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I think its about time I give it my shot at creating a gaming blog since I've got a lot of backlog to get through but there's another aspect I like to do outside of simply playing the games, research.
I played a lot of games and I plan on making videos in my spare time based on games similar to retrospectives and there's a lot of various things I'd find that help me appreciate the games whether it be dev interviews, trailers, behind the scenes, mangas, references to other games, and so on.
Chances are there is still an interesting story even behind the development process or the final product outside of the game itself so my journey plans is featuring more of that to help show off more of the devs works, along with my personal perspectives on games including some of the things to learn from the games that we can apply to our own lives to make them better.
For a short bit on myself, I grew up with Sonic the Hedgehog, Wind Waker and Dragon Ball as my most influential things and helped me want to expand much further trying to see a bit from every console or series I can, if it exists, I probably know about it even to a little extent since I try to keep my ear to the ground on those kinds of things more than ever now and try to play or learn about any game series that catches my eye in some way, shape or form.
Though it might take a bit to get the consistency rolling with how life can be, I want to do my best to try to update often and see what I can bring to the table. Hopefully you'll enjoy what this journey will have to offer.
I played a lot of games and I plan on making videos in my spare time based on games similar to retrospectives and there's a lot of various things I'd find that help me appreciate the games whether it be dev interviews, trailers, behind the scenes, mangas, references to other games, and so on.
Chances are there is still an interesting story even behind the development process or the final product outside of the game itself so my journey plans is featuring more of that to help show off more of the devs works, along with my personal perspectives on games including some of the things to learn from the games that we can apply to our own lives to make them better.
For a short bit on myself, I grew up with Sonic the Hedgehog, Wind Waker and Dragon Ball as my most influential things and helped me want to expand much further trying to see a bit from every console or series I can, if it exists, I probably know about it even to a little extent since I try to keep my ear to the ground on those kinds of things more than ever now and try to play or learn about any game series that catches my eye in some way, shape or form.
Though it might take a bit to get the consistency rolling with how life can be, I want to do my best to try to update often and see what I can bring to the table. Hopefully you'll enjoy what this journey will have to offer.
1 Yr✓#
Fri
1 Yr✓#
Hell yeah, love that shit! I can't consume enough video game essays. I'm excited to see ur blog grow dude.
#Excited for your blog
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I'm so ready for this! Congrats for making the jump and starting your blog!
I can't wait to see what you will come up with! 😊
I can't wait to see what you will come up with! 😊
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It's been awhile since I was able to do a little something with this blog especially since life decides to throw some things my way like my Wii Remotes not working but eventually decided it's probably better to do one game at a time rather than a series retrospective otherwise this blog will never get updated haha. So to start off this blog, I want to start off with an iconic innovative series for still being one of a kind: Samba De Amigo.
The game features Amigo, a very festive happy monkey and his friends as you follow the rhythm of latin-based music with the instrument of choice being based off of maracas. There will be circles on screen and rhythm balls will head towards them with the beat of the music and you need to shake the maracas when the balls land within the circle.
Originally, the game was an arcade cabinet and was eventually ported over to the Dreamcast which also included the option to play with controllers. The Dreamcast at least only had 14 songs and a version called Samba De Amigo Ver. 2000 would come after that which had improvements such as adding more songs, Amigo's sister Amiga making her debut to the series, and arm waving gameplay mechanics. The Ver. 2000 was exclusive to Japan though, a 2001 version which was international was in the works but never released due to Dreamcast being towards the end of its lifespan especially with the new Playstation 2 coming out and getting a lot of the attention.
Years later there would be Samba De Amigo on the Wii or Samba De Amigo Wii as most people called it though it's basically meant to be an upgrade to the original using Wii Remotes. So technically 4 different versions of the same game, I'd say Samba De Amigo: Party Central is the only one to break that chain many years later.
Despite all of the games, the characters still stay the same so it's better to learn the character's names which were shown in the Dreamcast manual, just remember Amiga is Amigo's sister in addition to the cast. All are very cool characters I love to see in the game though that livens up the atmosphere. That and I also like the cheetahs Chumba and Wamba are based off of the band Chumbawamba, which made the song Tubthumping which was also in the game.
