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| |  "Re(1):RANDOM GAMES #36- Sonic the Fantasy Que" , posted Wed 24 Jan 14:19  
I just discovered a Thai card game called Commandeer. It uses a grid to place units and different cards can attack in different directions. Most units have way more defense than attack so you defeat other units by careful positioning, playing command cards when you're attacking, and so on.
https://www.commandeertcg.com/
The factions have fun themes like...
Heisenberg- World War super science faction, their cards focus on ranged attacks (dudes with guns) and discarding opponent's cards (hackers)
Shangri-La- Buddhist cultural sphere faction, mostly samurai, kungfu dudes, and Thai interpretation of Hindu spirits. Haven't played as them yet
Lemuria- Your D&D academic wizards. Fey, zombies, that sort of thing.
Avalon- Christdom faction, ranges from Arthurian knights to 1700's pirates. Mechanically they focus on playing lots of small dudes that boost one another when in formation.
Hero Kingdom- Kamen Rider and Shocker faction. I think Kamenrider style focuses on strong individuals and Shocker style is on swarms of goons.
DC Comics- Apparantly it's not that hard to get the DC comics license in Thailand. Seemed to be a one time thing as they aren't featured in booster packs, just one complete set.
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| | "Re(2):RANDOM GAMES #36- Wild Guns everywhere" , posted Sat 27 Jan 06:29
Good news for Prof, Wild Guns is going to be ported to Switch, along with new features described in the PR below. I don't think they have specified whether the PS4 and Steam versions will be updated in any capacity (either for free or via a DLC). Speaking of which, the game is also described as « A big hit on Steam and PlayStation 4 » although the SteamSpy data available suggests they probably had modest expectations to begin with.
quote:
Wild Guns Reloaded Fires Its Way On To Nintendo Switch
The Arcade-Style Shooter Series Returns to Nintendo!
Burlingame, CA. – January 25, 2018 – Natsume Inc., a worldwide developer and publisher of family-oriented video games, today announced Wild Guns Reloaded for the Nintendo Switch; coming early 2018. A big hit on Steam and PlayStation 4, this is the first time the game will be available for the new Nintendo console.
Wild Guns Reloaded is a fast-paced gallery style shooter mixing the Wild West with steampunk. Players can play as Clint, Annie, two new characters, or all together in multiplayer action! Each can jump, dive and roll to get out of the way of the barrage of bullets enemies let fly – or shoot them down with their own gun!
In Wild Guns Reloaded, Annie has tracked down the famed bounty hunter Clint to get revenge on the Kid gang. With eight stages, each with three zones, there's plenty of bad robots to blast away. With a true arcade game feel, Wild Guns was the first sci-fi western to arrive on home consoles and, to this day, there really isn't any other game like it!
"Natsume developed the original Wild Guns in 1994 for the SNES, and we are proud to continue this legacy in Wild Guns Reloaded for Nintendo Switch," said Hiro Maekawa, President & CEO of Natsume. "We've included some brand new features for the Switch version that we're very excited about!"
The Switch version offers new game modes, such as Beginner Mode. Now, newcomers can play the arcade-style shooter with unlimited lives! And in contrast to Beginner Mode, Boss Rush: Time Attack was created for Wild Guns veterans. For the hardest of the hardcore, Boss Rush: Time Attack mode lets players take on all the bosses in the game, one right after the other! How far can you get?!
Même Narumi est épatée !
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| | "Re(2):RANDOM GAMES #36- CupHead?" , posted Tue 30 Jan 02:30:
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I just came across a game called CupHead. Seems very old school and a challenging game like in the 90s. I have not seen the cafe speak on it. Anyone have there thoughts on the game?
Cuphead is ridiculously good. I think that's an opinion that doesn't need to be debated, like, water is wet, British cheese is terrible, Cuphead is better than anyone who's been following the game since a couple of years even hoped it would end up being.
It's been a couple of years now that the industry and tools available have reach a point that "indies" went from meaning "cute little game to waste time for a couple of hours" into "the actually interesting good games that challenge you the way old games used to".
Hollow Knight is still the best game of 2017, and has a good shot at 2018 too.
My one biggest complaint about Cuphead is that until you reach the point where the boss noticeably changes animation to a weakened state, it's really hard to tell how well you're doing until you die, and impossible to tell how much damage anything does. I don't really know if using the fully charged (MEN'S BEAM!!!!) attack is better than using the lesser charged attack multiple times... it'd make sense if it was, but I don't really know, and the game is hard enough and predicated on being hard, so I don't like being blind about that. In the case of classic Contra, it'd often be the case that a boss might contain multiple smaller elements or simply aren't very durable in the first place, so by incidentally destroying those, you could very quickly and intuitively feel how much damage your weapon could do, and how much your damage increased when you got closer to things/mash harder/etc.
[this message was edited by Spoon on Tue 30 Jan 02:31] |
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| "Re(2):RANDOM GAMES #36- CupHead?" , posted Tue 30 Jan 13:10
quote:
I just came across a game called CupHead. Seems very old school and a challenging game like in the 90s. I have not seen the cafe speak on it. Anyone have there thoughts on the game?
Cuphead is ridiculously good. I think that's an opinion that doesn't need to be debated, like, water is wet, British cheese is terrible, Cuphead is better than anyone who's been following the game since a couple of years even hoped it would end up being.
It's been a couple of years now that the industry and tools available have reach a point that "indies" went from meaning "cute little game to waste time for a couple of hours" into "the actually interesting good games that challenge you the way old games used to".
Hollow Knight is still the best game of 2017, and has a good shot at 2018 too.
I've manage to play some Cuphead as well. Too bad semester has started for me (network classes), so I couldn't play as much as I want too. (Can't wait for Wild Guns Reloaded, though.)
Seem like Square-Enix heard the complains about Project Octopath Traveler's "distracting HD-2D" effects, as they've now given the option to turn them off in the game, among other things...(Maybe if enough people request it, there can also be completely-flat 2D lighting mode too)
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| | "Re(2):Taito Station Undercover documentary" , posted Thu 15 Feb 11:21
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I know "reality" television has nothing to do with reality but I never understood how the Undercover Boss scenario is supposed to be remotely believable. For a low-level position they hire a person nearing their senior years -who is also wearing an obvious wig- and then follow them around all day with a camera crew? Nothing suspicious about that!
I understand how you can pull it off for the first season. You could use age to explain the cameras, saying that it is a documentary about an older gentlemen entering the workforce. You could even pass off the disguise as an old guy who is trying badly to look younger. Or allow that people will suspect the disguise, and kind of play along with the idea that the guy might be the host of a new show, or some former d-list celebrity that no one recognizes, or whatever, and realize that eventually people are just going to decide he's a nobody that doesn't matter after a few weeks. For the first season, people have no reason to assume the guy in disguise is their boss, and entry-level is low enough that they likely have never seen their boss to recognize him.
The believability completely tanks after the first season though, once people know that the show exists. Yeah, not everyone is going to know about the series, but the odds are that someone will, and cameras+newbie (bad disguise or not) is a dead giveaway at that point.
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| | "Re(1):More Monster Musings" , posted Sun 25 Feb 10:28:
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Should I stick with one weapon in MH or should I branch out and have something for every occasion? There doesn’t seem to be any penalty for switching other than the need to grind for material. Then again, that may be a big enough deterrent to keep me from experimenting. I wonder how veterans of the series handle this?
Although I have already played for several hours I really need to knuckle down and advance the story a bit more. As it is I’ve been having too much fun meandering around the landscape. You can climb, crawl and find all sorts of other ways to explore. Sometimes when I’m out on these nature walks I have to pull out my long sword and hack something to death but the primeval world is tough like that.
Exploring during expeditions is great fun for me as well. Plus, you will end up with a lot of useful supplies/crafting materials and strong knowledge of the areas, which will help you a lot during hunts. I wish there were a little more depth available (for example, the fishing is a bit too limited to be a hobby unto itself). But I still get a kick out of exploring. I recommend not eating beforehand. For one, you save money. Two, encountering large monsters feels a little more dangerous and you may get that pleasurable "fight or flight" feeling in certain situations.
As for the weapons, I am sure there's a lot of room for mastery that would reward you for sticking exclusively with a single, technical weapon like the Charge Blade. That said, I don't think it's overly difficult to reach a base level of proficiency with any weapon, and they are extremely well-balanced. There are major differences, but no weapon is going to be as complex as picking up a new fighting game character. My feeling is that learning the enemies is ultimately more valuable than learning the nuances of individual weapons (though doing that is fun and valuable as well).
A great way to spread out, in my opinion, is to consider broader weapon roles. There are ranged and melee weapons, so why not have at least one of each? Then there are the various elements...again, why not have one of every flavor? If there's a certain monster that's giving you trouble and making the game feel temporarily less fun by repeatedly putting your ass in that cart, what better excuse to mix it up and try something new?
Maybe you've been using a beefy, fire-element great sword, but you are having issues with Rathalos who keeps hovering above your head and whacking you with his super-damaging tail-flip attack. This could be an excellent opportunity to try out the Bow, which allows you to stay out of range and hit him even when he's up in the air. And why not imbue your bow with the dragon element, which Rathalos is very susceptible to? The extra elemental damage should help make up for your lack of familiarity as you learn the ins and outs of archery.
Whatever weapon you're using, you'll learn more about various monsters' behaviors and attacks, so you're always getting something out of it (including monster parts to make new weapons with). Maybe you'll find one weapon that is so much fun for you that you won't feel the need to try anything else, but in general, I would say that trying a new weapon in MHW is low investment, high return.
There's no way to really screw yourself over, and you can refund materials (though not gold) if you decide to roll back an upgrade to try a different path (or a different weapon type). I have never felt I had to start all over with a tier 1 weapon and work my way up. Resources are plentiful. Go ahead and experiment!
For recommendations, I'd say try a ranged weapon, try something with a shield, and try dual blades just so you can land the Attack On Titan-style Levi buzzsaw attack by dashing off a ledge in demon mode.
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[this message was edited by Mosquiton on Sun 25 Feb 10:56] |
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| "Re(5): Iggypath Traveller" , posted Mon 19 Mar 05:34
Somehow, I just knew there would be something wonderful on Octopath Traveller if I looked for it, and lo and behold, the lovely official site has new videos on the merchant Theresa (can buy things from all townspeople) and one other job I was too excited to watch because I knew I was already sold on the game and wanted to talk about it here.
I recall some serious griping about the game's lighting earlier, which given the rarity of an actually pretty new 2D RPG seemed sort of unsporting in the same way that maybe my saying how ugly KOF XV is wasn't very nice. I recall reading an article a month or two ago about how the staff had majorly reacted to all criticism and introduced different lighting options, etc., so now there seems to be very little excuse to not enjoy these lovely Yoshida Akihiko character designs and classy music.
Actually, the lighting may have been odd before, but it created this effect that I kind of liked of the world being a bunch of little dollhouses...in a rare case of a non-traumatic memories of SaGa Frontier or FFVII, it reminded me of the 2D-sized but pre-rendered-looking towns.
人間はいつも私を驚かせてくれる。不思議なものだな、人間という存在は．．．
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| "Re(1):Random Dragon's Crown merchandising" , posted Fri 4 May 20:32
Really minor note, but this month Rayman Legends is available for free for PSN Plus users, so it's been a nice opportunity to take that game for a spin.
I only had a really brief experience of it from a demo years ago, , but the art is on point and the game flows really well - IIRC, it was originally designed for the Wii, where some section had you resort to a helped character to affect the stage through bits where you're use the touch screen - here the circle button seems to take care of that instead, and the whole thing flows a lot better thanks to it.
Another thing I like is one of the unlockable playable character, the viking girl Barbara - I like that kind of design/archetype (and it turns there there seems to be a bunch of characters based on her you can unlock too), and while it's not the first thing that would have come to mind to add to the Rayman aesthetics, there's some twisted fun on having her use an axe on things Rayman just tends to punch.
I wonder, will we ever get a game where we get to unlash her and her axe on the Rabbids?... This shared universe business is just asking for it, even if it mean Rayman gets to sit out of another game he helped bring to life after the Rabbids got a bit too successful...
...!!
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| "Re(2):Random Dragon's Crown merchandising" , posted Thu 10 May 22:06
I'm glad that Dragon's Crown is going to be released in 4K, I played a lot of this game in the Vita, but the small screen and the slowdowns made a not so good experience
quote:
Really minor note, but this month Rayman Legends is available for free for PSN Plus users, so it's been a nice opportunity to take that game for a spin.
I only had a really brief experience of it from a demo years ago, , but the art is on point and the game flows really well - IIRC, it was originally designed for the Wii, where some section had you resort to a helped character to affect the stage through bits where you're use the touch screen - here the circle button seems to take care of that instead, and the whole thing flows a lot better thanks to it.
Crrect me wrong, but does Legends include Origins or I'm making up stuff?
Another thing I like is one of the unlockable playable character, the viking girl Barbara - I like that kind of design/archetype (and it turns there there seems to be a bunch of characters based on her you can unlock too), and while it's not the first thing that would have come to mind to add to the Rayman aesthetics, there's some twisted fun on having her use an axe on things Rayman just tends to punch.
I wonder, will we ever get a game where we get to unlash her and her axe on the Rabbids?... This shared universe business is just asking for it, even if it mean Rayman gets to sit out of another game he helped bring to life after the Rabbids got a bit too successful...
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| | "What a horrible night to have a Curse" , posted Wed 16 May 11:31
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While on one hand, with all the indie pixelated Dracula clones out there, it makes sense to have one by Igarashi, those special effects in the boss scenes are really misplaced. They're too busy and flashy for the otherwise simple environments, making me wonder why they didn't go for a SFC rather than FC style.
Even though the release date is this month, I'm hoping the bosses as shown in the video are works in progress. What the video shows is an inconsistent hodgepodge.
First, there are the higher resolution "paper cut-outs". You could argue a NES precedent for this in the form of giant bosses that were displayed through use of the background layer. Those kinds of bosses were often detailed and colorful. Though Curse doesn't stick with the "background" restriction, and also displays large, higher detail boss parts over the regular action. Nor does it stick to the resolution restriction, resulting in boss images that look like paper cut-outs or Colorforms stickers being slid over the screen.
The train boss is passable. The higher resolution art doesn't fit the art style of the rest of the game, but it kind of works there to make the boss look more unnatural. Animation is okay.
The treasure vault boss, whether intentionally or not, pays a nod to the use of a black background surrounding the giant boss, but uses paper cut-out hands to attack. Perhaps because only the hands move, this boss looks less active than the train. It feels like there should be some other background animation effect. (Maybe even to function as an attack telegraph.)
The two-headed dragon just looks lazy. It looks like two paper cut-outs of dragon heads being slid back and forth over a paper cut-out of a body, spitting overlapping paper cut-outs of flame, all of which are layered over footage of a NES game. The biggest issue is that there hasn't been any effort even put into making the overlapping parts mesh together. It is just square cut-outs.
Alongside the higher resolution bosses, you have the "almost fits a NES game" bosses.
The turtle-person goes too far in the other direction, with uninspired and poor use of its three colors resulting in something that you'd expect to see in a mediocre NES game.
The electricity boss is fine. Umbrella girl is okay enough. The other electricity thing looks okay.
And then there is the third visual style... While the Umbrella girl borders on this, it truly fits the giant vampire girl(?). Here we get a character that kind of fits the visual style of the rest of the game, but functions similar to the paper-cut out fashion. What stands out here is her flight. While her attack is animated, her flight is just a static cut-out being slid across the screen.
The overall combination of these different styles (as well as the lackluster results in a few specific bosses) makes the whole product (at least when viewed in trailer form) feel a bit cheap.
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| | "Re(5):What a horrible night to have a Curse" , posted Thu 17 May 23:27:
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Well, not everyone can be Yacht Club Games.
I don't think it's that different from what Yacht Club did, and Shovel Knight wasn't a perfect "8-bit game" either. It's not an emulated approach but an idealized approach where limits are broken for the sake of sanity. The idea is not to become an NES but to create a "comforting" approach that accurately apes that feeling without the accompanying frustrations. It's like sure they could emulate VRAM limits and processor hit from effects and particles, but for what purpose? To get flicker and slowdown? In the end it really comes down to style, not technology.
Well, the entire article is about Shovel Knight "breaking the NES", so I'm certainly aware that they are bending the rules (it's quite a good read if you wanted to know exactly where and why they decided to "cheat").
I haven't really made a deep study of Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon at this point, but my initial impression is that Shovel Knight is done more artfully. For example, Baines complains about the two-headed dragon boss looking lazy/incongruous and I don't think there's anything that jarring in SK.
That said, I don't think Curse of the Moon looks terrible by any means and the gameplay looks quite fun (the wizard guy looks like he has some cool tricks). So I probably will check it out.
EDIT: I guess it's also worth mentioning that the Shovel Knight team had some rough spots and had to go for five months without paying anyone. There's always a cost. And of course I don't mean to denigrate the efforts of IntiCreates here who are undoubtedly super-busy and super-hard-working people judging from their release schedule.
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[this message was edited by Mosquiton on Thu 17 May 23:56] |
| | "Re(10):What a horrible night to have a Curse" , posted Fri 25 May 06:02
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I think it's more than just "cohesive", because some of the directorial choices arise from careful study of the technical limitations of the 8-bit consoles. So they have codified very carefully the limitations that they want to adopt and stick to them 100%, while for the things they choose to break, they do so very selectively. For instance, they do adopt palette limitations, but they don't adopt sprite count limitations.
I'd say that is still cohesive art direction, it is just making the effort to work out the details of that art direction. Even if every artist knew to work within "realistic limits" when doing retro game art, it would still be a matter of "cohesive art direction" to establish what those limits are.
Which is where Curse of the Moon's bosses appear to fail. It looks like a game where different artists each had different ideas of what "retro game art" looked like, so you have a hodgepodge of different methods. It's like hiring a bunch of artists to create fantasy art for an illustrated story, but forgetting to tell everyone to use the same media, so you end up with one artist turning in giant oil canvases, another doing acrylic paints on canvas board, another doing their art in watercolors, and one person doing their drawings with MS Paint.
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| | "Re(8):Curse of the Samurai or RE2" , posted Wed 13 Jun 09:52
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Tsushima annoys me every time I see it.
* The narration is so American it has to appeal constantly to "LOOK HOW JAPANESE EVERYTHING IS WE'RE SO MUCH IN JAPAN RIGHT NOW". It's terrible.
* The American dubbing is bad and weirdly racist, but worse, the Mongols have a weird filter on their voices to make their speech less distinct and more alien. Or maybe their voice was recorded in the middle of the Gobi. It's difficult to hear what they say, except when suddenly they shout SAMURAI very distinctively so the American audience can remember how SO JAPANESE the game is. I'm sure they'll shout GEISHA and NINJA later in the game.
How can American designers create a racist game without a single white character is beyond me. Or maybe it's that thing with alt-right people loving Japan so much because Japanese are honorary white for some reason.
* Combat does nothing to me. You can go the Bushido Blade route of 1-hit kills, or the normal video game route of waking the sword like a stick until the HP bar of the enemy is depleted. You cannot have both at the same time. You need to chose, game.
My first thought was that "I think this is necessary for people who AREN'T as well-informed as the MMCafe crowd", and after talking with another friend, I think more strongly about that.
To wit, I first watched that trailer with no audio, and it looked really good! Then when I watched it with audio, it felt off.
The first thing is that for the sake of the trailer and the main market in North America, the game is dubbed in English. So already, things are going to be a bit off. The need to constantly point stuff out my buddy cites as "you'd be surprised how poorly people understand historical Asian settings even in the age of the internet". The target audience of the game isn't just the audience that buys Yakuza (e.g. a crowd that already loves Japanese culture/cinema/etc.), but also the audience that bought their previous games of the Infamous series.
The English dubbing makes everything weird, and the emphasis placed on things feels like a bizarre localizing of what Western audiences perceive of as "overacting" in Japanese TV/film. The fact that historical setting X that is trying to be authentic has people speaking a language that was never spoken there is already going to be a leap. If they enunciated in the fashion of modern-setting Western cinema pieces, would that be a bigger leap? I don't know. I do think it's unfortunate that choosing to adopt stereotypes in order to provide legibility for a less-informed audience is the choice that they went with. But I do think that a Japanese voiceover option would make this a lot less bad.
I'm ok with not-quite-Bushido-Blade because that's what Samurai Shodown was, and even Nioh features plenty of enemies that almost die instantly (e.g. you kick them until their stamina drops to zero then you do a finishing strike on them) but don't quite die instantly.
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| "Re(9):Curse of the Samurai or RE2" , posted Wed 13 Jun 11:23
quote:
Tsushima annoys me every time I see it.
To be clear, when I said it looks incredible, I meant that very literally. The ambience, fields, town, effects and movement look great. I am not quite as optimistic about the story or how the game plays.
The voices I found more ostensibly silly than anything. The problem is that while the accent isn't really necessary, when there is no accent present there are people who will just tongue-in-cheek ridicule the game as being set in feudal California. A Japanese dub was the first thing I was hoping for but who knows if a studio like Sucker Punch has the connections to do that convincingly for the whole game.
