TIL about Napple Tale: Arsia in Daydream

Napple Tale was a game on the Dreamcast, now pretty much only playable via emulator.

It has a cutesy, robo-candy aesthetic, filled with bright, cheery colors, and dancy animation.

It is also a game for which the primary theme is ‘coming to terms with the fact that time takes everything from us: family, friends, joyful times, and eventually even life itself.’

It is also soundtracked by Yoko Kanno (the woman behind the soundtracks for Cowboy Bebop, Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex, and Wolf’s Rain) and is voiced by Maaya Sakamoto. (If you are an old anime fan, you’ve pretty much definitely heard her voice, even if you don’t know the name. She’s the original and later Motoko Kusanagi.)

It’s like it was written by Mary Shelley and then handed off to someone who had only worked on megaman and barbie games to do the visuals. Wild stuff.