Policenauts

Policenauts is a graphic adventure game with a point-and-click interface. It has also been called a visual novel and an interactive movie. The player moves a cursor freely across the screen to click on objects to examine them. During conversations, the player is given dialogue options to choose from. Once the right object in the scene has been examined or the dialogue options have been exhausted, the game progresses to the next scene in the story. In versions with cel animation, these scenes the player must examine are stills from the animated cinematics, so the game moves seamlessly between them and cutscenes. There are occasional action scenes where the player must fire a gun at enemies in a first-person perspective. The Sega Saturn version supports a light gun for these segments. ==Plot==

In 2013, Los Angeles Police Department officer Jonathan Ingram (Hideyuki Tanaka) was one of five "Policenauts", police officers who received astronaut training to protect Beyond Coast, humanity's first functional self-supporting space colony. During the test of a new space suit, an accident causes Jonathan to drift into space, presumed dead by his colleagues. In reality, the cryogenic survival system in the suit preserved him, and he is found and revived 25 years later. During that time, Beyond Coast has become the principal development location for potential interstellar travel, and is protected by a dedicated police force dubbed the Beyond Coast Police Department (BCPD). In 2040, Jonathan has become a private investigator on Earth in Old Los Angeles. He is visited by his former wife Lorraine (Chiyoko Kawashima), who remarried while he was presumed dead. Lorraine asks for Jonathan's help in solving the disappearance of her husband, Kenzo Hojo; the only clues are a torn leaf, a set of capsules, and the word "Plato". Jonathan is reluctant to take her case at first, but after Lorraine leaves his office, she is murdered by a man in a black motorcycle suit. After failing to catch the culprit, Jonathan decides to fulfill Lorraine's final request and travels to Beyond, where he is reunited with his former LAPD partner, BCPD Vice Department chief Ed Brown (Shōzō Iizuka), who agrees to help Jonathan investigate the circumstances surrounding Hojo's disappearance and Lorraine's murder along with Vice Unit members Meryl Silverburgh (Kyoko Terase) and Dave Forrest (Bin Shimada). During their investigation, Jonathan receives information from Karen (Kikuko Inoue), Lorraine's daughter with Hojo, that Hojo was growing increasingly stressed working at Tokugawa Pharmaceuticals, which is helping research medical solutions to health problems caused by living in space. Jonathan and Ed also run into former Policenauts Gates Becker (Osamu Saka) and Joseph Tokugawa (Iemasa Kayumi), the latter of whom Jonathan suspects of being involved. They receive further leads from a former co-worker of Hojo's; the informant is later killed and used to lure Jonathan and Ed into an unsuccessful booby trap. Hojo's body is eventually found, and Jonathan is framed for the killings. Tokugawa and Becker are revealed to have both been responsible for Jonathan's accident, and the prime movers behind an illegal drug and organ trafficking ring designed to counteract the negative side-effects of being in space for long periods of time. Hojo became involved in the conspiracy to save Karen from her terminal bone cancer, but eventually tried to break away and was murdered. With help from Ed and Meryl, Jonathan storms the Tokugawa headquarters, killing Lorraine's assassin and then confronts Becker. When apparently cornered, Jonathan tricks Becker into revealing the whole scheme through a live video feed, exposing the scandal to Beyond Coast. Ed saves Jonathan by killing Becker, while Meryl and the remaining police arrest Tokugawa. Jonathan donates his bone marrow to Karen upon learning that he is her biological father, and returns to Earth. ==Development==

in 2018 Policenauts was developed by Konami and directed by Hideo Kojima. Kojima began to explore concepts for Policenauts during the development of Snatcher (1988) when memory limitation issues prompted them to take a break. He wanted the game to remain in the adventure genre, feeling it was the best method to express what he wanted with video games. Development on Policenauts began in earnest in 1990 and lasted four years. Kojima wanted to explore a near future scenario that could realistically occur rather than outlandish science fiction. Space travel was also an influence after Toyohiro Akiyama became the first Japanese person to travel to space in 1990. Policenauts was originally titled Beyond, but Konami changed the name after they were unable to trademark it. Kojima's familiarity with film and television influenced the cinematography in Policenauts. Though not attempting to use video games as a vehicle for presenting movies, he wanted to fill what he perceived to be a lack of production quality in games. Kojima worked to take the excellence of acting, lighting, direction, and storytelling in filmmaking and match that quality in his games. He took inspiration from American buddy television shows he enjoyed growing up like Starsky & Hutch. The game was originally going to be marketed as a "Cinematic Virtual Reality". Konami did a trademark search early in development that turned up empty, but by 1994, the "Virtual Reality" term had been trademarked so it was dropped. == Release ==