The original arcade machine looks super cool, the picture below is of the Ver. 2000 arcade machine which was oddly significantly easier to find a good picture of. I did find a picture of the original version but it was very low quality. From what I could make out, it looked very similar but had Linda on the machine instead of Amiga. The maracas of the machine felt like an amazing concept done properly though. The maracas have a place to be put down, the cord is long enough to not interrupt gameplay and on the sides of the arcade cabinet you can see IR sensors with the maracas also having IR LEDs within them towards the top of them. These things together along with the game adjusting it based on your height made them more accurate as the sensors help determine where the maracas are for more accurate controls.
The dreamcast version also had maraca controllers to help you get the arcade experience. They were around $75 at the time of release to include 2 maraca controllers, a floor mat and a sensor bar to place in front of your feet and these work the same way to where it's accurate enough to essentially be just as good as the arcade. Considering how it’s a very unique controller that worked surprisingly well, I’ll post a video that goes more in-depth to the maraca controllers if you’re interested in seeing it in action.
That’s a problem with the Wii version, the 2 Wii Remotes you had to use and the sensor didn’t really have a good way to track the controllers vertically so it was a lot more finicky in the controls since the game relied on the sensor at the top end of the Wii Remote, which doesn’t stay as consistent since the purpose was to shake the Wii Remotes. You could’ve also played with Wii Remote and nunchuk but the cord is too short to freely move, it’s trying to be dancing but also making sure you don’t go too crazy which kind of limits the experience.
The experience is a bit better once you learn more about the characters, the game doesn’t really have much of any story to go off of so to make it a bit easier, a book exclusive to Japan called Samba De Amigo: The Greatest Guidebook was released. Still never got an international version but the guidebook is about 223 pages total which included a game guide to the original game, character profiles, original concept art and a backstory called Amigo’s Departure.
In short, Amigo grew up with his mom and dad in the mountains and Amigo’s mom sent Amigo to run an errand in the town. Amigo passed by a shop with maracas in a glass case that captivated Amigo as if they spoke to him. The shopkeeper allowed him to shake the maracas and shaking the maracas was as if Amigo realized his calling to master the samba with those maracas. His mom was hesitant at first but his dad persuaded his wife that Amigo had to go as sometimes a man needs to do what their mind sets out to do and won’t be talked out of it. Amigo leaving that house led them to the journey to master the samba meeting all of his friends along the way. The Wii Booklet told a similar retelling to this but the original concept art and just 223 pages worth for a game you can probably complete fully within 5 hours in astounding.
In my experiences with his game, there’s just so much to love about it while completing the 14 songs. 14 songs is extremely small, though you could get 9 extra songs through the Dream Passport, think of Dream Passport as like the Dreamcast’s online functions to download content since the Dreamcast was kind of the leading pioneer to connecting online for additional content. Most of it feels like it was meant to be part of Ver. 2001 but never panned out unfortunately. A majority of the songs fit perfectly for Amigo adding so much replayability to enjoy the game. With Amigo’s energetic personality, playing festive or upbeat songs gets taken to new heights which are specially shown off during songs like El Ritmo Tropical, Livin’ la Vida Loca, and Al Compas Del Mambo.
It’s just hard to not smile with this game, Amigo goes through all of the emotions depending on how well you do, from clumsily wobbling in the empty streets to being the life of the party with his smile so wide and the atmosphere with the vivid colors. The audience adds so much too as they cheer for you completing difficult parts and clap along with the beat when you’re doing well which helps the game feel more enjoyable to play, immersed in the world as if you’re part of the party and helps you keep the combo since the rhythm balls also follow along with the beat. The Wii version took this aspect out but still has enough to enjoy just watching Amigo dance happily, sometimes it’s fun just watching the NPCs since some like the skeleton guitarists can jump, jump while spinning or even do backflips. Just follow along with the energetic beat, watch Amigo and friends put on a lively performance and end every session with all of your worries washed away in the samba.
While there is so much to talk about games in general, I think I condensed enough of it to at least cover the major things I wanted to mention for the in-game stuff, but there will always be something interesting you tend to see when finding information on games like these.
