Youkai Douchuuki (Famicom) FAQ (c) Adamant (Fredrik Jullum) fredrju@online.no INDEX: 1: Revision History 2: Game Data 3: Introduction 4: Controls 5: Stores and items 6: Temples 7: Walkthrough 7.1: Level 1 - The Gate to Hell 7.2: Level 2 - The Path to Penance 7.3: Level 3 - The Sea of Seclusion 7.4: Level 4 - The Valley of Judgement 7.5: Level 5 - The World of Samsara 8: Secrets 9: Credits and disclaimer 1: Revision History v. 1.00: November 20th, 2009. FAQ completed v. 1.01: December 23rd, 2009. A couple minor updates, and the addition of the "secrets" section ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 2: Game Data Title: 妖怪道中記(Youkai Douchuuki/Demon Travel Journal) Developer: Namco Platform: Family Computer (NES) Release date: June 24th, 1988 (Japan) Genre: Platform Adventure ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 3: Introduction Youkai Douchuuki, translated as "Demon Travel Journal", for the Famicom is based off the arcade game of the same name. The naughty boy Tarosuke has been sent to the afterlife to get his final judgement from the Buddha, hoping to make it into Heaven. On his way he has to fight off an endless stream of the titular "youkai", a specific type of demons from Japanese folklore, by use of kiaidama, balls of spirit energy. The game has a very whimsical feel, but a lot of the humor will sadly go over the heads of those not familiar with Japanese mythology. The original arcade game was notoriously challenging, surpassing even the likes of the Ghosts'n Goblins series. Unlike most similiar arcade games, Youkai Douchuuki had no score counter or hi score tables, the sole point of the game was to see if you could make it all the way through. The game also had several different endings based on your actions in the fifth and final stage. The Famicom version reduces the difficulty level a lot, and redesign the stages to make the game more of an adventure game. Also new is the "pious" meter that decides your overall fate. While your actions in the final stage still decide the ending, in this version you need to fill your pious meter before this stage to determine exactly what effect these actions will have. The game allows you to continue indefinitely, but you lose 3000 pious units every time you do so. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 4: Controls D-pad Right: Move Tarosuke right / move pointer right in stores D-pad Left: Move Tarosuke left / move pointer left in stores D-pad Down: Make Tarosuke charge his ki / Move Tarosuke down when he's swimming / move pointer down in stores and temples D-pad Up: Move Tarosuke up when he's swimming / move pointer up in stores and temples A: Make Tarosuke jump / Make a selection in stores and temples / Skip ahead to next text window during dialogue scenes / Pray in temples B: Make Tarosuke fire a kiaidama Start: Start the game / Pause the game Select: Use a charm, if you have one ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 5: Stores and items These are the many items you can find throughout the game. Most items are used automatically when needed, with the exception of the charm, which is used by pressing the Select button. Most of them are bought in stores, this list sorting them by the order they appear in on the store screen. Recovery items: Demon Soup (ようかいじる) -6000 money: Recovers 4 units on your power meter. Used instantly. Hell Rice (じごくどん) -8000 money: Recovers 6 units on your power meter. Used instantly. Travel Manju (どうちゅうまんじゅう) -10000 money: Recovers 8 units on your power meter. Used automatically when you die. Nymph Poop (てんにょのふん) -10000 money: It's a mystery to everyone!! Attack items: Double Shot (2れんしゃ) -20000 money: Lets you have two kiaidama on the screen at the same time, allowing you to fire more rapidly. Triple Shot (3れんしゃ) -50000 money: Lets you have three kiaidama on the screen at the same time, allowing you to fire more rapidly. Other items: Demon Charm (ようかいごふ) -5000 money: Adds another charm to your inventory. You can carry up to 9 at a time. You use a charm by pressing select, at which point Tarosuke will summon his ancestor Monmotaro to fight for him. Monmotaro can float freely around the screen, and fire homing kiaidama that deal much more damage than Tarosuke's, but you will not be able to advance the screen while he's summoned. Also note that you will still take damage if an enemy touches the immobile Tarosuke, as well as Monmotaro. Press select again to de-summon him and retake control of Tarosuke. You start the game with one charm. Carl Lewis (かーる るいす) -2000 money: Makes you run faster. And there aren't any doping tests in the afterlife either! Kappa Flippers (かっぱのみずかき) -5000 money: Increases your swimming speed. Non-store items: These are the items you find around. I'm not sure if they have official names or not: Blue money pouch: Worth 200 money Flower: Also worth 200 money. Textless money bag: Worth 500 money 5-money bag: Also worth 500 money, making it somewhat pointless. Has the kanji for 5 (五) written on it. 1000-money bag: Worth 1000 money. Has the kanji for 1000 (千) written on it. 5000-money box: Worth 5000 money. Has the kanji for 5000 (五千) written on it. 10000-money box: Worth 