As for the swordplay, the issue you're talking about I think stems from developers trying not to limit what the player will attempt to do. It's "you'll do this thing and we'll make you love it" vs. "we really want you to do this thing, but if you'd like to hit buttons and see shit happen that's also an option." So I'd like to think you can just choose to play one way for the whole game but who knows, maybe I'm mistaken.
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| | "Re(4):Random games: did you know?" , posted Mon 16 Jul 02:56
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Ninja Baseball Bat Man was designed by Drew Maniscalco of Irem USA. He took inspiration from things like TMNT and Batman and sent his design doc to Irem Japan which developed the game.
It was designed by a guy in the US named Drew? I'd never have imagine.
One other cool thing about Ninja Baseball Bat Man is they have a pretty wide variety of special moves for the era. It came out in '93 and I believe it has way more special moves/techniques (like [down, up + button] as a basic example) than other contemporary games. Capcom's Punisher... which I think just has that one [d,u] command. I think I remember liking the twin bats guy, who had lightning-based moves.
I also remember the good/awful character select screen music, which if I remember correctly is a two-second loop composed of four notes and a deep voice saying "OHH YEAHH."
Oh my gosh, thanks for that info! I actually just recently beat Ninja Baseball Batman with my brother and my oldest friend a few weeks ago at a bar in Bangkok.
I'd always wanted to play it ever since I saw a few tiny screenshots of it in EGM years ago! One of the screens had the airplane boss and I drew him a lot that year. That game has such FUN art.
Finally getting to play it--it did not disappoint!
Mosquiton, your description is spot on! I was shocked by the variety of moves in the game! I was pretty drunk, so I don't remember the exact mechanics, but I recall that certain inputs allowed you to attack downed enemies, and there were a suprising amount of dash attacks and most suprising of all the game had SUPER MOVES! And I dont just mean the typical press attack+jump at the same time to do an area attack that consumes a little of your life bar, I mean big, meaty, screen filling supers. I want to say you had to grapple an enemy, then jump then press A+J in the air?
lemme look it up ...
Holy cow, each character's moveset reads like an early PSOne era 3d fighting game moveset!
https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/arcade/568361-ninja-baseball-bat-man/faqs/53661
Wow I barely scratched the surface of it! I gotta play it again!
The game has such a great aesthetic! I love these weird USA/90s Japan coproductions!
www.art-eater.com
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|  "Re(9):Random Nioh: did you know?" , posted Thu 26 Jul 22:57
Recently I started playing Nioh. I know the game has been out for a bit but considering it's long gestation it seems only natural to wait a bit before buying a copy. First off, I like the combat. While the game has the trudge, die, repeat formula of a From Software game the fighting isn't done with the shoulder buttons. Instead, it uses the face buttons which is the way God intended action games to be played. I'm only at the start of the game but I can already feel that I have a fairly good idea of how I'm going to be approaching most fights from now on. Thankfully, the action feels like it's going to be enjoyable no matter how many times I swing my sword.
Speaking of which, I'm having trouble deciding on a secondary weapon. My main weapon is the katana since it feels like a decent, well rounded weapon. After that, I'm at a loss. Should I go with double katanas just so I can stroll through the levels wearing three(!) swords? I'm leaning toward using the ninja chain since it seems to have decent crowd control, hits a great deal and -unlike the spear- doesn't clang against the walls as much.
One thing that's charming about the game is that it's a bit of a mess. For example: The drops are too frequent so you end up carrying around piles of garbage. The crafting system feels like a lot of work for minimal reward. There is a secondary leveling system involving titles that I discovered and subsequently forgot about until a friend reminded of its existence. One would think that a game that had been in development for so long would be a bit more polished. I'm not any of this is bad, mind you, instead I'm amused by how many rough edges made it into the final product.
I can't imagine what sort of Akira Kurosawa film would feature a white guy samurai throwing a magic dog at demons but somehow that turned into a game that's a hybrid of Ninja Gaiden and Tenchu. I'll be curious to see what sort of new silliness the game will throw my way.
Since this shouldn't just be me using this forum as a blog post here's something akin to news: Golden Axe is getting a stage play. Is there an audience for this?
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| | "Re(10):Random Nioh: did you know?" , posted Sat 28 Jul 07:03
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Recently I started playing Nioh. I know the game has been out for a bit but considering it's long gestation it seems only natural to wait a bit before buying a copy. First off, I like the combat. While the game has the trudge, die, repeat formula of a From Software game the fighting isn't done with the shoulder buttons. Instead, it uses the face buttons which is the way God intended action games to be played. I'm only at the start of the game but I can already feel that I have a fairly good idea of how I'm going to be approaching most fights from now on. Thankfully, the action feels like it's going to be enjoyable no matter how many times I swing my sword.
Speaking of which, I'm having trouble deciding on a secondary weapon. My main weapon is the katana since it feels like a decent, well rounded weapon. After that, I'm at a loss. Should I go with double katanas just so I can stroll through the levels wearing three(!) swords? I'm leaning toward using the ninja chain since it seems to have decent crowd control, hits a great deal and -unlike the spear- doesn't clang against the walls as much.
One thing that's charming about the game is that it's a bit of a mess. For example: The drops are too frequent so you end up carrying around piles of garbage. The crafting system feels like a lot of work for minimal reward. There is a secondary leveling system involving titles that I discovered and subsequently forgot about until a friend reminded of its existence. One wo
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Yeah, Nioh's got a lot to like about it and a lot that leaves you going "I guess they didn't have time to make this bit better". I really like how fully realized each weapon's moveset is, but because the moveset is tied to you the character and not the weapon, finding weapons isn't exciting as it is in Dark Souls, nevermind the sheer frequency with which you find them.
The spear to me has the flashiest moveset which makes it fun to use, but I agree that some of that fun gets limited when it's clanging off the walls all the time. I really liked the variety and versatility of the weapon that let me pretend I was Ass-quake, and it has quite astonishing DPS if you want it to do that. I wasn't a big fan of the double katanas, which neither seemed to be tops in DPS or in terms of interesting moves for the stats I picked for my character.
There aren't many kinds of enemies, but all of them are fun to fight except this one ninja enemy that deals way too much dmg wtf
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| | "Re(4):Re(10):Random Nioh: did you know?" , posted Tue 31 Jul 07:35
I just started last month as well, so Ishmael and I both have the chance of playing the game after all the patches (on PC, the DLC is included, so we have all the weapons from the start, and some DLC-only enemies added to the main campaign. I heard the vanilla game was more stale).
For the equipment, I didn't bother choosing a weapon until I finished the game. Whenever I got a stronger new type of weapon, I'd just play with it until its bar of affinity was filled, then I'd move to the next. It made the beginning a bit messy, but also quite varied because I ended up using all 7 weapons until the 5th map, where I started narrowing my choices.
From what I've read, all weapons are good, so it's really only down to personal choice. I didn't like the double swords either, and the katana is a bit boring, so I played with mostly spear or odachi (for long range pokes), tonfas (for close range) or kusarigama or axe (for whatever, I'm just going to press buttons and see how quickly I die). I'm well into NG+ now, and I still haven't decided on a pair, which is a testament to how fun the combat system is for me.
The stats are something that was annoying at the beginning, but I've been instructed by a Nioh pro to raise all the stats to 20 gradually, starting with the one that raises stamina, and only then to start thinking about specializing in one stat. That was a very helpful advise.
Another thing to make the game more enjoyable: ignoring the forge entirely until NG+. There is no reason to go there until then.
For the inventory clutter, it took me some time to find the shortcut "select all items with a rarity lower than X", but once I found it and could give over a hundred items to the spirits in one clic, it made everything much smoother.
So, yeah, clunky game, but weirdly addictive. I also started it after I had the weird idea to play Dark Souls 2 again from start to finish, and I think I'm officially fed up with that series for a while. Nioh's energetic combat was all I needed.
I hope it forces From to upgrade their system and make Sekiroh better.
The less said about the scenario, the better. I'd really like to know what Kurosawa's script was compared to "white guy goes to Sengoku Theme Park and befriends every character".
Musou has a similar problem as Nioh, in that every important character from the Sengoku era is great and fantastic and a good guy deep down, even if he killed a few tens of thousands of women and children on his way to make a better country for everyone. One of the reasons I like BASARA better is that it doesn't hesitate to make bad characters truly evil, some other comically bad, some other oddly shades-of-grey bad, and then top it all up with Wakamoto. Even the "good" characters are weirdly self-centered and don't see the problem in killing a few hundred innocent just to go say hello to their neighbour.
A Sengoku where everyone is a nice-person-who-only-wants-the-war-to-end-so-people-could-be-happy is so LAAAAAAAAAAAAAAME.
Except Kobayakawa. Apparently even Koei Tecmo agrees that this guy was a clown.
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| PSN: Ishmael26b
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CFN: Ishmael26b
| "Re(5):Re(10):Random Nioh: did you know?" , posted Wed 1 Aug 03:02
quote:
For the inventory clutter, it took me some time to find the shortcut "select all items with a rarity lower than X", but once I found it and could give over a hundred items to the spirits in one clic, it made everything much smoother.
Oh ho, that is useful! That let me quickly clear a great deal of detritus out of my inventory.
One last Nioh thing: the shrine kodama make incredibly annoying noises. I often stay in the vicinity of the shrine for protection when I'm checking on new items or debating on where to invest my skill points. But the entire time I'm there those little avocado looking bastards will not shut up. Just let me change my clothes in peace!
quote:
The less said about the scenario, the better. I'd really like to know what Kurosawa's script was compared to "white guy goes to Sengoku Theme Park and befriends every character".
Musou has a similar problem as Nioh, in that every important character from the Sengoku era is great and fantastic and a good guy deep down, even if he killed a few tens of thousands of women and children on his way to make a better country for everyone. One of the reasons I like BASARA better is that it doesn't hesitate to make bad characters truly evil, some other comically bad, some other oddly shades-of-grey bad, and then top it all up with Wakamoto. Even the "good" characters are weirdly self-centered and don't see the problem in killing a few hundred innocent just to go say hello to their neighbour.
I'm amused that in Nioh everyone is happy to pawn all the heavy lifting off to William, the undocumented worker but that's giving the plot far to much credit.
One of the reasons that I think Basara burnt out quicker than the Musou games is that in games like this every character is someone's husbando. If someone were to do a Musou with a modern setting they wouldn't look to politics for inspiration, instead it would work better if the factions were rival Korean boy bands that were literally fighting for control of the music charts.
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| | "Re(1):Streets of Rage 4, Shenmue 3, Seaman 2." , posted Thu 30 Aug 03:46:
quote:
Speaking of big-budget experiments, I've always viewed Shenmue as an amazing failure of a game. During the Dreamcast era Sega was laboring under the insane notion that games like Seaman were a good idea. Shenmue was the ultimate manifestation of that credo. It was gigantic labor of love where the term "love is blind" was never more apt. While I admire the audacity of the original game I agree with Iggy that the rerelease and Shenmue 3 are going to be huge expenditures of time, resources and nostalgia.
An amazing failure is, despite its flaws, amazing nonetheless. It can provoke thought. It can contain isolated moments of greatness and wonder. It can potentially inspire future works that are both amazing and successful.
I don't really have much of a personal relationship with the Shenmue series. But I think it's easily earned the right to take a crack at finishing the story and delivering a better version of a concept that was flawed in its execution but in many ways ahead of its time.
Like so much of Sega's output it was so far ahead of it's time. There's no GTA or Yakuza without Shenmue paving the way! Aside from laying the groundworks for modern 3d open world games (and QTEs), what I really admire about Shenmue is it's overall sense of visual/world fidelity. It's a very complete feeling world. Much more so than a lot of the games that came after it. GTA 3 was a fun sandbox, but Shenmue felt so much more lively (and just had way better graphics overall in spite of being older and on weaker hardware). Sure it's clunky, but it's also overflowing with personality. I think that's what brings people back to it over the years. It's like going back to a little town that you love. Shenmue feels like a place, which is quite an achievement for a game!
Also it has SUKEBAN and is thus very good
quote:
It can contain isolated moments of greatness and wonder. It can potentially inspire future works that are both amazing and successful.
YES! Totally agree! This is how I've long felt about films and comics, and more and more about games. It's just that games are such a time sink compared to movies, so it's harder to be forgiving.
www.art-eater.com
[this message was edited by nobinobita on Thu 30 Aug 03:53] |
| | "Re(1):Shenmue - I can't think of a good title" , posted Thu 30 Aug 03:51
quote:
Speaking of big-budget experiments, I've always viewed Shenmue as an amazing failure of a game.
While Jim Sterling isn't exactly...appreciated in certain circles, I think he pegged it right when he called Shenmue "the foundation for great games that came afterward", but that Shenmue itself is only a prototype. A prototype that has not only not aged well, but one that wasn't even that great at release.
Jim's description is a bit harsher than that. I don't agree with his judgement that Shenmue was always ****, but I do see it as a game that at best was somewhere from rather to heavily flawed. Shenmue was a bit of ambition, a bit of hype, a bit of Sega Dreamcast fanaticism, and a lot of forgiveness. Which is why I vote it was a mass hallucination.
I might be more interested in reading what he has to say if he didn't have to say it through his hyperbole/negativity-fueled persona. Much like some of the games he bashes, there's too much crap for me to wade through!
But that doesn't mean he can't have some interesting ideas or be right-ish about things. Still, one of my friends who had never played Shenmue and mostly plays fighting games recently got Shenmue on Steam and is loving it, even in spite of its rough edges. Certainly, faster loading times makes the experience a lot better. But Shenmue is so broad in scope it's amazing it manages to do anything well. At the time when it was new, there was really nothing which tried to do as much and in as much detail as Shenmue. Grand Theft Auto 3 really isn't the same.
Today, Yakuza/Ryu ga Gotoku is very much the distilled version of Shenmue, and aside from the different setting and hilariously giant scope, I think you'll be hard-pressed at this point to determine what Shenmue 3 will try or even be able to do better.
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| | "Re(2):Shenmue - I can't think of a good title" , posted Thu 30 Aug 05:41
quote:
This is how I've long felt about films and comics, and more and more about games. It's just that games are such a time sink compared to movies, so it's harder to be forgiving.
That's true, it can take a lot of time to get the full experience or even just the real essence of a game. And it can be hard to forgive when a game seems to be wasting your time (i.e., you're putting a lot in without getting much out).
But like you said, sometimes a game can create a world where it just feels compelling to simply be there. I need some space (usually years) between viewings/readings of my favorite movies/novels, but I will absolutely hang out in a great RPG (or RPG-esque game) for days or even weeks on end.
quote:
Today, Yakuza/Ryu ga Gotoku is very much the distilled version of Shenmue, and aside from the different setting and hilariously giant scope, I think you'll be hard-pressed at this point to determine what Shenmue 3 will try or even be able to do better.
If I could tell Shenmue one thing, it would be this:
"Remember, you only need to compete with one person: Yourself."
/ / /
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| PSN: zonepharaoh
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| "Re(3):Streets of Rage 4, Shenmue 3, Seaman 2." , posted Thu 30 Aug 05:59
quote:
My heart already belongs to the superior sukeban.
I was going to connect this to the Kimagure Orange Road talk in the non-gaming thread by promoting MY superior (almost) sukeban, but Iggy's choice is so overflowing with justice that I cannot disagree.
As for Shenmue, real-life experience probably enhances or detracts from the game. Truth be told, we never played the thing to completion: no matter how many replacement copies we got, we inexplicably could never get disc 3 to work, to the detriment of my forklift-driving dreams. But a bunch of us were just so taken with the fidelity of the world, and how accurately it reproduced a neighborhood in Japan (minus the kung-fu), the sense of place. The way the fluorescent light flicks on in your room just the way it does in a Japanese house, the box of tangerines in your closet, the little touches all around.
GTA might have been the great expander of the open world genre, but its open world always looked shitty and lame to me, a place I neither had a personal connection to nor had any interest in visiting virtually. Maybe Ryuu Ga Gotoku has been a greater success because the overall story and crime setting are more interesting to anyone regardless of where they've lived, while still containing the same joys of fooling around in the meantime.
人間はいつも私を驚かせてくれる。不思議なものだな、人間という存在は．．．
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| | "Re(2):Streets of Rage 4 is ...finally....here" , posted Mon 3 Sep 22:23:
Wow, only found out now about SoR4... This could be fun! But I hope there are more playable characters than just Axel and Blaze; come on, SEGA, give us at least Adam!
(I'd ask for Skate, but it's understandable if SEGA decides it's not a good idea to have a child fighting a gang of adult thugs)
quote:
Will Koshiro mark his return as a playable character or music composer?
That would be great! Although if he doesn't, there's still hope for a great soundtrack; I mean, I remember lots of people being outraged when KI 2013 didn't bring Robin Beanland back for the soundtrack, but then Mick Gordon ended up delivering even better music than the original games... and then Gordon left before Season 3, people were outraged again, and in the end Celldweller and Atlas Plug replaced him and managed to present some of the best tracks in the game (notably, Tusk's and Eyedol's).
Hopefully the same happens to this game in the case Koshiro doesn't return. But I think he will.
quote:
Axel looks like he put on forty pounds but still insists on dressing like he did when he was eighteen. That’s not a good look.
Yes. Though to be honest, I'm more concerned with Blaze keeping the strapless top and miniskirt to fight in the streets; that's basically foreshadowing for some serious wardrobe malfunction...
Maybe I'm this person right in front of you... nah probably not though.
[this message was edited by Just a Person on Tue 4 Sep 03:55] |
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| "Re(3):Streets of Rage 4 is ...finally....here" , posted Mon 3 Sep 23:37
quote:
Wow, only found out now about SoR4... This could be fun! But I hope there are more playable characters than just Axel and Blaze; come on, SEGA, give us at least Adam!
(I'd ask for Skate, but it's understandable if SEGA decides it's not a good idea to have a child fighting a gang of adult thugs)
Will Koshiro mark his return as a playable character or music composer?
That would be great! Although if he doesn't, there's still hope for a great soundtrack; I mean, I remember lots of people being outraged when KI 2013 didn't bring Robin Beanland back for the soundtrack, but then Mick Gordon ended up delivering even better music than the original games... and then Gordon left before Season 3, people were outraged again, and in the end Celldweller and Atlas Plug replaced him and managed to present some of the best tracks in the game (notably, Tusk's and Eyedol's).
Hopefully the same happens to this game in the case Koshiro doesn't return. But I think he will.
Axel looks like he put on forty pounds but still insists on dressing like he did when he was eighteen. That’s not a good look.
Yes. Though to be honest, I'm more concerned with Blaze keeping the strapless top and miniskirt to fight in the streets; that's basically foreshadowing for some serious wardrobe malfunction...
VIDEO 24/7, whom I have never heard of before, had Hands-on gameplay with SOR4.
I want to post my rant and opinion on the newly announced SOR4, one of rare rants I make on the cafe, not sure if I should though.
Long Live I AM!
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| | "Monokuma and Zero's creators join forces" , posted Tue 11 Sep 23:49:
It seems that Kazutaka Kodaka and Kotaro Uchikoshi (the respective creators of the Danganronpa and Zero Escapa series) founded a new game company, Too Kyo Games.
As a fan of both DR and ZE trilogies (in DR's case, I consider DRV3 as the actual third chapter rather than that awful DR3 anime), I must say I'm quite curious to see these two men collaborating in the same projects and all the insane ideas they may come up with (even if a little disturbed by the "children's death game, by children, for children" concept of one of the games).
EDIT: the first project seems particularly interesting... Limit X Despair. "Despair" is pretty much Danganronpa's favorite word, while "limit" could allude to the time limits imposed on characters from both the Zero Escape and Infinity series... Intriguing.
---
EDIT 2: I finished following the Root Double VN this weekend, and just found out its creator, Takumi Nakazawa, is also part of Kodaka and Uchikoshi's new company! Wow, Too Kyo Games is probably the closest thing one could have as a dream team of developers for visual novels...
Maybe I'm this person right in front of you... nah probably not though.
[this message was edited by Just a Person on Tue 2 Oct 03:24] |
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| "Re:Toaplan Lives! All your IP are belong to.." , posted Thu 13 Sep 13:17:
A new company called Tatsujin headed by Masahiro Yuge.
quote:
Yuge was one of the composers of the legendary company Toaplan and according to this he is the owner of almost all classic Toaplan licences, including Tatsujin itself (known as Truxton in the US), Tiger Heli, Flying Shark, Twin Cobra, Zero Wing (yep, that "all your base" game), Snow Bros, Dogyuun, Batsugun and much more.
It seems he is really interested in make new things with those games and he is searching for investors.
This is big news for Arcade fans! I can't 100% confirm this, but I remember reading some years ago in japanese sites that the current (at the time) owner of Toaplan IPs was extremely against using their IPs for new stuff and that's the reason why none of these games had new releases since the nineties (with exceptions of some Toaplan games licenced by Taito). I don't know if this was a change of mind or whatever, but I hope we can have good things from this new company. A new Batsugun release sounds perfect now (the Saturn version is now very expensive) and Snow Bros was very, very popular in latin america and Korea.
