Castle Quest (NES)

Castle Quest
Developer: Tomcat System Publisher: Hudson Soft Platform: NES Released in JP: May 18, 1990 This game has a hidden developer message. This game has hidden development-related text. This game has debugging material.

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Castle Quest, not to be confused with Castlequest is a strategy game that plays kind of similar to Famicom Wars and Archon.

Various Debug Tests

Enter any of the following Japanese words as a Player 1 name in any game mode. (Note that nigori and panigori symbols should be entered separately.)

• たろっと (Tarot) - Tarot cards viewer
• でも (Demo) - Demo sequence viewer
• くみんしーど (Kumin Seed) - Ending sequence
• もりきゅう (Wood 9) - Special round
• よこがお (Profile) - Character viewer
• さしえ (Illustration) - Picture viewer
• とらんぷ (Playing cards) - Playing cards viewer

Debug Monitor

To do: More parameters and menus.

Enter the Japanese word もにたー ([Debug] Monitor) as a Player 1 name. You can watch the RAM area from $0200 to $600 with all the info about the RAM variable function, and can change a lot of parameters.

From left to right, the headings are アドレス (Address), コマンド (Command), and データ (Data). トーン means "tone".

Use Up / Down to select the desired RAM address. Press A / B to enter and Up / Down to navigate the menus.

Easter Eggs

Programmer's Daughter

Enter the Japanese word おおくほななこ (Ookubo Nanako) as Player 1's name. A young girl will appear and give a speech:

Japanese	English
わたし、 おおくぼななこ！ ２がつ１１にちの ケンコクキネンビ うまれ！ おぼえやすいでしょ ウフ！ パパのつくったゲーム ヨロシクね！	I'm Nanako Ookubo! I was born on Feb. 11th, the day Japan was founded. That's easy to remember, isn't it? Teehee. Please enjoy my dad's games!

As indicated below, the programmer's name is Ookubo Ryouichi, who had in 1985 worked on developing the NES Battle City with the small software company Tomcat Systems. That game has an Easter egg noting that the game was "WRITTEN BY OPEN-REACH WHO LOVES NORIKO", while the title screen of this game has a copyright for "OPR", presumably short for "OPEN-REACH".

The games are separated by five years, and present in this game is the nearly-three-year-old daughter of the programmer.

One-Eyed Woman

Enter the Japanese word なかしままさと (Nakashima Masato) as a Player 1 name. A small one-eyed woman will walk on-screen and shout "ま！".

Unused Text

A small copyright text string is hidden inside located at 0x18010 in the ROM:

COPYRIGHT 1990 OPR RYOUICHI OHKUBO

The following text is located at 0x1FFF4 in the ROM:

CASTLE QUEST