10000 money. Has the kanji for 10000 (一万) written on it. Kiai level 2 mark: Not really an item, but appears in your inventory after you pray for increased kiai. Kiai level 3 mark: Appears in your inventory after you pray for increased kiai a second time. Kiai level 4 mark: Appears in your inventory after you pray for increased kiai a third time. Jump level 2 mark: Appears in your inventory after you pray for increased jump. Jump level 3 mark: Appears in your inventory after you pray for increased jump a second time. Jump level 4 mark: Appears in your inventory after you pray for increased jump a third time. Gonta's Remains: Doesn't show up in your inventory. The remains of the dead Gonta, find a suitable burial place for them. Nymph Heart: Refills your entire power meter, used automatically if you die. Tree Emblem: One of the three treasures you must collect in level 4. Fire Emblem: One of the three treasures you must collect in level 4. Earth Emblem: One of the three treasures you must collect in level 4. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 6: Temples Throughout the game, you will come across temples you can pray at. When you enter a temple, you will be asked what you wish to pray for - your spirit (こころ), your kiai (きあい) or your jump (じゃんぷ). A successful prayer for your spirit increases your piousness by 3000, a successful prayer for your kiai allows you to charge your kiaidama one more level, and a successful prayer for your jump makes your jump better. You can only pray once for each item per level. Praying is done by hammering the A button to fill an on-screen meter. Your prayer is successful if you manage to fill the meter, but you're only given limited time. Before starting the prayer, you must donate money - every 1000 money you give adds 10 units to the counter. About 70 units is generally enough, but since this is based on how fast you can hammer A, it's individual. Try experimenting. When donating, the amount you give is written out rather than purely rendered in numbers. The first number you can change is for ten thousands, the second for thousands. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 7: Walkthrough 7.1: Level 1 - The Gate to Hell Ooh, spooky. The first level is very simple and straight-forward. From where you start, move Tarosuke to the right, killing enemies as you go. Climb the stairs, the use the clouds as platforms to cross the lake. Watch out for the demons in the pit right after the lake, they deal a lot of damage. Jump down the hole at the end of the path, then go left. You'll see a fence here, simply jump through it to find some money boxes. After collecting them, go back and to the right from where you fell down. Swim through the sea here, and you'll soon find an island with a huge frog. Shoot the frog a couple times, and he will surrender, telling you "something good" in return for sparing him. If you climb the frogs that appear in front of him, you will reach the gamble hall, where you can play a dice game with some monsters. You can play up to 8 times, the first time for 1000 money, the second time for 2000, all the way up to 8000. The game is simple enough, two dice will be thrown and you guess whether the sum of the two will be even (two even numbers or two odd numbers) or odd (an even or an odd number). If you win, you get the amount of money you were playing about, if you were wrong, you lose it. You can quit at any time you feel like it. Play if you feel lucky, but I'd suggest against it, the risk of walking out with less than you came in with is high. Either way, head into the sea to theright of the frog island and continue right. Approach the green demon in the water slowly - you can only hit him when his head is up, and he doesn't start sticking it up until you get close to him, but if you get too close, an annoying bird will spawn and attack you. If you stop and fire at him until he dies the moment he pops up, though, you'll avoid the bird. Continue right after this, avoid the falling rock by the stairway at the end, and make sure to get the money bag under the stairs before climbing them to the next screen. After climbing the stairs, go left for another money box, then go back to the stairs and continue right. You'll eventually come to some more stairs leading to a lower level. It doesn't really matter if you take these or not, by continuing right you'll reach another pair of stairs taking you to a later point on the same level, so it's just a splitting path with no real reason to take either way over the other. The upper path has an imposing tree demon along the way, but he's easily defeated by just standing in froont of his face and firing rapidly, which prevents him from counterattacking. To the right of the second pair of stairs, you'll find another money box, if you took the lower route, you can climb these stairs once you reach them to get it. After this, go back to the lower route, where the level continues. Head right from the stairs into the cave, and continue onwards until you reach a hole. Fall down, and hold left as you fall to land on a platform with another moneybag. Then jump to the lower level of the cave, follow the path to the left, then drop down the hole here to meet the boss. The boss, the Red Oni, is the gatekeeper of this level, and you'll need to defeat him to continue. He himself doesn't do anything but sit there, but a number of ghosts will constantly appear and fly around the room, attacking you. The boss can be quite hard, actually, especially if you don't have your charm. The best strategy I've found is to move Tarosuke to the left edge of the screen, summon Momontaro, and have him move back and forth directly under the boss, firing constantly, while dodging and attacking any ghosts that home in on you. After enough hits, he'll explode, leaving behind a 10000-money box. Grab it to clear the level. 