(Thanks to Hayama Akito of ResetEra.)
[this message was edited by sfried on Thu 13 Sep 13:17] |
Rare Customer   | "Re(2):Capcom Beat em up Bundle" , posted Sat 15 Sep 05:47
I thought Chisato Mita was a freelance artist since she designed characters for Macross Delta but she still works at Capcom. According to this 2016 interview (translated here), she started her career as a background designer, then also designed characters and illustrations.
Some of the games she has worked on:
Capcom Belt Action Collection / Capcom Beat’em Up Bundle (PS4, Switch - 2018) Limited CD illustration
E.X. Troopers (PS3, 3DS - 2012) chara-design, background design, illustrations
Professor Layton VS Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney (3DS) Background Art Support
Street Fighter V Arcade Edition (PS4, PC - 2018) illustration
Toraware no Palm (iOS, Android - 2016 ) chara-design, background design, illustrations
Toraware no Palm: Refrain (iOS, Android - 201X)
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| PSN: zonepharaoh
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CFN: zonepharaoh
| "Re(10):TGS Bundle" , posted Fri 21 Sep 05:37
quote:
Do you remember love when Toshinden was marketed as the counter to Virtua Fighter, back when 3D fighting was new?
What a superdimensional reference! I remember people going nuts over Toushinden, which is puzzling in retrospect, although it was temporarily kind of pretty, and certainly much flashier than Virtua Fighter 1, which was very boring to my young eyes. But by the time beautiful Virtua Fighter 2 came around, that was that. I had NO idea they were the same people behind Oneechanbara, however!
Meanwhile, I am going to talk about this quote:
SF5 is getting a dojo mode and a dojo.
over here, since SFV currently features in about three different threads.
人間はいつも私を驚かせてくれる。不思議なものだな、人間という存在は．．．
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| "Re(1):Dragalia Lost (more like Daoko Lost)" , posted Tue 9 Oct 06:52:
I need help...
I don't know how Nintendo/CyGames new title has me by the nose the way other mobage have failed to me invested in the long run (including Fire Emblem Heroes and Pokemon Go). Maybe its the fact that it's an action RPG and the very nature of leveling up your characters taps into that primordial Seiken Densetsu feel. Maybe it's the co-op loot hording that reminds me of Phantasy Star Online but more streamlined. Maybe it was that recent raid event that sort of resembled a mini-Monster Hunter with going after parts of a dragon-turtle to debilitate it...
(Maybe it's the zeitgeist of dragons, girls, dragongirls that has recently hit the internet.)
Oh, I know. IT'S THAT BLOODY INFECTIOUS DAOKO MUSIC THAT THEY KEEP PLAYING. In fact, it seems all of the music was either from her previous album or a new unreleased one. Either way, I'm surprised they recruited the same artist who did that ME!ME!ME! anime short for such a wholesome game.
I don't really consider myself a mobile games person, either. I've dabbled a bit in PokeGo when it first came out, and even gave Fate Grand Order and Fire Emblem Heroes a whirl (even Terra Battle), but these titles never really held my interest for long.
I know there was already a topic made about attention span and games, but for me, I feel it probably has something more to do with creating addictive gameplay loops. It could be the combinations of upgrading gear for your party combined with accessories (which, from what I hear, are carry-overs from CyGame's other hit, GranBlue Fatnasy) where the buffs feel more "tangible" in an ARPG scenario, as opposed to a slower-paced turn-based combat, or it could probably be the dragon-raising/kingdom building aspect where you spend time upgrading your resources. Perhaps it's probably from the production values of the game itself (there's some real-time cutscenes), and the fact that the game has an actual fleshed out main story campaign. Either way, there seems to be a lot of things that are going for it that managed to make me pry away from Valkyria Chronicles 4 for almost about a week!
Still, I think there's a stigma to these sorts of games and most likely I'll be taking a break once this recent event is over (the raids are quite fun). I'll probably end up getting Daoko's last album while I'm at it...
[this message was edited by sfried on Tue 9 Oct 06:57] |
| PSN: zonepharaoh
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| "2B for charity, Sentimental Graffiti" , posted Thu 8 Nov 15:10
Nier-loving cosplayer Enako hosts a charity photo shoot for flooded west Japan and earthquake-hit Hokkaido, and shows up as a pretty sharp 2B. They also recorded afterwards with Nier's Yoko Taro and Saito Yosuke for Square's Edamame Arcade Channel. Much acclaim, and Yoko took a lot of photos, with alleged talk of the Nier sequel to be included in next Edamame episode. Hmm!
Meanwhile, in one of the wilder things I've seen, a proposed 20th anniversary event for legendary dating sim Sentimental Graffiti crowdsourced (?!) its 10 million yen goal within 10 minutes of launch, says Famitsu and will gather all of the old actors for a talk show and concert. That's pretty cool! Too bad that the original developer NEC Interchannel wasn't around to do it themselves (Prof, do you know why they were sold off and dissolved after making such crazy $$$ on these games?), and current rights holder Gungho couldn't be bothered. Though speaking of superior but fallen studios Gungho has acquired and let languish, if Game Arts ever wanted to do similar for Lunar or Grandia, I'd pay up. (...hey! It's Lunar~Eternal Blue's 25th next year!)
人間はいつも私を驚かせてくれる。不思議なものだな、人間という存在は．．．
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| PSN: ShikyohMukuro
XBL: IAMDC1
Wii: n/a
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| "The Cafe Catching Up Games Review" , posted Sun 25 Nov 22:40:
In an effort to try and catch up with fellow cafe members in the latest o hat video games have to offer, I will provide a quick review list of games I have recently played and completed.
Megaman Legacy Collection, 7/10: geez, these games are far harder than before. But the collection in general is good.
Megaman Legacy Collection 2, 7/10: The same as before but sad that the Saturn features were not used in the compilation for Megaman 8. Aside from that 9 and 10 are fun.
Mighthy Gunvolt Burst, 8/10: This game is fun. I really enjoyed it.
Mighty no. 9, 5/10: Argh, where to start? I mean MG Burst is far better than this. If anything, Mighty No.9 should have stayed as an 8bit or 16-bit game. Than transition to 32 bit, 64, etc. or sequels. I didn’t even finish the game.
Master Blaster Zero, 8/10: Another fun game. Easy difficulty yes, but the extra mode here difficulty is harder should have allowed you to use the mega blaster instead of the normal one. for me, the replay value did not fare well for me.
Bloodstained Curse of the moon, 8/10. This game is great and yes, I had fun, but I have not played Castlevania 3. Afterwards I found out it used the same formula. So yes, it may not seem new or fresh, but the replay value made it worth it.
Guardian Heroes (Xbox live), 7/10. I want to like the game more but cannot fully executed yet. I don’t play it much but will need to research more on how to utilize the games full potential.
Caladrius Blaze, 8/10: Now I will state that the graphics and presentation although nice, I expect better for this day in time. What I like about this game is its three-weapon system which can be like Radiant Silvergun. Each person has different weapons. So, replay value is high. It’s not really bullet hell or simple like steady speed like R-Type. That is a good thing to me. The ideas they have here are great. Bosses are good, concept, stories, the whole package. I just would have liked better graphics. Overall this is a good shooter and I came out impressed. Now I try to perfect it with using one credit only.
Shovel Knight, 10/10: Yea this is one of the best games I have ever played in a while. This is the 3-game package I reviewed.
Luminous Remastered, 8/10: It’s a puzzle game, addicting, and awesome music.
Capcom Beat em Up, 8/10: I am happy with this package. Trying to beat final fight using one credit is by far challenging!!!
Street fighter 30th Anniversary Collection, 7/10: I only use it for online play. Online play is steady and not much issue so far. Could have used more characters in Zero 3 though.
Sina Mora EX, 7/10: The graphics, atmosphere, and gameplay are amazing. Story is confusing. But the movement and speed of the game at times felt uneasy. Mechanics are good that gives it a fresh feel. It’s still relatively short campaign. Lots of features indeed but very very HARD!!
Still have a dozen more games to go. Long ways to catch up to you all. Will post my second batch maybe in a half year?
Long Live I AM!
[this message was edited by neo0r0chiaku on Wed 28 Nov 05:58] |
| PSN: ShikyohMukuro
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| "Re(3):Re(10):The Cafe Catching Up Arcade Revi" , posted Fri 21 Dec 22:31
quote:
Thanks for the photo reports! Man it looks so surreal, with a Japanese-style arcade on one side and a Sears on ther other, lol. Seeing those photos gives me the same feeling that I get when walking into a Costco here- it's a different country all of a sudden.
So impressions on those images--
Wow, those ad boards around the entrance look so photoshoppy... I LOVE EM!
3 hours of free play and food is really awesome... Pizza and ice cream are all you can eat!? oh wait it's for kids
Those caterpillars in the UFO catcher machines are... they look perfect as gifts on Christmas. What exactly are they from I wonder?
That artwork for alcoholic liquors is so loose and Japanese, lol.
They have a Marvel vs game on a Viewlix cab! What exactly does the "Time play" mean? does the cab reset after a limited time?
Seeing that the Groove Coaster is still ver 2.0, I do hope someone knows how to update it which should be possible because Round One cabs are actually connected online to Japan from what I understand.
It might be interesting to get photos of what the Round One here looks like. I'll try and hit one somewhere soon.
Time play is when a game can be used for when customers purchasing unlimited time credit on there card. It can be one hour, two, three etc. For unlimited play within that time. Only applies to arcade games with no online function or rewards like getting prizes and tickets. So yes you pay regular for any game that has an online feature or that is quite new like SF V, Initial D, or Tekken 7, even though it's really not new.
Long Live I AM!
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| | "Re(2):Triple threat of despair" , posted Mon 24 Dec 21:45
quote:
Are not the first 2 danganronpa terrible on the ps4? I heard that they look bad there because NIS/Spike Chunsoft didn't bother to upscale the games for the PS4 resolutions,making them blurry as hell.
I kinda enjoyed the first Danganronpa game, but I have this problem where every time when I talk with some fan of the internet who played the 3 games, tells me that the 2nd and 3rd entry are not that good, and that even the finale of the third game ruins everything.
Good question. Judging forma playthrough videos of DR1+2 Reload on YouTube, they seem to look quite good, although DRV3 does look much better than them.
As for the comments you found, it's quite surprising to read that; from what I've seen from the fanbase, the vast majority seems to consider DR1 the weakest entry of the franchise, with DR2 being superior to it in every way except the location, and DRV3 having the best graphics and post-game contents and the main game considered very good except for two twists - one involving the protagonist, the other involving the ending.
The DRV3 ending twist, however, depends a lot on the perception of the player. Personally, I think it was brilliant, ando many other people also loved it - and for people who dislike it, there is a line indicating that parts of the revelations could be fake. The twist involving the protagonist is indeed more universally disliked, but I don't think it ruins the game or anything like that.
Maybe I'm this person right in front of you... nah probably not though.
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| PSN: KTallguy
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STM: KTallguy
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| "Re(5):Triple threat of despair" , posted Tue 25 Dec 11:38
quote:
Have you played the Zero Escape games?
That is definitely one series where it seems like the games get weaker and the ending arguably retroactively makes the trilogy's story arc worse. However, each game tries to reach for higher and higher concept conceits, even though sometimes the results of doing so torpedo the drama certain moments are aiming for.
I played 1, and then I played 3. I skipped 2, which was probably a MAJOR MISTAKE. I think Danganronpa is overall more compelling... Zero Escape is conceptually interesting but really jumps the shark at times. The splitting narrative is interesting and the (major plot spoiler)
Spoiler (Highlight to view) -
ability for characters to somehow be aware of different timelines
End of Spoiler
is actually super cool, but the execution is very confusing, and I found the character designs to be bland (esp in 3). And the puzzles are mostly just kinda puzzle box style puzzles, they aren't tied to the story too much.
quote:
I read through the SomethingAwful translated playthrough of DR1, which was a herculean effort by the people who did it. I didn't really feel compelled to pursue the other DR games after the first one, though... maybe because the way the game ended didn't leave me with a desire to pursue the mystery/setting further?
Without spoiling anything, and without having played 3, I'll say that DR2's premise is done in a smart way that doesn't step on DR1 too much, but at the same time can feel a tiny bit inconsequential.
I really enjoy Danganronpa the most when it gets to the trials, because then it's just like a nutty Phoenix Wright, and I really can't get enough of that.
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| PSN: DefensorVirtuoso
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| "Re(7):Triple threat of despair" , posted Mon 31 Dec 15:59
Yeah, when I finished DR1 I didn’t feel like O needed a sequel at all, even though when the ending left a lot of unanswered questions, so as a self contained game it doesn’t work at all, not even from an open ending point of view
Actually, I played the first hour of DR2 and I got a lot of questions, like for example why Byakuya was fat now (And if was the same character) but then Indont liked some changes like how the world field worked and also I got the feeling that the game would somehow retcon everything in 1
These are games that I want to play but don’t find the strength to waste the time that I did on 1 (And I heard that 2 and specially 3 are way longer)
Also like I said, it doesn’t help that the games seems to be divisive at best within the fanbase, so you don’t have te motivation from others saying “trust me you should play them, it will be worthy”
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| | "Re(8):Triple threat of despair" , posted Mon 31 Dec 22:47
quote:
Yeah, when I finished DR1 I didn’t feel like O needed a sequel at all, even though when the ending left a lot of unanswered questions, so as a self contained game it doesn’t work at all, not even from an open ending point of view
Actually, I played the first hour of DR2 and I got a lot of questions, like for example why Byakuya was fat now (And if was the same character) but then Indont liked some changes like how the world field worked and also I got the feeling that the game would somehow retcon everything in 1
These are games that I want to play but don’t find the strength to waste the time that I did on 1 (And I heard that 2 and specially 3 are way longer)
Also like I said, it doesn’t help that the games seems to be divisive at best within the fanbase, so you don’t have the motivation from others saying “trust me you should play them, it will be worthy”
Yes, DR2 and DRV3 are quite longer than DR1. I'd say it's advisable to play them in order, NOT because of the plots (they're actually quite independent from each other, and the few moments where a game is mentioned in the other, there are enough explanations to understand everything without needing to play the previous game), but because of gameplay: besides being longer, the two sequels already use in their first cases advanced gameplay elements that are introduced gradually in DR1 (whose first case is maybe even TOO EASY in terms of gameplay elements).
But I wouldn't say the games are that divisive; the complaints from part of the fanbase relate basically to some plot twists. From what I see, the fanbase does consider DR2 and DRV3 as better games than the first one (that is, in terms of graphics, music, gameplay and such); it's the plot twists that make some people not like them as much - even then, this seems to be a problem only for DRV3 (and Kodaka's team did it intentionally); I don't remember seeing a single person saying DR2 is disappointing in relation to DR1...
Maybe I'm this person right in front of you... nah probably not though.
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| | "Re(9):Triple threat of despair" , posted Tue 1 Jan 09:06
quote:
Yeah, when I finished DR1 I didn’t feel like O needed a sequel at all, even though when the ending left a lot of unanswered questions, so as a self contained game it doesn’t work at all, not even from an open ending point of view
Actually, I played the first hour of DR2 and I got a lot of questions, like for example why Byakuya was fat now (And if was the same character) but then Indont liked some changes like how the world field worked and also I got the feeling that the game would somehow retcon everything in 1
These are games that I want to play but don’t find the strength to waste the time that I did on 1 (And I heard that 2 and specially 3 are way longer)
Also like I said, it doesn’t help that the games seems to be divisive at best within the fanbase, so you don’t have the motivation from others saying “trust me you should play them, it will be worthy”
Yes, DR2 and DRV3 are quite longer than DR1. I'd say it's advisable to play them in order, NOT because of the plots (they're actually quite independent from each other, and the few moments where a game is mentioned in the other, there are enough explanations to understand everything without needing to play the previous game), but because of gameplay: besides being longer, the two sequels already use in their first cases advanced gameplay elements that are introduced gradually in DR1 (whose first case is maybe even TOO EASY in terms of gameplay elements).
But I wouldn't say the games are that di
-- Message too long, Autoquote has been Snipped --
Where do you guys stand on another lengthy VN series that I haven't played, Umineko?
One of my friends who is/was a big fan of 07th from Higurashi and followed the Umineko games as they released said that the finale of the game felt like a bit of a thematic slap in the face, as if the game was chiding you for so eagerly pursuing these morbid mysteries in the first place.
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| | "Re(3):Re(10):Triple threat of despair" , posted Sun 6 Jan 03:12
quote:
I haven't played Umineko for an incredible dumb reason. I can't take seriously the art style, like, I don't know if the game is a big joke or what, specially when sometimes the characters are showing their teeths
You mean the original art style? If so, yes, I think it looks very ugly. But it's possible to swap it for a more conventional art style, done by another artist (the original art was done by the same guy who wrote the VN, if I remember correctly, while the new art is from a different artist), and in my opinion it looks very beautiful, even if a little generic.
Maybe I'm this person right in front of you... nah probably not though.
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| PSN: DefensorVirtuoso
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Wii: n/a
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| "Re(4):Re(10):Triple threat of despair" , posted Wed 9 Jan 01:48
quote:
I haven't played Umineko for an incredible dumb reason. I can't take seriously the art style, like, I don't know if the game is a big joke or what, specially when sometimes the characters are showing their teeths
You mean the original art style? If so, yes, I think it looks very ugly. But it's possible to swap it for a more conventional art style, done by another artist (the original art was done by the same guy who wrote the VN, if I remember correctly, while the new art is from a different artist), and in my opinion it looks very beautiful, even if a little generic.
Is [url=https://www.mangagamer.com/user_data/tmp/screenshots/20160606151454.png
]this the original art style? Because I was always confused when people talked about how great the Umineko games were while sharing what looked like a terrible parody of a deviantart artist who likes to draw Sonic OC
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| PSN: zonepharaoh
XBL: n/a
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| "Vanillaware prologue: Atlus' revenge" , posted Wed 9 Jan 03:59:
Typically, Vanillaware items warrant their own thread at the Cafe, but until the awfully named 13 Sentinals: Something Or Other makes some progress, into Random it goes! I don't really understand what's been going on, but I'm perfectly happy to assume Iggy is right and blame Atlus.
Anyway! Atlus' Vanillaware hostage site indicates that a promo video comes out on January 10, and on March 14 (give it to your girlfriend for White Day, but only if you're not sure you like her) you can buy the 13 Sentinals Prologue, which is a 3 hour demo, a 36 page artbook, PS4 avatars (hooray), and a 10-song mini-soundtrack...for 2980 yen.
Uh. I don't know how you go about selling people a paid demo with an artbook and music for the demo that people do not yet know they like because they have not yet bought the demo. Did they...run out of cash? Want to prove the project still exists?
At least the paid demos for FFVII and VIII had the good taste to come coupled with a free game like Tobal or Musashiden!
人間はいつも私を驚かせてくれる。不思議なものだな、人間という存在は．．．
[this message was edited by Maou on Wed 9 Jan 05:38] |
| PSN: BadoorSNK(forPSVITA:BadoorUSA)
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| "Re(1):Vanillaware prologue: Atlus' revenge" , posted Wed 9 Jan 05:37
quote:
Typically, Vanillaware items warrant their own their own thread at the Cafe, but until the awfully named 13 Sentinals: Something Or Other makes some progress, into Random it goes! I don't really understand what's been going on, but I'm perfectly happy to assume Iggy is right and blame Atlus.
Anyway! Atlus' Vanillaware hostage site indicates that promo video comes out on January 10, and on March 14 (give it to your girlfriend for White Day, but only if you're not sure you like her) you can buy the 13 Sentinals Prologue, which is a 3 hour demo, a 36 page artbook, PS4 avatars (hooray), and a 10-song mini-soundtrack...for 2980 yen.
Uh. I don't know how you go about selling people a paid demo with and artbook and music for the demo that people do not yet know they like because they have not yet bought the demo. Did they...run out of cash? Want to prove the project still exists?
That is really weird. It seems you can also get the demo on its own (and some whatever PS4 theme) for 980Y, or get that with Dragon Crown Pro or Odin Sphere on PS4, so that sounds a little bit more sensible (and I might get Dragon's Crown Pro this way since I only have it on Vita). But this type of "paid demo" did happen before for Gran Turismo 5, Metal Gear Solid V, and Final Fantasy XIII, all games known to have had very long arduous development (these examples are for more recent years after downloadable demos and content became the norm, so Zone Of The Enders doesn't count)
At least it still looks very pretty as expected.
http://100daysofmegashock.wordpress.com/
http://badoorsnk.wordpress.com/
pretzelmotion.com
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| PSN: Gojira_X
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CFN: Gojira
| "Re(5):Re(10):Triple threat of despair" , posted Wed 9 Jan 11:47:
So wait, if Prologue comes with those games where does that leave those of us who already own them?
quote:
I haven't played Umineko for an incredible dumb reason. I can't take seriously the art style, like, I don't know if the game is a big joke or what, specially when sometimes the characters are showing their teeths
You mean the original art style? If so, yes, I think it looks very ugly. But it's possible to swap it for a more conventional art style, done by another artist (the original art was done by the same guy who wrote the VN, if I remember correctly, while the new art is from a different artist), and in my opinion it looks very beautiful, even if a little generic.
