Hamtaro Video Games Are Weird | Little Hamsters, Many Adventures

[Music] super smash brothers brawl is a fantastic source of quality nintendo fan service so you know where i'm going with this and i want to thank you for doing your homework deep within the menus upon menus of brawls ui inside of the massive vault is the nintendo chronicle a list of every game nintendo has ever published as of december 2007 of course it's such a fascinating look at all the things nintendo was willing to put their money into man you see people thought that sora in smash was such a big deal but the true historians know that game watch mickey mouse is truly what paved the way for this partnership to take place don't fool yourself otherwise you got popeye on nes multiple baseball games featuring ken griffey jr so much so you would practically think he was a nintendo character he was on an official christmas card for crying out loud the virtual boy but at the bottom of the game boy line is where one of my favorite nuggets of nintendo trivia resides hamtaro in fact jump over to the gba and hey look at that more hamtaro i have just never gotten over this information man i get it you know licensed properties they make a lot of money sure nowadays we have the switch nintendo has worked with both marvel and dc they clearly don't care but hamtaro all right so here's a bit of a history lesson for all of you uncultured viewers out there who don't know about the almighty hamtaro the anime is by far one of the cutest damn things you could ever bear witness to across multiple seasons and even some movies hamtaro and his ragtag group of fellow adorable and quirky hamsters would go on adventures and and yeah you know that that was really about it that was the whole show and it was awesome i discovered this show around that time i was first getting into anime 2 with the likes of dragon ball z and whatnot and then to see tom from toonami talk about how good hamtaro was man i was a fan ever since just be sure to not get this confused with ebichu which is a totally different hamster anime i'll i'll say that much without getting demonetized hamtaro did exist before the anime but in a very small capacity there was some early animation where himtara wore a shirt and that's weird he's much better when he's naked and even before that there was this educational magazine for japanese school children where hamtaro would like stare your soul into submission i guess it's clear that the anime is when things started to peak dude even the theme song was so good good enough to have the lyrics altered by protesters in bangkok against the government of tai man i did not did not expect to see that on the series wikipedia page i can say that much ham hams unite to take down the government i guess so yeah this became a pretty notable franchise of course with success on their hands video games were soon to follow yeah there is a mobile game there's also an old pc game as well but i just can't believe that nintendo would publish most of them dude some are even made by alphadream what is this company this may come off as me scraping the bottom of the barrel of nintendo content to talk about for you guys on the internet but trust me there's a whole lot more to this than you could ever possibly imagine i have played every game in this franchise and i'm here to tell you we got some fun times ahead so without any further ado it's him taro time hushy hushy tiki tiki wu some of you may be expecting me to start with the game boy color classic ham ham's unite but actually that's not the first game in the series in japan that game has a nice big 2 attached to it which begs the question why was the first game totoko himtaro tomodachi daisuken dechu never get localized because because it's a hamster simulator that's why obviously there's a big language barrier to work around here though i can tell the game asks me for my blood type along with all my other information so you know i always thought that little nugget was missing from the pokemon games i tried so hard to figure out if there was actually a game here but i don't know man i couldn't find it i don't know what to say to that one definitely didn't think i was going to see him taro jumped today i'm really not sure why this is the case but it turns out hamster simulator is actually a full-on genre mostly in japan you got the hamster paradise series there's kisuke hamster hamster monogatari is another series with one of them even showing up on the n64 i i guess in japan hamtaro with this genre made total sense it does in retrospect but like why why are there so many hamster games uh it's no surprise this one didn't get localized we already got our deformed pets games we were totally fine at the time but now we move on to the good stuff ham hams unite developed by paksovnika a company that i'm pretty sure no one's heard of but trust me on this they also worked on mulmania this is a good group of developers right here i'm really glad nintendo had a go-to developer for their fairy rodent themed video games worked out great for him it's kind of strange that this one is considered a sequel in japan i mean him taro's in it sure but this is a totally different beast i mean look at him what a beast he is looks like we have a conundrum on our hands hamtaro doesn't know ham chat unbelievable on top of that all of your friends have gone missing too well since boss can't be bothered