7.2: Level 2 - The Path to Penance This is where the game starts getting more involving. From the beginning, go right and climb the first stairs you see to find the first shop in the game. On this level, you need the Manju and the Poop, and you should get another Charm for the boss. You will need the Flippers on the next level, so keep them in mind as you go shopping. Once you've bought what you wanted, continue to the right. Ignore the first stairs you see, walking right until you meet Gonta, a weird... dog... thing. Gonta is hungry and asks for manju, so give him the ones you bought and he'll eat them... then die of food poisoning. Before he dies, he'll ask you to give him a good burial. Pick up his remains, then go back to the stairs you passed before, climbing them this time. At the top of the stairs, go left for the game's first temple. You can go up to level two in kiai and jump for now, your kiai should get absolute first priority here. Once you're done praying, go back to the stairs and towards the right. Continue right past the swamp, and you'll reach a couple houses where you meet some gigantic demons. They look strong, but they're easy enough to defeat despite being able to take many hits. Having your kiai at level 2 really helps here. In the next swamp you meet another huge demon, this one capable of shooting fire. The fireballs can be destroyed with a single kiaidama, so if you aim them well, he's no problem to kill. After this battle, continue to the right for another pair of stairs. get the money bag under them, then ascend. Head left, and jump through the fence here, and you'll find a cut-off bamboo. When you approach it, the goddess of the bamboo will appear, explaining that since the bamboo isn't growing, she's gone fat from lack of exercise, asking for help. Say yes, and you'll give her the nymp poop, which works as fertilizer and makes her slim again. For this good deed, your piousness will increase by 5000. Head back right, past the stairs, and continue through the huge building and the forest. Once you reach the mountain, you'll find another store. It doesn't sell anything the previous one didn't, so buy what you need, and continue onwards, through the cave. You'll eventually reach the edge of the floating island, having to jump on cloud platforms to reach the next. If you fall, you'll land in a room with a boss monster that's incredibly tough to beat without the charm. If you beat it, you'll be sent back to right before the cloud platforms, so try to stay on them. Once you reach the next island you see, jump onto the first cloud platform, and stay on it a while, and it will rise and drop you off at an inn owned by a sparrow, where you can get your entire power meter filled for 5000 money. Certainly beats the food of those money-grubbing shopkeepers. Whether you visit the inn or not, continue towards the right and you'll reach other of the fire-shooting demons. Kill him, then continue right to the edge of the island, with cloud platforms leading to the next. Don't fall - not only will you have to fight the boss, but winning will send you back to before the PREVIOUS set of cloud platforms. After crossing the clouds, continue right, into the cave, and climb the stairs at the end. Go to the left, and you'll find a huge set of stairs leading up to the Pond of God, where you get to relax with a naked chick after your long journey. Yay. She'll give you the Nymph Heart, whose power you will surely understand later. It will completely refill your power meter when you die, which is absolutely helpful. After recieving this, go back down the stairs and head right, walking slowly to avoid the bullets the hands shoot out. They can be hard to avoid. Jump between the platforms and clouds, making your way the the right edge, then drop down the hole here, where you'll meet the second boss, the Blue Oni. He'll ask you if you managed to get this far in the arcade game, and if you say no, he'll tell you he'll let you pass if you give him all your items. Refuse, or say you've made it this far before, and he'll say you probably knew about his trick and attack you, if you give him your stuff he'll laugh about how he tricked you and attack you anyway. If your kiai is at the second level, and you get the pattern of the ghosts down, it's not THAT hard to beat him itemless, but it takes time, and it's much more pratcical to just let Momontaro kill him for you. The Blue Oni is sitting at a higher level than his red counterpart, though, so Momontaro can't hit him from the floor. Stay a bit above ground level, and move a bit around to take out ghosts, and you should beat him without taking much damage, though. Once he's dead, you get another 10000-money box. If he took your stuff, it's gone for good, though. Onwards to level 3. 