Is [url=https://www.mangagamer.com/user_data/tmp/screenshots/20160606151454.png
]this the original art style? Because I was always confused when people talked about how great the Umineko games were while sharing what looked like a terrible parody of a deviantart artist who likes to draw Sonic OC
Yeah Ryuukishi07 didn't have the most advanced art style but he did write the entire scenario for this and the Higurashi series.
It actually worked in Higurashi's favor because when you see a screenshot like this you're not really expecting such a mature, fucked up story. Or at least before Higurashi existed you didn't.
But then Umineko happened and the twist was pretty much expected at that point. The art style didn't help it anymore.
[this message was edited by Gojira on Wed 9 Jan 11:52] |
| PSN: DefensorVirtuoso
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| "Re(7):Re(10):Triple Vanillaware of despair" , posted Thu 10 Jan 04:53
The paid demo stuff doesn't convince me for a Vanillaware game, unless it's like the dlc of Muramasa where the 3 hours episode could actually get a lot of mileage thanks to the overall difficulty of it plus the extras of trying them with other characters. but if is just the normally easy first stages it would be terrible
Since we are speaking of Vanillaware, I want to give my take on their 3 most famous games
Muramasa is a masterpiece, but from a gameplay, and artistic point of view, I really love everything in that game, specially how great is to master the games to the point of beating them with only 1hp.
After that I tried playing Dragon's Crown and Odin Sphere Leifthrasir, but my issues with DC is that I don't find that interesting the gameplay loop on that game, plus I think that too much stuff happens on screen, and in OS case I don't like the more RPG approach that the game has, where some actions slow down the action, plus overall I prefer the "open world" aspect of Muramasa over the stages in Odin Sphere
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| | "Re(2):Re(10):Triple Vanillaware of Catherine" , posted Sat 12 Jan 17:21
quote:
Ishmael's memory of the Dragon's Crown Dwarf AKA Iggy is correct. For me, Dragon's Crown is like Nier or Wander and the Colossus: the game is so infinitely excellent that when people bring up minor technical problems it's like they're speaking another language and I have no idea what they are talking about. Unfortunately, I can't really conceive of playing the game again without my eternal team leader, Toxico. 
Speaking of Atlus, I see that Catherine is available on PC, finally! I'm very interested in the story but I am not sure about gothic horror and I'm frankly not very good at Puyo Puyo or Lumines, let alone Q-bert. Can I survive this sheepish gauntlet??
Catherine has a wonderfully mature bunch of stores in certain endings, a bunch of "lolwat" endings that are clearly wankery, a plot twist common to all threads that is mostly dumb, and a really great aesthetic even when the ordinary shading of the puzzle parts seems to weirdly clash with the aesthetic of the characters. All that said, in the original release, a few of the levels were really quite hard, but one of the very peculiar things about the game is that the game is very much about learning block manipulation techniques. And I don't mean special abilities, I mean algorithms. In fact, one of the algorithms you get taught much later in the game would borderline trivialize some of the earlier levels, but if you really thought things through, it's entirely possible you'd figure out that algorithm out all by yourself.
So in conclusion the most important things remains that Steam lets you refund any game no question asked if you play fewer than 2 hours of it and request the refund within two weeks of purchase.
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| | "Re(2):Zer0Ranger and STGs" , posted Sat 19 Jan 04:16
quote:
The best STG I have played in quite a while is Zer0Ranger, which was released last year on PC:
Link Here....
Being a home-platform first STG that doesn't have a particular pedigree, it's able to look at progression systems from other games and adopt them in ways that fit it, rather than just trying to find some way to grant infinite continues over the course of 10 hours like so many other arcade-first STGs did in their home ports.
I always appreciate when this type of game makes an effort to keep you from ruining your own experience with infinite lives/continues.
Could you go into a little more detail on how they do this? Is it using a checkpoint system?
The game takes a bunch of cues from Dark Souls in having a MYSTERIOUS STORY with MYSTERIOUS UNEXPLAINED THINGS that connect to game mechanics, such as the entirely unexplained continue mechanic (you earn more continues from the cumulative score of your recent game over, but the game presents this progression with a BIG VISUAL but without explaining it because it connects to MYSTERIOUS STORY), or how at the end of each level, you get to pick one of two subweapons, but these subweapons are entirely unexplained in what they will do, which sounds very annoying... but this is alleviated by the fact that whenever you start a new game, you can choose to start at any stage you have reached and you can choose your loadout from what you would normally have available by that stage. So if you merely wish to clear the game and see all the levels, the game makes a lot of concessions to help you do so, and the "you'll find out more after you die" is very in tune with the metanarratives popularized in the era following Dark Souls, Undertale, etc.
However, unlike classic STGs (with the exception of that one horrible final level in that one old arcade STG that might've been Strikers or Gunbird or Aero Fighters where when you continue you start at the start of the level!!!!!), when you continue in Zer0Ranger you will resume not exactly where you died, but at the last "checkpoint" of the stage, which prevents you from straight hammering your way through the game with continues: you need to at least be able to beat each section of each stage with 2 or 3 lives. While score attack is a part of the game, looking for ways to make the challenge of the game manageable with a sense of meaningful advancement I think is important for the larger audience.
The game does not go in the direction of the "buy upgrades from the store" that a lot of other STGs (and infamously, "euroshooters") did as a means of progression. I really enjoyed a number of games which have that, but the very carefully crafted levels of this game wouldn't be served well with that. The game is also not a pure danmaku game: it has a sense of different level environments which allow for unique obstacles that are not bullets (which I vastly prefer to pure danmaku!), and even the big waves of bullets are not very dense. Having a sense of zone environments is important for the storytelling elements of the game, which is something I find pure danmaku games lose out on.
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| | "Re(3):Astral Chain" , posted Thu 14 Feb 19:23:
quote:
Astral Chain Holy cow, a game with Katsura "Video Girl Ai" Katsura and Taura "Half of Nier Automata" Takahisa, and no one told me about it?! I went from excited that someone was making a long-overdue sequel to Astal on Sega Saturn, to disappointment that of course that was untrue and that I cannot read, to excitement again.
Hello friends.
It's so nice to feel the warm familiar glow of the Cafe. Lately I've been wandering the wastelands of Twitter, righting wrongs (or is that "writing wrongs" :D) and sharing information on cool games and art with those who seek asylum from the bottomless maw of the hate mongering beast that is Social Media.
I've just put together a long thread on this very game. Since my blog has gone completely kaput I've been using Twitter as if it were a blogging platform. It's ... sort of working!
Please check out my thread on Astral Chain!
https://twitter.com/Richmond_Lee/status/1095930379075108864
In this thread I discuss:
-How the game recalls Katsura's past work!
-How Katsura's work has long been influenced by other luminaries such as Nirasawa, Keita Amemiya, Takayuki Takyea and Katsuya Terada (can you believe they all went to school together???)
-How the closest parallel to how this game plays is probably not any JoJo title but rather Konami's PS2 sleeper, Sword of Etherea
-How the player character works for an organization called "Neuron" and how their being chained to their "Legion" (the stand thing) visually parallels the physical makeup of Neurons chained together.
Please feel free to leave all your responses here, in this gentle and civilized place.
www.art-eater.com
[this message was edited by nobinobita on Thu 14 Feb 19:24] |
| | "Re(4):Astral Chain+more bugs" , posted Fri 15 Feb 01:02
Oz!!! My favourite Konami game since, I don't know, Goemon 2 or something.
I was not really keen on Astral Chain because Katsura "what year is it" Masakazu, but you mentioning it could play like Oz prevents me posting more negativity in case you'd be right.
It's bad Oz is stuck on PS2 (too old to be easily remastered like a PS3 game, too recent to be available on Vita or elsewhere like most PS1 games)(also no one bought it)(also Konami), because I loved the game. In terms of low-budget beat'm all, it's in the middle between Sokaigi's style-over-total-suckiness and God Hand's fantastic-gameplay-on-a-shoestring-budget. I can't remember who developed it? What are they doing now? I wish them well.
As for Astral Chain, I suppose the angle is "for tokusatsu fans that are also 40 years old or more"? Then Katsura Masakazu makes sense. I guess.
So weird, though.
I also like that they announce that instead of showing more Bayo3. That means they're spending more time to make Bayo3 even better, and chances are the game will be pushed back to 2020 and will avoid a crash course with DMC5 that no game would have benefited from. Take your time. Make good games.
--------------
Speaking of good games, I am ecstatic that Hollow Knight's new-playable-character turned extra DLC campaign mega-evolved into screw this, let's make an entire new game around her.
I'm so happy! It looks so pretty! She's so great!
Also, what's that voice sample. Is she Chinese/Japanese? She's great. I'm so happy.
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| | "Re(5):Astral Chain vs. Shin Nobi" , posted Fri 15 Feb 04:17:
quote:
“Confused Americans are more intent on attacking ‘sexualized’ characters than considering the psychotic violence at the core of AAA Western game design!”
I know this is nitpicking an isolated part of a joke, but just in terms of aesthetics I really dislike the shorts on the female cop. You also put "sexualized" in quotes, but I think it would be tough to argue that this artist hasn't made a deliberate choice that fits his personal design philosophy.
Maybe it's my personal perspective, but shorts on high-tech armored battle-cops doesn't really work for me. In most media I've seen, shorts on cops are usually played for laughs (the evocatively and provocatively named Jim Dangle on Reno 911, an episode of Corner Gas where the cops impractically get bikes to patrol their rural town and Davis starts walking around with distractingly sexy shorts). In summary, what type of cops usually wear shorts? Bike cops. And a cop pedaling down the sidewalk in their shorts automatically gets a 88% respect penalty and a 120% susceptibility to ridicule.
Now, I freely admit to enjoying sexy designs. But to be honest, this woman's uniform(?) just strikes me as doofy. I'm not going to demand "realistic" character designs across all media in all cases, but to me the shorts make her looks a) less professional, b) less capable, and c) more childish.
Sure, we needn't be slaves to logic and practicality in escapist media (as we often aren't in real life)... but like, is the armor on her torso so heavy that she has to shave off a pound by ditching pants? Is this supposed to "enhance her mobility"?
Showing more skin isn't even a great way of visually differentiating the characters IMO, since the designs are otherwise so similar (I get it, they're all cops and the main characters are twins, but still). There were multiple times in the trailer when the scene went from the woman to the guy which had me temporarily think that he was wearing the shorts in the family.
I'm not going to ask Katsura Masakazu not to draw butts, as he's clearly pretty good at it. For a female future cop, this design just doesn't look cool.
With that out of the way, gameplay does look somewhat promising. I have always liked rope/chain mechanics in games.
/ / /
[this message was edited by Mosquiton on Fri 15 Feb 04:35] |
| PSN: zonepharaoh
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| "Re(2):Castlevania just keeps getting staked" , posted Wed 20 Mar 12:57
quote:
Finally Symphony of the Night on Nintendo.
Don't count your chips yet! While the logical final four entries would be Nocturne/SOTN, Rondo, Vampire Killer/Bloodlines, and Minuet/Aria, the entirely illogical inclusion of the second Game Boy game (!?!?!) shows that there's an equally likely chance of the tragic but extremely funny selection of Lament of Innocence, Dracula XX, Concerto/Harmony of Dissonance, and Judgment.
This actually fits with their "classics that defined the series" tagline, you know: Lament defined how to fail to upstage the DMC series that borrowed your own Dracula in 3D aesthetic; Dracula XX defined how not to design a port, a 2D Dracula game, or a last-generation SFC game in 1995; Concerto defined how not to design a Metroidvania or a soundtrack in any way, shape, or fashion; and Judgment defined for the fans exactly how intelligent Konami deemed them.
Even if it's bad for games preservation, I do appreciate how Konami will almost certainly continue their own Nintendo-will-never-release-Mother-3-in-English joke by ensuring that Vampire Killer is never, ever available anywhere, ever again.
人間はいつも私を驚かせてくれる。不思議なものだな、人間という存在は．．．
|
| | "Re(3):Castlevania just keeps getting staked" , posted Wed 20 Mar 13:11
quote:
Finally Symphony of the Night on Nintendo. Don't count your chips yet! While the logical final four entries would be Nocturne/SOTN, Rondo, Vampire Killer/Bloodlines, and Minuet/Aria, the entirely illogical inclusion of the second Game Boy game (!?!?!) shows that there's an equally likely chance of the tragic but extremely funny selection of Lament of Innocence, Dracula XX, Concerto/Harmony of Dissonance, and Judgment.
This actually fits with their "classics that defined the series" tagline, you know: Lament defined how to fail to upstage the DMC series that borrowed your own Dracula in 3D aesthetic; Dracula XX defined how not to design a port, a 2D Dracula game, or a last-generation SFC game in 1995; Concerto defined how not to design a Metroidvania or a soundtrack in any way, shape, or fashion; and Judgment defined for the fans exactly how intelligent Konami deemed them.
Even if it's bad for games preservation, I do appreciate how Konami will almost certainly continue their own Nintendo-will-never-release-Mother-3-in-English joke by ensuring that Vampire Killer is never, ever available anywhere, ever again.
I think the real proof that Konami hates its customers and is evil and abusive is that they want to make us pay for Haunted Castle as it is one of the games in the Arcade Classics collection.
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| | "Re(4):Castlevania just keeps getting staked" , posted Thu 21 Mar 04:52
quote:
Finally Symphony of the Night on Nintendo. Don't count your chips yet! While the logical final four entries would be Nocturne/SOTN, Rondo, Vampire Killer/Bloodlines, and Minuet/Aria, the entirely illogical inclusion of the second Game Boy game (!?!?!) shows that there's an equally likely chance of the tragic but extremely funny selection of Lament of Innocence, Dracula XX, Concerto/Harmony of Dissonance, and Judgment.
This actually fits with their "classics that defined the series" tagline, you know: Lament defined how to fail to upstage the DMC series that borrowed your own Dracula in 3D aesthetic; Dracula XX defined how not to design a port, a 2D Dracula game, or a last-generation SFC game in 1995; Concerto defined how not to design a Metroidvania or a soundtrack in any way, shape, or fashion; and Judgment defined for the fans exactly how intelligent Konami deemed them.
Even if it's bad for games preservation, I do appreciate how Konami will almost certainly continue their own Nintendo-will-never-release-Mother-3-in-English joke by ensuring that Vampire Killer is never, ever available anywhere, ever again.
I think the real proof that Konami hates its customers and is evil and abusive is that they want to make us pay for Haunted Castle as it is one of the games in the Arcade Classics collection.
Am I the only person that enjoyed Lament of Innocence? I wouldn't expect anyone to say it's their favorite Castlevania, but it's a far cry from the awful 3D Castlevanias on Nintendo 64. Sure, it's short and the map isn't incredibly sophisticated, but the gameplay is competent (even if it's derivative and not-too-deep they did have a decent 'perfect guard' mechanic). It's pretty enough for a PS2 game, with some nice lighting and colors, and you can unlock the main villain and play through again with a different move set.
And I liked a lot of the soundtrack! Some weird and not-so-great tunes that lean way too hard into electronica, but it sometimes works pretty well.
/ / /
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| PSN: zonepharaoh
XBL: n/a
Wii: n/a
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CFN: zonepharaoh
| "Re(4):Mosquiton of Innocence" , posted Thu 21 Mar 13:53
quote:
Lament of Innocence
Actually, I have no particular beef with this game...I never played it, and I'm not sure many other people did, either! It's probably totally fine, just an ironically "defining moment in the series" where it became clear that not only did Konami not know how to sell its Metroidvanias in Japan, it also had no idea how to recreate the flash and fun of Capcom's DMC not-quite-Dracula series that had completely stolen from and upstaged it. On the other hand, things might've been different if it had the N64 version's motorcycle skeletons...
quote:
I think the real proof that Konami hates its customers and is evil and abusive is that they want to make us pay for Haunted Castle as it is one of the games in the Arcade Classics collection.
The funniest part is that in a website full of hilarious and elaborate 1980s America styled descriptions of each game, literally all they could find to say about the game was "The arcade version of Castlevania which bewitched the fans with its haunting graphics."
quote:
I could see the covering up to Rondo for the first Castlevania collection to signify the Classicvania era, while leaving the Metroidvania era as another installment.
Watch out! Konami Dracula has spies all over the world who are plotting the newest ways to make you suffer. As punishment for your misplaced hope you shall instead have in the final four slots: the first Game Boy game, Circle of the Moon, N64 Dracula, and of course the arcade version.
人間はいつも私を驚かせてくれる。不思議なものだな、人間という存在は．．．
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| PSN: ShikyohMukuro
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| "Re(5):Castlevania just keeps getting staked" , posted Thu 21 Mar 22:03
quote:
Finally Symphony of the Night on Nintendo. Don't count your chips yet! While the logical final four entries would be Nocturne/SOTN, Rondo, Vampire Killer/Bloodlines, and Minuet/Aria, the entirely illogical inclusion of the second Game Boy game (!?!?!) shows that there's an equally likely chance of the tragic but extremely funny selection of Lament of Innocence, Dracula XX, Concerto/Harmony of Dissonance, and Judgment.
This actually fits with their "classics that defined the series" tagline, you know: Lament defined how to fail to upstage the DMC series that borrowed your own Dracula in 3D aesthetic; Dracula XX defined how not to design a port, a 2D Dracula game, or a last-generation SFC game in 1995; Concerto defined how not to design a Metroidvania or a soundtrack in any way, shape, or fashion; and Judgment defined for the fans exactly how intelligent Konami deemed them.
Even if it's bad for games preservation, I do appreciate how Konami will almost certainly continue their own Nintendo-will-never-release-Mother-3-in-English joke by ensuring that Vampire Killer is never, ever available anywhere, ever again.
I think the real proof that Konami hates its customers and is evil and abusive is that they want to make us pay for Haunted Castle as it is one of the games in the Arcade Classics collection.
Am I the only person that enjoyed Lament of Innocence? I
-- Message too long, Autoquote has been Snipped --
Well, it was great to start, but got repetitive in both combat and level design. However, music kept me playing. So I decided to weigh it out.
Long Live I AM!
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| PSN: gekijmo
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| "Devil May Cry 5 ramblings" , posted Fri 29 Mar 11:53
I got Devil May Cry 5 the other week and was able to play through Devil Hunter (normal) and Son of Sparda (hard) fairly quickly. I was even able to go through Human (easy) to clean up blue orbs, secret missions, and easily get the “get S rank in all missions” trophy.
After typing this all up I am sorry for its length, but is pretty much all my thoughts on the game.
My first thought was how easy I found the game on normal and hard. I am no DMC expert, but nothing was too frustrating; I was reminded how I found Bayonetta 2 much easier than Bayonetta 1. Even the secret missions felt very easy. Part of that is due to the fact that the game is very generous with gold orbs (continues). They are sprinkled throughout the game and you are given a gold orb every day for logging in. Other people can gift you gold orbs by rating your performance as “stylish” (more on that later). I didn’t feel compelled to play it safe on a few bosses due to the over abundance of gold orbs so I would just power through with no concern for rating. I have 30 Gold Orbs on my game now. I think over the last 16 years I have been playing DMC I have had 30 Gold Orbs on hand in total across the various games. In addition to gold orbs, you can buy continues with red orbs, but the cost increases with each continue per level, but the cost will reset when you go to a new mission. Another interesting change is that you can no longer buy green stars to manually refill your life during the game. You can still come across green orbs on stages and Nero has an item that can manually give him health.
The second thing I noticed was that the game felt really short. The first couple of stages are linear tutorial levels and 3 or 4 stages are just boss fights. That is part of the reason I was able to go through the game 3.5 times in a short period of time.
The stages themselves were uninspired overall with a smattering of interesting ideas. The early stages have an abandoned city overrun with demon roots and human husks, but that is not fully fleshed out. The later part of the game is generic “demonic hallways.” I know this genre breaks down to “hallways to battle arenas,” but I would have liked to have seen some more personality, especially in the later part of the game. By and large the stages are extremely linear with almost no puzzles like in earlier DMC games. The closest thing to a consistent puzzle is grabbing hatchlings to dissolve demonic roots. Finding the hatchling is almost never a challenge. There are one or two segments of the game where Nero needs to use his wire snatch to traverse the level. One interesting thing that isn’t expanded on is that Nero needs to use his rocket arm to traverse up an incline in order to reach a secret mission and blue orb. I would have liked to have seen that a few more times with some of the different arms. Like, he would need to use his time control arm to freeze platforms that move too quickly or something else creative. V can access secret routes by summoning his devil trigger which will knock through certain walls. However, there are few of those. I would have liked to have seen V and Nero get a couple more unique stages to flesh out those possibilities.
