You’ve asked for it. Rising Stuff now has an entire Wiki Page dedicated to the Playdia.
http://www.risingstuff.com/wiki/index.php/Playdia

That’s right folks your prayers have been answered. For on this day (or rather last week) the mighty Topher Marohl has brought forth a second Playdia review! All it took was 7 months of begging and harassment. In this epic video Topher critiques a Sailor Moon as well as a Dragonball Z game in a way only Topher can. Drunk.

Our resident Playdia expert Topher Marohl has his own show! I know. This is fantastic news. So how does this show relate to Japanese import games? Well, you will just have to watch to see.

A lesser known accessory of the Bandai Playdia was this special band that came with one of the Ultraman games. I thought you might enjoy this well-made commercial that certainly contributed to the incredible success that was the Playdia… “Ano…” is right.

Topher, our beloved head of Playdia here at Rising Stuff, has given us his first review of the Playdia! I’m sure you’ll all enjoy it.

Language learning is one of the reasons that many people get into Import gaming (the other reason is that import games are awesome). Of course any game that is in Japanese has some use for learning the language. However many Playdia games can be more useful than most.

Since many (though not all) games were geared towards younger gamers, a lot of them contain far more simplified Japanese. On most titles you won’t find complex kanji but rather the simplified character sets of Katakana and Hiragana. Also the speech is often less complex to appeal to the younger gamers and their more limited vocabulary.

In fact there are even a few games to teach you Hiragana!

Read the rest of this entry »

We are so glad you that you chose to visit us today. 20 years ago today, Sega released the Mega Drive in Japan and today we have something new to show you as well. What started as an idea four years ago to help people acquire import video game will today expand into a community of gamers united in a common interest. It will also stand as a resource for Japanese gaming information and discussion.

Rising Stuff is dedicated to Japanese retro gaming. We will cover classic games and the consoles they play on. Many of these have never made it out of the land of the rising sun. We will try to cover obscure system like the PC-FX, Wonderswan and Playdia as well as the better-known systems like the Mega Drive, Neo-Geo, Saturn, PC-Engine and Famicom Disk System. For some of these systems our news and reviews might be the first ever written in English. And if you are an expert on any of these systems or games yourself, we are always looking for new contributors.

And don’t worry, the Rising Stuff Store is still here providing you with the games you are looking for at the prices you want, with the service you deserve.

So please join us in our forums and chat room. Our mods and admins are here to help you feel welcome and answer any questions you might have. If you enjoy playing Japanese games you have come to the right place. Welcome home.

There is not much media available about the Bandai Playdia but I was able to find this Japanese commercial from 1994 starring Yumi Adachi. She is a fairly famous Japanese actress and singer. She is also famous in Playdia history for appearing in the game Ie Naki Ko Suzu no Sentaku. Personally I think this ad is very cute when she and Goku are saying the “Kamehameha” together.