Game Girls Go! Is a show featuring Japanese television personalities playing Japanese retro video games in a contest of either prizes or “punishments”. Each contestant is given the chance to play 3 retro games on three different retro consoles and given a set of challenges to complete while playing the games. If by the end of all three games they have completed more challenges than not, they win a prize. If not, they face a one-shot “punishment” challenge in a final attempt to find success.
The show, Game Girls Go! features popular Japanese female television personalities playing classic Japanese video games in a contest of prizes or “punishments”, being described as “Double Dare - like icky challenges.” And while the television personalities and end-game challenges add an air of wacky unpredictability to the mix, the real stars of Game Girls Go! are the games, insists studio head Charlie Maib.
“We have put the upmost emphasis on the gaming aspect of the show,” said Charlie. “Over the last two years, we’ve been making inroads in Japan working with agents and game companies to make this happen. Of course, the companies that own the rights to these games are very concerned about their image, so they would never want to attach their name to something trashy, or something that would reflect poorly upon them”
Mr. Maib said that the show was crafted with the help of a conglomerate of Japanese production studios and had input from the gaming companies themselves. “It was a real group effort to make sure the show had the quality we were going for, and that it felt 100% Japanese. It went through a few iterations; but in the end, I think we have the right mix to appeal to both American and Japanese gamers.”
During the pre-production of Game Girls Go!, one of the things that Studio Happy Chicken insisted on was that the games not be second tier to the people playing them. “This is a show about games, about the love of retro gaming,” Maib insists. “Although the games were meant to be displayed in standard definition on old tube TVs, we have taken the upmost care in upscaling each one so that they shine in HD.” What this means is that for many gamers, this will be the first time to experience these classics in crystal clear 1080p HD. “Every game is hardware upscaled from a pure signal and then compared with how it would look on a tube TV to make sure nothing is out of place, no colors are off, that the aspect ratio is correct. It’s not as simple as just plugging a system into a computer and hitting record.”
The history of the games are important as well, insists Maib. “We’ve worked with the game companies to get little nuggets of gaming trivia that we can interject into the history portion of the show. Game Girls Go! is more than just watching someone play a game: we get into the history of each game featured on the show and offer some insight into how it came to be and its impact on the current generation of gaming. Plus we highlight the system that the game is being played on and talk about it as well. Every game will be an original copy of that game played on the system that it was designed for. No virtual console play, no emulation.”
Although interest for Game Girls Go! is high in Japan, developers in the region expressed some reservation in bringing the show west. “One of the things I was told time and time again was that while the concept of the show was great, developers doubted that westerners had much interest in old Japanese games. I decided to try and prove them wrong.” Stated Maib about the challenge of localizing Game Girls Go!
The decision was made to bring Game Girls Go! to Kickstarter as a way to visibly show that such a product would be supported in North America and beyond. Currently with a little over $2400 in donations and 12 days to go, the going has been tough; but Maib
is still extremely hopeful for this venture in the west. “Our goal is small, only $12,000... and some people have questioned if that’s enough money; but they have to realize that we’ve been working on this for 2 years. We have the equipment, we have the licenses. We even have distribution in the US and Japan. The amount is low because Studio Happy Chicken has taken care of all of the extras. What we’ve offered up is a realistic budget that gets things done in a matter-of-fact, no frills way. If we get funded, this will happen.”
Episode Length: 60 minutes
Format: Blu-ray Disk, On Demand
Japanese Distribution: INTEC Media Corporation
North American/ EU Distribution: MVD Entertainment