As for the characters themselves, they play great for the most part (I have some issues with V). Nero’s main change is of course his devil breaker arms. Each one is very unique which adds a whole new level of depth to his gameplay. By not allowing the player to switch arms at will like with Dante’s weapons you have to learn the intricacies of your currently equipped arm or just destroy it manually for a decent amount of damage to equip an arm you are more familiar with. Dante’s styles are fairly unchanged from his DMC4 set. It feels like Royal Guard is more forgiving now, or maybe I am just more used to it. His new weapons each have a unique feel that makes every encounter fresh if you choose to mix it up. V is an interesting concept, but could have been given a bit more to work with. The character itself seemed interesting on first glance; the weak guy who needed a cane to get around and had to use summons to fight. On the prologue stage you see V ride away on a black mist and I thought that would be how he would get around in general, but when you get to play as V, he walks and jumps like a regular character and the black mist he rides is his dash you need to purchase. V’s combat is pretty tricky as you are controlling Griffon and Shadow simultaneously and if you aren’t paying attention to your movement, you might input a special attack by mistake. For example, if you walk back while holding R1 to target an enemy that is far away and press Griffon you will summon Griffon back to you to do his sphere attack. If you double jump Griffon is summoned back to you and if you dodge Shadow is summoned back to you as he is the black mist you ride. Griffon and Shadow can be made to do attacks by themselves at the cost of Devil Trigger gauge which is a good tactic on earlier difficulties, but I am unsure how that would work on harder modes. The devil trigger summon, Nightmare, will attack by itself, but you can also ride it and control its specific attacks. However, since it is so slow I just let it do its own thing. V’s style gauge is also very lax. I got my first “SSS” combo with him and I feel like I was just mashing.
There is a light online co-op feature that happens in a handful of stages where you MIGHT see another character controlled by another player. For the most part you will see them in a background as some stages run parallel to each other in the story. In one specific mission you can possibly play with the character in the same stages. At the end of mission you can rate the player’s performance as stylish to reward them with a gold orb. It has been speculated that this feature will transfer over to bloody palace much like what Bayonetta 2 did.
Overall, I really liked the game and is most definitely worth a rental if that is still viable for you. I probably should have held off until the game was $30. It is great to see a lot of the more experienced players really go into the mechanics and do great stuff with the dodging and parry systems. I wish the story was fleshed out a bit more too, but that has been a problem with the mainline DMC series since day 1. You get an intro that sets up the concept, a revelation in the middle, a resolution at the end. Between those three points the main character has banter with boss battles between those three points usually to get new weapons. There are a couple more things in DMC5, but not much to really expand of the characters.
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| PSN: zonepharaoh
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| "Re(1):Re: MegaDrive Mini by M2! Yuzo Koshiro " , posted Sat 30 Mar 22:29
M2 on emulation?! HOT HOT HOT
And with 40 titles instead of 20ish, Sega goes the extra mile, in their scrappy way, just like they always did in their console days. quote:
Forgot to mention, includes Castlevania: Bloodlines!
Amazing! Official advertising copy: “Konami still hates you, but we don’t!”
I am sorry about the likely lack of Mega CD games since the glorious but expensive era of NEC and Sega add-ons is the least preserved. I’d buy 8 copies of this thing if it contained Lunar and especially the superior original version of Lunar 2, Popful Mail, Shining Force CD, Sonic CD, Keio Flying Squadron, and of course TIME GAL.
人間はいつも私を驚かせてくれる。不思議なものだな、人間という存在は．．．
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| "Re(2):Re: MegaDrive Mini by M2! Yuzo Koshiro" , posted Sat 30 Mar 23:18:
Segata Sanshiro himself sings his theme on-stage
quote:
M2 on emulation?! HOT HOT HOT
And with 40 titles instead of 20ish, Sega goes the extra mile, in their scrappy way, just like they always did in their console days. Forgot to mention, includes Castlevania: Bloodlines!
Amazing! Official advertising copy: “Konami still hates you, but we don’t!”
I am sorry about the likely lack of Mega CD games since the glorious but expensive era of NEC and Sega add-ons is the least preserved. I’d buy 8 copies of this thing if it contained Lunar and especially the superior original version of Lunar 2, Popful Mail, Shining Force CD, Sonic CD, Keio Flying Squadron, and of course TIME GAL.
Well, for Sega-CD, there's always the Analogue Mega SG to fill that niche, which uses FPGA.
[this message was edited by sfried on Sat 30 Mar 23:22] |
| PSN: zonepharaoh
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| "Re(3):Re: MegaDrive Mini by M2! Yuzo Koshiro" , posted Sat 30 Mar 23:55:
quote:
Segata Sanshiro himself sings his theme on-stage
Further proof that whether it was the MCD, the arcade-perfect Saturn RAM cart, or the first modem-equipped system, Sega was too advancd for its time and too good for this world.quote:
Well, for Sega-CD, there's always the Analogue Mega SG to fill that niche, which uses FPGA.
True, but like 8Bitdo's system, it involves hooking up your retro console to the original hulking MCD, which not only looks really stupid, but also involves using the original discs. I just want a MCD and PCE Duo-only CD mini system! quote:
Come to think of it, has there ever been a good puzzle in DMC?
That one time I accidentally played through DMC1, I mostly remember orbs gravitating towards me and running like a bat out of hell through the world's simplest dungeons. The biggest puzzle was when the Magma Spider would appear again. I enjoyed Gekiganger's review!
人間はいつも私を驚かせてくれる。不思議なものだな、人間という存在は．．．
[this message was edited by Maou on Sun 31 Mar 01:53] |
| | "Re(1):Devil May Cry 5 ramblings" , posted Sun 31 Mar 06:49
quote:
My first thought was how easy I found the game on normal and hard. I am no DMC expert, but nothing was too frustrating; I was reminded how I found Bayonetta 2 much easier than Bayonetta 1. Even the secret missions felt very easy.
One of the really curious differences between Bayo 1 and 2 is just how much harder the little bonus fight portals were in Bayo 1. Bayo 1 had fights with crazy restrictions like how many times you could attack in the fight, never touching the ground, etc. and the difficulty level of these wasn't really matched in any way by their counterpart in Bayo 2. I don't feel like it's because I was a dramatically better player of the game in Bayo 2, either! The mission requirements just weren't as exacting!
I also think that no DMC game will ever be as hard as DMC3's initial North American release, which started you off at the Hard difficulty of the japanese version, and if you game overed a few times and agreed to tone down the difficulty... it merely brought it down to DMC3 japanese normal difficulty!
I do think it's a bit of an interesting question about how "hard" a game such as this ought to be. If it's really difficult, the average player will never get the chance to feel that cool playing the game because they are struggling to survive. If it's too easy or the game is too generous with its continue mechanic, players like me who aren't really into the score attack feel like we can't "continue" without trivializing the game. Give me my limited lives and checkpoint continues!
quote:
good puzzles in DMC
Sometimes I think where the RE roots of DMC really show aren't in the attempts at a stat progression system (which would be executed much better in Onimusha, however similar their design is!), but in the nonsensical puzzles that largely consist of bringing an odd engraving into an odd socket.
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| | "Re(3):Re:Daigyakuten meets Shiren meets Akima" , posted Wed 10 Apr 04:43
quote:
Hmmm, maybe instead of "unfair," it would be better to say "unkind." A game like Fuurai is predictable and "fair" in that a given floor and its monsters will always follow the same rules, and that when things go badly, it's either player error or a particularly unlucky set of monster and trap layouts all lining up at once. But I think you can see from the article that what he's getting at is that roguelikes can be gloriously cruel in a thrilling way based on their irreversible nature and the unpredictable exact arrangement of floors. I think this is still in the realm of both "bad luck" and "fairness" based on a floor's set parameters.
I haven't played a lot of other roguelikes because Fuurai is the only roguelike and the only game I will ever need, but I do think it strikes a nice balance between the pure roguelike's utter destruction of experience and inventory when you die, and a gradually more accomodating world resulting from helping NPCs who help you in towns in later runs.
I do think that the rescue code feature of the DS version of Shiren is really cool, though!
One of the aspects of "fairness" I think is the perception of justified punishment: when you get into a situation where failure is insurmountable due to circumstances out of your control (e.g. super unlucky trap + monster placement combined with inadequate tools when you entered), it feels unjustified to receive the same extremely harsh punishment as when you failed at something that was within your means. While that can be entirely true of real life and somewhat fits within the worldview of the game, it can definitely feel annoying and make it feel like the game wasted your time by randomly deciding that your run just ends NOW, when the game otherwise is so strongly about you learning how to overcome the obstacles before you with the rules that the game has. There's a fine line between "even experienced wanderers can face unexpected defeat" and "experience is irrelevant HAHA YOU DIED" in terms of atmosphere, and it's one which any randomly generated game has to reconcile in some way.
In the worst case, the roguelike just feels like a slot machine, which enters a level of nihilism that makes you feel as though the game is not worth experiencing at all, and that overwhelmingly undermines any other feeling/message/experience the roguelike could possibly convey.
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| PSN: zonepharaoh
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| "Re(5):Re:Daigyakuten meets Shiren meets Akima" , posted Wed 10 Apr 16:05
quote:
I do think that the rescue code feature of the DS version of Shiren is really cool, though!
It's true! The balance and item placement are all out of whack in the DS version, but the rescues were tons of fun. I went on a lot of Fuurai boards and traded rescue codes, sometimes heroically saving others (but usually dying instead). It's way easier to exchange info on the smart phone versions, and there are legions of helpful rescuers on the otherwise useless twitter, too!
quote:
One of the aspects of "fairness" I think is the perception of justified punishment: when you get into a situation where failure is insurmountable due to circumstances out of your control (e.g. super unlucky trap + monster placement combined with inadequate tools when you entered), it feels unjustified to receive the same extremely harsh punishment as when you failed at something that was within your means.
I think what keeps this particular one mostly fair is that since the monsters on a given floor are always the same, you know which are "bad floors" and can plan accordingly for them, and thus don't feel cheated when encountering a particularly dangerous mix that seems like a fact of life on those floors...I feel more like a sheepish, thrill-seeking bank robber who inevitably got caught. Only the occasional Monster Houses and rust traps truly annoy me.
quote:
sometimes no matter how much you prepare, you're not ready.
Not if you're completely crazy (hello!) and do entire sacrificial runs with the plan of gathering good swords and shields to leave in warehouses to later weld together into the ultimate equipment, leaving yourself literally empty-handed and facing certain doom once you've made the drop-off.
人間はいつも私を驚かせてくれる。不思議なものだな、人間という存在は．．．
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| PSN: KTallguy
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| "Re(6):Re:Daigyakuten meets Shiren meets Akima" , posted Thu 11 Apr 11:42
quote:
I think what keeps this particular one mostly fair is that since the monsters on a given floor are always the same, you know which are "bad floors" and can plan accordingly for them, and thus don't feel cheated when encountering a particularly dangerous mix that seems like a fact of life on those floors...I feel more like a sheepish, thrill-seeking bank robber who inevitably got caught. Only the occasional Monster Houses and rust traps truly annoy me.
First off, what an incredible article. Thanks for sharing.
I try my best to balance leveling up Shiren and avoiding death, but I feel like you really have to ride that edge hard to be strong enough to survive... especially when the sun sets on the later levels and I'm left shivering in a corner as things go bump in the night. I should give it another go but so far, once I get to the crazy day/night levels I usually get destroyed.
quote:
You mean the anime or the third game (Danganronpa V3)? If it's the former, sorry to say that its plot twists are quite frustrating (and they kinda ruin one major plot point of the second game). If it's the latter, you'll either find the main twists the most brilliant idea ever or the most stupid one (personally, I thought they were brilliant).
I haven't watched any of the anime, I'm on the 3rd game. Your words truly excite me! :)
I like silly Metal Gear Solid style twists so as long as it's ridiculous enough I'll probably enjoy it!
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| PSN: gekijmo
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| "Capcom UK hinting at something (AvP footage)" , posted Tue 16 Apr 00:38
Link Here
Looks like a possible arcade package. Got some Darkstalkers, Shoot em ups, SF2 and AvP out of nowhere. It would be great to finally have AvP at home to play (outside of an emulator).
quote:
Thanks for the write-up on DMC5! At some point I'm going to have to give the game a try since the action looks too entertaining to pass up.
The orb system in DMC has always felt to me like something left over from it's initial development as an RE game. There has to be some penalty for getting killed but the miserly way it handed out gold orbs felt like something more suited for a survival horror game. Since the series has developed into being about doing combination attacks while doing handstands and other ridiculousness it seems odd that it is still using such a rough progression system. I guess the developers feel the same way and have given up and simply starting handing out gold orbs as login bonuses.
Come to think of it, has there ever been a good puzzle in DMC? When I think back on the sections that were designed to break up the combat I can't think of one that was truly memorable. It's a shame to hear that DMC5 mostly turns into an exercise in running from one similar environment to another. But if it means none of the characters have to climb into a turret like poor Bayonetta it may be a blessing.
In the long run, I really don't mind that continues are easier to get in DMC, maybe they could just do the point penalty and leave it at that and not have the player waster red orbs on continues.
I recently replayed DMC 1 and realized "puzzles" usually just amount to you hitting that wall dial to get something going and are on a time limit. Which made me realize that there are NO wall dials in DMC5. I think a first for the mainline series. Every now and then there is a "pay attention to which path you need to take or you will restart" puzzle. Follow in floating light in DMC1 and follow the light source of the shadows in DMC4. Puzzles overall are a fluff piece in DMC that really just drag the game to a crawl if you don't know what you are looking for.
quote:
I also think that no DMC game will ever be as hard as DMC3's initial North American release, which started you off at the Hard difficulty of the japanese version, and if you game overed a few times and agreed to tone down the difficulty... it merely brought it down to DMC3 japanese normal difficulty!
I do think it's a bit of an interesting question about how "hard" a game such as this ought to be. If it's really difficult, the average player will never get the chance to feel that cool playing the game because they are struggling to survive. If it's too easy or the game is too generous with its continue mechanic, players like me who aren't really into the score attack feel like we can't "continue" without trivializing the game. Give me my limited lives and checkpoint continues!
Speaking of difficulty, I replayed DMC1 after 5 since I knew V referenced several bosses from that game and was surprised how easy I found it. I even made it harder for myself so I could get the "no continues" trophy. When I was in high school I remember Phantom making me so frustrated and that was the first REAL encounter in the game. Outside of the Nightmare fights (which are only hard because the fixed camera angle can obscure his weak point) the hardest enemies are the Death Scythe enemies.
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| "MD Mini update, Dracula: Dismal Collection" , posted Fri 19 Apr 02:40
Oh! Konami took the most boring approach possible on the final Dracula collection lineup: the 3 FC ones plus Kid Dracula, the 2 GB ones, the MD one, and the SFC one. I guess I'm glad they didn't do something insulting like include Dracula XX and not Dracula X.
On the other hand, a collection is just the place to include unloved curios like the MSX and X68000 games and Dracula XX. Instead, just like Capcom's weird arcade stick console is "the thing you buy to get Alien vs. Predator," this is "the thing you buy to get MD Vampire Killer." And Kid Dracula, of course, if you are a member of the MMCafe Hard Corps.
And speaking of the Hard Corps, the Mega Drive Mini added some real champions to the lineup: Contra Hard Corps, Musha Aleste (HECK YEAH), Thunder Force III, LANDSTALKER (!!!), and Bare Knuckle II.
It's interesting to watch the Japan/US lineup diverge in the same way that the US console was wildly different and much more successful (as opposed to the US Saturn, which was wildly different in that it had no games). Ironically, the US-only games that made the biggest difference, the massive EA sports library, probably won't show up because of licensing. Less enthusiastically, the US Mini currently has Earthworm Jim, Ecco the Dolphin, Altered Beast, and Toejam and Earl, but NOT Musha Aleste, which if unaddressed would constitute as great a crime as what Sega of America did to the Saturn.
人間はいつも私を驚かせてくれる。不思議なものだな、人間という存在は．．．
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| "Re(1):MD Mini update, Dracula: Dismal Collect" , posted Fri 19 Apr 08:47
quote:
Oh! Konami took the most boring approach possible on the final Dracula collection lineup: the 3 FC ones plus Kid Dracula, the 2 GB ones, the MD one, and the SFC one. I guess I'm glad they didn't do something insulting like include Dracula XX and not Dracula X.
On the other hand, a collection is just the place to include unloved curios like the MSX and X68000 games and Dracula XX. Instead, just like Capcom's weird arcade stick console is "the thing you buy to get Alien vs. Predator," this is "the thing you buy to get MD Vampire Killer." And Kid Dracula, of course, if you are a member of the MMCafe Hard Corps.
I can say here what I was reticent to say over on Tweeter since it’s so much more public: that I’m surprised that Konami didn’t add all the various Castlevania oddities because I strongly believe that there was no curation whatsoever on Konami’s part and because it’s not like they seem to be preparing for a ‘volume 2’ of this collection— otherwise they might have saved a heavy hitter like Super Castlevania. I guess it’s possible that they’re saving Rondo and SOTN for a future release? I mean, my impression of Konami these days is that they just throw a bunch of stuff on a disc and call it a day.
I don’t really have much of an opinion on the Mini MD myself, although hearing how unpopular the MD was in Japan it’s a little surprising they’re releasing the mini there at all.
Oh, and my hot take on the US Saturn is... worth a whole other thread! Maybe I’ll do it someday!
You have to carefully reproduce the world of "Castlevania" in the solemn atmosphere.
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| "Dracula meets Langrisser's ghost" , posted Mon 22 Apr 04:48
quote:
these idiots region-lock their games even when they are 20 years old.
Whaaaaat?! Konami's Steam page advertises having both languages. Unbelievable. Reminds me of the excellent internet slang for the reverse region lock on Japanese Steam where overseas releases of Japanese games aren't available, "omakuni" (shortened from "it's on sale, but not in your country, jerk!").
Here's something even weirder, and in the spirit of the classic MMCafe (?) report on that time a Z-grade eroge company bought and defiled Valis with a "new release." Yep, classic strategy RPGs Langrisser I&II, known for their beautiful Urushihara Satoshi illustrations, were just released by a random company on Switch and PS4, but with unbelievably shitty replacement art, the kind of mainstream generic CG style that's been sucking since about 2000 or so.
But wait, here's what's really wild: if you buy the expensive limited edition, you get a special download code for a classic mode that removes the new art and restores the Urushihara art (!?!?!). Is this the first example of a game imitating the modern anime industry pratice of censoring a show and then making money on uncensored DVD sales?! I kind of have to admire them for how hilariously dastardly it is.
人間はいつも私を驚かせてくれる。不思議なものだな、人間という存在は．．．
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| | "Devil came through here" , posted Thu 25 Apr 09:18
I don't know if anyone else here likes adventure games, but in case anyone does, this Friday there'll be the release of Lorelai, the third entry in the Devil Came Through Here series. The previous entries, The Cat Lady and Downfall, were quite impressive.
Interestingly, while they're presented as a trilogy, the games are actually quite detached from each other, each being a tale about a different person. The common traits in them are just the Silent Hill vibes (psychological horror deriving from personal issues like depression, PTSD, anorexia and so on) and the presence of a mysterious figure known as Queen of Maggots.
Anyway, if anyone is interested, here's the suggestion.
Maybe I'm this person right in front of you... nah probably not though.
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| | "Re(1):Devil came through here" , posted Fri 26 Apr 20:05
quote:
I don't know if anyone else here likes adventure games, but in case anyone does, this Friday there'll be the release of Lorelai, the third entry in the Devil Came Through Here series. The previous entries, The Cat Lady and Downfall, were quite impressive.
Interestingly, while they're presented as a trilogy, the games are actually quite detached from each other, each being a tale about a different person. The common traits in them are just the Silent Hill vibes (psychological horror deriving from personal issues like depression, PTSD, anorexia and so on) and the presence of a mysterious figure known as Queen of Maggots.
Anyway, if anyone is interested, here's the suggestion.
I have The Cat Lady, I bought it at an unspecified point lost in the mids of time and past Steam Sales. I still mean to play it at some point!
Good to know there's two more games like that if I like it, AND on top of that that they're not related so I can enjoy them however I want/can.
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| | "Re(2):Devil came through here" , posted Fri 26 Apr 22:33
quote:
I have The Cat Lady, I bought it at an unspecified point lost in the mids of time and past Steam Sales. I still mean to play it at some point!
Good to know there's two more games like that if I like it, AND on top of that that they're not related so I can enjoy them however I want/can.
Well, to be fair, the games aren't completely unrelated, but you don't need to play them in order or even play all of them. There are some links between them (we can't tell which ones for Lorelai as it will still be released, but the protagonists of The Cat Lady and Downfall live in the same building and cameo in each other's game), but the stories don't interfere in each other. It seems Lorelai will follow the same pattern (although it will apparently reveal the backstory for the Queen of Maggots, who was a mysterious being in the prévios entries).
