The Nintendo 64 launched in Japan and North America a few months apart from each other, however, they both had same launch title lineup: Mario 64 and Pilotwings 64 came out day-and-date with the system, and shortly after came Wave Race 64. It was a sparse catalog of games in the system's earliest days, but still, what a solid trio, especially Mario and Wave Race, which became big hits for Nintendo! But what if I told you that these two legendary N64 games got fancy re-releases in Japan only? Maybe you've heard of the Shindou versions of Mario and Wave Race 64. On the surface, they were simply the exact same games, except with Rumble Pak support added, but a deeper dive shows Nintendo did a lot more than just add vibration. And even though they're not very well remembered, these versions had a greater impact on the legacy of these two games than you may realize. Which is pretty impressive for a couple of Japanese-only re-releases, right? Also, a quick shout-out to NordVPN, they can protect YOU from being tracked online, save 66% off a two-year plan when you go to nordvpn.com/stopskeletons and use the offer code 'Stopskeletons', that's 66% off using the offer code 'Stopskeletons' at nordvpn.com/stopskeletons And now... let's get ready to rumble! The Shindou versions of Mario and Wave Race - literally "Shindō Pak Taiō" versions - were sold on their compatibility with the N64 Rumble Pak. Rumble, or haptic feedback, is so commonplace now that it's hard to remember a time when vibrating controllers were a big deal. The technology has existed in arcades from as far back as at least 1976, in Sega's motorcycle arcade game Fonz. But it made its big console debut with Star Fox 64, which original copies came packed with the N64 Rumble Pak. It marked an industry turning point... "しびれる!" ... and from here, vibrating controllers would become the norm. It's hard to say if Nintendo were the first to think of putting rumble feedback into console controllers, but they WERE the first to market. Though this wasn't without setbacks: To run at full capacity, the Rumble Pak requires two AAA batteries, which adds quite a bit of weight to the controller. We weighed it: The Rumble Pak itself weighs half as much as the controller, plus the way it sits on the back end does make the controller noticeably heavier. On top of that, the N64 controller only has one slot, meaning that if games support rumble but didn't have battery-backed saves to the cart, (which, by the way, most games didn't) you'd have to swap out the Rumble Pak to save your game, then swap it back. Just because you're first doesn't always mean you're best. The PS1 would release its Dual Shock controllers a year later, and the Dreamcast rumble packs worked similarly, but did not require batteries. Fun fact though: The N64 Rumble Pak was a specific technology that Nintendo patented in 1995. Sony and Microsoft, on the other hand, might have rushed their controllers out too quickly, and had to deal with patent infringement lawsuits that cost them tens of millions of dollars. Nintendo to this day continues to be a pioneer of rumble technology with HD rumble on the Switch... ... not that anyone probably cares. But bringing it back, the Rumble Pak was unleashed upon gamers with Star Fox 64's 1997 launch, and while it was a huge hit for Nintendo of America, it actually underperformed in Japan! Maybe Nintendo of Japan thought they needed a little more juice to help push the Rumble Pak, which explains the surprisingly elaborate ad campaign behind the Shindou re-releases. You see, these Rumble Pak re-releases of Mario and Wave Race 64 were planned to be sold at full price: 6,800 yen, which is about 70 bucks. Seriously, that's already a bit of a hard sell for two games Japanese N64 owners probably definitely already owned! So they brought in rising teen idol Ryoko Hirosue, who actually was already in their Star Fox 64 commercial. I guess that makes her Nintendo's Rumble Girl. "し~び~れ~る~~!" Not only that, but the games were slated to be released on July 17th, which also happens to be Hirosue's 17th birthday. As if targeting golden birthdays wasn't enough, copies of these games were apparently sold with a hand fan that had Hirosue's face on it. I'm not sure this ever happened, actually, I couldn't find any pictures online, and the complete copies we have don't include it. And listen, you might have forgotten or never known about these re-releases, but Nintendo really swung for the fences here! They must be something really special, right? Welp, let's see what the rest of the world was missing out on! First up: Mario 64. Now, to really get your head around the changes made in the Shindou version, we first have to start with the two other versions: The original, vanilla Japanese version, and the North American version, released in June '96 and September '96, respectively. They were only released a few months apart, but it was enough for these versions to be quite different from each other! From layout differences, like this star which is in a box in international versions, to much less voice acting: In the vanilla Japanese release, Peach's letter doesn't have voiceover, and there's also a serious shortage of Mario too, just a lot less voicework that is actually noticeable right from startup. [Peach definitely not reading her letter aloud] It's also missing one of the greatest voice clips of all time: But that's because he's Koopa, not Bowser, in Japan... anyway. Of course, you can also expect a lot of glitches from a game that essentially created the blueprint for how the industry would conquer the third dimension. Mario 64 is well known for its glitches, but the Japanese version is a little more glitchy than others, like Bowser's