Germs Nerawareta Machi

## ＧＥＲＭＳ〜狙われた街〜

The cover for the game showing various bodies melding at their heads at the center of the boxart.

### Genre

Survival Horror
Cosmic Horror
Adventure
First-Person
Open-World
Walking Simulator

### Mode

Single Player

> 今までになかった! こんなゲーム!? 地球侵略心理アドベンチャー
>
> Never before! A game like this!? An Earth Invasion Psychological Adventure
>
>

Germs the Targeted City (ジャーム ～狙われた街 ～, GERMS Nerawareta Machi) is a PlayStation game released in 1999 made by KAJ. It stands out as an early open-world horror game and the cover is unique with an amalgamation of 3d modeled bodies. Little is known about the production of the game and a low quantity of disks were made leading copies to be scarce.

## Release

Germs was only released in Japan on July 22nd 1999 and it is hard to find and expensive to get a physical copy. There are various fan attempts to translate the game for non-Japaneses speaking audiences.

## Game-play

Open-world game play allows for the player to explore a large portion of the world and ignore some plot lines and do quests in different orders.

The outside environments are devoid of color except for bright red arrows pointing to entrances with blue doorways. The grayscale environment may due to technical constraint or rendering technique, a stylistic choice, and or a way to reduce the noise of the complex environment for players new to an openworld.

If the player is killed by someone infected with the mutation, the player will not die and instead wakes up in a mutated form in the Yamasaki Coal Mine. The game presents the option to cure their mutation and continue with the story, or explore the world as a mutant.

## Plot

The game takes place in an unnamed city. Various elements suggest the game takes place in an English speaking country with area names similar to western landmarks, signage in English, and characters having names from many regions.

The game starts with the player having worked all night along with their assistant in the Newspaper Office. The player's character left the city with their family after graduating high school, only recently returning and is staying at the Hotel Seasons. Through email, phone calls, and dialog the player is guided to new quests, sometimes multiple new quests start so multiple sequences can occur and some are completely optional.

At the beginning of the game the computer has an email from the forestry guard talking about 6 witnesses seeing a suspicious light in the mountains north of the city. Another email is from your old classmate Hiroshi Fujita mentions strange happenings at the city's power plant and if you call he invites you to come to his house to talk about it. You can call Fujita on the office phone or get directions from the Map Shop.

The player can interview Wataru Fukada, one of the witnesses to the lights. Fukada refuses to be interviewed aggressively denying any knowledge of anything. The player can discover a strange substance in Fukada's house, and see a UFO to the west.

At Fujita's house, he explains how his device that measures the distortion of the space-time continuum is detecting levels outside of the norm in the city with the power plant at the center of the effect. Since the plant is close by he says you two should investigate it, bringing a pistol for defense. At the front gate you are told that the second floor is off limits by a worker and Fujita suggests going through the back entrance. Inside the plant guard dogs and workers will attack. One worker, Ienari Shibata, is visibly mutated and says to not get in the way. A key from Shibata allows for access to the lower level of the plant where another mutant confronts the player. If Fujita brings the explosive device from his garage he uses it on a machine he believes is swelling up all the energy.

...

A call comes to the office from a Department of Defense agent Kouda who says to meet up at the Grand Station. Meeting up with him he tells how he had to gain access to the city through a fishing boat.

...

The end of the story occurs upon defeating the Final Mutants in the coal mine. A ending narrative similar to the beginning of the game occurs and afterwards the player can explore the world after the 'incident' with many locations closed and Naomi Scully leaving the city to come back after tying up loose ends.

## Credits

*Please be aware the quality of the image containing the credits may cause misspellings.*

Development Staff

* 遠藤増春 Masaharu Endo
* 梶塚千春 Chiharu Kajizuka
* 松本泉 Izumi Matsumoto
* 斉藤美佐子 Misako Saito
* 原政人 Masato Hara,
* 海老原弘子 Hiroko Ebihara

Special Thanks

* 河村豊 Yutaka Kawamura
* 河村加也子 Kayako Kawamura
* 熊切寛 Hiroshi Kumakiri
* 柳田和宏 Kazuhiro Yanagida
* 芹澤正信 Masanobu Serizawa
* 島貫二郎 Shimakanji Jiro
* 美美 Mimi
* 梶塚多恵子 Taeko Kajizuka
* 梶塚隆光 Takamitsu Kajizuka

## Physical game

Along with the game cover, the physical game comes with a two sided back cover, and an additional spine for advertisement of gameplay. A post card and manual with a map on the back are also included. A sealed copy of the game includes a black sticker on the plastic.

The pictures of featured gameplay are all taken on the first day in the game and the additional spine spells 'Germs' in katakana.

The unfolded manual found insideMap on the backside of the manualThe back of the game case on the outside, giving information on the game and pictures of gameplayThe inside of the back cover, showing bodies behind where the disk sitsThe Spine card, which overlaps the back and front case imagesThe included postcard front sideThe included postcard back side
## Influences and References

* The name 狙われた街 is likely influenced by the Japanese title for the Sci-Fi novel *The Body Snatchers* (盗まれた街, stolen city) and shares the name of episode 8 of Ultraseven. Both feature seeds spreading an alien invasion.
* Naomi Scully has a similar backstory to Becky Driscoll in The Body Snatchers, being recently divorced and the ex girlfriend to the protagonist. Her last name is a reference to Dana Scully from X-files.
* Wilhelm is named after and talks about Wilhelm Reich who invented the original cloud buster, which is a weapon in the game.
* There are some similar themes to the 1989 film *Tetsuo: The Iron Man**,* directed by Shinya Tsukamoto, in how BASK ENLODA, a typical salaryman, turns into a machine and there is an abandoned warehouse. Similarly, the old man Wataru Fukada, is his mutated state, also obtains some mechanical, metallic parts. The *Tetsuo* film being black and white, having an unnamed protagonist, and having artistic sexual themes is similar to the game as a whole too.