By the way, curiously, a previous version of Downfall (with LucasArts' style graphics and a slightly different plot) was released before TCL. After TCL's success, the creator felt unsatisfied with Downfall and decided to remake it. The old version still comes with the new one as a bonus.
Maybe I'm this person right in front of you... nah probably not though.
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| "Re(3):Final Fantasy XII The Zodiac Age" , posted Thu 2 May 09:24
quote:
I just noticed that this thread has been propped up since the start of 2018. This is an old thread. In celebration of that I thought I would randomly bring up an old game.
In celebration of the release of Dragon's Dogma on the Switch I pulled out my PS4 copy and started playing it yet again. While the game is just as amazing and slightly goofy as I remember what I didn't expect to find was other players. I'm not the only person out there playing because my pawn is still getting regular side-jobs and coming back loaded down with rift crystals. Even more odd, I found changing my pawn's vocation didn't affect her job prospects all that much. I remade my ranger into an odd looking elf who hasn't learned all her spells yet and she's still getting hired. For reasons unknown I appear to be playing as Father Christmas.* Kudos to the people out there still playing DD. Now if we could just get a proper sequel...
*My decision to play as Santa is particularly odd since I had previously played through the game as Sonny Chiba. But no matter who I play I always make certain to take plenty of family portraits.
I also started playing Dragon's Dogma on Switch too...until I got side-tracked by the release of Final Fantasy XII The Zodia Age on the system as well. Never have two games complemented each other on the RPG spectrum.
For starters, I've never played Final Fantasy XII. I've heard a lot about this game, from it having a "dry" plot (I'm really liking it so far!), to having a divisive combat system (I'm really liking it so far!), there was something about this game that drew me to the fact that perhaps the same people who dislike it were fans who started out on Final Fantasy VII/VIII, and expected an RPG with an immediately "charming" cast (of which, I'm liking FFXII's so far!).
Not to point the fingers at Nomura/Nojima/Kitase, but I'm appreciating how this particular FF feels a bit more grounded in its story, compared to even somethng like FFXV. I'm not really sure, but I always thought FFX's, XIII's and XV's cast felt "off" as they really forced the casts to have quirky personalities without much basis in motivation. Noctis feels sorta clueless, and Tidus acts like an idiot (in fact, almost all Nomura protagonists act like idiots!). Despite people complaining about Vaan, I was expecting him to be a literal Tidus clone and I'm just so glad he's not. Balthier and Fran make a great team and the supporting cast members feel distinct without them trying needlessly to stand out.
The combat, in particular, feels like proto-version of Xenoblade Chronicles combat system (especially when you turn comabt from Wait into Active), except concepts like positioning and cooldown still haven't been thought off at this stage, and areas do have than "Monster Hunter"-esq cordoned segments, probably to get around the PS2's limitations back in the day. So I guess saying Xenoblade Chronicles was "FFXII done right" in terms of its battle mechanics and world exploration wasn't at all wrong, as I feel very at home playing FFXII and its engaging battle system.
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| PSN: zonepharaoh
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| "Re(4):Final Fantasy XII The Sfried Age" , posted Sat 4 May 04:51
Uhyo~! The second chance in as many months to revive a legendary classic like the (not actually) Anti-FF12 thread, you say?!
I think most of the stuff in there still applies: the art is really wonderful, though the in-game models ironically look far superior to the CG that was clearly finished years earlier in a delayed production that was saved only by our eternal master, Kawazu.
Sakimoto's got some real stand-out pieces like Rabanastre and the last boss theme, though a lot of the rest is boring "twinkle shimmering music" that perfectly matches the equally boring, endless plains and forests you'll trudge through.
I didn't get much out of Gambits, but I think it's a cool experiment, and (like most things) it's more interesting than FFVII!
quote:
dry plot...perhaps the same people who dislike it were fans who started out on Final Fantasy VII/VIII
I am a weirdo whose favorite is FFVI but whose second-favorite is FFVIII, so as a representative of this non-existent demographic I am here to report that while I don't expect to like everyone, I do expect some character development, somewhere. My most memorable experience in FFXII was making dozens of save files before what seemed like would finally be some meaningful character interaction (note: there never was!).
Balflear's desire to be the star of his own game rings a little too true, and even the "Vaan is just there to narrate the story" apologists tend to overlook how we never understand anything about Ashe, either. Still, I get how people can dig the personality-light political stories Matsuno focuses on, and what a bravely different design! I do still quote Gilgamesh's lines from this one, too...what a riot.
人間はいつも私を驚かせてくれる。不思議なものだな、人間という存在は．．．
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| PSN: zonepharaoh
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| "Re(5):FFVII: Endless Torment Edition" , posted Sat 11 May 05:29
To celebrate the unwanted reappearance of the FFVII remake, here is the unwanted reappearance of the (only sometimes) anti-FFVII thread! I tried to revive the actual thread, but like the 1990s internet's fevered attempts to find out how to revive a certain character in the game, it was futile.
Because I'm your pal, here is the Japanese trailer. A friend who saw the English one thought Cloud sounded like a numbskull when he said "a flower?" THRILLINGLY, this is the extremely unlikely link to the much classier Writing Thread: we think this is a preview of bad localization practices! Yeah, that's what he says in Japanese, but it is more natural to repeat a word as a question/confirmation in Japanese (particularly in media like this) whereas in English it makes him sound deeply stupid for not knowing what a flower is. My friend said Cloud should instead have hesitatingly said, "oh...thanks," and I think she's right!
The worst thing about this is that it indicates the most redeeming element of the game, love points between characters, may be gone and that we can no longer take Tifa (good), Yuffie (better), or Barett (CANON) on a date.
人間はいつも私を驚かせてくれる。不思議なものだな、人間という存在は．．．
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| | "Re(6):FFVII: Endless Torment Edition" , posted Sat 11 May 08:50:
quote:
My friend said Cloud should instead have hesitatingly said, "oh...thanks," and I think she's right!
How about "Oh, for me?"
I agree that, based on his visual reaction, Cloud is definitely thinking, "Why are you giving me a flower?" and trying to be polite about it.
But yeah, I am already slightly concerned about the English script/localization. The combat is looking pretty alright, I think... but that's probably the least of my concerns for this project overall. I'd love to be pleasantly surprised, though!
/ / /
[this message was edited by Mosquiton on Sat 11 May 08:54] |
| PSN: zonepharaoh
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| "Re(1):MD Mini update, Dracula" , posted Fri 17 May 00:22:
This news pairing continues to hold!
Konami may not have been smart enough to avoid a region lock on the Steam version of their Dracula collection, but at least they're now including all regional versions anyway, probably because the Japanese release inexplicably has the US version of Dracula II, which would be even more incomprehensible and useless in another language. I suppose that resurrecting the dark lord every 100 years requires initially bringing as much ill will into the world as possible even when eventually reaching the right decision.
Also: the next 10 (Japanese) entries in the Mega Drive Mini have been announced, with some really great choices like Story of Thor/Beyond Oasis, Phantasy Star IV, and the Yuuyuu Hakusho game everyone loves but I never played, as well as some less inspired choices you could get elsewhere like Dai Makaimura, Street Fighter II', and the Rockman 1-3 collection (more interesting abroad where only released on the proto-online service Sega Channel).
Meanwhile, the US version continues to criminally lack Musha Aleste and must therefore be destroyed immediately.
人間はいつも私を驚かせてくれる。不思議なものだな、人間という存在は．．．
[this message was edited by Maou on Fri 17 May 00:30] |
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| "Re(2):M2, Dracula" , posted Fri 17 May 04:04
quote:
This news pairing continues to hold!
Konami may not have been smart enough to avoid a region lock on the Steam version of their Dracula collection, but at least they're now including all regional versions anyway, probably because the Japanese release inexplicably has the US version of Dracula II, which would be even more incomprehensible and useless in another language. I suppose that resurrecting the dark lord every 100 years requires initially bringing as much ill will into the world as possible even when eventually reaching the right decision.
Also: the next 10 (Japanese) entries in the Mega Drive Mini have been announced, with some really great choices like Story of Thor/Beyond Oasis, Phantasy Star IV, and the Yuuyuu Hakusho game everyone loves but I never played, as well as some less inspired choices you could get elsewhere like Dai Makaimura, Street Fighter II', and the Rockman 1-3 collection (more interesting abroad where only released on the proto-online service Sega Channel).
Meanwhile, the US version continues to criminally lack Musha Aleste and must therefore be destroyed immediately.
Speaking of M2, here's their Castlevania ports in action. I really hope they'll also be responsible for a "Castlevania Anniversary Volume 2." which would mean a better emulated Rondo/SotN. Also seeing Super Castlevania IV run fluidly and sound accurate makes me wonder if Konami would also be willing to invest in them for an Axley port.
I'm surprised Japan is getting Yu Yu Hakusho but I'm not sure what would take its place in an outside-Japan release. Batman and Robin? The X-Men/Spiderman games?
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XBL: Sibarraz4Life
Wii: SW-0240-1091-7555(SWITCH)
STM: Sibarraz
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| "Re(4):M2, Dracula" , posted Mon 20 May 07:47:
I'm going to wait for the already announced patch that is going to include the JP versions of the games. I have heard horror stories of the US version of Castlevania 3 compared to its JP counterpart, so I'm going to wait a little before buying the collection
And speaking of the series, last month I bought the requiem collection for the ps4 and an SNES classic, so I played and beated Rondo of Blood and Castlevania IV, 2 games that are always compared for being released close to each other.
Overall, I feel like I love Rondo of Blood more than SCIV, basically because I really hate the levels in SCIV, the 8 way whip kills the balance against the enemies, making the difficulty come from the plataforming sections, which at times are very frustrating, I know that is castlevania and is commonplace to fall over a pit since it requires a milimetric precision for the jumps, but here there are too many of them. Also, although impressive, I hate at times the frame drops in the game, and overall I have grown accustomed to the more anime look of Rondo than the more gothic look of SCIV. Still, both are great games, and also I don't understand why people say that SCIV is an easy game, when for the most part, I found it way harder than Rondo of Blood which sometimes is described as one of the hardest games in the series
[this message was edited by sibarraz on Mon 20 May 07:53] |
| PSN: zonepharaoh
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| "MD Mini hits forty...two titles!" , posted Wed 5 Jun 02:34
Don’t look now, team, but Sega announced the final ten games for MD Mini, and then made it twelve because Sega is too good for our cruel world!
They include the obligatory Columns (yawn), Dynamite Headdy (why not the superior and ROCK AND ROLL WILD Alien Soldier?), Alicia Dragoon (never played but I have an enormously positive impression), Road Rash II (vroom), Langrisser II (to remind us that the illegitimate Switch port has a pay-to-remove-the-awful-redesigns option by contrast), Darius (sure) and...Tetris (?!?).
It occurs to me that Mega Drive might be like SNK on this international BBS given that it did better abroad and unites so many people across different experiences—from niche third place to PCE in Japan, to SFC rival in the US, to victor in some parts of Europe (UK?), to others I don’t even know about! What are your memories?
Like all Mega Drivers, my 68000 heart is on fire for sure.
人間はいつも私を驚かせてくれる。不思議なものだな、人間という存在は．．．
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| | "Re(1):MD Mini hits forty...two titles!" , posted Wed 5 Jun 03:17
quote:
Don’t look now, team, but Sega announced the final ten games for MD Mini, and then made it twelve because Sega is too good for our cruel world!
They include the obligatory Columns (yawn), Dynamite Headdy (why not the superior and ROCK AND ROLL WILD Alien Soldier?), Alicia Dragoon (never played but I have an enormously positive impression), Road Rash II (vroom), Langrisser II (to remind us that the illegitimate Switch port has a pay-to-remove-the-awful-redesigns option by contrast), Darius (sure) and...Tetris (?!?).
It occurs to me that Mega Drive might be like SNK on this international BBS given that it did better abroad and unites so many people across different experiences—from niche third place to PCE in Japan, to SFC rival in the US, to victor in some parts of Europe (UK?), to others I don’t even know about! What are your memories?
Like all Mega Drivers, my 68000 heart is on fire for sure.
While my childhood console was a SNES, a friend of mine had a Genesis and I understand your feelings; it had some great games. It's a bit sad that several videogame generations later, people still can't let go of console wars and fail to realize it doesn't matter if they have the "best" console; each of them has their own unique gems (unless it's a 3DO).
Anyway, recently I've been obsessed about the old Phantasy Star games, so it's nice to know that PSIV is in MD Mini's selection (but it's a pity that PSI and PSII aren't - yeah, I know PSI isn't a Genesis game, but still...).
Maybe I'm this person right in front of you... nah probably not though.
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| PSN: zonepharaoh
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| "Re(2):MD Mini hits forty...two titles!" , posted Thu 6 Jun 12:05
The internet tells me that only the East Asia (non-Japan) MD Minis will have Alien Soldier, thereby making it the best version for all Zepys, nobis, and really anyone else. Visualshock! Speedshock! Soundshock! GOGOGOGOGOGOGOG
quote:
it doesn't matter if they have the "best" console; each of them has their own unique gems (unless it's a 3DO).
Now, now, until literally this year, even the poor 3DO had the only acceptable home version of Super Street Fighter II X, you know~~~
Please chronicle your Phantasy Star exploits here, whether it’s on your brand new MD Mini or elsewhere. M2 doing the Switch port was almost enough to make me play 1, of all things, but I desperately want a good way to play II and IV. Sega Ages version of II was easier but ugly redesigns and still fundamentally hostile. Isn’t there a copy that reduced encounters and upped experience? That may’ve been Sega Ages collection (no redesigns), but that was two consoles ago and I didn’t buy it then.
人間はいつも私を驚かせてくれる。不思議なものだな、人間という存在は．．．
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| | "Re(3):MD Mini hits forty...two titles!" , posted Fri 7 Jun 00:08:
quote:
Now, now, until literally this year, even the poor 3DO had the only acceptable home version of Super Street Fighter II X, you know~~~
Please chronicle your Phantasy Star exploits here, whether it’s on your brand new MD Mini or elsewhere. M2 doing the Switch port was almost enough to make me play 1, of all things, but I desperately want a good way to play II and IV. Sega Ages version of II was easier but ugly redesigns and still fundamentally hostile. Isn’t there a copy that reduced encounters and upped experience? That may’ve been Sega Ages collection (no redesigns), but that was two consoles ago and I didn’t buy it then.
That's right, I had forgotten about SSFIIX on 3DO... probably the best game it had (maybe the only good game it had?).
As for PSII, from what I read, yes, the version on the Sega Ages collection had these benefits (plus faster walking speed), with the Genesis graphics instead of the PS2 redesigns. Apparently it even has an option to be played as its US version (with texts in English and a slightly different soundtrack).
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EDIT: speaking of the PS2 redesigns, I read that SEGA intended to make one for PSIV as well and release all three remakes (I, II and IV - which isn't actually named IV in Japan) in a collection in the West, which makes a lot of sense as they constitute a full story (PSIII being more of a side story than part of the main one). But then, for some unrevealed reason, they decided to cancel both the PSIV remake and the releases outside of Japan.
That's a pity. Then again, it seems not everyone who played the PSI and II remakes liked them, so maybe for once SEGA made a right decision? I guess we'll never know...
Maybe I'm this person right in front of you... nah probably not though.
[this message was edited by Just a Person on Sun 30 Jun 09:02] |
| | "Re(1):Orochinagi.com closes operations" , posted Sun 9 Jun 15:18
quote:
The internet tells me that only the East Asia (non-Japan) MD Minis will have Alien Soldier, thereby making it the best version for all Zepys, nobis, and really anyone else. Visualshock! Speedshock! Soundshock! GOGOGOGOGOGOGOG
it doesn't matter if they have the "best" console; each of them has their own unique gems (unless it's a 3DO).Now, now, until literally this year, even the poor 3DO had the only acceptable home version of Super Street Fighter II X, you know~~~
I heard that Sega Asia is targeting some crazy sales numbers for md mini in Asia, like, numbers that shouldn't even be considered following the lackluster sales on the ps classic. The prices are going to crash for sure if Sega doesn't change their production numbers by launch
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| | "Re(3):MD Mini hits forty...two titles!" , posted Wed 12 Jun 13:19
quote:
The internet tells me that only the East Asia (non-Japan) MD Minis will have Alien Soldier, thereby making it the best version for all Zepys, nobis, and really anyone else. Visualshock! Speedshock! Soundshock! GOGOGOGOGOGOGOG
it doesn't matter if they have the "best" console; each of them has their own unique gems (unless it's a 3DO).Now, now, until literally this year, even the poor 3DO had the only acceptable home version of Super Street Fighter II X, you know~~~
Please chronicle your Phantasy Star exploits here, whether it’s on your brand new MD Mini or elsewhere. M2 doing the Switch port was almost enough to make me play 1, of all things, but I desperately want a good way to play II and IV. Sega Ages version of II was easier but ugly redesigns and still fundamentally hostile. Isn’t there a copy that reduced encounters and upped experience? That may’ve been Sega Ages collection (no redesigns), but that was two consoles ago and I didn’t buy it then.
Hello dear friends. I'm back from the wild lands of Facebook and Twitter!! Let's get to it!
I grew up with the Mega Drive. My dad or maybe a family friend, someone with blessed foresight and generosity somehow picked up a Mega Drive for us during a brief visit to Hong Kong. So we were playing 16bit arcade quality games at home a full year before everyone else in America. It's easy to forget just how impressive that system was when it first landed. The jump from NES to Genesis is still the biggest jump in console tech and capabilities that I can remember.
Games went from looking limited and abstracted (but still nice) to fully fleshed out worlds that could realize very rich, very refined artistic vision that did not feel compromised in any way (at the time--and still now for the best games!)
The first games we had were Altered Beast and Thunder Force II (wow that voice acting!). Shortly after that we also got Phantasy Star 2, Revenge of Shinobi, Strider, ah man, they were such amazing games! Altered Beast actually scared the crap out of me! And Phantasy Star 2 was obviously the best thing ever. I immediately thought it was even cooler than Star Wars!
I remember while basking in the arcade-at-home glow of the Mega Drive, the NES lost all its lustre. My brothers ended up selling our NES to a neighbor. I recall the day he showed up to pay for the NES and all our games and accessories. He was beaming, absolutely stoked to finally have an NES. But then he looked over at our TV and was like "what ... is ... THAT?" I recall the blood draining out of his face as he witnessed the awesome spectacle of huge colorful sprites on a home TV for the first time in his life. He was speechless as we shooed him out of our home with his box of treasures that were instantly rendered quaint at a glance at the future of SIXTEEN BIT POWER.
I mean obviously I really love and value the NES today. And a lot of the early Mega Drive games haven't aged that well, but not that many people seem to remember just how absolutely mind blowing the Mega Drive was for the time (wow was it really still the 80s when all this happened??). For me it was a bigger jump than SNES to PSOne because SNES games were so obviously more beautiful than early low poly games.
I think I might pick up that Mega Drive mini! There's just something nice about the form factor of having a dedicated console vs playing on an emulator. Hopefully the controllers will feel good and be un-laggy too.
The Mega Drive was never a big hit in Asia. Even in Thailand where I'd go and pick up new games every summer, the Famicom was king out here. Then the Super Famicom (since it was so easy to bootleg games with the floppy disk drives--Spoon knows what I'm talkin about!).
In the years since I moved back to Thailand I think I've only met 1 other person that owned a Mega Drive. It was an obscure oddity. I hope more people get to experience those games now though, because a lot of them really are timeless classics!
www.art-eater.com
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| | "Re(2):Panzer Dragoon Remake+TRIALS OF MANA!!!" , posted Wed 12 Jun 13:55:
quote:
Panzer Dragoon Remake...
PANZER DRAGOON REMAKE!
Edit: Oh, and Seiken Densetsu 3/Trials of Mana, Collection of Mana Switch coming over. Dragon Quest hero and Banjo in Smash, etc. Some Zelda sequel...
Oh. My. GOD!!! This is epic! I thought SD3 would never get an official release on the West... and it even got a name!
This is so fantastic that I can even forgive that they didn't even bother to add colors to SD1! Woohoo!
I'm sorry I couldn't resist. Warning: Incoming Old Man Rant:
Both remakes actually look pretty nice BUTTTTTTTTT
Panzer Dragoon is sadly the latest victim of the video game industry's addiction to color grading. The original game had such beautiful tasteful colors. The first stage felt like flying over the cold atlantic ocean on a nice, day. Not overtly sunny. It had a very cool sedate feeling. The lighting felt like a "normal" day in this world full of crumbling ruins. By making the lighting feel grounded, it made the fantastic stuff feel all the more fantastic.
The new Panzer Dragoon remake is color graded into muddiness. It's technically more saturated and colorful than the original, but it blends into a muddy mess. It's full of theoretically "good" color theory, like with contrasting blue shadows with warm lighting. But it's executed in such a lifeless overly busy way. I mean look at that footage. What time of day is it? The sunlight is bathing everything in yellow from a front angle, and yet the sky is sunny and blue? What season is it? Is it hot or cold out there? Can you feel the temperature? It's missing a lot of information all for the sake of looking like someone's instagram feed.