The major thing was something still without a definitive answer from the developers from what I could find and that’s the very many references to the number 38 in the series. 38 appears quite a lot, at the studio stage, there is a 38 on the carpet Amigo stands on, 38 on the backdrop behind the audience of kids, 38 on Bingo and Bongo’s drums, Amigo’s birthday being March 8th (3rd month, 8th day), in the Greatest Guidebook when Amigo leaves the house there is a 38 on the calendar, also in the same story Rio, Chumba and Wamba were on the Billboard’s Latin Charts for 38 consecutive weeks, Amigo in the wallpaper within the game files had a 38 on the side of his car and the licenses plate on the front was Amigo38.
in-game screenshots of 38 shown in each image
While no official answer has been announced as far as I’ve seen, my best theories was they decided to make Amigo’s birthday March 8th and everything was a reference to that or my other one being Sonic Team developing this game was part of the CS3 division in Sega which was later renamed SEGA R&D No. 8 (or called AM-8 but same division). The 3 and 8 from these names would make 38 so might be a reference to the game developers themselves. Maybe we’ll get an official answer one day but pretty much every game has a more interesting story associated with it, though it’s not the Dreamcast version directly, it’s still something I found while researching that I’d like to share involving Samba De Amigo Wii’s marketing.
Now if you’re like me, I thought this commercial was extremely wholesome and cute to see an actual chimpanzee look so happy playing Samba De Amigo Wii. There was another variation where the man’s bored family was greeted by the chimp bringing the game and maracas for the family to enjoy. One group however, most likely disagreed with that notion.
There was another commercial that has been pretty much erased from the face of the Earth (believe me I tried to find it), it was a similar commercial to these ones with the chimpanzee break dancing. PETA basically sent SEGA a message saying they should remove the advertisement because monkey trainers usually train their monkeys with extremely abusive methods like electroshock therapy, beatings, food deprivation and after they become an adult, they’re sent to a roadside zoo or sold to a laboratory for testing since they’ve outlived their usefulness. Just how extreme that sounded made me shake my head in genuine shock but surprisingly enough, SEGA removed the advertisement and promised to never use live chimpanzee actors ever again. PETA celebrated this decision and apparently gave them vegan chocolates in the shape of monkeys as thanks. Their post regarding the matter is still on their website to this day which you can find here: https://www.peta.org/blog/chimp-chimp-hooraysega-pulls-ape-ad/
There’s always interesting stories within pretty much any game you dig into whether being innovative or simply goofy and I’m guaranteed it’ll continue to be that way for as long as the gaming industry exists. Really don’t know if future updates on this blog will be easier or harder than this game but I’ll see what comes of it, hopefully you all found it as interesting as I have so thanks for making it this far. I’ll start seeing what games I can dive into next. Take care in the meantime everyone.
The game features Amigo, a very festive happy monkey and his friends as you follow the rhythm of latin-based music with the instrument of choice being based off of maracas. There will be circles on screen and rhythm balls will head towards them with the beat of the music and you need to shake the maracas when the balls land within the circle.
Originally, the game was an arcade cabinet and was eventually ported over to the Dreamcast which also included the option to play with controllers. The Dreamcast at least only had 14 songs and a version called Samba De Amigo Ver. 2000 would come after that which had improvements such as adding more songs, Amigo's sister Amiga making her debut to the series, and arm waving gameplay mechanics. The Ver. 2000 was exclusive to Japan though, a 2001 version which was international was in the works but never released due to Dreamcast being towards the end of its lifespan especially with the new Playstation 2 coming out and getting a lot of the attention.
Years later there would be Samba De Amigo on the Wii or Samba De Amigo Wii as most people called it though it's basically meant to be an upgrade to the original using Wii Remotes. So technically 4 different versions of the same game, I'd say Samba De Amigo: Party Central is the only one to break that chain many years later.
Despite all of the games, the characters still stay the same so it's better to learn the character's names which were shown in the Dreamcast manual, just remember Amiga is Amigo's sister in addition to the cast. All are very cool characters I love to see in the game though that livens up the atmosphere. That and I also like the cheetahs Chumba and Wamba are based off of the band Chumbawamba, which made the song Tubthumping which was also in the game.
