森田将棋64 Morita Shogi 64 Contents 1.Introduction 2.Manual Translation 3.Walkthrough 1.Introduction Released on April 3rd 1998 by Seta, Morita Shogi is the third and last Shogi game to be released on the N64. This game is much more pleasant to look at than Seta's other game Saikyo Habu Shogi. It has a traditional Japanese theme, so the opening cutscene features some nice warring states battle scenes, and the main menu has some pleasant traditional Japanese music. The options menu even allows you to choose lovely environmental sound effects that match each of the four seasons. With these features, and the groundbreaking ability to play online, I would say that even without a tournament mode, this is easily the best of the three shogi games on the N64. The titular Kazuro Morita was a well known programmer in the early days of Japanese computing. Born in Toyama prefecture to a family of doctors. Kazuro enrolled at Saitama Medical School where he joined the computer club. With an NEC TK-80 he programmed his first game, a version of Orthello in 1976. 1982 he won the grand prize of 1 million yen at an Enix game competition with his game Morita's Battlefield. This war strategy game was programmed in a month. When it was released on cassette it earned Morita over 5 million yen in royalties. In 1983 he formed a game development house with his computer club members and within six months they released a port of Xevious for the PC-8801 called Arufosu. In 1985 he released the first Morita's Shogi title which placed well in many computer Shogi tournaments. Morita himself was a 5th Dan Shogi player. In total there would 11 titles in the Morita's Shogi series. His NES and PC RPG's such as Beast God Rogas, Minelvaton Saga, Dungeon Land and Just Breed are his best remembered titles. Kuzuro Morita passed away at the age of 57 on July 27, 2012. He is survived by his brother Takashi Morita a politician and doctor. Befitting Morita's contribution to the advancement of Shogi games, the N64 version features online play, a feature made possible by the RJ-11 Modem Connection port built into the top of the cart. Despite this sales of the game were reportedly sluggish and therefore it is not uncommon to find complete boxed copies to this day. In May 2020 security researcher CTurt discovered that the modern connection port could be exploited to allow remote code execution on the N64 much easier than via the game sharks or flash cards. This opens up the possibility of easily running homebrew games or online multiplayer games on the N64 hardware. 2.Translation Guide This game require the controller pak to save certain data, but you can play the game without it. After turning the game on and watching the cool Waring States style introduction you will arrive at the title screen. Here you have the following options. 1 Game Room - Play a single game here 2 Shogi Ranking Test - Take a test to check your ranking 3 Research Room - Experiment with the AI 4 Shogi Problems - Try to solve shogi problems 5 Environment Settings 6 Change your online name 7 Japan Shogi Network - Connect to the internet to play Shogi online 1 Game Room In the game room you have the follow options Play a quick game Detailed Settings Continue a game Go back After choosing "Play a quick game" the following settings will be shown Players - Human or CPU, you can set the CPU level here too (from 1-6) Handicap　- 平手 means no handicap. Otherwise you can choose to remove pieces. Set the time limit for turns　無制限 means no limit. Countdown timer on or off. Then you have two buttons at the bottom of the screen. Start the game Go back When you pause during a game you are shown the following options Restart the game Load a game record Save a game Load a game Environment Settings Return to the main menu Cancel 2 Shogi Ranking Test - Take a test to check your ranking You have　three options here Take the ranking test Read the next move - Shows you the next move in a problem Go back 5 Environment Settings You have the following options here Left side Style of shogi pieces Board material pattern Countdown Timer - on or off Countdown Style Right side Countdown Sound - on or off Music - on or off Environmental sounds - Spring, Summer, Autumn, Winter, or none. You then have two options Confirm Go back 7 Japan Shogi Network I would love to write a detailed guide of how this mode worked. But considering the fact that this game came with 2 manuals, both of which are over 30 pages in length I think its a better use of my time to translate a game that people will actually want to play. Nevertheless, here is the main menu in this mode. Connect Line Settings Joining Procedures Server Address Book Message Settings Write a sentence Go back I assume the sentence writing options allowed you to create a predefined message to send to players before and after games. It makes me wonder how many people played this game at the time and if a small community ever sprung up around it. Do those people still remember the other people they played against on Morita Shogi 64 and wonder where they are now? 3.Walkthrough You need to be able to recognize the kanji for each piece in order to use this guide. The pieces are as follows, with the piece they are most similar to in chess, the meaning of their name and then the kanji as it appears in the game. 1 King / General 玉 1 Rook / Flying Chariot 飛 1 Bishop / Angle Mover 角 2 Gold Generals 金 2 Silver Generals 銀 2 Knights / Cassia Horse 桂 2 Lances 香 9 Pawns /Foot Soldiers 歩 Higher ranked players sometimes have a differently named king, 王將 Pieces that reach the end of the board are promoted and are shown with red kanji as follows Promoted Rook / Dragon King 龍王 Promoted Bishop / Dragon Horse 龍馬 Promoted Silver General 成銀 Promoted Knight 成桂 Promoted Lance 成香 Promoted Pawn と In this guide I will refer to spaces on the board in the following way. 9 to 1 across the top, and A to I from top to bottom. This is not traditional shogi notation, but I hope it easier to understand for those people who do not know shogi notation. So in the traditional opening of a game, the board looks like this: ９８７６５４３２１ 香桂銀金王金銀桂香 A 飛 角 B 歩歩歩歩歩歩歩歩歩 C D E F 歩歩歩歩歩歩歩歩歩 G 角 飛 H 香桂銀金王金銀桂香 I Apologies for the messy formatting, its the best I can do with all the different kanji sizes and combinations of Latin characters. If you follow this guide, you will take and promote pieces automatically but I have included those instructions in order to make it easier to understand. In shogi you can also put spare pieces or pieces you have captured on the board if you wish to. You can do this in game by moving the cursor to the extra pieces at the bottom right of the screen. At the end of every game your opponent will resign so there will be no long drawn out games.