Tail Concerto

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Tail Concerto (テイルコンチェルト, Teiru Koncheruto), the first title to the Little Tail Bronx series, is an action-adventure platform video game developed by CyberConnect (CyberConnect 2 as of 16th of September 2001) for the PlayStation.

The story follows Porto policeman Waffle Ryebread as he attempts to arrest the Black Cats Gang during vacation time, which leads to a much higher-stakes adventure than expected. Despite being relatively simple, comparable to most Saturday morning cartoons and anime, Tail Concerto would serve as an integral part to the creation of Little Tail Bronx as a series with its anthropomorphic characters, mecha and world building.

The game was published by Bandai in Japan in April 1998, France the following December, and North America in November 1999 by Atlus. The latter publisher was notorious for printing lesser-known titles in low numbers, causing the second-hand market demand of the game to be one of the highest amongst PlayStation titles. As of 2024, North American copies of the game run at an average of $400 USD.

Gameplay

The gameplay of Tail Concerto is simple, befitting of its status as the first game in the series. It's an action platformer where the player controls Waffle Ryebread in his Police Robo to explore various levels represented as islands of the Kingdom of Prairie and complete certain objectives. Most of the time the game does not restrict player's movement and allows them to explore Prairie freely at their own pace.

Progression

Most of the time the player's mission is to catch all kittens from the Black Cats Gang scattered throughout the level, but sometimes it is required to find a certain item, reach a destination or defeat a boss to progress the story.

Most of the kittens present active threat to Waffle by piloting various mechas or throwing bombs dealing damage to Police Robo. However, some of them appear not hostile- walking abound, sleeping, playing or hiding. Either way, all of them must be caught and sent to the police headquarters using Robo's built-in teleporter located on it's back. Besides kittens, there are other hazards like spikes, streams of hot steam or bottomless pits.

After finishing main objective at each island, it will be possible to visit them again through the world map to complete side quests or find missing items. Some levels, however, become unavailable after finishing them.

At some points player can talk to Panta to report to the police HQ through his radio and save the game's progress.

Items

Police While exploring the environment, player can find different items restoring Robo's health or opening extra content:

• Bones - restore 30% HP
• Canned food - restore 50% HP
• Medkits - restore 100% HP
• Whistles - substitute to extra lives. Used to continue the game from control points after losing all health.
• Pieces of photograph - optional collectable items represented as red boxes with white stars. Each of them is an 1/4 of complete pictures which can be viewed at Waffle's home in Porto. Some pieces can be obtained by completing side quests for Prairie citizens.

Controls and abilities

Waffle's Robo has its own set of actions to move around, fight or catch kittens:

• Jump - by pressing the cross button, Police Robo can jump or grab and climb ledges. Mashing the button midair will make Robo flap it's arms to prolong the jump.
• Jet engine - when on Airleaf islands, Police Robo will receive an upgrade allowing Waffle to fly across long distances by holding down the cross button. While flying, jet engine consumes energy. Energy restores automatically while standing on ground.
• Grab - By pressing the circle button, Waffle will grab an object in front of him. This is not only used to capture kittens, but also to pick up items, collect them and throw them. Holding down the button will make Robo's arms spin and attack everything in front of it. While holding the object, same action will show the trajectory of the throw.

• Bubble - By pressing the square button, the Police Robo will fire a bubble from a circular device at the front of the mech. This can be held down in order to properly aim a shot. Bubbles are used for stunning kittens, but are also the primary way to damage vehicles and bosses without throwing back their projectiles or slapping them with the mecha's hands. This is upgraded at the very end of the game to deal more damage in the form of a green blast.

• Dive - By quickly tapping either left, right or down on the D-Pad and hitting the cross button, Waffle will dive in that direction. While not useful at first, it becomes invaluable during latter bosses, due to their attacks being more challenging to avoid.

Music

The main theme for the Japanese version titled "For Little Tail" (テイルコンチェルトOP「For little tail」) was performed by Kokia, which would be recorded just a year before her musical debut in 1998. The song was referred as an "illusion song" by Kokia as it would never see an official album release until the release of her 2010 album "Road to Glory ~Long Journey~". The same album would also feature an alternate and extended version of the song titled "For little tail ～once～".

LieN would go on to cover "For Little Tail" in their "Azur" album. A live version was also performed. The group then created an entirely new song for the game in the Tail Concerto Perfect Soundtrack titled "TAIL CONCERTO -Floating Island Story-". The latter track, among a few others from the game, would later be reused for Fuga: Melodies of Steel 2 in the form of paid DLC.

The English version of Tail Concerto would instead feature an instrumental opening song composed by CC2. The French release of the game, however, would retain Kokia's song.

Manga

Main article: Tail Concerto (manga)

A short one-shot manga for Tail Concerto was published by Bandai and featured in Monthly Shōnen Ace's June 1998 issue. Images of adverts first surfaced online, with the manga itself then being fully scanned. It was illustrated by mangaka Raka Masaki and tells the story of how Waffle and Alicia met 10 years before the events of the game.

Manga Gallery

• Monthly Shōnen Ace June 1998 cover, featuring Waffle & Alicia (left)
  Monthly Shōnen Ace June 1998 cover, featuring Waffle & Alicia (left)
• Colored advert, exact source unknown
  Colored advert, exact source unknown
• Index entry inside June 1998 issue
  Index entry inside June 1998 issue