Fantasy Zone (ARC)
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- For other games in the series see Fantasy Zone.
Fantasy Zone is a free-roaming horizontal shooter developed by Sega Research and Development Department No. 1 and published by Sega.
In the game, the player takes the role of a sentient spacecraft named Opa-Opa. In 1422 B.G., the official interplanetary currency was disrupted and the ninth planet of Eridus was hit by the Great Depression. Then, an investigation by the Space Society (Space Guild) revealed that someone was manipulating the Menon aliens to steal foreign currency and build a huge fortress in the "Fantasy Zone." Opa-Opa immediately headed for the "Fantasy Zone" to solve the situation.
The game contains eight stages (called Rounds). In each round, the player is free to go wherever they want. There are several bases that spawn enemies, and these must all be destroyed. They can be found using the radar at the bottom of the screen. After the player destroys all the bases, they must face the boss of that round and defeat them to proceed. Whenever the player dispatches enemies and bosses, they will drop money which can be used at the shops for weapons and parts upgrades. The shop can be located via a flying orb that appears randomly throughout each stage. However, the weapons upgrades are temporary, so it is wise to use them as much as possible before they run out, as they are on a timer.
The game received positive reviews from critics and was ported to several different platforms, as well as receiving a few sequels.
Contents
Screenshots
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Music
Fantasy Zone's soundtrack was composed mostly by the legendary Hiroshi Kawaguchi, who also scored such gems as Hang On, OutRun, and Space Harrier. The music mostly employs rock with Latin themes mixed in, and it works surprisingly well given the content and atmosphere of the game. Each round's theme is about a minute in length, so it doesn't drag too much, and the moderate tempo of each song matches the speed of the game.
What's interesting to note is the variations of a few songs; Round Up and Hot Snow were altered between the Japanese and North American releases, Victory Way has an alternate shorter version of itself, and a couple round themes have versions with shorter intros when the player must restart them.
According to Kawaguchi, the tracks Credit, Shopping, and Game Over were composed by someone he referred to as his superior. He has not revealed their identity and likely intends to keep it private.
Atwiki.jp says of the soundtrack:
Track names and ordering comes from the Sega Game Music VOL.2 soundtrack CD (see below). However, the game itself also gives the names of the songs.
Recording
| # | Title | Composer | Length | Listen | Download |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 01 | Credit | Unknown | 0:01 | Download | |
| 02 | Opa-Opa! | Hiroshi Kawaguchi | 2:26 | Download | |
| 03 | Shopping | Unknown | 1:42 | Download | |
| 04 | Keep On The Beat | Hiroshi Kawaguchi | 1:15 | Download | |
| 05 | Saari | Hiroshi Kawaguchi | 1:15 | Download | |
| 06 | Prome | Hiroshi Kawaguchi | 1:27 | Download | |
| 07 | Round Up | Hiroshi Kawaguchi | 0:04 | Download | |
| 08 | Round Up (Japan) | Hiroshi Kawaguchi | 0:04 | Download | |
| 09 | Hot Snow | Hiroshi Kawaguchi | 1:46 | Download | |
| 10 | Hot Snow (Japan) | Hiroshi Kawaguchi | 1:46 | Download | |
| 11 | Don't Stop | Hiroshi Kawaguchi | 1:01 | Download | |
| 12 | Dreaming Tomorrow | Hiroshi Kawaguchi | 1:28 | Download | |
| 13 | Boss | Hiroshi Kawaguchi | 1:08 | Download | |
| 14 | Ya-Da-Yo | Hiroshi Kawaguchi | 1:40 | Download | |
| 15 | Victory Way | Hiroshi Kawaguchi | 1:07 | Download | |
| 16 | Game Over | Unknown | 0:07 | Download | |
| 17 | Victory Way (Ranking) | Hiroshi Kawaguchi | 0:39 | Download | |
| 18 | Opa-Opa! (Restart) | Hiroshi Kawaguchi | 2:21 | Download | |
| 19 | Ya-Da-Yo (Restart) | Hiroshi Kawaguchi | 1:39 | Download |
Credits
- Ripper: drdevil
- Recorder: Doommaster1994
- Game Credits:
- Not Credited Composer: Hiroshi Kawaguchi
- Unknown Composer: Unknown
- Uncredited Samba Whistle: Katsuhiro Hayashi
(Source: Verification from composer; game lacks credits.)
Like most games at the time, Fantasy Zone does not have credits. While the developers sneaked in their initials in the high scores (as many Sega games did), none of the names appear to belong to Kawaguchi, as he was normally credited in high score lists as "MIY", referring to his birth surname Miyauchi.
Kawaguchi has taken credit for composing the game's soundtrack, though he has said that his superior is responsible for a few songs. Kawaguchi has not revealed their identity.
Katsuhiro Hayashi said he programmed the samba whistle instrument that is used in a few songs.
Albums
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Audio Devices
The arcade game uses a YM2151 chip (clocked at 3.58 MHz) for audio, which was a sound chip in the late 1980s.
Releases
Links
- mobygames.com/game/8220/fantasy-zone/ - MobyGames.
- gamefaqs.gamespot.com/arcade/575827-fantasy-zone - GameFAQs.
- en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fantasy_Zone - Wikipedia.
- https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/ファンタジーゾーン - Wikipedia (Japanese)
- w.atwiki.jp/gamemusicbest100/pages/488.html - Atwiki.jp (Japanese).