The original arcade machine looks super cool, the picture below is of the Ver. 2000 arcade machine which was oddly significantly easier to find a good picture of. I did find a picture of the original version but it was very low quality. From what I could make out, it looked very similar but had Linda on the machine instead of Amiga. The maracas of the machine felt like an amazing concept done properly though. The maracas have a place to be put down, the cord is long enough to not interrupt gameplay and on the sides of the arcade cabinet you can see IR sensors with the maracas also having IR LEDs within them towards the top of them. These things together along with the game adjusting it based on your height made them more accurate as the sensors help determine where the maracas are for more accurate controls.
The dreamcast version also had maraca controllers to help you get the arcade experience. They were around $75 at the time of release to include 2 maraca controllers, a floor mat and a sensor bar to place in front of your feet and these work the same way to where it's accurate enough to essentially be just as good as the arcade. Considering how it’s a very unique controller that worked surprisingly well, I’ll post a video that goes more in-depth to the maraca controllers if you’re interested in seeing it in action.
That’s a problem with the Wii version, the 2 Wii Remotes you had to use and the sensor didn’t really have a good way to track the controllers vertically so it was a lot more finicky in the controls since the game relied on the sensor at the top end of the Wii Remote, which doesn’t stay as consistent since the purpose was to shake the Wii Remotes. You could’ve also played with Wii Remote and nunchuk but the cord is too short to freely move, it’s trying to be dancing but also making sure you don’t go too crazy which kind of limits the experience.
The experience is a bit better once you learn more about the characters, the game doesn’t really have much of any story to go off of so to make it a bit easier, a book exclusive to Japan called Samba De Amigo: The Greatest Guidebook was released. Still never got an international version but the guidebook is about 223 pages total which included a game guide to the original game, character profiles, original concept art and a backstory called Amigo’s Departure.
In short, Amigo grew up with his mom and dad in the mountains and Amigo’s mom sent Amigo to run an errand in the town. Amigo passed by a shop with maracas in a glass case that captivated Amigo as if they spoke to him. The shopkeeper allowed him to shake the maracas and shaking the maracas was as if Amigo realized his calling to master the samba with those maracas. His mom was hesitant at first but his dad persuaded his wife that Amigo had to go as sometimes a man needs to do what their mind sets out to do and won’t be talked out of it. Amigo leaving that house led them to the journey to master the samba meeting all of his friends along the way. The Wii Booklet told a similar retelling to this but the original concept art and just 223 pages worth for a game you can probably complete fully within 5 hours in astounding.
In my experiences with his game, there’s just so much to love about it while completing the 14 songs. 14 songs is extremely small, though you could get 9 extra songs through the Dream Passport, think of Dream Passport as like the Dreamcast’s online functions to download content since the Dreamcast was kind of the leading pioneer to connecting online for additional content. Most of it feels like it was meant to be part of Ver. 2001 but never panned out unfortunately. A majority of the songs fit perfectly for Amigo adding so much replayability to enjoy the game. With Amigo’s energetic personality, playing festive or upbeat songs gets taken to new heights which are specially shown off during songs like El Ritmo Tropical, Livin’ la Vida Loca, and Al Compas Del Mambo.
It’s just hard to not smile with this game, Amigo goes through all of the emotions depending on how well you do, from clumsily wobbling in the empty streets to being the life of the party with his smile so wide and the atmosphere with the vivid colors. The audience adds so much too as they cheer for you completing difficult parts and clap along with the beat when you’re doing well which helps the game feel more enjoyable to play, immersed in the world as if you’re part of the party and helps you keep the combo since the rhythm balls also follow along with the beat. The Wii version took this aspect out but still has enough to enjoy just watching Amigo dance happily, sometimes it’s fun just watching the NPCs since some like the skeleton guitarists can jump, jump while spinning or even do backflips. Just follow along with the energetic beat, watch Amigo and friends put on a lively performance and end every session with all of your worries washed away in the samba.
While there is so much to talk about games in general, I think I condensed enough of it to at least cover the major things I wanted to mention for the in-game stuff, but there will always be something interesting you tend to see when finding information on games like these.
