{"id":849,"date":"2026-03-23T09:35:20","date_gmt":"2026-03-23T09:35:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.tesp.co.uk\/OHam\/WP\/?p=849"},"modified":"2026-03-23T09:35:24","modified_gmt":"2026-03-23T09:35:24","slug":"fatal-frame-ii-the-card-game","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.tesp.co.uk\/OHam\/WP\/2026\/03\/23\/fatal-frame-ii-the-card-game\/","title":{"rendered":"Fatal Frame II: The Card Game ?"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Zero Series logo<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Now, there are a few video games I’m really into, and there are some video games series I’m really into. There are some I’m a fan of but only a few I’m a REALLY big fan of. Fatal Frame is one of these I’m REALLY into.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now, I’ll give some background.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fatal Frame <\/strong>is the US English name of the ‘Zero<\/strong>‘ video game series which has a iffy relationship with translations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The first game came out for the PS2 in 2001, with a Western release in 2002. It was a one-off game BUT (despite a couple of minor issues) they followed it up well. Set in 1986, Mafuyu Hinsaki<\/strong> goes into the allegedly haunted Himuro Mansion<\/strong> in search of folklorist Junsei Takamine<\/strong> who he was started to work with, and went to the Mansion for research into his new book, but went missing, along with his Editor and assistant. we kinda don’t get as much information on his relationship to Takamine but he was basically started to work for him but still in a low level. Mafuyu takes with him his family Camera, which has been passed down in the family. He then goes missing. His younger sister Miku<\/strong> fears for her brother and goes in search of him, finding the camera and having to solve the mystery of what happened, and her own family has a connection to it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One of the key features of the game is when ghosts appear, how do you fight them? use your camera! basically, you take photos of them. It might sound a bit silly but it works really well.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Miku in her Original design (long story) in the rope hallway<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

The game’s name.. sigh.. Original name was ‘Zero<\/strong>‘ and has a kinda connection to a type of photo you can take. Basically when a ghost is getting closer and closer you will get a point when the ‘capture circle’ (basically the bit which shows what’s in frame) turns orange\/red. Take that photo and it’s a special ‘zero shot’ which is more powerful and in some cases, the only shot that does any damage to the ghost. When it got released in the Europe (and Australia) they got confused.. this is because with alot of Japanese stuff, the production team put together for a product is often named after the product and a common way is to have the word ‘Project’ in front. the team which created ‘Zero’ was ‘Project Zero’.. sadly, the mistake meant the pal release was called ‘Project Zero<\/strong>‘ which.. doesn’t make any sense. In the USA release, they called it ‘Fatal Frame<\/strong>‘ which plays up the Camera side and I really like that title.. thought it doesn’t quite make sense. In the 2nd game, they did add another special camera shot called a ‘Fatal Frame’ so that’s pretty nice.. They did release a Japanese exclusive novel based on the first game, with some weird tweaks, but it’s fair enough. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

There was one HUGE screw up the USA release of the game had though. They called it ‘Fatal Frame: Based on a true story’. This was marketing BS. The mansion was inspired by a real life mansion, and all the games are inspired by various bits of Japanese folklore, but they are in no way based on a true story. The USA division came up with this as a really poor bit of marketing which technically, was a lawsuit in the waiting.. but I don’t think one ever happened. It would be a hard win.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The game was followed up with Fatal Frame (Zero) II Crimson Butterfly<\/strong>. This was also for the PS2 and came out in 2003\/2004. It was a very good game which has a number of ‘subtle’ hints back to the first game (doesn’t really spoil much but.. In the first game, you find out your great-grandmother Yae Hinsaki<\/strong>, lived in the mansion with her husband, folklorist Ryozo Munakata<\/strong>. In the second game, as you explore the village of Minakami<\/strong> (translated as All Gods<\/strong> which is fair enough) you find out about the twin shrine maidens who are highly related to what happened to make this is a ghost village. The shrine Maidens were twins Sae<\/strong> and Yae Kurosawa<\/strong>. On the night everything went wrong, They were being taken out of the village by Folklorist in training, Ryozo Munakata. Yae ends up marrying Ryozo moving to the house in the first game. The third game builds this even more ^_^;<\/p>\n\n\n

