Obscure Games You May Not Have Heard Of - Episode 14, Drihoo
BEEV
So I was talking about the Original Xbox, and how it’s possibly the most underrated console. It’s really only viewed as The Halo Machine, which is SO unfair to it. Halo is good, yes, we all know that. But there’s so much more. What people DON’T know is that there were a lot of JP exclusive games on the console
That’s a really weird thing to think about today. The Xbox sells like fucking garbage in Japan. But at the time, no one knew it would flop so hard, and a lot of Sega devs jumped over to being Xbox devs because they weren’t Nintendo or Sony. Unfortunately, this means a lot of them are SUPER obscure. Case in point, today’s game, Drihoo
Drihoo is a JP exclusive Xbox game made by Highwaystar. They’re a company you probably haven’t heard of, they made a few games between 97 and 2002… and then apparently after 20 years of silence helped make Live a Live, according to Moby Games, but I dunno how true that is. Anyway, Drihoo was their final game. Their swan song. What’s it about?
In Drihoo, you play as Dunk the Dwarf, who’s a treasure hunter. He’s seperated from the rest of his squad by a cave-in, and is left alone to explore the holy valley to try and find treasure! Luckily he’s well equipped for the job, with his giant fuck-off drill, and a huge-ass hammer.
Gameplay basically takes place in three parts. First, underground exploration. Dunk can use his drill to dig through dirt and create a snaking anthill of tunnels and caverns, all to find lost treasure, hidden characters and shops, and especially tombs. The valley you’re in is very Egypt themed, and you’ll find lots of ancient tombs to explore. Digging is fun, but dig too much and the area becomes unstable, with earthquakes breaking up your tunnels, and Goblins and the like will occasionally pop out to steal shit. To dig, you use the R button, which is analog on the Xbox controller, so putting on more pressure uses up more Beev but spins up faster!
Once you enter a tomb, gameplay switches to combat. Combat is kinda clunky and slow, and later enemies are a nightmare. You can dodgeroll, but this ain’t no Dark Souls. If you dodgeroll too much Dunk becomes dizzy and open to enemy attack. Really, clunky Dark Souls is kinda the best way to describe it, but with a charge hammer attack. In fact, this game has been talked about as an influence on the Soulsborne games but I dunno how true THAT is. Anyway, explore the tomb to find items you can appraise in town to sell! Tombs are littered with enemies and traps, and doors you need to open either with keys you’ll find, or by breaking them down. Dunk breaks em by slamming his head into em, which lowers his Beev Meter.
Oh right, the Beev Meter! Yes, Dunk’s health is labeled as his “Beev”, and you can increase your Beev by drinking Beer. I’m assuming its a hilarious mistranslation, but I really love saying the word Beev. It’s fun! Anyways, to drink Beev, have some ale equipped and then press L. Again, the L and R buttons are analog, so you can drink quickly by slamming on that L button… but even though you refill health faster, as a tight pinch in battle, you’ll waste and spill all your precious beev! It’s a silly but fun mechanic. And VERY dwarfy.
The third and final gameplay style is heading back to town. You can return to the surface and enter town to restock on supplies, upgrade equipment like your hammer and drill, buy some more Beev, appraise items and artifacts you find, and sell em for profit. The main story involves researching these ancient tablets that tell the story of the area. In each underground section there’s a Boss Temple to find, and once you beat it, you can unlock the next region by buying the rights to salvage there.
It’s a fun gameplay loop. Maybe a bit repetitive? But I get weird pleasure in digging out corridors and hunting for treasure, big Motherlode vibes. It scratches an itch. Drihoo isn’t an AMAZING game but I find it EXTREMELY fascinating, and super cool. It recently got a translation patch in October of 2022, but it’s a machine translation. Sadly, the game is rather obscure and no one quiiite cares about it enough to give it a proper treatment. I can’t even find any evidence of anyone beating the dang thing. But it IS super interesting, and I recommend you check it out!
Or at least I would, if it wasn’t, y’know, 150+ dollars, and if Xbox emulation was better. Hey, did you know modding an Xbox isn’t that difficult? You can easily load games off of hard drive. You should look into that~
And if you’re interested in another indepth look about this game, and its possible connections to the Soulsborne games, check out this review I found that came out in December of last year! I first discovered this game early 2022, and I’m honestly so glad people are actually starting to notice it, what I consider the most obscure Xbox game.
https://www.timeextension.com/features/digging-into-drihoo-the-xbox-exclusive-that-shares-dna-with-the-soulsborne-series