to go and hunt for anyone himself leave it to our hero to fill out the dictionary and repopulate the hamster hideout himself from there you kind of just wander around a bunch you pick up food talk to locals gather items for those who need them occasionally dabble in blackmail and fill up your hamchat book and really that's the best part of the game each word is associated with this adorable little gesture and like oh my god this game is so cute that is the main takeaway to get out of this it's just oh man oh look at him do the thing oh this is adorable ham huh ham huh for god's sakes put some heart and soul into it we kind of work with an old school point-and-click mentality with this actually whenever you come in contact with anything just try every option available to you and hope it's the right one eventually you'll get it right sometimes it leads to progression sometimes it's just another cute animation sometimes you almost die it's a lot of fun ooh a cave what's in here shush we'll get caught think i just stumbled across a crime scene alright how do we how do we get the scar from this bird [Music] ah what do you mean peeing didn't work damn it oh ham ha my friend how goes the day uh how embarrassing [Music] much love to this salesman too by the way he just begs you to buy whatever he's trying to pedal at the moment and does so with this really catchy song playing in the background i love it it's my favorite part of the game okay wait no i lied my actual favorite part of the game has to be pretty late into the adventure when you basically kill a man he screams for his life on the way down and antara goes oh yeah you know let's let's put that scream in the dictionary oh my god you see that's the thing with these games now they are oddly compelling you may think it's just a kid's game you give it's a little jimmy or sarah it'll shut him up for a while but no not at all hamtaro has a body count now bringing all of your ham ham friends back to the hideout is only part of the journey you do so get to see a sick party take place but the adventure truly isn't over until you fill up that dictionary it isn't until you hit boss with that ham test when you're all filled up and then he gives you the final word great you the book cover changes oh and oh and that's it now oh damn you know what that's pretty anticlimactic i'm not gonna lie where's my gripping narrative game well considering how all over the place the game boy color exclusive lineup was i guess by default that that makes this one of the best nintendo exclusives on the console so uh hey congrats are in order my ham ham friend good good job maybe the sequel is even better ham ham heartbreak for the game boy advance enter player name huh hmm bijou is playable in this one too interesting [Music] i am original and funny clearly i didn't watch enough of the anime because uh my god hamtaro has a villain this is spat a character that apparently only showed up in three episodes of the show and was strong enough of a character to become the focal point of a video game good for him oh and what a villain he is essentially he just randomly goes about his day finding happy people and doing whatever he can to ruin love for them basically a standard twitter user the more i think about it well naturally we can't have that come on hamta i mean sonic come on sonic you have to save the day oh no we got the dictionary wet losing all of the information inside in the process somehow well i guess we've forgotten all the words now and have to go get them all over again it's like a metroid game all of a sudden when samus would lose all of her powers randomly the game certainly looks a whole lot better now that it's on better hardware but essentially it is basically the same idea pick up food talk to the locals gather items for those who need them partake in high-speed action scenes and make him taro scared for his life and then fill up your ham chat book you know same game it's just that rather than being solo bijou joins you for most of the ride and rather than bringing your friends back to the hideout you mend broken hearts of anybody that stands in your way this does include your friends but basically anybody could be hit by spat's evil ways you're not so much of a matchmaker as you are a match repairer and you know that's that's still a pretty respectable job playing both of these games back to back and needing to fill out the dictionary with all of these words that you already had before is a bit annoying but there is a whole slew of new words with much more fleshed out animations too this game is still cute as ham heck let's not kid our hamselves here this game is mother hamming adorable big fan of liberty where they just randomly pull out a statue of liberty cosplay amazing they look fabulous there's bloat tea which introduces inflation to the franchise good and rub rub you're free to insinuate anything you want about this in the comments below it's not all the same game though there is definitely a lot more done here to spice things up from time to time many of the tasks that you have to accomplish are more dynamic than before when they were just mostly static there's a volleyball segment a dancing minigame where you plan out your entire routine to get graded on there's like a genuine boss fight like what the environments are a bit all over the place as well ham ham's unite tried to stay a lot more grounded and