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Tongara's Clockwork Knight Collection

Allie

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As much as I love the original, I've always really enjoyed the "Segarocks" arrangement of A Lullaby - especially this version from the Live in Japan recording:



P.S. The recording has long since vanished, but I once covered this song in the style of Radiohead's Motion Picture Soundtrack (just try and imagine that if you can)! I think my starting point was being inspired by the organ of the Segarocks treatment, and from there I slowed it down closer to what's heard over the end credits of Clockwork Knight. I may yet one day revisit this idea...
 
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Allie

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On the subject of POGs, I once had the official Milkcap Maker, and I bought spare copies of certain SSM issues just so I could use pieces of Saturn-related artwork to create my own series. I seem to remember creating ranges based on Sega Touring Car and VF3 (naturally), but I've no idea where any of these went.

Also, speaking of A Lullaby...

 
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Tongara

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Also, speaking of A Lullaby...


Well, ain't that something! Haha

I'm very impressed. The arrangement was original, and apart from listing "Misumi Kosaka" as "Takano Urara" for some reason (She simply did a cover of the song way back when), I am delighted to see it!
 
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Tongara

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Right, for today, I'll post something that may be a bit nostalgic for members based in the US who would visit Toys "R" Us back in the day~

1. Clockwork Knight 1 & 2 - Toys "R" Us VidPro Cards

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So, what exactly are these? Well, back in the 80's and 90's (and probably a bit beyond), these large cards were on the shelves of the game sections in US branches of Toys "R" Us. You would simply take one off the store shelf, and take it up to the designated counter, and then after the card was scanned (they generally ad a barcoded sticker with the price on) and you paid for your item, the clerk would simply go and get a copy of the game from the back room where they were kept.

What was the point of this? Well, for one, it saved on floor space in the store by having thinner shelving holding thin cards instead of full game cases. Another reason is also that it stopped potential theft of $60~ games from the shelves... at worst, you were stealing a piece of cardboard, costing the store virtually nothing in losses.

As a bonus, it not only showed the front cover, but the back cover of the game, too, as shown above, so you could find out exactly what the game was about, just like you could with the physical game in hand.

These cards were created by the company "Vidpro DALLAS・TORONTO". While the ones I am showing here are for the two Clockwork Knight games released in the US, pretty much every game you can think of that retailed probably had one, for all major consoles of said eras. Some were even printed for games that never actually made it to retail release (such as "Half Life" for Dreamcast)!

These cards were not sold at retail, and were most likely tossed when a game stopped retailing, but seemingly people have had access to them over the years, sometimes complete collections. They tend to go for not too much on eBay depending on the game (some go for a bit more depending on the games rarity and popularity, etc).

These are the only two I was interested in, for obvious reasons, and I was glad to get them without any pricing stickers. We never had VidPro or something alike it in the UK as far as I remember, so I was glad to finally pick them up after seeing them for years~
 

Druid II

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And about the prime selection sampler - I looked for it and bought it from you because:
1. I wanted to own it, as it is a piece of Clockwork Knight history, plus I had looked for it for a very long time.
and
2. To release it into the wild for everyone to enjoy, which my own dump and scan allows.

When I bought it from you, I assumed I was allowed to do as I wished with it, as I would with any other game I bought. I am sorry if that was not what you had in mind when selling it to me. Not much can be done now if thay is the case.

You misunderstand; I already dumped it and uploaded it, the reason I bought it in the first place was just that. I thought that if all you needed was the data then we could've saved some time and money. But I suppose if you needed it for your collection, then it's fine either way.
 
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Tongara

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You misunderstand; I already dumped it and uploaded it, the reason I bought it in the first place was just that. I thought that if all you needed was the data then we could've saved some time and money. But I suppose if you needed it for your collection, then it's fine either way.
Yeah, I really did want to have it, so it was genuinely appreciated. You are a pretty rad person. :cool:

That said, I had no idea that it was already dumped or uploaded anywhere (I could never find it, sadly)! Haha

I am glad all is good with this, regardless~
 

Tongara

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For today, I'd like to post some of my favourite Clockwork Knight items... we're heading into the realm of books~

1. Clockwork Knight 1 & 2 - Official Guide Books

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As the title says, these are literally official guide books for the Japanese releases of both Clockwork Knight games.