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Sae Kurasawa as the Bloody Kimono<\/em> after the failed sacrifice<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Anyway, in the second game, it is 1988 where twins Mio<\/strong> and Mayu Amakura<\/strong> are visiting a childhood play spot in a forest before it get destroyed for a new lake, when they come across a legendary ‘lost village’ and end up getting trapped in it and separated as they kinda have to reveal the mystery of what cursed the village, where they find a camera, not the same as the first game of course, but one which sets up that a few cameras were made by a Dr Asou<\/strong>. This works the same as the camera in the first game but with some different features as each one was a prototype. The Japanese name was ‘Shaeiki<\/strong>‘, meaning “shadow-shooting machine” or something like that, which could reveal the hidden shadow world of the ghosts. For English, they called it the ‘Camera Obscura<\/strong>‘. of course, that was a name of a very old camera type but as it’s a ‘darkened chamber’ camera, it kinda works. It reveals the hidden.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I could go on. The third game was good but started something that I personally dislike which makes it not quite as good as the first two (but still great), the fourth was never translated outside of Japan but did get a fan translation patch (it was also the first originally released on a different console. the first 3 were PS2, (with gamecube\/xbox ports), this was Wii. The fifth was a Wii U exclusive so it didn’t do too well, but was later ported to the PC but.. only steam… I won’t touch steam (if it’s still running in a few years, what with all them big lawsuits), even for the Fatal Frame series. They did a couple of Spin-off games, Japanese Mobile exclusive, a 3DS exclusive which makes use of the consoles camera with ‘augmented reality’ so the handhold become a camera which you need to move around the room to find the ghosts etc. Fun but the consoles camera is also a minor draw back (iffy light).. I brought a second hand 3DS for this game ^_^. there was also 2 novels, the one based on the first game, and one original one (which I have a fan translation of with ALOT of corrections by me) and a Japanese exclusive comic series. There was also a TV movie based on the second novel.. it’s good, not quite as good as the novel and it’s ties to the series are a bit.. less then they should be, but… I brought a second hand Bluray player for that film then they FINALLY did a official subtitle release!.. yep.. Did I say big fan?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

All this and I haven’t gotten to the point yet ^_^<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Back in 2005, a guy named ‘Joe Fourhman<\/strong>‘ running a small website made a few fans made card games. He made one based on Fatal Frame II, while claiming he might do one based on the first and third games later on. He never did. I want to talk about this game cause it’s pretty good. You need to print the stuff yourself of course, and the cards don’t come with backs so my copy, I made a nice box, came up with some basic card backs, put the rules into a printable nice looking format and stuff. I need to come up with some figures and I did start on them for the player pieces but.. never finished.. yet.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Kiryu House Exterior Location. Note it shows 3 possible Interior locations connected.<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Basically, it’s a card game where two to four players (okay, you CAN solo this game where instead of being the first to win, you just kinda have to win. There isn’t really a death case so you can’t game-over.. so it’s a bit less of a solo possible but still, you can do this). You each have a camera, move around a board created from laying out the location cards in a 3×3 grid. You have the exterior map, and interior. The Exterior map cards are randomly dealt face down into the grid. these feature key locations from the game (All God’s Cemetery, Kiryu Hourse, Kureha Shrine,, Kurosawa House, Misono Hill, Osaka House, Outside the Storehouse, Tachibana House & Whisper Bridge<\/strong>). Some of these locations also have interior locations. If it has interior, you can choose to enter the building and you randomly draw the interior location card(s) to show the path you take. These cards are also based on game locations but don’t 100% line up with the game cause of the random-side. once you exit the building, you discard the interior cards and the next time someone enters it, they draw a new set. Different locations will have different effects too. The Kureha Shrine can only be entered once you have a set number of points, as this leads to the final boss fight.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now, basic game play is each turn, you draw a card from the Main deck. If the location you are on has a Ghost (I’ll come to that) you can fight them. After that, you can move up to 1 space to another location. You can then play a card from your hand, and discard down to 5 cards as you can only have 5 cards in your hand at the end of a turn.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now, main playdeck cards you can pick up can be Items (again, taken from the game) which can help you out or give you points in your album, they could be Action cards which let you do a special action like take a card back from the discard pile, they can be Upgrades like more powerful film for you camera or ways to power it up or give new functions, or they can be Ghosts. The Ghosts are all taken from the game and feature 3 main times. But even these types can be cut up. the first typing is Hostile, Non-hostile and Boss. Hostile ghosts are much harder to defeat then Non-hostile. That’s kinda it for that. Boss are 4 special ones, based on major bosses in the game (Ryokan Kurasawa<\/strong> – the Ceremony Master, Seijiro Makabe<\/strong> – the Failed Kusabi, Yoshitastsu Kiryu<\/strong> – the Doll Maker and Sae Kurosawa<\/strong> – the Crimson Sacrifice) and can only be fought at the end. Now, ghosts also have a few other features of note. They can be Interior, Exterior or both. That is quite simple. Exterior ghosts can only appear in exterior locations, Interior ones in Interior, and both can be both. see? Simple.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Sae as the Bloody Kimono Ghost card<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