realistic with its locations but here in heartbreak we have a theme park with the hamster roller coaster and i mean that alone is way out of the boundaries of what we had before there is more of the same but it's a lot more polished there is no denying that there were some moments that were pretty aimless where i needed a random word that i just happened to miss because i didn't talk to every single npc in the previous area that kind of sucked but in general it's still a good time dude dude okay uh spoilers i guess but when you get to the end of the game and need help building a catapult to get to spat's evil lair you need to get a special spoon to do so only obtainable after getting three special gems something pretty easy to come across and then [Music] oh ganon's not gonna see this coming i tell you what and by far my favorite part of the game it's technically not even a part of the game it's stuff that was taken out but the code is still there and this is amazing hard way into the game there's this segment where our heroes go on a boat trip to a different area and in the final product the game just cuts from one area to the next after getting onto the boat and it's fine you don't really think much about it well initially there was going to be a cutscene referencing one of the iconic moments from the titanic this is real and there was going to be a rendition of my heart will go on by celine dion playing in the background this is a real thing that almost happened [Music] okay so i'm not going to pretend to be like a titanic expert or anything like that but i think this implies that hamtaro dies ham ham heartbreak really has no right to be as enjoyable as it is i'm starting to understand why nintendo put so much money into this franchise ham ham's unite was a nice charming fun adventure and this is just way better it could only go up from here i guess things are about to get even crazier next up the um sort of the end of the hamtaro adventure game trilogy here we have rainbow rescue releasing in japan europe and not america for some reason not not sure why that happened but the craziest part of all this was developed by alpha dream the team that brought us mario and luigi and tomato adventure yes hamtaro rainbow rescue is also their baby okay well i guess it was time for someone new to give these hamsters a shot i can't believe it oh no you guys it looks like the rainbow prince bow has fallen that's not good apparently this being is able to make rainbows with his umbrella that's pretty cool but it's lost its power after losing its colors oh darn well alright simple enough i guess go with your friends and scavenge the land for items that have the core colors that you need and save the day but you know first things first here we gotta partake in a little bit of coloring you're gonna give me a coloring book as soon as the game starts of course i'm gonna take advantage of it there you go sonic the hamster my fan character is real now one thing that is immediately apparent with this game the sprite work has gotten a massive upgrade heartbreak was just a bit of a polished version of unite which was fine but wow you get a little bit of extra budget in there and rework all the sprites it looks so good especially those character portraits man great looking stuff all around the shading is immaculate or dare i say immaculate i guess rainbow rescue actually released a few months before superstar saga did and it is very evident in both that art direction is one of this team's strong suits alpha dream really knew how to get those pixels to look really nice on the surface it may seem like this is more of the same once again except now you control a whole slew of hamsters at the same time instead of just one or two but no actually the entire gameplay loop has been completely modified and i think for the better there's still plenty of locals to talk to and ham has to throw around at your leisure but now mini games take center stage in almost everything you do the world is filled with tasks to complete simple little mini games that get you from one place to another secure an item that you need stuff like that and rather than being restricted from progression because of a word that you just simply couldn't think of sometimes you need a specific hamster for a task that you haven't recruited yet and then there you go you get the one that you need since not everybody can do everything this time around and you move on with your day considering superstar saga's main gimmick was partnering brother with brother like at all times it's pretty wild to think that this game works with a similar concept i mean it makes sense they were both being developed around the same time but the parallels i didn't think i'd be comparing mario to hamtaro but uh here we are also since dialogue and the actions happen a lot quicker and we have a much more standard form of progression now with story segments revolving around a specific color and then you move on the pace has quickened up dramatically from what it used to be that aura of sort of being lost and kind of just wandering around aimlessly until you talk to the right person with the right word that's no longer here thank goodness plus the whole minigames needing specific hamsters thing adds a whole lot of personality to these characters that mostly just relied on text in the previous games there is a lot of genuine thought put into this now