7.3: Level 3 - The Sea of Seclusion Watch out for the jumping enemy at the beginning of this stage, if he touches you, he'll latch onto your head, making your money decrease at a rapid pace until you shake him off. Avoid him, grab the 5000-money box nearby, then go left as far as you can for another temple. Pray for the upgrades you want, then go back to the beginning of the stage and continue right. There's a store here, buy anything you need, then continue right, crossing the sea to the next island, killing enemies along the way. On the second island, head right, past the enemies, until you reach a cloud. Use this as a platform to reach the top of the screen, and you'll climb the mountain. On this new screen, simply head left, across the lake, then jump on the platforms to the next cloud, using this to reach an even higher screen. On this screen, head right, jumping between the platforms and the cloud to reach the 5000-money box. If you fall, you can't get back up, so be careful. The pit to the right of the box will take you to the sea on the previous screen, where you can go right and down the hole to get back to the point where you first started scaling the mountain. The pit to your left, however, which you'll be forced to fall down if you missed the platforms leading to the money box, will lead to a screen with two minibosses. The first one is a red oni who can easily be defeated by just staying on the left platform and shooting kiaidama while dodging the souls flying at you. He'll give up a 5000-money box when defeated. The second boss is a bit further to the right, a blue oni on a high platform. The best strategy is to get on top of the small platform near him and shoot charged kiaidama straight forward without jumping, hitting the fireballs when he shoots those. He takes quite a lot of hits. Once he's dead, he'll drop a 10000-money box, get that, then drop down the hole under his platform to land in the sea to the right of the second island. Head right across the sea to the next island, then jump into the deep water here, and sink to the next screen. Note that Tarosuke will constantly be sinking when underwater unless you're pressing up. The first thing you'll see after diving underwater is a sign showing the way to the Palace of the Dragon King. Ignore it, it leads to a fake palace where an impostor princess will charge you 10000 money to play with her, then attack you in a faux RPG battle. Head to the right instead, and you'll enter a maze of underwater passages. Skip the first pit, it just leads to a passage that wraps around itself, and has nothing of interest in it. Touching the ground near the falling boulder sends you to a boss battle with a sea horse who takes a lot of hits to defeat, but isn't overly difficult. Heading right instead, you'll come across some air pockets. Get the money bag in the first one, and jump into the second, huge, one to access an inn like the one in level 2. You can most likely use the healing it provides. After the air pocket with the inn, you'll find another pit. There's some money down there, but it can easily be skipped. Like the first pit, it wraps around itself. Continuing right, you'll find another air pocket with money, and a third pit. This is the one you want to go down. If you continue further right, you'll find some more falling boulders - touching the ground here sends you to another sea horse battle. This one is red rather than green, but there doesn't seem to be any other differences. To the right of these boulders, you'll find two 5000-money boxes, though one of them is located inside a rock, and there doesn't seem to be a way to get to it. Heading down the third pit, you'll find another pit to your left, and one to your right. ignore both of these - the left one takes you to the second pit from the upper area, while the third one takes you to a room that eventually leads back to the upper area, near the falling boulders. Go to the right of these pits, however, and you'll meet some demons offering to sell you a turtle. You'll be asked to make an offer, they'll sell it if the offer is at least 30000 money (so might as well go for that, it's the cheapest you'll get it for) . The turtle will thank you for freeing it from these tormentors, and your good deed will increase your piousness by 5000. The turtle will offer to bring you "somewhere good", telling you to hold onto it's back. Do so, and it will take you to the real Palace of the Dragon King, conveniently located right offscreen. In the palace, the princess will welcome you, and there will be a dance number. Whom the dancer is depends on how pious she finds you. After this, you'll be given the tamatebako before leaving. The turtle will ask you to open it. Yeah, let's not. The damn turtle will keep insisting, but if you say no enough time, it will eventually let you go. The tamatebako will either contain 10000 money or your old age. if you get aged, you'll be so severely handicapped you can't get very far in the next level, but you can regain your youth with Nymph Poop. If you don't have the money, it can be a bit of a pain to collect, and you'll have to shell out 10000 for the poop, so the gamble isn't really worth it. After this scene, you'll go to the next level. 