Sukeban Shachou Rena Pro Tips

[Princess Rescuer]

Sukeban Shachou Rena is an endearing Wii minigame collection where you play with cats in an office. You do various activities such as walking on a tightrope, driving a car, and playing a piano. The game is, however, notoriously wonky as it was banged out in 6 months. It is one of the smallest games on the system, and one of the least popular (at least initially) yet can provide hours of challenge and entertainment, certainly better than most Wii minigame collections. The Wii motion controls are used in a variety of interesting ways, and the Nunchuk even gets some worthy action as well.

This guide will go over how to unlock all 16 cat costumes. These are purely a bragging rights reward, as they can only be placed on one cat only during story mode cutscenes, and by the time you obtain the last one, you will be done with story mode. Still, having a full board with no missing spots sure is nice.

Getting all 16 cat costumes, and 100%ing the game is, in 2020, my most impressive gaming achievement- and that's really saying something considering the impressive things I've mentioned in the first Umihara Kawase game.

Let's get the most notorious one out of the way: the Quizzes. Even for players who understand Japanese, the quizzes are indecipherable. There is, however, an easy strategy that any simpleton can do to win them with enough patience: simply point your Wii Remote at one answer and select it over and over. The game isn't clever enough to prevent this, and will eventually give up the goods and present you with a row of correct answers. This strategy works even for the later quizzes with the strictest requirements.

Now onto the Piano. Getting good at the Piano requires you to shake your Wii Remote and Nunchuk at the correct times to perfectly match the notes in the song. Strangely, Wii Remote notes are regular music notes with varying heights while Nunchuk notes are all on the same elevation and represented by Nunchuks. Only a full shake of either of them will register as a hit. Piano songs are a rhythm game. They are the same each time, so memorization and repetition works wonders. There are a few things you can do while learning a piano song. First, you can focus on the left side of the screen. The line goes from left to right, then teleports back to the left while new notes appear behind the ones you just cleared. It's not like Guitar Hero where the notes keep scrolling. Second, finish songs while practicing. Don't start over if you aren't being forced out of the song. You need practice with all of the parts, especially the end. Third, developing tempo and timing is enough to greatly help you with songs most of the time. There are usually patterns of repetition in the song notes, so if you train to repeat them, you'll do them automatically and won't need to constantly move your eyes.

Next is Driving. When driving, the important thing to do is point the Wii Remote at the screen vacuuming the colored electrodes in the sky to power up the car. This mini-game is so easy and forgiving, you can keep up a constant streak of boosts with the Z button. The cones barely slow you down. There are intervals of turns you have to memorize, where you point the Wii Remote and Nunchuk in the direction of the turn. The sooner you do this, the better.

Next is Dancing. Dancing is easy. As long as you are just shaking the Wii Remote and Nunchuk constantly, and not even imitating the onscreen moves, you will ace all three levels of this minigame easily. My only protip is that you do this minigame last whenever it's in a set in Story Mode.

Next is Money. You reach your hand out and grab a pile of money when the cat isn't looking. Start with the Wii Remote pointed up, tilt it down and forward to reach out, and press A to grab while doing it. The main obstacle is the cat able to spot you and fend you off. You can tell when the cat is about to do this, without fail, when her music notes turn red. Also, her assistant will attempt to jump on your hand, where you'll have to shake it off. It usually takes one grab to happen, then you should probably wait it out. Lastly, figure out workarounds for the control issues.

Next is Catch. You weave your body left and right to dodge cats, while catching ones with hearts coming out by pressing A to open your arms. You should be leaned all one direction most of the time though. Also, if you're going for the high score, just keep resetting until you get nothing but cats with hearts, which give you more points and clear the screen. Sometimes, a tackler might jump in front of a heart cat, and whenever that happens, it's not worth getting it.

Next is Carrying. You carry cats across structures of blocks, dropping them when you run out of stamina. Your goal is to get them to their food bowls. This minigame is incredibly easy to ace though- just bring them all back, put one close, and then have three time-increasing green blocks ready to go to bring you back to 99 seconds. When the last cat gets to the food bowls, you will have several seconds to get the timer back up to 99 again, as it will be frozen while the cat is still in the safe zone walking to the food.

Last is Tightrope. In order to walk very quickly on the Tightrope, wiggle the Wii Remote on its side slightly so the needle stays in the center of the meter. This will help you prepare for the gusts of wind that will throw you off if you're already too far on that side. Next is dodging the balloon bunnies. You can clearly tell they've left the line of fire when they wave at you. Also, they won't be in your line of fire most of the time and should be easily passed if you are walking at the fastest speed.

In Story Mode, save after every single Gold Medal- you'll need all golds to get costumes with no exceptions. If you're having trouble getting gold on a minigame, do the minigame in Story Mode, press Plus and Minus to exit without saving, then do the exact same minigame once in Free Play Mode so you can unlock it for good and practice unimpeded without affecting your save file. Also, pick file 1- every reset will start you on File 1 no matter what.

I am the first person to ever 100% this game. It's short and not that difficult if you know what you are doing. It's a novel minigame collection that will give your Wii a workout- especially if you don't mainly use a Japanese Wii and are desperate for content to use on it.

2022 Update: I have figured out the quizzes! The questions are in Japanese, but here's what they are: "Which symbol doesn't appear on the block" (text with no number), "Which symbol appears on the block when the other 3 don't" (text with a 3 in it), "How many times does this symbol appear on the block" (text with symbol in brackets where the answers are numbers), and "Which symbol appears on the block twice" (text with a 2 in it). You don't have to know all of them- if you are close and have plenty of time left, you can switch back to quick selecting. In order to save time and be able to see the symbols on the block when it spins fast, press the home button on your Wii Remote. The time will pause while you can read the question. Briefly un-pause and pause again to see the symbols on the block and the answers.

It helps if you use a Wii U as it is more responsive and allows you to read the symbols better.

One last tip: Remember that in each minigame, pause scumming is your friend. There is no pause button, but the developers did not anticipate the ability to pause with the Home button. In the Catch minigame, you can see where the cats jump so you can tilt out of the way (or in the way if it's a heart cat). In the Tightrope, you can pause just before a gust of wind blows and prepare for it. In the money grabbing minigame, you can pause to see if the money cat will look or just shake its head. In the Piano, you can pause to see which notes are coming. In the Car, you can pause to see which cones are coming.