ultimately all jokes aside this is still a kid's game and me the grown adult playing a game that's way out of his target demographic may not have the best judgment call here but these games are pretty good i mean there's no committing crimes there's no narrowly avoiding death there's no narrowly causing death but it's still pretty good there may be some of those weird twisted things at the end of the rainbow that i haven't seen yet but even without that it's still enjoyable i guess you see that's one of the problems when you have a genuinely solid game to talk about there's less interesting things to say i mean good for the game i guess alpha dream did the impossible here and hit the ground running with hamtaro that's so so cool but if you're looking for more of that blackmail and aura of death stuff that the previous adventures gave you that's not going to be here hopefully your thoughts on the game don't hinge on that fact alright gang as loud as you can hamtaro should have been in smash instead of sora ah look at that he ran to go write an angry letter to nintendo good for him he has his head in the right place but now for all intents and purposes this is the end of the sort of i don't know like it's a ham torah trilogy i guess we have three games of a similar gameplay style where each game has very noticeable upgrades as we move forward while each staying very enjoyable in their own right this these are pretty good i gotta say these are actually really fun alpha dream would go on to make a few other games for the franchise but none of them really hit the high marks of before next on the docket we have hamtaro the ham ham games as you can probably figure just based on the artwork we got a sports themed minigame collection here interestingly enough this game was released in between rainbow rescue's japanese release and its european release nearly a year and a half later why the long delay you might ask well that's because of nintendo didn't really matter to japan i guess but nintendo of europe specifically wanted ham ham game's release to coincide with the 2004 summer olympics in athens greece because of course oh man the world is funny sometimes we got racing tennis diving hammer throw this is indeed an olympics-based video game alright i have played far too much mario and sonic in my life to know exactly what to get out of this all of the sprite work continues to be great and for what it is it plays fine but i think i'm mostly just upset that the era of amtaro adventure games is dead now this is a fine enough minigame collection but i didn't want this i was able to change the main hamster greeting though from ham ha to suh dude so i mean that's something and then we can jump to the ds and well unfortunately things don't really get any better there's a quiz game that didn't release outside of japan so that's a total bust and then there's a game that did get localized hi hamtaro ham ham challenge it's another mini minigame collection but catered for a much tinier child's demographic it's pretty brain dead honestly the previous minigame collections were like kind of mario party themed they were easy but you still had to put some thought into it here nah these are for children still trying to develop their basic motor skills sadly before we knew it hamtaro had entered licensed game purgatory before fading out into relative obscurity also like what the hell is this they made all of the characters incredibly tiny with these massive heads and oh god i hate it i mean you think fat pikachu to skinny pikachu is like this really disgusting sin but this oh this is gross i hate it i hate it so much that's not him taro i don't care what anyone says that's not him taro that's a clone alpha dream should not have messed with the good thing man maybe they wouldn't be bankrupt right now if that was the case okay maybe that one was mean it's crazy man i knew for years that nintendo published these games and it was always this neat little nugget of trivia that i had in the back of my head but when you really look at everything this series had to offer this was one hell of a rabbit hole or hamster hole i guess the mario and luigi developers were involved one of the games was tied to the olympics there's the cut titanic scene that is fantastic stuff once again hamtaro killed a man at the end of the day what i'm calling the hamtaro adventure trilogy offered plenty of entertainment for the hours i put into it the other games not as good but it made that adventure trilogy all that sweeter so that's really cool and i definitely recommend you check them out especially if you like cute things like this thing and really when you really really see just how many of these games released and nintendo made sure they were exclusive they put money behind this franchise it just begs the question why did hamtaro not get into smash but sora did that's all i have to say i'll leave you with that bye-bye [Music]

Channel: AntDude

Views: 335,675

Keywords: AntDude, Hamtaro Ham Hams Unite, Hamtaro Ham Ham Heartbreak, Hamtaro Rainbow Rescue, Hamtaro Ham Ham Games, Hamtaro Game Boy, Hamtaro Game Boy Color, Hamtaro Game Boy Advance, Hamtaro DS, Hamtaro video games, Hamtaro games, Hamtaro, Hamtaro Ham Hams Unite review, Hamtaro Ham Ham Heartbreak review, Hamtaro Game Boy Color review, Nintendo Hamtaro, Hamtaro review

Id: QkqsdTIzk3s

Length: 21min 16sec (1276 seconds)

Published: Sun Mar 20 2022