Releasing in January and August of 1995 respectively, these are super interesting books. They were used over the last 8 years to find some really interesting secrets about the games (especially the second), some of which were completely unknown to western audiences, including the hidden message and appearance from a digitised version of an idol of the era known as Hiroko Nakayama (中山 博子) who in addition to being a presenter for the Japanese Video Game TV Show Game Catalogue II (ゲームカタログII), was also a big fan of the first Clockwork Knight game, and a hidden message and 2D render of Hirokazu Hamamura (浜村 弘一), who in addition to being an irregular host on Game Catalogue II, was also former Weekly Famitsu chief editor (You can read more about this here).

The contents of the first book points to how late things in the game were changed, and shows a lot of evidence of the original intention being just 1 single Clockwork Knight game, on a much smaller scale than both games combined... In the same book, there is a special interview with the games producer, but sadly that has not to this date been translated... yet.

They were produced by Aspect (アスペクト), who were a subsidiary of ASCII Corporation, Inc., before later becoming a part of SEGA. During the era where they were owned by ASCII, they produced many guide books for all sorts of games, for lots of different consoles, including the two Clockwork Knight games. I think they still produce game guides, but from their start, they were also a publisher in general. The books were also made in association with Famicom Tsūshin (Famitsu), which at the time was also another ASCII subsidiary.

I intend to have both of these books professionally scanned and translated at some point.

2. Clockwork Knight: Pepperouchau no Daibouken (CG Storybook)

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This is one of my favourite EVER Clockwork Knight items...

Quite a rare item, this book was actually put together by the "Clockwork Knight Team" themselves who actually worked on the game, and was released a few days before the game in December of 1994.

This book is very special. It contains beautiful renders of the first Clockwork Knight game, some never seen before (such as the outside of the house the game is set in!). The book also seems to tell the ORIGINAL story of Clockwork Knight, as it was originally meant to be put out...

What do I mean by that? Well, as mentioned about the above first guide book, there was a lot of evidence pointing to 1 single, much shorter game than the two games combined...

Both this book and the first guide book actually include shots of the ending of Clockwork Knight 2, which is funny, as the ending scene of Clockwork Knight 2 has far more resemblance to the "Attic" levels of the first game than the "Clock Tower" levels the end of the second game is set in.

The ending of this book is also completely different to how the story goes in the game. It's really exciting stuff, and as I have more than one copy, I'll be having this professionally scanned at some point and translated at my own costs, as I want the full, original story out there.
 
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Tongara

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For today, we're going to look at some print media, and a very special competition~

1. TV Magazine (テレビマガジン) 1995.03 & 1995.05 Issues

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So, uh... what are these magazines? Well, TV Magazine (テレビマガジン) is a children-oriented monthly Japanese magazine (mainly aimed at young boys) published by Kodansha Ltd. that primarily features children's television shows and videos, and to a lesser extent, children's video games, model kits, and toys. It was first published on November 1st, 1971.

Alright, so you're probably thinking "That's nice and all, but what on earth would such a magazine have to do with Clockwork Knight?!"... well, I can easily answer that!

Let's look closely at the top right front cover of the 1995.03 issue...
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Well, as you can see right there, there is a Sega Saturn console sitting on the front cover. The text right next to it says "セガ・サターンクロックワークナイトイラスト大コンテスト", which pretty much translates to "Sega Saturn Clockwork Knight Illustration Big Contest"... see, I told you there was a reason for posting this! haha

Now, inside the issue is a 3 page feature on the first Clockwork Knight game (strangely at least 1 of them is a screenshot from a much earlier version of the game, even though it was now 3 months after release!), but the main focus for today will be one particular part of the third page, where the details of the competition can be found (Which, itself, also contains a screenshot from a much earlier version of the game...):

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The basics of the competition were, the entries were to be drawn on the clear side of a plain postcard, and then the 2 above little white address boxes with blue text were to be cut out and attached to the address side of the postcard. The entrants also had to pay 50 Yen (¥50) for postage costs. The deadline for the competition was 1995.03.05, and the winners were to be announced in the street dated 1995.05 issue of the magazine.