Policenauts was first released for the PC-9821 on July 29, 1994. Kojima received a letter from a hearing-impaired player after release, upset that modern games like Policenauts with its CD-ROM technology were replacing game text with actual speech. Kojima originally omitted subtitles to evoke a cinematic feel, but he added them for following versions to satisfy the players. A short demo with a game glossary, artwork, and design documents was released on April 21, 1995, called the Pilot Disk. The 3DO version and subsequent console ports had a drop in display resolution, and used newly animated full motion video in contrast to the animated stills used in the PC version. The next port was for the PlayStation, released on January 19, 1996. A bonus disc called Policenauts Private Collection was released concurrently which has most of the same content as the 3DO's Pilot Disk bonuses plus storyboards and the game script, as well as select shooting segments from the main game. Seeing the system's potential, Kojima promised himself he would make a Metal Gear game for the system, though first he ported Policenauts. and it was re-released digitally on PlayStation Store on May 14, 2008. The final port was for the Sega Saturn, released on September 13, 1996. The version comes packaged in a slipcase containing the game case itself and a hardbound art book. Localization An official English translation of Policenauts was announced for release on the Sega Saturn in 1996 in North America. It appeared in catalogs with promotional box artwork, but the game never materialized. According to Jeremy Blaustein, who worked in Konami's international business department and led the translations of Snatcher and Metal Gear Solid (1998), there were never plans to localize Policenauts. He personally felt it was one of Kojima's weaker games, not enjoying the "space cowboy" theme and feeling it lacked the tension and humor of Snatcher. In response to the PS One re-release in 2003, fans organized an email campaign to pressure Konami to localize the game once again. Their attempt was publicized and supported by IGN. Other help was provided by YouTuber Slowbeef. The translation was finally released two years later in August 2009 as a patch for the PlayStation version. It can be played on an emulator, ==Reception==

In Japan, critics praised Policenauts for its high level of presentation. Both Sega Saturn Magazine and Famitsu praised the quality of animation, voice acting, and its engrossing setting. Sega Saturn Magazine felt it was more like a movie than a game and praised its unique blend of genres, but found some of the text difficult to understand and warned that its heavy scientific writing may not be suitable for everyone. GameFan reviewed the PlayStation and Saturn ports; they felt it pushed the genre of interactive movies better than previous games in the genre and praised the game's intricate technical details, although they cautioned that its specificity may put off some players. They also praised its suspenseful storytelling, and felt it was worth players' time even though it emphasized text over action. They concluded that Policenauts was "a masterful achievement, a near-future scenario so intricately detailed, well thought out and full of originality it puts Hollywood's best attempts at sci-fi to shame." Comparing the game's production values to anime of the mid-1990s, Bob Mackey of 1Up.com liked how the game transitioned seamlessly between cutscene and gameplay, and preferred this style of presentation to games with high-quality cinematics that do not complement the gameplay. Kojima's fascination with space and future technology was noted in several reviews, and the elaborate detail placed into describing hypothetical technologies and commonplace items was frequently singled out for praise. The game did receive some criticism. Some felt its moments of sexual humor – notably the option for Jonathan to grope the breasts of many of the game's female characters ― conflicted with its otherwise serious tone; Mackey explained that this was a remnant of the game's original release on Japanese computers during a time when the market was flooded with hentai games. Concerning criticisms of its slow pace, Mackey wrote that the game requires patience, while Kalata criticized the lack of a dialogue skip option. Parkin wrote that its format is outdated and not for everyone, but still called it "a triumph of gentle interactive storytelling", and felt it could be enjoyed by those with interests in "thrillers, point and click adventures, science fiction homage and Japanese esoterica". == Legacy ==

Policenauts was not well known in the West until the fan translation was released in 2009. While still working with Konami in 2012, Kojima expressed interest in exploring a follow-up to Policenauts, but felt it was difficult to carry out from a business perspective. Bob Mackey of 1UP.com criticized Konami for failing to acknowledge or pursue localization of Policenauts and other non-Metal Gear games by Kojima. Some of the Policenauts staff went on to hold lead development roles on Kojima's later efforts, including the Zone of the Enders and Metal Gear series. The character Meryl Silverburgh and the Tokugawa Corporation in Policenauts were repurposed for the Metal Gear series. == Notes ==