Sega Publishes Pt.2 of Virtua Fighter's Arcade History

MadeManG74 · Jun 20, 2017

You may remember recently that Sega published a short, but great piece on the history of Virtua Fighter, and it's massive boom in popularity in Japan. Obviously, there's a bigger story to tell with Virtua Fighter's illustrious history, and part 2 of this piece has just been published.

http://sega-interactive.co.jp/special/history/columns/c_senpai_09.html

As with last time, we'll keep this thread updated with any translations as they come through!

TRANSLATION:
Thanks @Toto & @Tweleve (Kenny)

Part 2: Looking Back with Bunbunmaru [Virtua Fighter Boom] [Part 2]

An unexpectedly sudden Virtua Fighter boom took place in the 90’s. Leading this boom were a handful of top players, who became legends.

As 3D fighting game pioneers, they completely changed both the gaming industry and society in general. I thought we ought to take a peek at our Sega senpais (I call them this as a mark of respect) achievements, so I asked one of the key top players in the Virtua Fighter boom at the time, Bunbunmaru, for an interview. This was the plan for the second part of my interview.

As the Virtua Fighter boom was heating up, not only the gaming media, but even the general media was covering the phenomenon. Coverage in this way was very strange at the time.

These included “SPA!” (a Fusousha magazine) and “AERA!” (an Asahi Shinbun publication), as well as on TV, in shows such as “Asakusabashi Young Haberdashery Shop” [weird one to translate…] (affiliated with Tokyo TV), “Tonight” (affiliated with Asahi TV), “The Most Common Show” [another weird one…] (affiliated with TBS) and more. Regardless whether it was print media or TV, they were covering the craze.

“I was regularly getting appearance requests from “Tonight”, and I appeared on the show a few times. It wasn’t official Sega PR, but to spread the game I liked, I was participating in various activities. The more players starting to play Virtua Fighter, the more interesting, don’t you think? I wanted to grow the number of players, to convey the games appeal, so I appeared in various media” [Bunbunmaru]

Of course it wasn’t just Bunbunmaru, the other famous Virtua Fighter players (especially the so called “Iron Men”) were practically making a job out of these activities, just because of the fact they were "Strong at Virtua Fighter". These included media appearances, tournament commentary, strategy guide writing etc. This means it might be most correct to refer to these players as the pro gamers of the time.

“Earning money by playing games. With that meaning, Takahashi Meijin [I had no idea who this was, see this link(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Takahashi_Meijin)] was a pro gamer. But Meijin was just doing advertising/PR as a developer. We might have been the first pure gamers to become pro gamers. At the time, we participated in many tournaments as well. There wasn’t large amounts of prize money like you have at modern tournaments, but you could still win various prizes” [Bunbunmaru]

When yours truly was a child, you’d often hear from adults that no matter how good you became, you could never earn money (let alone eat!) by playing video games. Now that is clearly accepted that playing games be an occupation, it is quite moving to see.

So I attempted to ask Bunbunmaru directly. Why do you think the game flourished at the time?

“I think there were a few reasons. One is that the game itself was really cool. I think that as a trendy person, you were caught up playing Virtua Fighter. For example, at the time, there was club in Shibuya which started an event called Polygon Junky. With that sort of atmosphere, I think even people that didn’t really play games all that much started to take an interest. Also, like I was talking about earlier, the punch and kick and other animations were really realistic. Additionally, the impact when a technique hit, the sound effects and the timing of them, was really finely detailed and you could tell it was well made. If you look at it from the view of a pro wrestling fan, the techniques were really close to their real life counterparts. What I mean to say is, more than just a game, people could enjoy it like it was similar to a sport or a martial arts match, and I think that’s may be why everyone was so crazy about it. “ [Bunbunmaru]

I see. Virtua Fighter was not just a deep game, it was also an unequivocal production. When fighting, you should defeat the opponent and that is it. As a spectator, that is easy to understand. For that reason, I think people were able to immediately understand what they were watching. I asked something else I was curious about. Shinjuku Jacky, Ikebukuro Sarah, Kashiwa Jeffrey and other famous players all had names which were “Place Name + Character Name”. So why did Shinohara-san end up as “Bunbunmaru”?

“At the time, I used to go to play mah-jong with the Virtua Fighter guys. Everyone used to use their Virtua Fighter name on the scoreboard. At the time I didn’t yet have an alias, so someone wrote Bunbunmaru up on the scoreboard one day. Because I was using Wolf, a character skilled in pro wrestling, if I followed the “Place Name + Character Name” format, I think I would’ve been Shinjuku Wolf right? But someone said, “You use the Giant Swing, which spins the opponent round and then throws them, so you should be called Bunbunmaru!” [Bunbun is to buzz or to shake, and maru is circle] It wasn't because I used a tactic called "Bun Bun Maru" in Mahjong!

Bunbunmaru used Wolf because he liked to defeat his opponent with impact. At Virtua Fighter tournaments, he didn’t just want to win, he wanted to win in an amazing way, one of his motivations being his desire to try and entertain the viewers. He is an entertainer through and through.

Lastly, what does Bunbunmaru think about Sega-senpai [referring to the project to chronicle Sega’s arcade history]? I ask him about the charm of Sega’s arcade games.

“Sega’s arcade games have many games with pioneering ideas, so I think they’re pretty good. In terms of 3D fighting games there’s obviously VF, but for recent comparisons, there’s World Club Championship Football (WCCF), the trading card game for Romance of the Three Kingdoms, or the Wonderland Wars game using the special pen device. Arcade games provide an enjoyment which you can’t experience with consumer games, so they’re special places. The fact that there are many games with these kind of ideas makes me happy” [Bunbunmaru]

Sega-senpai, always too ahead of their time, created the world’s first 3D fighting game Virtua Fighter. As something that hasn’t been seen to this day, it can be seen as different. Games which are representative of an era have many things which are substantially different. When you aren’t bound by the rules of the genre, people are shocked and you can attract them.

Once again I think that Virtua Fighter, and the movement of which included it, was an invention which laid a foundation for future 3D fighting games.
Click to expand...

MadeManG74 · Jun 20, 2017

Updated with translation! Thanks to @Toto & @Twelve

KADAJ757 · Jun 20, 2017

The mother of 3D fighting games!

WolfKing · Jun 22, 2017

Respect!

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Sega Publishes Pt.2 of Virtua Fighter's Arcade History

MadeManG74 Moderator Staff Member Tournament Manager Silver Supporter

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Sega Publishes Pt.2 of Virtua Fighter's Arcade History

MadeManG74 Moderator Staff Member Tournament Manager Silver Supporter

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