key changing into a star in this cutscene, or a glitch that happens when you get over 1000 coins... ... just to name a couple! The Shindou version came out about ten months after the North American version, and Nintendo definitely took advantage of that time! If you think of the North American version as a second revision, the Shindou is like a third revision. But we should probably start with the rumble features first, since that's the reason these exist, right? The first thing I noticed is that the vibration is shockingly active in the menu! Like, it's almost a jump scare! Hitting Start, checking scores, adjusting audio, it just assaults you with vibration! Dude! Chill out! Once you get into the game though, it makes more sense, with vibrations activating when landing a jump, butt-stomping or hitting walls or blocks. It's functionally the same as Mario's next mainline game, Mario Sunshine, so I guess check that out if you wanna get a better idea of how this version works. It doesn't add much, but it's pretty cool! In terms of other features, there's this fun gag when you press Z on startup. Get a load of this! This is the most Marios I've seen since Space World 2000! This is often referred to as an Easter egg, and I guess it technically is, but it's actually mentioned in the instruction book, so it's not THAT big of a secret. It also features most of the voicework that was missing from the vanilla Japanese version... MARIO: "Okie dokie!" PEACH: "Dear Mario. Please come to the castle. I have baked a cake for you." "Yours truly, Princess Toadstool. - Peach" Like I said, this is basically a revision of the North American version, meaning it has all the fixes from the vanilla Japanse version, plus some other fixes that... ... make the Shindou version basically the Greedo Shot First of Mario 64. Before I get ahead of myself, these problematic changes will only impact two specific groups: Hardcore fans, and speedrunners. Most people could still play Mario 64 Shindou and enjoy what the rumble function has to offer. However, this version has mysteriously increased load times. In just a cursory look at our footage, load times doubled and sometimes tripled for entering the castle or starting a level. It's still only fractions of a second, I didn't notice it myself before counting frames in the footage, but for speedrunners, that adds up! They also changed some of Mario's behavior, like making it so he always faces the screen after grabbing onto a tree or pole, but the biggest change is that Nintendo took out the Backwards Long Jump. This is pretty significant, since the Backwards Long Jump is an essential part of Mario 64 speedrunning that allows you to skip huge sections of the game. By this measure, because the rumble doesn't really add that much, it's in fact a worse version of the game. Perhaps surprisingly, the legacy of the Mario 64 Shindou version would live way past its 1997 release: It was the version ported to the Chinese-only iQue in 2003, and, by the way, if you didn't know, the iQue was a console made partially by Nintendo to get around the Chinese government's increasing restrictions on games, and the games were digital-only as a way to fight China's legendary bootleg market. Really fascinating stuff, but let's move on to the next year: In 2004, where Mario 64 launched with another system: The DS. Super Mario 64 DS is not based specifically off of the Shindou version, as it is a pretty substantial remake, but I thought I'd point out a couple of key things: Similarly to the Shindou version, it also excludes the Backwards Long Jump, which is kind of unfortunate, in my opinion. However, unlike the Shindou version, it does NOT have rumble support, even though the DS had its own Rumble Pak! Though to be fair, the DS' Rumble Pak was bundled with Metroid Pinball, and didn't launch for a full year after the DS' release. And you'd be forgiven if you didn't know or forgot that the DS and DS Lite had Rumble Paks. In contrast to the N64, very few games actually support it, but going into this video, I thought for sure it would have been among the few, and was a little surprised to see that it doesn't. From here, Mario 64 would see re-release in a new format: As a digital download via Virtual Console! I was kinda surprised to see that all of the Japanese Virtual Console versions of Mario 64 are based off of the Shindou version, while the rest of the world got their respective international versions. And y'know, I'm actually not sure if the Japanese Virtual Console releases even included the actual rumble, and there's reason to suspect that it didn't! For example, Star Fox 64, which is THE rumble game, didn't have vibration support in the Wii Virtual Console version, though it DID in the Wii U Virtual Console version. What's wild to me is that vanilla Mario 64 was a huge hit in Japan, right, selling millions of copies. However, this revision that released a year later, that probably only a tiny fraction ever actually played, became the canonical version for Japan, but not the rest of the world, like "This is the definitive Mario 64!" says Nintendo, but not definitive enough for the rest of the world, "and you Japanese players that grew up playing the vanilla version..." "... nah, that one doesn't count anymore!" I mean, for such an important game like Mario 64... ... it's kinda baffling! Where does that leave our other Shindou game? Well, for starters, Wave Race 64's legacy is far less complicated than Mario 64's. There are far fewer differences between the vanilla Japanese and North American versions. Most of the changes are more like presentational differences: The billboard advertisements in races are changed, a few voice clips have been re-recorded, they