To note, the release of this issue (street date of 1995.02, with a cover date of 1995.03) means that this competition happened during the production of Clockwork Knight 2 in Japan, but we'll come back to that later, as it's significant.

So, what were the prizes?
Grand Prize (1 Winner Only) - Sega Saturn Console with controllers, etc.
Prize A (3 Winners Only) - Clockwork Knight game for Sega Saturn.
Prize B (3 Winners Only) - Virtua Fighter game for Sega Saturn.
(It is assumed that the Grand Prize would also come with a copy of each game)

Along with 2 other Judges, the games producer "Noriyoshi Oba" was one of the judges.

As previously stated, the winners were announced in the 1995.05 issue of the magazine. So, who were the winners? Well, in a very small section of the issue, we get to find out...

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Grand Prize Winner: Takuya Kawamoto from Ōsaka Prefecture (大阪府/ 川本 拓弥)
Prize A Top Winner: Yuiko Muraoka from Aichi Prefecture (愛知県/ (村岡 佑伊子)
Prize A Other Winners: Asuka Kido from Saitama Prefecture (埼玉県/ 木戸 あすか) & Saori Nishimura from Hyōgo Prefecture (兵庫県/ 西村 沙織)
Prize B Top Winner: Yūsuke Hanai from Aichi Prefecture (愛知県/ 花井 祐輔)
Prize B Other Winners: Kazuaki Mihara from Kyōto Prefecture (京都府/ 三原 一晃) & Hikaru Suzuki from Aichi Prefecture (愛知県/ 鈴木 輝)
(Only the top winners illustrations were featured in the magazine, probably due to issues of space)

So, are we at the end of the story for this one? Well, almost, but not quite.

Remember earlier I mentioned that this competition happening during the production of Clockwork Knight 2 in Japan was significant? Well, that is because the winners and a few other entrants had their illustrations featured in the end credits of the Japanese version of Clockwork Knight 2!



And thus, ends the story on the Illustration contest. This was a long post, but I was happy to write about it and spread the information a little. It just goes to show you, you never know what is hiding in old Japanese magazines of the era, sometimes even mostly unrelated to gaming!

More information on the Illustration contest (and full scans from TV Magazine Issue 1995.03) can be found on the section I wrote about it on the Clockwork Knight 2 Sega Retro page.
 
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Tongara

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For today's post, we're going to head into the realm of Clockwork Knight fashion~

1. Clockwork Knight Official "Sega All Stars" Long Sleeve T-Shirt

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Yep, that's an official Clockwork Knight T-Shirt~

So, how did such an item come to be? Well, according to a bit of research many a year ago, back in 1996, there were UFO Catchers (Crane/Claw Games) with SEGA based T-Shirts as prizes in their Arcades, etc, in Japan. The series of T-Shirts were called "SEGA All Stars Long Sleeve T-Shirts (セガオールスターズロングスリーブTシャツ)". I've personally seen ones for Vitua Fighter 2, Virtua Cop and Virtual On, but there could be others... it's not so well documented, sadly.

The one above, is of course, for Clockwork Knight and happens to still be sealed. Now, you might be wondering what the full shirt looks like?

Well, there is good and bad news... the good news is, over the years I've happened to come into possession of 2 others of the same shirt, both without the packaging, so I could show that to you right now... but, the bad news is, they are currently away in storage, so I can't, and I'm unwilling to open the one pictured above (It took many a year to find this sealed one)...

Luckily, a few other people online have also bought this shirt in the past, and they even shared image online of it, so I'll kindly use one of their images and hope they don't mind~

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(Credit to @japananimeposters on Instagram for this image)

And here it is from another angle, where you can see more of the shirt, including the arms:

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(Credit to Kaneda on Instagram for this image)

It's a pretty nice shirt! While it has an amusing print on the front, it's totally plain on the back, and the size says "Free Size", which I feel is more of a Japanese M-L at the most (So a US/UK S-M).

