The anime-watching youngsters of today might be obsessed with the likes of Jujutsu Kaisen, Solo Leveling, Naruto: Shippuden and Bleach, those of us who are old and grey will recall seeing an anime series on television that took us across the reaches of space in a story inspired by Greek legend.
A Japanese and French co-production, 1981's Ulysses 31 retold Homer's Odyssey through a sci-fi lens. Penned by Nina Wolmark and Jean Chalopin and co-directed by Chalopin and Tadao Nagahama (Star of the Giants, Robot Romance Trilogy), the series follows Ulysses and his crew as they guide the spaceship Odyssey to the Kingdom of Hades. It was broadcast in Japan, France, England and the US, as well as other regions, and remains a cult classic.
The nostalgic appeal of the series is such that Spanish studio Sequentia Soft is producing an unofficial game for the ZX Spectrum, fixing an injustice which has lingered for 40 years: Ulysses 31 never received a video game adaptation during the '80s.
Described by Sequentia Soft as "a homage to the happiest moment of our childhood," Odyssey 31 is a "freeware, non-profit game that perfectly complements the story of Ulysses, although it doesn't tell any of the episodes from the series. Instead, it has a new script inspired by another mythological chapter of the classic Greek Odyssey. It's a new adventure that will delight fans."
It takes the form of a choice-based text adventure, "with gameplay very similar to graphic adventures, although simpler; created for the ZX Spectrum."
As for why the team has chosen the Spectrum as its platform of choice, the reasons are simple:
"We don't want to fall into the indignity of using the series' graphics as is; we don't want to use the work of the original creators for the game. So, the Spectrum forces us to "redraw," convert, and then redraw, outline, readjust, and manually color all the areas. Although we're inspired by the series, we believe that artistically it's a new, handcrafted, charming, 8-bit fan art creation made with a lot of love.
The script, the plot (and the gameplay) are also a concept that starts from scratch, or at least, inspired by classical myths.
The ZX Spectrum was also the computer of that era that we hold most fond memories for. So, it's wonderful to be able to make this effort, creating the game we were never able to have for our beloved retro machine."
The developer expects the game to launch sometime this year. If you wish to support the project, donations can be made here.