Currently, Red Fortress has not been officially released, so it still uses its development codename, "Jackal."
As soon as Satoshi Tajiri got his hands on it, he keenly felt that Jackal upheld Atlas's usual characteristics: the controls felt great, with no sluggishness, and the little jeep was quite agile as it drove around.
There are two attack modes: machine gun and rocket launcher. The machine gun has powerful firepower, while the rocket launcher provides area-of-effect damage.
The machine gun has a fast fire rate but can only shoot in a straight line, while the rocket launcher can blast a large area in front of it, but its fire rate is very slow.
Both weapons can be used freely without any restrictions.
Although there was no accompanying game manual, Tetsu Kobayashi had given a brief introduction to the basic gameplay. Satoshi Tajiri drove the jeep into a walled compound, and one look told him this must be the place mentioned in the game instructions where people needed to be rescued.
"Blow open the door and you can rescue the people inside."
Satoshi Tajiri fired a rocket, blew open the door, and the little figures lined up one by one and ran toward the jeep.
Although it was only a few minutes of gameplay, Tajiri Satoshi already had a rough assessment in his mind.
The controls felt as smooth as ever, though he couldn't judge the monster AI yet, as he hadn't encountered a boss fight.
Tajiri Satoshi was quite satisfied with the art and music; it could be said that they maintained the developer's consistent standards.
After rescuing the first group of hostages, Tajiri Satoshi began to explore other directions.
Wall-clinging, shooting while hugging the wall, or point-blank firing.
This closed beta wasn't just for them to play the game; besides playing, they also had the task of finding bugs, a point Tajiri Satoshi kept in mind.
"Second rescue wall — wall-clinging causes clipping into the scenery —"
Tajiri Satoshi looked down and carefully recorded it.
However, this could only be considered a minor bug, not a malicious one.
He explored all the way, restarting a few times, and basically found that it was possible to clip into the scenery by hugging the walls near certain props. It was the kind of bug most players wouldn't trigger, as a normal person wouldn't keep rubbing against a wall when they knew they couldn't get through.
In the midst of his testing, Tajiri Satoshi suddenly noticed something.
When a rocket is fired, there is a brief flash on the screen, and the rocket firing action has a noticeable post-cast animation.
That is to say, from the moment the rocket is fired until it explodes, the player is unable to move.
However, during this period, attacking still works, so the machine gun can be fired.
"The flash can't dodge bullets, but it can reset the movement state, and reversing resets the firing state..."
Tajiri Satoshi stared intensely at the screen, some dormant instinct from years ago seemingly awakening.
The "Jack" of Red Fortress—rocket cancel!
By using the states of reversing and rocket firing to reset each other, he finally achieved an almost seamless, rapid-fire rocket launch.
Tajiri Satoshi specifically drove up to the boss to test it out. The formidable-looking tank was completely suppressed by the rockets and unable to fight back; facing the jeep, it was powerless to win!
Tajiri Satoshi pulled out pen and paper and solemnly took notes.
This game has a bug!
Throughout the day, the testers thoroughly experienced the game and also discovered some insignificant bugs, such as places where one could get stuck in the scenery, or the ability to repeatedly pick up the same two hostages to get double points.
However, although some players did discover the existence of the stealth section, apart from the monsters patrolling according to fixed logic, it didn't differ much from the large battlefield outside. On the first day, no one actually discovered the correct way to play the stealth level.
Even so.
Kobayashi Tetsu was truly shocked when he read the feedback reports from these people.
"No way, how is there a rocket launcher cancel! It scared Iwata Satoru so much he cried!"
Kobayashi Tetsu looked down at Tajiri Satoshi's report, his expression exceptionally grave.
Encountering a jeep, resetting the rocket launcher makes it as strong as a monster, scaring a trillion hostages, and enemy tanks can't win no matter how hard they try!
After pondering for a moment, Kobayashi Tetsu picked up a pen and quickly wrote down a note, outlining the parts that needed to be fixed.
"These are all parts of the game that must be modified; I have already written the specific reasons above. Ohba-kun, take this to Iwata Satoru as soon as possible and have him make the changes accordingly."
Noriyoshi Ohba acknowledged, then ran out, hopped on his bicycle, and pedaled away furiously.
Not long after leaving, he opened the note and examined it carefully. Sure enough, it was written in great detail, including Kobayashi Tetsu's brief analysis of these corresponding bugs.
Noriyoshi Ohba reported it to Hayao Nakayama exactly as it was.
After seeing Noriyoshi Ohba off, Tetsu Kobayashi casually dialed the office number.
"There are some benign bugs in Red Fortress. I'll speak, you take notes. Regarding the current issues in the game, except for the screen-transition bug used for skipping levels, do not change any other content."
"Try to eliminate the wall-clipping issues as much as possible, but don't change the rocket launcher reset or the double-hostage bug. Keep these and turn them into features."
On the other end, Satoru Iwata immediately agreed.
Tetsu Kobayashi hung up and shrugged.
In reality, he had just given Noriyoshi Ohba something to do. He could have just called Satoru Iwata directly at the office without needing a face-to-face meeting.
What was on the note was purely something Tetsu Kobayashi had scribbled down casually; in reality, he had no intention of doing those things at all.
Benign bugs do not affect the normal game flow, and they can even enhance the experience. For instance, the double points resulting from the double-hostage bug can be used for score-chasing gameplay. Even without a system to exchange points for rewards, players' pursuit of high scores is endless.
Therefore, whether it was the double hostages or the rocket launcher reset, Kobayashi Tetsu chose to keep them.
For players who couldn't trigger these, it wouldn't affect their playthrough, while for those who could, it would be an unexpected surprise.
Only the bug where players could get stuck in the walls needed to be fixed to prevent them from getting soft-locked during gameplay.
Once everything was recorded and the various players had been sent off, Noriyoshi Ohba returned in the evening, drenched in sweat.
"President, I've already handed it over to Manager Iwata."
"Well done," Kobayashi Tetsu said, praising him offhandedly before suddenly changing the subject: "You haven't eaten yet, have you?"
"Uh." Noriyoshi Ohba scratched his head.
He really hadn't eaten yet.
"Let's go."
Kobayashi Tetsu threw an arm around his shoulder, acting very familiar: "There's a restaurant I really like, come with me, let's have a proper dinner first!"
Noriyoshi Ohba lowered his head, looking at the arm so close to him, feeling somewhat annoyed.
This was too much! He didn't like having someone with their arm around his neck; it was a terrible feeling!
He didn't feel any sense of intimacy from the gesture at all. On the contrary, Noriyoshi Ohba actually hated being put in a headlock like this; it felt as if his shoulder didn't even belong to him anymore.
However, facing Kobayashi Tetsu, he still had to put on an expression of flattered surprise, all the while grumbling incessantly in his heart.
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