There are then Bound ghosts and Chase Ghosts. Bound ghosts stay in the location they appear, where Chase ghosts will move around the board.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fighting the ghosts is pretty simple.. kinda. Each ghost has a ghost power. You have an attack strength. Without any upgrades, this is just 1D6. You roll the D6 and try to get higher then the ghost power level. Someone like the Surveyor Masumi Makimura <\/strong>has a power of 4. So you need to roll and get 5 or 6. So you really want to get upgrades which can do things like add a number of your roll, or even increase the number of dice you roll. The highest film (61-film) lets you roll 3 dice, so you pretty much are gonna be able to catch that ghost. There are also some other effects to help with stuff. Once the ghost has been defeated, you get to put it into your album and you get a score. The Surveyor would give you an album value of 2. the less players in the game, the higher the album value you need to go after the boss (9 points for a 2 player game, 7 for a 3 and 6 for a 4).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Boss fights are slightly different as you have to defeat the boss 3 times (they are powerful) to boss them. They can also fight back. This doesn’t defeat the player but can push weaken the player or push them back so they need to spend time before they can fight them again, giving more time for the other players to catch up.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Various ghosts also have some special features. Sticking with poor Masumi, If you roll a 1 when you are battling him, you have to discard your entire hand. IF you are fighting his girlfriend, Miyako Sudo<\/strong> – the Wanderer) you have to discard one ghost from your album if you roll an even number. Some effects only do something if you lose, like the Broken neck<\/strong> who if you fail to catch her, you lose 1 of your upgrades, or you have the non-hostiles which will give you a benefit if you have them in your album, like Yae Kurosawa<\/strong> – the remaining twin, who will add 1 to all your attack rolls.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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I’ll admit, I’ve only played this a couple of times so far, and I might need to figure out a nice ‘solo’ rule more then just ‘how long does it take to complete it’ or ‘beat your score’ But I find it pretty enjoyable. It’s a free game, if you don’t factor the fact that you need to print the cards, maybe put them in sleeves, score some dice, some life point tokens for the bosses, and some tokens (or pieces) for the players, but that’s kinda expected. I think maybe some of the rules could have been written a bit better but hell, I’ve seen published ‘for sale’ games with worse rules and it’s pretty fun, especially if you have played the game so you can bore the other players explaining who Chitose Tachibana <\/strong>was, or why the Akane Kiryu<\/strong> is said to have killed her sister, and just what’s so important about the Crimson butterflies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I would also say, some of the images really need a better contrast… Some are kinda like that in the game with some fog and stuff but others just don’t work too well for printed cards. Being 2005, might explain why some of the images are more old camera shots so they aren’t the best of quality. Also the font used can be a little hard to read when printed on a standard printer, these things need to be thought about.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While out of date, his website is still mostly up and running and this game can be downloaded from his at:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

https:\/\/www.fourhman.com\/fatalframe<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I can’t really say too much about the guy as a person and haven’t followed him or his site, but he does do a few other old fan card games which I might check out some time, the main ones of note for me would be the Red Dwarf Card game but he also does one based on Talespin and MST3k which was some.. tin-pot tv show based on them old 70s shows where random people give commentary on some old stuff. I did see bit of one some time back and it was a case of.. I’ve seen this done far better before you, so why are people raging about you and claiming you invented something which they parody? … weird.. How good these other games are, no clue. It looks like he also did one ‘inspired by’ the DC Super friends cartoon.. fair enough.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In a way, it really is a shame he never did ones based on the first and third games. It wouldn’t be too hard to just do a simple reskin really, but I think it needs something a little extra.. You want each to be the same game but not just a palette swap.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The game series itself pretty much died after the 5th game, and are now stuck in ‘remakes and remasters’.. sigh.. no problem with upgraded graphics versions for modern systems but… they often do annoying things like changing designs and game play to be ‘more modern’ which really… no.. classic games are classic for a reason.. I would prefer you to do more then just rehashing the old ones. though saying that, I will say the original US (and I think the european) release of Fatal Frame did tweak Miku’s design a bit.. I didn’t like some of these, like removing the ribbon but some were okay. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

oh and.. don’t go into the so-called ‘controversy’ with that 5th game.. I think some of it is down to mistranslation and understanding but I can’t say the game series makers didn’t make screw ups.. The first game had a reason why the Camera worked which was tied to that first game. Doesn’t quite make sense when you find out more in the second, and there are HUGE debates on some of the ghosts in the third.. (spoiler, Miku’s brother doesn’t appear in the third game. It is something giving the impression of him, though this is.. not as clear as it should be, it is stated in the game)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Now, there are a few video games I’m really into, and there are some video games series I’m really into. There are some I’m a fan of but only a few I’m a REALLY...<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[44],"tags":[206,204,208,207,205],"class_list":["post-849","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-outofthebox","tag-card-game","tag-fatal-frame","tag-free","tag-tcg","tag-zero"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tesp.co.uk\/OHam\/WP\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/849","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tesp.co.uk\/OHam\/WP\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tesp.co.uk\/OHam\/WP\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tesp.co.uk\/OHam\/WP\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tesp.co.uk\/OHam\/WP\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=849"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.tesp.co.uk\/OHam\/WP\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/849\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":874,"href":"https:\/\/www.tesp.co.uk\/OHam\/WP\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/849\/revisions\/874"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tesp.co.uk\/OHam\/WP\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=849"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tesp.co.uk\/OHam\/WP\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=849"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tesp.co.uk\/OHam\/WP\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=849"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}