Nintendo Switch Cosmic Fantasy Collection Complete Review: Rebirth of the PC Engine / TurboGrafx RPG
768On January 25th, 2024 the first official English translation of Cosmic Fantasy 1 was let out into the world! Alongside Cosmic Fantasy 2, with some changes. So, how do they rate?? Let's take a look!
(Chapter markers and more below...)
0:00 GTV ID: Unlimited Fun Where Available!
0:03 Heck Froze Over!
0:19 The Road to January 25, 2024
4:37 Cosmic Fantasy 1: The Adventures of Yu
13:50 Cosmic Fantasy 2: The Adventures of Van
18:45 The Final Verdict and Score
21:46 Still Waiting for Cosmic Fantasy 3...
Episode Information
GTV 162 "The Cosmic Collection" Season 9 Episode 2
Original Airdate: February 8, 2024
Produced January 27-February 3, 2024
Recorded at Butsudan Studios and edited on my 14” MacBook M1 Pro! Edited and produced with Photoshop, Final Cut Pro, and Topaz AI. All paid for with Gainful Employment™
Check out the rest of the GTV episodes all about Cosmic Fantasy!
Cosmic Fantasy Complete Series https://youtu.be/BiD0jwfFEYE
Cosmic Fantasy Manga Part 1 https://youtu.be/K1W4yWQmkro
Cosmic Fantasy Manga Part 2 https://youtu.be/VPs0HT-TNJM
Cosmic Fantasy 3 Secret Code! https://youtu.be/mV4jswNWn54
Great videos about the TurboGrafx Turbo Duo and PC Engine!
The Zonk Song https://youtu.be/uwKCKQWl1uQ
The More You Know: TurboDuo https://youtu.be/eCsIJqQP8NY
Who Are Kato & Ken? https://youtu.be/CtKuKTSjF_g
What REALLY Happened to Yuko After Valis III https://youtu.be/GgNLDalIBT4
Pac-Land Fever https://youtu.be/QDO9ynkxa7k
Twinbee! Be There With Bells On https://youtu.be/Dh-ISK4mngU
Bonk's Nomenclature https://youtu.be/U-m5MPGTMpA
Turbo-Grafx 16 Arcade Developer Interview https://youtu.be/0SAUfI5BBMA
At The End of the Rainbow (Keith X Wataru) https://youtu.be/g9j-EGPilRo
Partial Transcript:
On January 25th, 2024, Edia Co. Ltd, released Cosmic Fantasy Collection for the Nintendo Switch! (Yay!!) A popular RPG series that was for the most part left behind in Japan.
For a few people out there, you know the score, but for the rest of the world let’s get up to speed on what this actually means.
Back in 1990, developer Telenet Japan, released the first in a series of a Role-Playing games for the PC-Engine CD-ROM2 System. Cosmic Fantasy. The hook was that the game’s story, progressed through animated cut-scenes with voice overs, a very new concept at the time. Kazuhiro Ochi, who had well known by the end of the 80s, directed the animation. Anime voiceover superstars brought the characters to life.
Oh yeah, one more thing! Some of the scenes were a little spicy!
Cosmic Fantasy never reached the heights of Final Fantasy or Dragon Quest, but was popular enough to continue for 5 full games, as well as an anime OVA, one Radio Drama and two manga books.
One installment, Cosmic Fantasy 2 managed to come stateside, with a full English Translation on the TurboGrafx-CD, by Working Designs.
Over time, the template that Cosmic Fantasy had created became adopted by most of the RPG industry, while artists and programmers from the series created new works including the “Tales of…” and “Star Ocean” series that still exist today.
For all of the impact Cosmic Fantasy had, the series was basically forgotten by the end of the 90s, and in the 21st Century remained dormant. Telenet Japan closed around 2007. Ownership of the game became unclear as unknown company after company, would buy up the remains of Telenet while the world moved on.
As games of the 80s and 90s were reborn through Virtual Console and modern remakes, Cosmic Fantasy remained absent. The only re-release of the game was through an obscure Japanese website, selling each game for about $8 U.S. The only way for most to get a fix of Cosmic Fantasy was through emulation, which I fully support!!! But it came with a caveat, as without fluent Japanese proficiency, 4 of the 5 games were unplayable.
In December 2022 Edia released the first two Cosmic Fantasy games for the Nintendo Switch, in both a standard card version, as well as a deluxe box set with illustrations by Kazuhiro Ochi, a soundtrack and some other cool stuff! You better prepare to pay up! ￥7,140 for the basic game - also on the E-shop individually or together and ￥14,000 for the deluxe set, yikes! But with that, the promise that a second collection with the remaining three games would come later and that *maybe* these games will leave Japan and be playable in English!!
Edia kept its word! Cosmic Fantasy Collection 2 arrived in December 2023 and I can’t believe I get to say this, an English version of Cosmic Fantasy 1 appeared on the U.S. Nintendo E-shop on January 25th, 2024!!!!!!!!!
Along side Cosmic Fantasy 2, which was already released in English but is still exciting nonetheless.