Mana Remake looks nice. So glad to finally get a Western release for Seiken Densetsu 3!! This is a decades long dream come true! The remake actually looks pretty nice BUTTTTTTT (Butt) I know this is impossible but I wish they'd had just stuck wiht Nobuteru Yuuki's original look cos it's just so goddamn good. I much prefer his solid angular, but still fluid artwork to the overtly soft stylings of the remake. It's still very nice looking though! I don't mean to throw the new art team under the bus too badly!
My only other complaint is that the environments feel a bit lifeless compared to the original, which is admitedly one of the masterpieces of sprite art, especially when it comes to tile based environments. I wish they had taken a more modular approach to the remake not for the sake of nostalgia, but because when you work in a modular way it makes everything feel tidier and more connected. Level of detail is more consistent. It just feels better! I have this exact same complaint regarding the new Pokemon which otherwise looks really excellent!
Anyway I've been travelling a ton this week going to conventions and meeting up with old friends. I have not kept up with E3 or Nintendo Direct or anything at all. Looking forward to slowly catching up to all that stuff with you all here!
*update*
Actually took another look at the Trials of Mana trailer. I take back everything I said about the backgrounds. They look fine!
www.art-eater.com
[this message was edited by nobinobita on Wed 12 Jun 14:19] |
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| "Re(1):The PC Engine Mini: Konami's Curse" , posted Wed 12 Jun 15:19:
NOBI: great MD history! I'd forgotten what a leap MD was since it got outclassed by SFC so quickly, especially in Japan. I'll link your tales during the inevitable MD Mini launch thread in September. On to less illustrious minis, we have...
quote:
At first I thought it was a joke ...
It's a weak launch roster even with Ys and Dracula X, especially since Mega Drivers are a lot of the same audience, but then again, this is modern-day Konami. (WAIT. Did they manage to get the rights to PCE based on having absorbed Hudson, who designed it?!) And holy clams, that laughable US roster will not sell a single copy, assuming anyone can be arsed to fiddle with the terrible website with age confirmation.
Exodus could explain better, but I'd assume PCE's appeal would be mostly the anime-filled CD games and the best versions of games that received scaled-down MD and SFC ports, rather than some of the fairly crappy base system games on display here. I never owned a PCE, but seems pretty obvious it should have: Dracula X, TOKIMEKI MEMORIAL(!!!), Ys, Exile, Cosmic Fantasy, Garou, AOF, Tengai Makyou, Vasteel, Snatcher, and cheeky entries like Doukyuusei and Basted, because... I said so.
人間はいつも私を驚かせてくれる。不思議なものだな、人間という存在は．．．
[this message was edited by Maou on Wed 12 Jun 15:27] |
| | "Re(2):Panzer Dragoon SaGa Scarlet Grace" , posted Wed 12 Jun 23:41
quote:
MEANWHILE, because Iggy is away this week either fighting ninjas or stopping Brexit, I'm here to tell you on his behalf that Romancing SaGa 3 and SaGa Scarlet Grace are coming out in English, so that you too can join Iggy and the approximately three other English-speaking fans in talking about this deadly magnificent series. Please proceed to SaGa/Anti-Octopath thread and SaGa Scarlet Grace thread for re-education immediately.
I am back from the Gallic wars. Now I'm done with the Roman invasion, I can thank you gracefully for this bit of impromptu proselytism for our lord and savior, which will allow me to focus on the remakes of Panzer Dragon and SD3.
They both suck.
Panzer Dragon is one of these games that were groundbreaking at the time, but judged purely as a game from 2019, is just... not a very interesting game? The original had historical significance, but stripping it from its awkward look, it's just some random on-rail shooter that is not Rez. I hated the Space Harrier sequence in Bayonetta, so there's really no nostalgia for that.
SD3 is one of the greatest pixel art masterpieces of the SFC. Personally, I feel that SD3, RS3 and Rudra are the 3 best looking games of the machine, and seeing (again) RS3 being remade with absolute reverence to the source material, just a bit updated to keep the nostalgia googles on, emphasizes how the SD2 and 3 remakes fail at what they're doing. They just remove the pixel art in order to appeal to a modern audience (and make it easier to port around I suppose) without realizing they're destroying 50% of the game. Who ever thought that Seiken Densetsu needed full voice acting? Seriously?
The risk they face now is that without the distinctive look (and strange square proportions) of the SFC original, we might look at the game with our 2019 eyes, and risk realize, like PD, that these games, maybe, are just not very good anymore. This is really similar to the debates about the preservation of millennia-old monuments: how much do you preserve? How much do you replace? What do you replace? What do you modernize?
The SD (and FF4-6) remakes are basically like destroying the inside of the Ôsaka castle to reshape it as a modern hotel with all the modern facilities but none of the original soul. At least Kawazu was still in-house to spare RS that infamy.
Ironically, both RS3 and SD3 were released a bit rushed, one having several quests unfinished, the other being riled with bugs. They haven't yet said what they changed in RS3, so there's hope there. It just sucks that we'll never get the original SD3 with proper QA.
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| | "Re(3):Panzer Dragoon SaGa Scarlet Grace" , posted Thu 13 Jun 00:46
quote:
Adventure in addition lets you choose 1 of 3 color palette options: monochrome, super game boy (perhaps GBC, I'll compare later), and LCD spinach (seems to be the same filter used recently in the Castlevania Anniversary Collection).
That's nice, but I still wish it was properly colored. Then again, it would probably take a lot of work and could cause some programming issues, so...
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quote:
SD3 is one of the greatest pixel art masterpieces of the SFC. Personally, I feel that SD3, RS3 and Rudra are the 3 best looking games of the machine, and seeing (again) RS3 being remade with absolute reverence to the source material, just a bit updated to keep the nostalgia googles on, emphasizes how the SD2 and 3 remakes fail at what they're doing. They just remove the pixel art in order to appeal to a modern audience (and make it easier to port around I suppose) without realizing they're destroying 50% of the game. Who ever thought that Seiken Densetsu needed full voice acting? Seriously?
The risk they face now is that without the distinctive look (and strange square proportions) of the SFC original, we might look at the game with our 2019 eyes, and risk realize, like PD, that these games, maybe, are just not very good anymore. This is really similar to the debates about the preservation of millennia-old monuments: how much do you preserve? How much do you replace? What do you replace? What do you modernize?
The SD (and FF4-6) remakes are basically like destroying the inside of the Ôsaka castle to reshape it as a modern hotel with all the modern facilities but none of the original soul. At least Kawazu was still in-house to spare RS that infamy.
Those are good points. I guess the full voice acting in Trials of Mana are interesting for new players (who might find it weird to see a new RPG with no voices), but people who experimented its original version may be annoyed with this inclusion, indeed.
The good thing is, with Collection of Mana, fans of the games how they used to be can appreciate them how they used to be, while new players can try both versions and choose which they prefer. Everybody wins, I guess?
(by the way, was the SD1 remake even released in the modern platforms like PS4 or Switch?)
Maybe I'm this person right in front of you... nah probably not though.
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| PSN: entropytempts
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| "Re(4):Panzer Dragoon SaGa Scarlet Grace" , posted Thu 13 Jun 01:24
quote:
The SD (and FF4-6) remakes are basically like destroying the inside of the Ôsaka castle to reshape it as a modern hotel with all the modern facilities but none of the original soul. At least Kawazu was still in-house to spare RS that infamy.
One would have to be a madman to try and contradict Iggy but this is one case where I disagree. IV at least managed to avoid this by producing 2 separate remakes: the 3D one for the masses on NDS that eventually made its' way around different platforms, and the 2D hi-res PSP edition like they made for I and II. Other than some slight proportion changes that mostly pertain to overworld character sprites no longer being restricted to a single tile, comparing side by side with the original SNES sprites shows that they were really faithful there.
quote:
That's nice, but I still wish it was properly colored. Then again, it would probably take a lot of work and could cause some programming issues, so...
Actually no, the color palettes, at least as applied on a GBC, seem to be run by a separate process on the hardware than the actual game code. I don't know how much we're allowed to discuss roms / emulators (specifically! not piracy), so I'll simply state that the official options aren't for you if you want to play in color, but you do have options even on a relatively low performance system. (If Prof gives the thumbs up I'll create a new thread, else if you would like further advice we can chat privately. Hoping we can though because that could open up a bunch of other fun stuff, for instance I'm currently playing through Castlevania Harmony of Despair multiboxing all 4 players at once).
quote:
(by the way, was the SD1 remake even released in the modern platforms like PS4 or Switch?)
Negative :( Sword of Mana was GBA only I believe, not aware of any virtual console type releases. Adventures of Mana was a Vita game that made it out to Android (and maybe IOS?).
"Hai ... Shindekudasai?"
Anyone still playing Phantasy Star Online 2?
Ship: 2
ID: entropytempts
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| "Re(3):Panzer Dragoon SaGa Scarlet Grace" , posted Thu 13 Jun 20:17:
quote:
I am back from the Gallic wars. Now I'm done with the Roman invasion, I can thank you gracefully for this bit of impromptu proselytism for our lord and savior, which will allow me to focus on the remakes of Panzer Dragon and SD3.
They both suck.
Panzer Dragon is one of these games that were groundbreaking at the time, but judged purely as a game from 2019, is just... not a very interesting game? The original had historical significance, but stripping it from its awkward look, it's just some random on-rail shooter that is not Rez. I hated the Space Harrier sequence in Bayonetta, so there's really no nostalgia for that.
So wait, are you telling me Panzer Dragoon Orta, a follow up sequel that is an acclaimed rail shooter which happens to NOT be Rez, sucks?
It seems to have aged pretty well, so I don't see why a remake of the first game with some QoL improvements added to it would be considered a terrible thing.
[this message was edited by sfried on Thu 13 Jun 20:19] |
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| "Re(5):Panzer Dragoon SaGa Scarlet Grace" , posted Thu 13 Jun 23:32
quote:
So wait, are you telling me Panzer Dragoon Orta, a follow up sequel that is an acclaimed rail shooter which happens to NOT be Rez, sucks? I didn't play Orta, Xbox were a weird thing for Americans we can't really understand, like Nascar and Jerry Springer.
My memory of PD is really strictly on Saturn, and it's not a particularly good one. I think even at the time I preferred Starfox as a game?
And, I mean. Starfox. On SFC. If PD is not Rez, Starfox is DEFINITELY not Rez.
How was Orta improved?
Glad you asked. Digital Foundry made a video about PDOrta via backwards compatibility, but I couldn't find the link.
(DF Retro did make a video about how much PD2 did improve upon the original, as well as subsequent ports.)
One of the original developers of the Panzer Dragoon and its sequel did speak about its creation at this year's GDC.
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| PSN: DefensorVirtuoso
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Wii: SW-0240-1091-7555(SWITCH)
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| "Re(6):Panzer Dragoon SaGa Scarlet Grace" , posted Thu 13 Jun 23:56
quote:
So wait, are you telling me Panzer Dragoon Orta, a follow up sequel that is an acclaimed rail shooter which happens to NOT be Rez, sucks? I didn't play Orta, Xbox were a weird thing for Americans we can't really understand, like Nascar and Jerry Springer.
My memory of PD is really strictly on Saturn, and it's not a particularly good one. I think even at the time I preferred Starfox as a game?
And, I mean. Starfox. On SFC. If PD is not Rez, Starfox is DEFINITELY not Rez.
How was Orta improved?
Glad you asked. Digital Foundry made a video about PDOrta via backwards compatibility, but I couldn't find the link.
(DF Retro did make a video about how much PD2 did improve upon the original, as well as subsequent ports.)
One of the original developers of the Panzer Dragoon and its sequel did speak about its creation at this year's GDC.
Panzer Dragoon Orta is amazing, it made realize how terrible is Nintendo for not being able to develop a good sequel of Star Fox 64
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| PSN: DefensorVirtuoso
XBL: Sibarraz4Life
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CFN: VirtuaDefender
| "Re(8):Panzer Dragoon SaGa Scarlet Grace" , posted Fri 14 Jun 03:40
quote:
Panzer Dragoon Orta is amazing, it made realize how terrible is Nintendo for not being able to develop a good sequel of Star Fox 64
They did (Star Fox 2), but they cancelled it last minute in favor of the "reboot" (Star Fox 64).
Star Fox 2 actually did some pretty innovative things for its time, too!
I bought an SNES classic last month, and I was actually impressed with Star Fox 2, I thought that it would be more unplayable, but overall is an OK game
Still, for me Star Fox 2 is more of a beta of Star Fox 64 than a sequel (I was shocked to discover all the similar things in both games, I always thought that argonauts claims that Nintendo copied lots of things from Star Fox 2 was them just being bitter, but is true)
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| "Re(9):Panzer Dragoon SaGa Scarlet Grace" , posted Fri 14 Jun 04:39
quote:
Panzer Dragoon Orta is amazing, it made realize how terrible is Nintendo for not being able to develop a good sequel of Star Fox 64
They did (Star Fox 2), but they cancelled it last minute in favor of the "reboot" (Star Fox 64).
Star Fox 2 actually did some pretty innovative things for its time, too!
I bought an SNES classic last month, and I was actually impressed with Star Fox 2, I thought that it would be more unplayable, but overall is an OK game
Still, for me Star Fox 2 is more of a beta of Star Fox 64 than a sequel (I was shocked to discover all the similar things in both games, I always thought that argonauts claims that Nintendo copied lots of things from Star Fox 2 was them just being bitter, but is true)
There were some aspects that were brought over in later Star Fox games, but not all of the innovations SF2 did were implemented in 64, sadly. (The Walker, for instance, was one of them. The whole idea of going inside spaceships and blowing them up from the inside was actually better carried out in 2 than in Star Fox Zero!)
That said, a remake of Panzer Dragoon is better than having no new Panzer Dragoon anything, "Not-being-Rez" be damned!
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| | "Re(3):R-Type Final 2 fully funded, hits over" , posted Sun 16 Jun 02:41
quote:
I'm still baffled by why they made the KS one week only. Whether they felt the amount of money they wanted was achievable easily or not at all easily, making it only one week disadvantages them enormously. I backed it, but not at some of the crazy high levels on offer.
It seems they knew her public was very narrow, but affluent.
Which is good for the game to be made, if that's really all the budget they need to finish it.
However, the KS also demonstrated there was not broad appeal for the game. A KS where 100k people give $10 is not the same as a KS where 1000 people give $1000, even though they bring the same amount of money.
They're basically working on a game that has already sold most of the copies it is ever going to sell, while telling their investors that their property has almost no value outside of these core fans.
They actually had a bit over 8k backers, which does mean it didn't hit the points of things like Hyper Light Drifter (over 20k backers), but is in the neighbourhood of things like Darkest Dungeon (a bit over 9k backers). I think they definitely could've gotten quite a lot more, because projects that do gain momentum with 30 day campaigns usually bring in a significant portion (i.e. more than 20%) of their total backers in days following the first week of the campaign.
It did get more than 40 times the backers of Kentucky Route Zero, though!
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| PSN: zonepharaoh
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| "Sonic Mania: I AM THE EGGMAN" , posted Thu 20 Jun 14:51
I meant to post this six months ago! I finished Sonic Mania, and as Naganuma Hideki once told us in Sonic Rush, THIS IS WHAT U NEED.
I’m always dubious when a series continues without its original creators, and have no use for post-Sakaguchi Final Fantasy or post-Lucas Star Wars, but since Christian Whitehead and friends rebuilt Sonic CD from scratch for Sega, their credentials are impeccable. Plus, having chosen the secret best Sonic game as their debut proves their great taste, which shows up all over the place in Sonic Mania’s delightfully clever levels and design gimmicks.
It’s telling that Iizuka’s long-adrift Sonic Team made the Sonic Mania guys feature a number of classic stages, yet the greatest stages in the game are actually the brand-new Studiopolis, which is the best pinball stage of any Sonic, and the hugely creative Mirage Saloon, which takes the one photo of Sonic 2’s cancelled Dust Hill and makes something amazingly lively and fun. (I still have no idea what they were going for with Press Garden, but oh well.)
And in that same way, the best boss fight in the entire game isn’t yet another reproduction of Sonic CD’s marquee race against Metal Sonic, but an incidental miniboss with unstoppably funky music where you race down a highway while being pursued in a helicopter by an Egg Robo dressed as a police officer with a rocket launcher and his minions with billy clubs. He is both adorable and dastardly. God Hand’s Gene sez: I LOVE IT
Probably not by coincidence, the quality of Sonic games correlates directly with their music, hence Sonic 2’s score by the bassist from the most important Japanese pop band of all time, and Sonic CD’s insanely excellent beats (sorry, Sonic 3, but Michael Jackson’s…sound producer just isn’t going to cut it). Here, too, the Sonic Mania team’s obvious love for Sonic CD does them credit, with similarly crazy-wonderful electronica-funk-house-with-sirens (what do you call this stuff???). Eggman’s cackling disco dance floor and its bass/piano (?) couldn’t be more Sonic CD, and even overused classics like Stardust Speedway and Chemical Plant are HOT HOT HOT. And then there’s the competition mode narration, where…OH MY GOD, is that the Daytona announcer?!?!?!??!
I guess there’s a few issues, though even these appear around the same places as the originals. Mid-game, the stage 6 and 7 bosses have a weird difficulty spike compared with those before and after, just like Sonic 1’s endless drowning adventures in Labyrinth, or Sonic 3’s infamously impassable barrel in Carnival Night. The special stages, always the most inexcusably bad aspect of any Sonic game, are even more arbitrary and hard to control now than in the wonky Mode 7 style of the originals they’re imitating. And after all the work reproducing the style of Sonic CD’s glorious opening animation for Sonic Mania’s own intro, the ending cinema is bafflingly short. Why? These problems are probably there on purpose just so they wouldn’t totally shame what’s left of Sonic Team.
In conclusion: HI-SPEC ROBO GO!!!
人間はいつも私を驚かせてくれる。不思議なものだな、人間という存在は．．．
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| | "Re(1):FF Mania: I AM THE WALRUS" , posted Fri 21 Jun 04:51:
quote:
I’m always dubious when a series continues without its original creators, and have no use for post-Sakaguchi Final Fantasy or post-Lucas Star Wars,
This is entering the world of auteur theory, but what happens when something has been around long enough that it is arguably a piece of common folklore?
For instance, most people don't demand that stories about Robin Hood or King Arthur only be the original telling and anything else is worthless: Robin Hood is a commonly understood cultural icon for which any tales about derring-do where he and his merry men steal from the rich and give to the poor is ok. Superman is practically there already, and Star Wars is on its way there given that there are literal grandparents who saw the original now.
If you think about FF games, Ishii, Tanaka, and Kawazu are still at Squenix, and still work on FF games, and all three were designers on the very original FF game! So arguably this means that such games as the latter half of FF12 ought to be entirely within your purview, along Tanaka's own FF11 (which our local historian Loona can recount oral history of). Given that Kawazu was the main dungeon designer and combat system designer of FF1 (and its usage of D&D style spell usage counts rather than MP feels very Kawazu what with his love of tabletop games), it also becomes an interesting question as to the nature of auteurship within a collaborative work where elements of the work considered iconic and essential to it were not all done by one person. It gets even stranger when principle aesthetic contributions are done by separate people, especially when the aesthetics of systems is poorly defined: we don't have a strong theory of aesthetics in system design, much like how we don't have a strong theory of aesthetics in software architecture, but we can clearly articulate how something is a "good game design". By that notion, Uematsu and Amano form two of the largest and most principle aesthetic contributions to FF, but just because those two are working on a project together doesn't make it truly FF. I don't know if this means that a new paradigm of oeuvre taxonomy is needed, or if the notion of oeuvre among highly collaborative projects must necessarily be fractured.
The scenario writer of FF1 however happened to be a script writer for the anime of Kimagure Orange Road, which means you can basically watch that anime and pretend you are watching a Final Fantasy anime. This is clearly the most important point of all this.
EDIT: double post!
[this message was edited by Spoon on Fri 21 Jun 04:52] |
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| "Re(2):Sonic Mania: YOU ARE THE EGGMAN" , posted Tue 25 Jun 12:19
You'd think video games would be the antidote for auteur theory since it's a huge creative collaboration and not just the director. And sure enough, Ohshima and Naka's teams separately gave us two different and equally wonderful takes on Sonic for CD and 2. So I'd like to think a game series could become its own folkloric archetype for many different people to riff on, like Robin Hood or even just Lupin III.
...and yet: looking at the post-MD Sonics where Naka and Ohshima weren't really involved, the intolerably stupid non-Sakaguchi follow-ups to FFVII and FFX, or, god help us, the garbage Kato wrote for Chrono Cross once Horii and Sakaguchi weren't in the lead, it makes me wonder.
