Get Info: #bandkun

Abandoned project: Band-kun/Beatnik for Playdate

by Matt Sephton — Sun, 11 May 2025 16:58:00 +0000

Back in November 2020 I was exploring the PC-98 back catalog, and stumbled across a strange game called Band-kun. Strange in that it’s a 1-bit black and white game on a platform that was capable of colour, and also because it’s a hybrid adventure/management/music/rhythm game. I was smitten.

The Idea

I was already developing for the Playdate, a modern 1-bit platform, and it struck me as the perfect opportunity to create a remaster of the game. So, I set my sights on securing the licence. The original title was developed by Koei—Japan’s equivalent to Electronic Arts—a giant now known as Koei Tecmo, whose owners are worth hundreds of billions. The game itself is credited to one of those owners: Yoichi Erikawa, who used the pen name Ko Shibusawa. I had a feeling this wasn’t going to be easy.

I published a thread about the game and my prototype on Twitter, introducing the game to the West, which remains my most popular post and thread of all-time (~20 years, for me) at over 450K impressions. I also mirrored the thread as a blog post which is no doubt an easier read.

The idea for the remaster was to not remake the original game at all, but rather to take the vibe and bring it into the modern era. So there were no plans to use the original music, or perhaps even the original graphics. I would leverage modern device capabilities and input methods to create a totally new experience a million miles away from the limited original game from 1990.

Challenge Accepted

A couple of days later, 18th December 2020, Cabel Sasser of Panic reached out:

“Hey Matt, I love a good challenge—do you want me to actually try to make contact with someone at Koei? Regarding Band-Kun? (Philosophically, the idea of reviving a long-forgotten PC Koei title is just enormously interesting to me ahhahah)”.

By 25th December 2020—thanks Santa!—Panic’s guy in Japan, Noby, had a breakthrough finding contact details and sent an email to Koei. Their reply came quickly on 27th December 2020 when a lovely person in Koei’s IP management department replied:

they knew of the Playdate and were waiting patiently to pre-order
they had the licence for the Band-kun game (music to my ears!)
there was an outstanding question about the music rights
and some remaining business questions for Panic to answer

The project then became in need of a budget to be set: for both the licence and for me to build it. Even with this discussion happening in late December 2020, it was suggested that the game could feature in Season 2. And that, unfortunately, was the last I heard of it. Sad, and surprising, but true.

Not one to give up so easily I submitted the game twice, kind of, in pitches to Panic.

Open Pitch: Band-kun

June 2022
to reignite the licence discussion
a reimagining of the original game for a modern device
as a team effort with musician and tools programmers; to hit a deadline
suggested budget was included
pitch pdf (191 KB)

On 1st May 2024 I sent a message to Panic stating that I was still interested in making the game and to check the status of the project, but never received a reply.

Season 2 Pitch: Beatnik

July 2024
an all-new game
let’s forget about the IP
completely revised and redesigned
as a solo endeavour; I was confident I could complete the new scope myself
no budget was required
pitch pdf (185 KB)

Go/no-go

Neither of the pitches were successful. There was no further discussion of the licence from 2020.

Regardless, I decided that I would continue working on the game and release it myself. This was the big project I was working on pretty much exclusively from May 2024 to October 2024. You can see elements of it in my New World and Band-o-matic tech demos.

In August 2024, I took a two-week break from working on Beatnik to develop Bender 2: Bend Harder, an expanded version of a game I originally made in 2012. As part of that project, I integrated some of the tooling and library code I had built for Beatnik to test and validate a few of the technologies and concepts. And that was the end of that.

Old Codes, New Releases for Playdate

by Matt Sephton — Tue, 11 Mar 2025 16:24:00 +0000

As I sadly move away from game dev on Playdate, I’ve released a couple of interesting old things…

SHARK TURTLE

This is a version of SameGame (さめがめ) originally released under the name CHAIN SHOT in 1985 by Kuniaki “Morisuke” Moribe for Fujitsu FM-8 home computer. The concept is as old as Tetris, perhaps even older, and at one time SameGame in its many guises was more popular than Tetris in Japan. One version had an active modding scene and some had strategy guide books.

It was submitted and rejected in the first wave of submissions to Playdate Catalog. At one point the plan was to wrap this in a theme/concept and give it the same sort of love that resulted in the great experiences of my other games like YOYOZO, Fore! Track, Bender 2: Bend Harder, but for one reason or another it never happened.

What is here is a fully-playable, feature-rich, albeit “no frills” version of SameGame with fast updates, solid controls, and great music. It’s a lot of fun and great to play little-by-little when you have a spare moment, as you dictate the pace and progress of the game turn-by-turn.

gingerbeardman.itch.io/shark-turtle

NEW WORLD

This is an interactive music track where you’re the DJ. You control various instruments and vocals, doing live mixing of the track. It’s really fun to play with!

