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If you have never played The Typing of the Dead, then newsflash: you should. Who would've thought that taking the zombie-splattering action (and beautiful B-Movie voice acting) of The House of the Dead 2 and turning it into a typing game would've been such a great idea? Sega, that's who. For an uncoordinated person like me, who spends his time typing about pointless gubbins on the internet, the keyboard is my weapon of choice for zombie slaying.
I'm sure most who are at least aware of The Typing of the Dead know that it originally started life in '99 in Japanese arcades, before being ported to Dreamcast and PC in 2000, with English versions both releasing in America (but strangely not Europe) a year after that in 2001.
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| Credit: Thierry Régagnon on Flickr |
The Typing of the Dead: Zombie Da! Typing Lariat (Windows and Mac, 2007)
While there were two other enhanced Typing of the Dead ports released in Japan prior to this one (titled The Typing of the Dead 2003 and The Typing of the Dead 2004), that both added extra modes, this one is a lot more intriguing because of its Mac port, which was released to be compatible with Mac OS X Tiger (10.4). According to Macintosh Garden, this was 'one of the very few titles that Sega released specifically for Macs in Japan'.
The absolute bestest thing ever about this port, though, is instead of the HOTD2 characters carrying keyboards with Dreamcasts hooked up to batteries on their backs, they carry Compact Macs. The fact the developers went to the effort to add in such a detail is great; what a beautiful sight to behold. Unless the mere existence of Macs give you an aneurism. If so, we'd hate to tell you how we produce the majority of the Junkyard's content...
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| Credit: Macintosh Garden |
The Typing of the Dead: Zombie Panic (PlayStation 2, 2004)
From one disliked system to another (depending on who you ask), we now move onto The Typing of The Dead's 2004 Japan-exclusive PlayStation 2 port, which came bundled with a USB keyboard, and despite adding the subtitle "Zombie Panic", is mostly the same as the original. Although, according to the ever-helpful Sega Retro, this port incorporates mini-games into the main story.
This version trades the Dreamcasts for silver fat PlayStation 2 consoles, which results in James and the gang looking like a bunch of Dreamcast deserters who got suckered in by the whole "Emotion Engine" thing. Hope you enjoy watching all those cutscenes in The Bouncer when you're not slaying zombies, you traitors. Bah!
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| Credit: NintendoComplete |
English of the Dead (Nintendo DS, 2008)
Representing something of a missed opportunity, this 2008 Japanese Nintendo DS title was not titled "The Writing of the Dead," because what you have here is a game that aimed to teach Japanese players English words by having them handwrite them with the DS stylus. Occasionally, the game also asks players to complete sentences by selecting words multiple choice-style. Because of its premise, the game is very accessible to English players; although I bet after playing for a while your wrist would get tired (get your mind out of the gutter).
What blew my mind the most about this game, though, is that it recreates the levels of The House of The Dead 2 with some pretty decent 3D graphics for the DS. I recommend checking out this playthrough by NintendoComplete to see this title in action.
Oh, and the characters all carry Sega Mega Drives/Genesis on their backs. I'm not kidding.
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| Credit: NintendoComplete |
The Typing of the Dead 2 (Arcade, 2007/Windows, 2008)
That's right, you read that correctly; exclusively in Japan, The Typing of the Dead received a numbered sequel in arcades and on PC, and it was based on The House of the Dead III! I genuinely had no idea this existed! Looking at gameplay footage of the PC version, it doesn't look like its inaccessible to English speakers (or typers, rather), as you still type English characters, but for the romanisations of Japanese words.
While we sadly never received the original House of the Dead 3 on Dreamcast, the spirit of the console lives on in this Typing of the Dead sequel, because while the characters now wield keyboard-shaped shotguns instead of regular keyboards hanging from their shoulders, they still carry Dreamcasts on their backs, just as they did in the original!
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| Credit: NintendoComplete |
How many of these Typing of The Dead games were you aware of? Are you going to give any of them a try? Let us know in the comments below!
Credit and thanks to: Mr^Burns who posted the SegaXtreme post that initially brought The Typing of the Dead: Zombie Da! Typing Lariat to my attention, Macintosh Garden, Sega Retro, The Wiki of the Dead and NintendoComplete.
