Garage (video game)
A surreal journey through a biomechanical mind.
Garage (full title: GARAGE: Bad Dream Adventure; Japanese: ガラージュ) is a Japanese surrealist point and click adventure game developed by Kinotrope and published by Toshiba-EMI for Windows and Macintosh in 1999. It is notable for its nightmarish, Jungian setting and extremely limited original release, which made it a rare collector's item before later re-releases.
Quick Facts
- Publisher
- Toshiba-EMI; Sakuba Metal Works (Digital)
- Platforms
- Microsoft Windows
- Mac OS
- Android
- iOS
- Nintendo Switch
- Genre
- Adventure; Horror
Facts from the source article.
Plot and gameplay
The game is set inside the mind of a man named Yang, who enters a therapy machine called Garage. This machine creates a dystopian world similar to Kowloon Walled City, inhabited by biomechanical entities trapped on a web of tracks. The player controls a small bio-machine searching for its shadow, a mysterious entity reflecting another facet of itself, while solving puzzles, fishing for frogs, and managing supplies of Ego and Fuel. Graphics are pre-rendered and digitized.
Development
Tomomi Sakuba wrote and designed the game, also serving as art director. Masahiro Ikuta produced it, with Akihiko Kawa as co-producer and Akiya Hayashi as programmer. 3D graphics were created by Gengo Ito and Hiroki Watanabe, with music by Tomonori Tanaka. Sakuba's interest in game development began after playing Cosmic Osmo around 1990; learning it was made in HyperCard, he studied the software and created experimental projects before developing Garage. He designed the hero as a creature with an organic head on a machine body, applying this design to all characters. The official website launched in August 1995, where Sakuba kept a development diary.
Release
The first release was limited to 3,000 copies. Toshiba-EMI withdrew from CD-ROM publishing before further copies could be produced, making original copies extremely rare even in Japan. A used copy on Suruga-ya initially had an asking price of 300,000 yen. Members of 4chan's /vr/ board pooled funds to acquire and preserve a copy. The creator initially resisted republishing due to game balance concerns and lack of rights. A limited re-release, Garage Private Edition, sold out in mid-2007. On March 31, 2020, LoneDev released the GarageDoor patch, translating the game into English and enabling play on non-Japanese Windows 10 systems. An official remaster, Garage: Complete Version, launched on iOS and Android on December 10, 2021, with UI and balance improvements, new chapters, sidequests, and multiple endings. It was ported to Windows via Steam as Garage: Bad Dream Adventure on July 7, 2022, and to Nintendo Switch on June 6, 2024.
More in Point-and-Click Adventure Games of the 1990s
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