A few people might recognise the image used on the shirt... well, it has been seen before in other SEGA products, such as the Sega Saturn CG Collection, where it is used as part of a Clockwork Knight slideshow:

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It was also used as the cover image to an issue of the SEGA Internal Magazine called "Harmony", on it's 137th issue... sadly, as this was an internal magazine, it's not readily available to show... except, the "Sega Freaks Cards" collection has a card showing that very issue and cover (I'll be getting to these cards in this thread at some point):

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And that is it!
Sadly, I do not know of any other Clockwork Knight wearable merch, but new discoveries are made in the Clockwork World all the time~
 
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Allie

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Quite a rare item, this book was actually put together by the "Clockwork Knight Team" themselves who actually worked on the game, and was released a few days before the game in December of 1994.

This reminds me of a question I've been wanting to ask for a while... Does anyone know if there was ever an official credit for CS Team Ara in any of the print media relating to the Clockwork Knight series? I've never seen this mentioned in either of the games (or their many regional variations), but Ara features on the spine of a book in the background along with similar references to other teams founded at the same time, including Andromeda (Panzer Dragoon) and Aquila (Victory Goal). Saying that, it's been claimed the original Panzer Dragoon was released before Team Andromeda settled on its final name, yet Clockwork Knight - a game from even earlier - managed to slip this in as an Easter egg of sorts. Also, with the exception of its logo featuring on a pitchside advert in one of the Japanese installments of the Victory Goal/Worldwide Soccer franchise, I don't believe Aquila ever credited itself as such.
In comparison with its stablemates, I don't recall there even being an official logo for Team Ara, though I'm sure one must have existed at some point. If my research is correct, Ara, Andromeda and Aquila were all formed at the start of 1994 with the sole purpose of developing new IP that would launch with the Saturn, even though Panzer Dragoon ended up missing this deadline slightly. Along with these three divisions, the same CS unit also had a further splinter group named after a constellation, only this one was known as Team Vega, which went on to produce J.LEAGUE プロサッカークラブをつくろう! and its immediate sequel. Again, I've never found a logo for Vega, and I still don't know who created the Greatest Nine/World Series Baseball games outside it being another team within the CS department.
 

Tongara

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This reminds me of a question I've been wanting to ask for a while... Does anyone know if there was ever an official credit for CS Team Ara in any of the print media relating to the Clockwork Knight series? I've never seen this mentioned in either of the games (or their many regional variations), but Ara features on the spine of a book in the background along with similar references to other teams founded at the same time, including Andromeda (Panzer Dragoon) and Aquila (Victory Goal). Saying that, it's been claimed the original Panzer Dragoon was released before Team Andromeda settled on its final name, yet Clockwork Knight - a game from even earlier - managed to slip this in as an Easter egg of sorts. Also, with the exception of its logo featuring on a pitchside advert in one of the Japanese installments of the Victory Goal/Worldwide Soccer franchise, I don't believe Aquila ever credited itself as such.
In comparison with its stablemates, I don't recall there even being an official logo for Team Ara, though I'm sure one must have existed at some point. If my research is correct, Ara, Andromeda and Aquila were all formed at the start of 1994 with the sole purpose of developing new IP that would launch with the Saturn, even though Panzer Dragoon ended up missing this deadline slightly. Along with these three divisions, the same CS unit also had a further splinter group named after a constellation, only this one was known as Team Vega, which went on to produce J.LEAGUE プロサッカークラブをつくろう! and its immediate sequel. Again, I've never found a logo for Vega, and I still don't know who created the Greatest Nine/World Series Baseball games outside it being another team within the CS department.
I have personally never seen them credited anywhere as such, I am sorry to say.

The only real credit to them is them being credited as "Clockwork Knight Team (クロックワークナイト・チーム)" inside the story book.
 

NikeX

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An exotic within an exotic world. Really exceptional. The characters are very distinctive in the world of video games. Especially today.
The collection is really diverse. The phone cards and the signature of Hirofumi Murasaki are very vers special.
I was very impressed by Clockwork Knight at the time.
Have merchandise figures ever been made?
It would be predestined.
Your collection deserves a place of honor. May it continue to grow.
 

Tongara

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Ah yes, I have a lot more in my collection, but I rarely post here now so I simply haven't posted it here.

I thank you for the compliments on my collection. Sadly, no figures were ever made.
 

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