Date: Q4 2007 Platform: Preview by most honorable Randy Sluganski March 16, 2007

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What if we were to tell you that there was a new game based on Japanese culture in development?  Yeah, I hear ya, ho-hum, so what, just another mind-numbing Japanese fight fest or incomprehensible strategy game.  Street Fighter vs. Tekken Super Duper Special Edition XXIV.

Well, you would be wrong grasshopper, for Once Upon a Time in Japan: Earth is an old-fashioned, point-and-click adventure game.  No, seriously, it is! 

Based in Dallas, Texas, Abborado Studio founders and friends Ben Keeney and Jared Morante decided to take their love and fascination with Japanese culture to another level and thankfully for us, that was an adventure game.  I think it is safe to claim that this is one subject that has not been overdone in the adventure genre.

Once Upon a Time in Japan is planned as a series of classical point-and-click games set in 17th Century Japan.  Visually inspired by Disney and Studio Ghibli, a Japanese film animation studio, the designer’s goal is to use meticulous research to create an authentic game world.  The use of Japanese voice actors will also add to the authenticity. Earth is to be the first in a series of games, the others being Once Upon a Time in Japan: Humankind and Once Upon a Time in Japan: Heaven.

As for the storyline (graciously borrowed from the Abborado website):

In the early 17th century, after many decades of civil war, Japan was finally united under the Tokugawa Shogunate. Zenjiro, a samurai living in the small seaside village of Hagana, welcomes peacetime with open arms. Content to care for his family and lead a simple existence, he hasn't been forced to draw his sword or commit an act of violence in the last sixteen years. Unfortunately, Zenjiro discovers the forces of nature can cut as deeply as any katana, and without a shred of remorse. A survivor by circumstance, not only must he explore the province to find others; he has to search his own soul for answers.

Along the way he will realize that peace has a price, and in a land ruled by the military for four centuries, there are those who have come to rely on the very wars they fought to exterminate.

Come on, are you guys sure this is an adventure game?!  Well, these screenshots sure look like a point-and-click adventure game:

Okay, it took some doing, but I’m convinced.  If Once Upon a Time in Japan: Earth is not (I smell a box quote here) this years unique and freshest idea for an adventure game – and a lot of other years also – then I’ll gladly stand by and watch as my wife eats a plate of Fugu. 

We’ll have some further info soon on puzzle types, characters and so on, but in the meantime there is a wonderful interview with Abborado Studio founders Ben Keeney and Jared Morante at Adventure-Treff.