7.4: Level 4 - The Valley of Judgement Start by collecting the 5000-money box right next to your starting point, then head right. You'll soon reach a store, buy what you need. If your jump is high enough, you can get a 5000-money box by jumping off the fence to the right of the store. Head right into the cave, and you'll find another money box on the ground. Continue right, and you'll find two staircases. This stage is non-linear, your overall goal is to collect three treasures from three bosses spread around the level and present them to the witch guarding the Sanzu River. If you continue right from these staircases, you'll find a fence. By jumping into it, then on top of it, then off the top oof the screen, you'll reach an inn. Keep it in mind, it can be useful for healing between bosses. If you take the starcase leading down, you can head left to find a temple and increase your status a bit more. Head right, and you'll find another staircase - ignore this for now, and continue tight to meet the tree demon. It's pretty easy to defeat, just shoot charged kiaidama into it's mid-section while dodging the balls it fires. they can be destroyed with your kiaidama, and they also float up and down, allowing you to walk under them without too much trouble. Once it's dead, you get the tree emblem. To the right of the tree demon, you'll find an old man asking you to give him Gonta's remains. Do so, and your piousness will increase by 5000, and the old man will let flowers rain from the sky. Grab as many as you can, each is worth 200 money. The staircase before the tree demon leads to the Sanzu River, where you don't want to go before you have all the treasures, so ignore it. Go back to the staircase leading up near the beginnign of the level, and you'll see a fork in the road. If you head left, you'll find another staircase to climb, make sure to grab the moneybags here too. At the top of this staircase, head to the left, jumping between platforms. Make sure not to fall off the cliffs, this leads to a room where you need to fight some hand monsters. Defeat ing them sends you back to the previously mentioned road fork. If you successfully cross the cliff area, you'll find a staircase leading to a lava pool. Go down here, then continue left, avoiding the lava, until you find the fire demon at the end. Fighting him fair and square is really hard, so I suggest just placing yourself right in front of his face, firing as fast as you can, which should hopefully prevent him from counterattacking too much. Once he's dead, he'll leave the fire emblem. Yes, you'll have to take a dip in the lava to get it. Now, head back to the crossroad, preferrably via the hand room. Visit the inn if you need to, which you probably do. If you head right from the crossroad, you'll find some log platforms to jump between. Falling leads to the same hand room as falling from the cliffs. Be careful with the clouds, some of them sink when you stand on them. After the logs, you'll find some stairs, climb them. Head left from here, and you'll find another pond like the one in level 2. You won't get a heart here, but if you're pious enough, a rope will come down from the heavens, and you can climb up to find 5000 money. If not, the nymph will turn into a naked guy, and poop will rain from the sky. Yow. In either case, head right from the stairs, and you'll find a bunch of platforms placed over spikes. Cross this highly dangerous area to reach the edge of the cliff, and jump down to meet the earth demon. He's quite easy, just dodge the rocks he drops when he flies around, and when he lands on his platform, blast him with a fully charged kiaidama. Repeat until he dies, then grab the earth emblem and drop down the hole on the left side of the room to land at the shore of the Sanzu River. Head right to meet the Sanzu witch, and show her the three treasures to be allowed to cross the river and meet with Enma Daiou, who will let you into the World of Samsara. 7.5: Level 5 - The World of Samsara In the World of Samsara, you need to be absolutely pious all the time, not committing any sins of violence or greed. In game term, this mean you must avoid killing enemies or picking up money, which will lower your pious meter substantially every time. Killing an enemy reduces your piousness by 1000 points, a 1000-money bag reduces it by 500, and a 5-money bag reduces it by 200. Good luck. First off, wait for the two walking enemies to get close to you, so you can jump them without touchign the moneybags. Dodge the jumping enemy as well, and head right. the enemies in this area aren't too hard to avoid, so make your way to the right, and drop down the pit. At the bottom, head right, dodging the enemies (scroll the jumping one offscreen when you see it to deal with them once at a time, then continue right. Watch out for