It is a technology demo that was put together as part of a pitch for a game. Whilst the game never came to be, an improved version of this technology went on to be used in Bender 2: Bend Harder for the dynamic background patterns that animate to the beat of the music.

gingerbeardman.itch.io/new-world

More games!

All my Playdate games:

YOYOZO
- read about it being a GOTY 2023
Sparrow Solitaire
- read the making of
Bender 2: Bend Harder
- read the making of
Fore! Track
- read the making of
Super ICARUS
- read about its dynamic music

Extracting images from Band-kun

by Matt Sephton — Sun, 03 Jan 2021 00:00:00 +0000

I loaded the GRX file from Band-kun into GraphicConverter (macOS) as RAW 1-bit data and was delighted to see the graphics are uncompressed.

This made it somewhat trivial to extract all the graphics, including some I’m yet to see in the game!

Band-kun バンドくん musician simulator (1990, KOEI)

by Matt Sephton — Wed, 16 Dec 2020 00:00:00 +0000

I’ve been playing an old (1990, KOEI Co Ltd) Japanese NEC PC-9801 game バンドくん [Band-kun; Mr. Band; Band Man] where you start a band and have to recruit members, make some recordings and live a life of sex, drugs and rock’n’roll. It was also available for the Fujitsu FM Towns and Sharp X68000 Japanese personal computers.

Band-what?

Band-kun is a hybrid simulation/adventure/rhythm game. You explore a fictional city taking to various inhabitants, learning about the music and the music industry, recruiting band members and performing and recording music. You perform the music using mouse gestures, so it’s possible to ad-lib and receive better/worse results a little like playing a musical instrument. After recording you need mix the song in a studio, then get your friend Bob Marley to sell your CDs on the street corner, or figure out how to get the music played on the local radio station which is, of course, broadcasting from a zeppelin riding high above the city.

You need to work dead-end jobs to pay your way, and repeat the recording/gigging process to work your way up through soul-destroying small club gigs to a big arena gig, and allegedly you can even die from the excess partying.

Playdate version?

It’s originally B&W so I figured it would look great on Playdate, so I made a little proof of concept.

Band-kun required a MIDI-capable sound card PLUS an external MIDI sound module - a very expensive 30,000JPY piece of equipment back in 1990. So it wasn’t a success and was forgotten about. But it eventually led to Guitaroo Man and the birth of the music game genre on PlayStation.

Anyway! I’d love to licence Band-kun and re-release it on a modern device that can do the original concept justice. The Playdate crank and accelerometer could be used to perform the music!

I wondered if anybody knows KOEI founder Youichi Erikawa (aka “Kou Shibusawa”)? Hook a brother up! バンドを組んでメンバーを集め、レコーディングをして、セックスとドラッグとロックンロールの生活を送るという昔（1990年、KOEI）のPC-9801のゲーム「バンドくん」をプレイしています。@koeitecmogames からライセンスしたいので、襟川陽一に協力をお願いします。

Edit: since I originally wrote this twitter thread and blog post, contact has been made with KOEI’s licensing department. 🤞

Period reviews

Detailed review from the 1991-01 issue of #マイコンBASIC micomBASIC

Courtesy of a scan at Internet Archive.

Super Soft Hot Information: Band-kun #バンドくん in #micomBASIC1990/12

Courtesy of a scan at Internet Archive.

“SLG in which you form a band, gain experience through practice and live house performances, and aim to win a contest. After winning, the game turns into a highly flexible session software. MIDI compatible.”

Review of Band-kun #バンドくん in Technopolis #テクノポリス 1991/01

Courtesy of a scan at Internet Archive.

“We borrowed a studio and practiced hard with our friends to win the contest. Hone your skills!”

“In the city, you’ll try to win a fight against a band member. It’s hard to get them to play with you at first.”

Translation (WIP)

I’ve been poking around in the Band-kun game files.

Everything is stored uncompressed in very simple structures across a few files. I’ve not figured them all out, yet, but can see graphics (done), dialogue (partial), music (to-do). Band-kun ships with Scenario 1 “ZAP CITY 1991” and is able to play additional scenarios, but none were released.

Regardless: it should be easy to create a translated version of the included scenario. And maybe even create a new scenario (varying difficulty depending on changes).

User Manual

A scanned PDF for Band-kun #バンドくん is available with thanks to the Neo Kobe project archive.org/details/band-kun-manual

Promotional leaflet

Download the game

Get the disk image at Internet Arcchive for PC-9801 or FM-Towns

All the faces

Here are all 120 “famous” faces, extracted from PC-9801 Band-kun, thanks to @fukui_keeekn on Twitter.

Birthday blog post?

Check out my other #birthday blog posts.