changed a few course names, like from Sandy Beach to Sunny Beach... ... most of these can be chalked up to standard localization changes, so, before we even get into the Shindou versions, there wasn't much for Nintendo to "fix" with Wave Race in the first place, but there are still some significant differences. First off, the rumble feels way more natural than Mario 64, which isn't surprising, really. You feel the vibration initially as you accelerate, and once you reach top gear, it reacts as your craft impacts against the waves. It's pretty similar to how the vibration feels in the GameCube sequel Wave Race: Blue Storm. And it's great! It's a shame Pilotwings and Mario Kart 64 didn't get the same re-release treatment. But anyway, I wouldn't say it's an essential feature, but it DOES make an already-great game just that much better! In terms of other features, Wave Race 64 Shindou has some pretty substantial additions. All the voice clips changed for the North American version are as they appeared in the vanilla Japanese version, however, and this is totally anecdotal, I feel like the audio mix or master was tweaked for this version and made louder overall. Like the entire soundtrack, all the audio, just sounds a little louder. It's been often misreported that the title screen voice is different in the Shindou version, but that's how it sounded in the vanilla Japanese release. It's actually the non-Japanese versions that are different! Go figure. We also noticed slightly faster load times, but only very slightly faster. As you can see, they definitely aren't as big of a difference as in Mario 64. Another big difference is the inclusion of time trial ghosts. This was similarly seen in Mario Kart 64, however instead of transparent racers, your times are represented as cute dolphin buddies! Also similarly to Mario Kart, you can only save two, and they require such an incredible amount of memory space that you have to pull out the Rumble Pak and save it on a Controller Pak, but look! It's dolphin buddies! The third significant change is music: Wave Race Shindou's soundtrack features three songs that have been altered. Now, as far as I'm concerned, Wave Race 64 is one of the greatest video game soundtracks of all time, and, by the way, is one of the few games composed by Kazumi Totaka that doesn't appear to include the Totaka song. But anyway, the idea that you'd mess with perfection and alter songs was insane to me! But, I have to say, I think these alterations do almost uniformly improve the soundtrack! The first altered song is the theme to Sunny/Sandy Beach: The Shindou version has an entirely new and slightly longer intro, features guitar on the main melody instead of the synth piano tone, and is in a different key. Now, I'm torn on how I feel about this one. On its own, I don't mind it, but the guitar tone brings a more intense vibe which clashes a bit with the game's first proper race, and easiest track. The Port Blue / Port Pirates stage is another remixed song that, again, features more guitar and less synth piano, plus a rewritten section before the song loops that makes it a few seconds longer. Honestly, I'm pretty neutral on this one. It's a testament to its quality that I, like a lot of people, didn't even notice the difference. But put them side-by-side, and you can't miss it, but it's still... a minimal difference. The best change is the final track of the game, Southern Island. A pretty significant change here, again, a different key, more guitar, and a slight change to the main melody. Overall, I think this is a large improvement! Like the altered version of Sandy Beach, it's more intense, which is fitting for the last race in the game. As a huge fan of the music in this game, I was pleasantly surprised by these new versions! In terms of its legacy though, Wave Race 64 Shindou is pretty similar to Mario 64: This was the version ported to the iQue, and for its Virtual Console releases, most regions got their respective non-Shindou versions. Though some did have some additional advertisements changed. Nothing major, but since they were already tinkering with it to change some JPEGs, kinda wish they'd switched out the songs as well? As for Japan, as you can see from this commercial for the Wii U Virtual Console, the Japanese Virtual Console releases of Wave Race 64 are the Shindou versions, and while this isn't as weird to me as the case with Mario 64, I do think everyone outside of Japan missed out on a better version of Wave Race 64! Though at the end of the day, I don't think the rest of the world was worse off without the Shindou versions. I think that content-wise, the North American Mario 64 is probably the best version, based on the fact that there's more content and still enough fun glitches for superfans! Going by speedrun.com's current charts, the vanilla Japanese version is overall faster, though the North American version is on top for some runs! And yeah, I do think we technically got a worse version of Wave Race 64, but I'm definitely not saying that the non-Shindou versions are bad, unless you're talkin' about the PAL version, and then... ... yeah, you hate to see that happen. We'd like to thank N64th Street for letting us borrow their pristine boxed copies of these games. Having the physical games and instructions here helped a lot with researching some of the more granular trivia. What do YOU want us to cover next? Let us know in the comments below, and also, tell your friends about this show, and consider supporting Stop Skeletons From Fighting on Patreon, and making some new friends, like all of these awesome people right here! That's enough rumbling for one video, so... ... till next time, we'll see you again real soon.
