Tail Concerto

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   Game infobox, development history (TC2 info has its own article), legacy

Tail Concerto, the first title to the Little Tail Bronx series, is an action-adventure platform video game developed by CyberConnect2 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. The player controls Waffle Ryebread in his police robo, which has its own set of moves.

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

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. The bubble is primarily used for stunning kittens, but is also the only way to damage vehicles and bosses without throwing back their projectiles with the aforementioned grab ability. 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

The player must use these abilities in order to capture all the kittens in a level, which will then yield that stage's crystal and allow for the boss to be fought. After every level, the player returns to Waffle's hometown of Porto in order to progress to the next objective.

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 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

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 and later fan-translated. 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

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  Monthly Shōnen Ace June 1998 cover, featuring Waffle & Alicia (left)

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  Colored advert, exact source unknown

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  Index entry inside June 1998 issue

External Links

Official Website (Japanese)