the moneybags blending in with the background, then continue right, jumping down the next pit. Hold right as you fall to dodge the spikes on the ground. Let the enemies here close in on you, then jump over them and the spikes in one go, before continuing right. The enemies and moneybags here are easy to avoid, so continue towards the clouds, and use them as platforms to climb to the top of the screen. On the next screen, jump from the middle cloud when it's at it's lowest to dodge the money bag. Dodge the enemies to the right, and continue onwards. When you reach the clouds over spikes, it's hard to avoid the first money bag, so jump into the spikes and take the hit, then jump onto the cloud from them instead of trying to make the jump. Head right, and climb the stairs, then head left to find another pond. If you're pious enough, a rope will come down - climb it, and the Buddha will speak to you, rewarding your pious by transporting you a bit forward, to the area right before the blood pool. If you're not pious enough, you'll get the poop rain, though. If you go right instead of up the stairs, you find an area where you can swim underwater. It's another one of those areas that wrap around, so there's absolutely nothing to gain from goign down there. If you continue right, you'll find a pit that leads you back to before the spikes, and past that, another area where you can go underwater. If you're not pious enough to use the warp in the pond, this is where you need to go. Swim down, then to the left, get out of the water, and drop down the pit here, holding right to avoid landing on spikes. Go right from here, and you'll reach the place where the warp would've sent you. Jump the money bags and continue right, scrolling one enemy onto the screen at a time to be able to handle them easier. be careful of the frogs, they die if you jump on them, and you don't want that. make a huge leap across both money bags at the dock, and land in the blood pool. You can't jump as far as usual in the blood pool, so be wary. At the end of the pool, use the clouds to reach the top of the screen. On the next screen, the electrified cloud (or whatever it is) making up the floor will damage you if you touch it, so use the floating clouds as platforms. take your time, dodge the enemies that fly in, and make your way to the right, then use the final cloud to reach the top of the screen. Jump onto the huge cloud here, then head right to find the Buddha's throne. He's moved, though, so jump off the right side of the throne to land in the next area, some kind of frozen cave. Head right, avoiding the pits, who all send you back to the beginning of the cave, jumping the money bags as you go, before jumping on the cloud at the end and off the top of the screen. You won't be able to stay on the cloud until the enemies get close, so jump off it, then dodge the enemies and go right to reach the blood pool again. Jump in, clearing the money bags, making sure to jump the first one in the actual pool from the dock itself. Hurry through the pool, as frogs will be raining down, and they're hard to jump. Get onto the clouds at the end, and climb to the top of the screen. On this next screen, you need to time your jumps. Stay on the first cloud for a bit until it starts rising to reach the next one, then jump quickly between the next couple clouds. The final one that looks like it can't be reached will eventually lower itself if you wait, jump on it, and let it rise to the top of the screen. On the next screen, the electric cloud is back. Jump between the clouds, dodging the enemies, and let the final one lower itself before jumping on it, then let it rise to the next screen. Jump onto the huge cloud, and go right to finally meet the Buddha and get your judgement. If your piousness is 2900 or lower, you go to Hell. If your piousness is between 3000 and 7900, you become a ghoul If your piousness is between 8000 and 12900, you are reborn as an animal If your piousness is between 13000 and 19600, you are reborn as a human again If your piousness is 19800 or higher, and you continued at least once, you go to Heaven. If your piousness is 19800 or higher, and you did not use any continues, you go to the Namco Hall of Fame, joining the ranks of the greatest Namco video game heroes of all time. Can you name them all? How high can you get? ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 8: Secrets While sleeping at an inn, hit A a couple times for Tarosuke to start dreaming. The subject of these dreams should be quite easy to guess. Press A during the credit roll to see the princess' dance again. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 9: Credits and disclaimer This guide was written by Fredrik Jullum, aka Adamant, for GameFAQs as part of the NES FAQ completion project. It may not be posted on any other site. This guide covers the Famicom version of Youkai Douchuuki, and is not accurate to the arcade or PC Engine versions of the game. This guide is partly based on information from Taiheiyoh's (太平洋上) Homepage, which can be found at http://www.k4.dion.ne.jp/~tai_yoh. Thank you very much - your site was very helpful in explaining the pious system.