There are so many games I want to play. As in, all of them. But so many are hidden behind language barriers, and it makes me really sad. I was thinking about a game today that will NEVER be translated into English that fascinates me greatly. I dunno if it’s even particularly… good? But it’s really fascinating and that alone makes me want to give it a chance.

title screen

Real Sound: Kaze no Regret (リアルサウンド ～風のリグレット～) is a 1997 Sega Saturn game made by Warp. Warp was Kenji Eno’s company, they made D. Anyway, Eno found himself getting a lot of letters from fans who were blind, who told him that they loved his games. He met with some of these fans to discuss how they could play his game, and while doing so, he got the idea to make a game FOR blind people.

Which is something that I can’t even think of having been done before. If it’s ever been done since, it’s not very many games.

Now, to be clear, Real Sound: Kaze no Regret isn’t as indepth as a lot of games. It could easily be described as a radio drama you listen to, but occasionally chimes pop up and you get to choose an action to continue down a certain path in the story. It’s a choose your own adventure radio drama. But even just the fact that a high concept popular game dev went “You know what, no one makes games for this small demographic, they deserve games too!” is really really cool.

Also of note are the feelies put into the package, including instructions in braille, which is neat.

Sequels were planned but unfortunately, they were cancelled over problems with sound compression technology. Those ideas were later used in D2, at least, and Eno would often keep thoughts about what he learned with Kaze no Regret later down the road. D2 and Enemy Zero had a lot of auditory themed stuff in them.

Unfortunately, Kaze no Regret did not sell well, which honestly makes sense. It’s become a collector’s item though, because of Eno’s other works being so popular. But it’s also not nearly as renowned despite how interesting it is. D is on Steam. Kaze no Regret got rereleased for Dreamcast, and that’s it. That version had graphics btw, the Saturn version is just a black screen. The Dreamcast version is a black screen that occasionally shows additional pictures that aren’t necessary to understand anything.

Is this game good? I have NO idea. It might be the worst story and audio drama ever concepted. But I love that it was concepted, and I find it super interested at the very least. Maybe they could have gone further with it. When I first heard of this game, I thought it might be a little bit like D, an interactive movie with some adventure game elements. You listen to the audio drama, then you have to solve some kind of puzzle using only auditory clues. That would have been sick! Someone make that.

This wasn’t originally intended to be an Obscure Games post, but this sure is an obscure game. I mostly just wanted to talk about a game I thought was cool, and that I wish I could play. But if any game requires Japanese language comprehension, it is this game for sure.