The major thing was something still without a definitive answer from the developers from what I could find and that’s the very many references to the number 38 in the series. 38 appears quite a lot, at the studio stage, there is a 38 on the carpet Amigo stands on, 38 on the backdrop behind the audience of kids, 38 on Bingo and Bongo’s drums, Amigo’s birthday being March 8th (3rd month, 8th day), in the Greatest Guidebook when Amigo leaves the house there is a 38 on the calendar, also in the same story Rio, Chumba and Wamba were on the Billboard’s Latin Charts for 38 consecutive weeks, Amigo in the wallpaper within the game files had a 38 on the side of his car and the licenses plate on the front was Amigo38.
in-game screenshots of 38 shown in each image
While no official answer has been announced as far as I’ve seen, my best theories was they decided to make Amigo’s birthday March 8th and everything was a reference to that or my other one being Sonic Team developing this game was part of the CS3 division in Sega which was later renamed SEGA R&D No. 8 (or called AM-8 but same division). The 3 and 8 from these names would make 38 so might be a reference to the game developers themselves. Maybe we’ll get an official answer one day but pretty much every game has a more interesting story associated with it, though it’s not the Dreamcast version directly, it’s still something I found while researching that I’d like to share involving Samba De Amigo Wii’s marketing.
Now if you’re like me, I thought this commercial was extremely wholesome and cute to see an actual chimpanzee look so happy playing Samba De Amigo Wii. There was another variation where the man’s bored family was greeted by the chimp bringing the game and maracas for the family to enjoy. One group however, most likely disagreed with that notion.
There was another commercial that has been pretty much erased from the face of the Earth (believe me I tried to find it), it was a similar commercial to these ones with the chimpanzee break dancing. PETA basically sent SEGA a message saying they should remove the advertisement because monkey trainers usually train their monkeys with extremely abusive methods like electroshock therapy, beatings, food deprivation and after they become an adult, they’re sent to a roadside zoo or sold to a laboratory for testing since they’ve outlived their usefulness. Just how extreme that sounded made me shake my head in genuine shock but surprisingly enough, SEGA removed the advertisement and promised to never use live chimpanzee actors ever again. PETA celebrated this decision and apparently gave them vegan chocolates in the shape of monkeys as thanks. Their post regarding the matter is still on their website to this day which you can find here: https://www.peta.org/blog/chimp-chimp-hooraysega-pulls-ape-ad/
There’s always interesting stories within pretty much any game you dig into whether being innovative or simply goofy and I’m guaranteed it’ll continue to be that way for as long as the gaming industry exists. Really don’t know if future updates on this blog will be easier or harder than this game but I’ll see what comes of it, hopefully you all found it as interesting as I have so thanks for making it this far. I’ll start seeing what games I can dive into next. Take care in the meantime everyone.
5 Yrs✓#
NoOne
5 Yrs✓#
Not the PETA message lmao.
Anyways, that was a fun read! It looks like a cute game.
Anyways, that was a fun read! It looks like a cute game.
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Very cute game with a good upbeat soundtrack absolutely. Shame to say that Ver. 2000 is the only one closest to the experience. Party Central looks fun but does more popular songs in general rather than latin-based. If you get your hands on it though, definitely a good time.
5 Yrs✓#
NoOne5 Yrs✓#
Yeah, I don't think I'll be able to play it 😅. Got none of the consoles on which it's available, and it seems like it'd be a pain to emulate, with all the motion control stuff. Maybe I'll try emulating the dreamcast version someday.
1 Yr✓#
Fri1 Yr✓#
Imo an authentic experience would probably be round $350-$400
I have a counter offer under $50:
plus gameI love amigo and ive always wanted to try the dreamcast game. Dreamcasts here are pretty affordable but a collection wouldn't be. Emulation I feel wouldn't be reasonable for ver. 2000 which is a real shame
✓#
Whatever works lol
The Wii also had similar accessories but it was more of the unstable precision that made people hesitate anyway, oddly enough I did see some reviews saying the Dreamcast was still more consistent than switch so quite the hefty accessory even back then.
If you do want to play the original just to see, there are a few emulation options since you can still play it with controller. Though it's a bit more complicated I'd also like to thank Dreamcast Live for preserving all Dreamcast DLC and the tools needed to input it.
Unfortunately even if you wanted to, I think Ver. 2000 being Japan exclusive made it significantly harder to find for emulators so wouldn't recommend it since all I found were sites that I'm guessing had potential viruses, just be way more cautious if you want to give it a go.