All of which is why Sonic Mania is a minor miracle and everyone who hasn't already played it really ought to! I have credibility on two levels, you know: I played all the original Sonics A LOT and am thus knowledgeable, but I only like Sonic 2 and Sonic CD and am thus selective and not a "crazy internet Sonic fan" (ew) who was dreaming of something like this. Really. Stop looking at me like that.
quote:
Ishii, Tanaka, and Kawazu are still at Squenix, and still work on FF games
Kawazu was the main dungeon designer and combat system designer of FF1
On second thought, forget everything I said above. I'm perfectly happy to go with the new dogma that the only artistically consistent thing Square can do is to continuously remake FFII, with Kawazu in the lead, forever.
quote:
The scenario writer of FF1 however happened to be a script writer for the anime of Kimagure Orange Road, which means you can basically watch that anime and pretend you are watching a Final Fantasy anime.
<3
Amazing! You have referenced my other bible besides Lunar. WELL GUESS WE HAVE TO GET MARRIED NOW
The only acceptable Final Fantasy anime is the magnificently terrible/awesome Final Fantasy V OAV, though.
人間はいつも私を驚かせてくれる。不思議なものだな、人間という存在は．．．
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| "Imperial SaGa and Phantasy Star" , posted Mon 1 Jul 00:39
Shameful pouble-post (please play Sonic Mania), but it's not my fault since Just a Person used the Chrono Trigger to go back in time for an important update, but I'll get to that in a minute.
FIRST, Kawazu's Apostles are pleased to inform you that Imperial SaGa Eclipse is in development for PC and smartphones. This is the sequel to the original PC flash game from 2015 that's closing down at the end of this year. Get ready for the awe-inspiring medium of HTML 5! Itou Kenji on music and Kawazu is executive producer, so technically you have to care!quote:
speaking of the PS2 redesigns, I read that SEGA intended to make one for PSIV as well and release all three remakes (I, II and IV - which isn't actually named IV in Japan) in a collection in the West, which makes a lot of sense as they constitute a full story (PSIII being more of a side story than part of the main one). But then, for some unrevealed reason, they decided to cancel both the PSIV remake and the releases outside of Japan.
That's a pity. Then again, it seems not everyone who played the PSI and II remakes liked them, so maybe for once SEGA made a right decision? I guess we'll never know...
That's serious shame---I do kind of remember that being planned. Probably low sales since they were in a weird in-between space: a very low-budget remake as the headliner bundled with the original version as a bonus. Part of it's a visual problem: I recall Polly describing the PSI remake as garish and bright, and I sure didn't like PSII's incredibly drab PC game-looking designs. Compare this dullsville cover and featureless in-game art with Yoneda Hitoshi's absolutely profound original. It added (not very fun) timed attacks like Shadow Hearts yet was still way too difficult to play...couldn't possibly pick up new players except for the very dedicated.
人間はいつも私を驚かせてくれる。不思議なものだな、人間という存在は．．．
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| | "Re(1):Imperial SaGa and Phantasy Star" , posted Mon 1 Jul 20:26
quote:
That's serious shame---I do kind of remember that being planned. Probably low sales since they were in a weird in-between space: a very low-budget remake as the headliner bundled with the original version as a bonus. Part of it's a visual problem: I recall Polly describing the PSI remake as garish and bright, and I sure didn't like PSII's incredibly drab PC game-looking designs. Compare this dullsville cover and featureless in-game art with Yoneda Hitoshi's absolutely profound original. It added (not very fun) timed attacks like Shadow Hearts yet was still way too difficult to play...couldn't possibly pick up new players except for the very dedicated.
Yeah, it seems they didn't look very attractive to new players, especially for PS2 games. Nevertheless, it would be nice if PSIV's remake weren't canceled just for completion sake, and had the West compilation happened, Sega could finally give their translation some consistency (it's weird how the planets change names every game or how Noah/Lutz has a different name in PSI and PSII despite being the same person). Though overall I do prefer the English names (Alis and Odin sound much cooler than Alisa and Tylon, for instance).
Oh well, I guess remaking a game is always a risky task. That reminds me of the Silent Hill HD Collection, which ended up being a complete disaster (I was upset before it came out that Konami had left SH4 out of the compilation... now I'm grateful).
Maybe I'm this person right in front of you... nah probably not though.
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Platinum Carpet V.I.P - THE FOOL  | "Imperial Vault, SaGa Heaven" , posted Tue 2 Jul 03:52
Speaking of ghosts from the imperial past... someone needs to talk about Heaven's Vault on this BBS.
...
...
FINE, I'll do it. Jeez.
So. Heaven's Vault is a Translate'em'up Third Person Archeologer about a woman wearing sensible clothing, exploring a strange sci-fi world to uncover the past of the civilizations flourishing there by finding random objects forgotten in the mud and trying to decipher the glyphs that cover them.
Honestly, if that description didn't convince you, I'm not sure what you're doin' around here.
The gameplay is really walking around, talking to people, exploring everything in search of glyphs, and that's it. No action, no violence, no destruction of ancient ruins, no explosion, no snakes, no whip, no double handguns, no wise-cracking white dude. It's slow, it's meticulous, it's boring at times. It's exactly what it says it is.
It's not without faults (the invented language is a bit too close to English for my tastes, the validation system is close to Obra Dinn's induction-until-you-get-it-right, some of the dialogue trees get confusing, it's weird that so many objects have random words written on them, the language doesn't change through the thousand of years you're looking into, the camera is buggy at times, the 2D art looks weird on a 3D plane) but it's not like there's many games on that specific corner. The sci-fi setting is really good, the characters extremely well written, and the dialogue trees evolve the situations in interesting ways, that make me believe I am influencing the relationship of the characters, even if maybe I don't and the game just lies very convincingly. The main character is really great, I love her.
But wait, there's more!
Even though the game tricks you into thinking it's one of those familiar Translate'em'up Third Person Archeologer games like there's so many of nowadays, it's actually much more about History, how history defines civilization, how people in power use it to legitimate their power, how empires can erase specific things of the past to reshape it... It's also about colonialism, about the imposition of someone else's culture, about the struggle to have your culture survive under another culture's foot, about living between these two cultures and the compromises it forces onto you, about belonging, and about not belonging.
It's an absolutely fantastic game, unlike anything I've ever played, and very likely the Obra Dinn of the year (sorry Baba is You, you're fantastic too, but a bit lacking on the political side of things). This board is more or less the prime target for it, so maybe it's been discussed in another thread and I missed it? Anyway. Play it.
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| PSN: KTallguy
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| "Re(3):Imperial Vault, SaGa Heaven" , posted Tue 2 Jul 10:50:
I liked 80 days and I had my eye on Heaven's Vault, but didn't bite yet. But Obra Dinn was freakin' fantastic, so if it's similar to that I'm down.
I must admit, I got a little excited that there was some new SAGA game that I didn't know about :p
Also also! Baba is You is one of those infuriating games where you grind for hours on a thing, come back, and beat it in one try.
Since this is now the indie game thread, another one! I haven't had much time to play it but Pathologic 2 is out, and much less buggy than their first game. Be warned that it's an opaque and frustrating survival game (I think they patched in some easy difficulty), but it has surreal stage play storytelling and haunting art. Also not many Eastern European companies are making games so I like to support Ice Pick Lodge.
Edit: Oh shit, there is a new SaGa game and it's HTML5! Perfect!
[this message was edited by KTallguy on Tue 2 Jul 10:51] |
| | "Re(5):Teppen All Stars" , posted Sat 6 Jul 06:57:
quote:
Teppen
I initially thought Teppen sounded like the name of a restaurant! And I was right.
So anyway, I downloaded the game and played it for maybe six hours, which is certainly a good sign, but after using my uncanny ability to peer dozens of hours into the future to determine my ultimate satisfaction with the game, I uninstalled it the same day. That doesn't mean it was bad, necessarily, just that it's not quite for me. I'll share some of my thoughts.
Other than some bugs and crashes, it's a reasonably polished game. Speaking to the off-brandish name, there is a bit of "unofficial product" feel here and there. There is some good quality art, and the hero characters generally look appropriate and have nice animations, but the card art doesn't always feel authentically Capcom. I found a lot of the Resident Evil and Mega Man franchise art feeling kind of off, for example. (On the other hand, the MonHun art is pretty solid).
In terms of gameplay, it's a modern-feeling, lane-based design where you try to punch past defenders to whack the opponent's hero. There are no turns, so the pace is determined by an energy meter that charges steadily, and is depleted by X bars when you play a card with X cost. Cards are placed in one of three lanes (top, mid, bottom), and they send an attack arrow over to the opponent's side of the screen. Every character card has attack and defense values, like every other card game since Magic the Gathering, and there are "action cards" that do stuff when you play them.
The real-time element is kind of exciting, but it's also a little bit wonky and imprecise. If you have a close situation (e.g., you are waiting for your meter to charge so you can drop a defender at a last minute to intercept an attack arrow), you have to drag and hold the card in place while you wait for the meter to roll over. Unfortunately the UI elements are so small you can't really tell exactly when your energy will fill up or an attack will hit (at least when playing on a phone).
This slight messiness is partially an interface problem, but it also seems like an inevitable consequence of real-time gameplay that isn't broken into discrete phases or turns. I'd really like to have been able to pre-place a card that would activate when I had the energy to pay for it, and/or see a countdown clock that indicated exactly when an attack would hit me.
Still, being real time makes things feel a bit more tense and urgent. The other primary virtue of being "real time" is that games move quickly. I think they top out at five minutes, but I played maybe 100 games and never had one time out). In general, each match is pretty fun if you aren't getting totally stomped.
Deck-building is what I like most in card games, and while they have some interesting stuff going on (including several direct analogues to Magic the Gathering mechanics like "flight" and "shroud"), it seems to heavily push you into using cards from a single color. Each category has its own mechanics (e.g., like being extra attacky, returning cards from the graveyard), so cards within a particular color have a lot of obvious synergy. Picking two or more colors seemed very limiting, as that reduces your total energy (and thus keeps you from using powerful high-costed cards). There may be interesting ways to do multi-color decks after you unlock more of the card set, but it looks like the game is pushing you into clear archetypes and optimization.
Ultimately, I have the same problem with it that I have with just about every other modern digital card game. It's almost sure to be all about crafting the most efficient deck possible (which will shortly emerge into a clear meta available to anyone who can be assed to look for it online) and grinding out wins until you eventually have the cards that form the best possible deck... and then grinding out more wins. Maybe I'm just a little burned out on this type of thing lately.
So anyway, I unlocked a few characters in "story mode" (which is basically playing three easy matches with that character), then hit on a good Morrigan deck and was grinding out wins in the method outlined above (sometimes winning extremely quickly thanks to an epic rare Devil Hunter Dante card). After ranking up through the entire first tier of rankings, I realized that future me would inevitably burn out and look back on this as wasted time.
While I really dove into the game at first, my mind is not configured in such as way as to enjoy this type of activity for long. Experimentation kind of felt like a waste of time, as you are fighting random opponents and thus need to be as consistent as possible to advance and earn rewards. This makes me want to approach the game like work and keeps me from enjoying the game in a more flexible, exploratory way. And, being a bit older now, sinking serious time into any sort of grind tends to send me into "What the hell am I doing with my finite amount of time on this Earth?" mode.
A few other issues contributed to my early retirement. When I got to the higher ranks, graveyard-abusing Wesker appeared to be total OP bullshit (or maybe he was just a hard counter to my particular type of deck). The game also seems to crash a lot, and I am reasonably certain that when the opponent rage-quits, you are still assigned a loss!
Then again, a few things kept me playing for longer than I might have. You get cards randomly by opening packs, but you can also craft particular cards you using the "souls" resource, which is similar to Hearthstone and basically every other FTP digital card game. One is that Morrigan's "super move" is pretty fun to inflict on people. It inflicts a status effect on all enemies that keeps them from attacking or defending and sets them up for various card-combo beatdowns), and it has a sexy animation to top it off. Doing this to an opponent right at the end of the match when I was clearly going to win anyway might have had something to do with those rage quits, though. 
For anyone thinking about trying it, they seem to be giving away a decent amount of login goodies for early birds (meaning you can open a lot of packs and have better odds of getting some ultra-rares). It's worth screwing around with if you approach it with reasonable expectations (i.e., this is a standard FTP card game).
I can think of one more noteworthy angle, and that concerns the treatment of the legacy. While Teppen does have some weird/obscure/lovable Capcom characters*, and it feels like they have earnestly tried to connect the right personalities to the cards, I suspect that the game was designed first and much of the "Capcom flavor" was added in afterwards. I didn't really notice any knowing winks, nods, in-jokes or even flat-out memes. This game doesn't seem to have the amount of love, charm, or awareness of Capcom's history that went into SNK vs. Capcom: Card Fighter's Clash, which is perhaps the thing that would most endear me to the game.
Bottom line, the game is basically fun, but the Capcom flavor tastes just a bit watered down. It has a typical FTP structure, which has its pros and cons (I don't think the game felt particularly greedy or generous as far as these things go).
* - For those that want to know the answer to the question "Whu...WhuAT AM I FIGHTING FOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOoooouRRRRRRRrRraaarrrrgggggghhhhhhhh????," Zero's ill-fated lover Iris from Mega Man X features on multiple cards.
/ / /
[this message was edited by Mosquiton on Sat 6 Jul 12:13] |
| PSN: zonepharaoh
XBL: n/a
Wii: n/a
STM: n/a
CFN: zonepharaoh
| "Re(6):Teppen Mega Drive All Stars" , posted Sun 7 Jul 05:16
I had fun reading Mosquiton's review of Teppen, which we may as well start calling Teppan-yaki so we can imagine there's a little more hibachi-style flavor/weirdness in there. Eventually, we may figure out just what Zero has been fighting forrrrrrrrrr all this time.
Meanwhile, it's less than three months till the glorious Mega Drive Mini but too early for me to make the MD thread, so let's celebrate with semi-recent USGamer interviews on how great it will be:
--"The man that designed that Mega Drive 30 years ago still works for Sega Group. We had him design this version too. It's not just the designer. It's also the manufacturers, the packaging designer person, everybody came back for this."
--"We're always the challenger going against the top brands. The Mini is the personification of that kind of challenger image and the loyalty of all the fans that have been with us for a very long time."
The most amazing bit is that whereas other companies, when asked about where their missing 1990s game preservation materials are, usually answer that they "lit them on fire" or "deleted them immediately upon launch," Sega went that extra mile to seal them away, and unleash them upon the world two decades later via the power of lockpicking:
--"The people that made the packaging had to go back into the archives and look for the photos to recreate them. There was a cabinet that they remembered they had old photos in. They went to the cabinet and tried to open it, but the keys didn't work," he tells me. According to Miyazaki, no one had the keys to the filing cabinet though, so a locksmith had to be called in to open it.
人間はいつも私を驚かせてくれる。不思議なものだな、人間という存在は．．．
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| | "Re(4):Imperial Vault, SaGa Heaven" , posted Tue 9 Jul 02:47
quote:
Since this is now the indie game thread, another one! I haven't had much time to play it but Pathologic 2 is out, and much less buggy than their first game. Be warned that it's an opaque and frustrating survival game (I think they patched in some easy difficulty), but it has surreal stage play storytelling and haunting art. Also not many Eastern European companies are making games so I like to support Ice Pick Lodge.
I was really interested in Pathologic 2 simply because of the notion that it is less buggy and unintentionally impenetrable than the first game, though it still retains plenty of intentional opaqueness. On the topic of unintentional opaqueness, it took me a few conversations to realize that the little round symbol beside conversation replies indicates "end conversation", which I didn't catch at first because every time a conversation ends at the start of the game, you get a Thought, and the Thought symbols/icon pop up are all round, so I thought if you picked those choices you would get "things" from the conversation.
The introductory part of Pathologic 2 is really neat and is totally on the edge of "artsy fartsy arthouse movie BS" and "actually neat surrealism" and "I like the worldview of the video game it intimates"
The way the conversation screen looks make entering conversations with people practically jump scares, though.
Also so far I've wandered far South off the map, and spent a lot of time walking/running away from people trying to punch me.
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| | "Re(6):Imperial Vault, SaGa Heaven" , posted Wed 10 Jul 04:32
quote:
Meanwhile, Square must have heard about Mosquiton's disappointment with Teppen and just announced the Final Fantasy Digital Card Game featuring later polygonal characters represented as FFVI-style sprites, which pleases me, not least because it reminds me of 1990s internet fanpage creations like the interactive Mysidia and Illucidia (??) online towns.
The FF6-style sprites are actually recycled from another gatcha, FF Record Keeper. Also, FFRK had a neat graphical identity that this card game lacks horribly.
As for Teppen... if by day 2 I already need to think twice about starting the game "if only to get the log-in bonuses", and failing to do it twice... I guess my relationship with the game will be short-lived.
Still, I wish them all the best in their future endeavour.
I'm not sure what made me bounce off... the visuals, which are at the same time nice but also super dark and not cheerful and unCapcom-y? The lack of info about what each card does? Or the fact Dota Underworld is sucking up all my time?
If Capcom does an Autochess with colorful graphics, though, it might be the end of me.
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| PSN: zonepharaoh
XBL: n/a
Wii: n/a
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CFN: zonepharaoh
| "Re(1): hackin'" , posted Sat 13 Jul 01:31:
quote:
Maou will likely sniff at some of the hacks done to the Working Designs games, but I do think that making the dialogue text use upper and lower case is definitely a positive improvement... I also had no idea that Working Designs added substantial difficulty to that one game including making saves cost a resource!
I do sniff! But despite disagreeing with the hacker's opinion on what makes a good script and a good localization, it's always fun for people to try something different, and having to use a valuable resource to save in the US version is tough (even if I think it's kind of neat!). It makes a lot more sense for games they accidentally broke...Exile, I think?
Fixing bugs, on the other hand, is a pretty cool aspect of rom hacking, though in some cases, they become part of the fabric of the game! I once saw a patch that removed the Vanish/Death and Vanish/Degen instant-kill combination from FFVI, but those always felt so natural that they seemed intentional. And I figure if you're slick enough to know how to equip Edgar's Drill as armor to max out your stats, the bug is just fine. Still, I'd enjoy playing a version of FFVI where the Magic Evasion stat actually worked (I believe it's accidentally connected to regular Evasion).
quote:
adding of air control to Castlevania 1!
On the other hand, I'm not sure I can condone heresey! Then again, it would be a really nice introduction for people who wanted to get into the series after starting with a Metroidvania. They could model it after FFIV Easy Type (the only rom hack I know of to have an official release, hohoho) and push it as the "friendly edition!"
人間はいつも私を驚かせてくれる。不思議なものだな、人間という存在は．．．
[this message was edited by Maou on Sat 13 Jul 02:34] |
| PSN: zonepharaoh
XBL: n/a
Wii: n/a
STM: n/a
CFN: zonepharaoh
| "PCE Mini(mum Effort)" , posted Mon 15 Jul 13:42
コナミ：討伐開始
The only thing more unforgivable than a double-post is Konami’s continued incompetence, so let’s marvel at its extremely weird choice to have the PCE Mini include 26 Japanese language games and 24 English language games to guarantee that no one will be happy! It’s not like they didn’t have standard practices (FC, SFC Mini), best practices (MD Mini), and disastrous practices (PS Classic) to study from, so...what the hell IS this?!
I see they now have Snatcher, Bomberman ‘94, Dracula X, Ys 1&2, and unofficial MMC mascot game CHOU ANIKI, but where on earth are Tengai Makyou, Cosmic Fantasy, Exile, Garou, an influential girly game or two like Doukyuusei, and all the other anime-heavy CD games that defined the system?! Unsurprisingly given the history, the US lineup contains nothing additional of any importance.
At least they managed to figure out that they should probably include Tokimeki Memorial (for god’s sake), but otherwise, they’ve managed to make the PCE Mini feel a lot more like the irrelevant overseas legacy than its important second place finish in Japan.
人間はいつも私を驚かせてくれる。不思議なものだな、人間という存在は．．．
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| PSN: ShikyohMukuro
XBL: IAMDC1
Wii: n/a
STM: N/A
CFN: n/a
| "Re(1):PCE Switch Mini(mum Effort) or Lite" , posted Mon 15 Jul 14:02
quote:
コナミ：討伐開始
The only thing more unforgivable than a double-post is Konami’s continued incompetence, so let’s marvel at its extremely weird choice to have the PCE Mini include 26 Japanese language games and 24 English language games to guarantee that no one will be happy! It’s not like they didn’t have standard practices (FC, SFC Mini), best practices (MD Mini), and disastrous practices (PS Classic) to study from, so...what the hell IS this?!
I see they now have Snatcher, Bomberman ‘94, Dracula X, Ys 1&2, and unofficial MMC mascot game CHOU ANIKI, but where on earth are Tengai Makyou, Cosmic Fantasy, Exile, Garou, an influential girly game or two like Doukyuusei, and all the other anime-heavy CD games that defined the system?! Unsurprisingly given the history, the US lineup contains nothing additional of any importance.
At least they managed to figure out that they should probably include Tokimeki Memorial (for god’s sake), but otherwise, they’ve managed to make the PCE Mini feel a lot more like the irrelevant overseas legacy than its important second place finish in Japan.
I am not to familiar with the PCE or TG but if it has some gems worth playing, I would like to try it. But is it a good deal? I saw somewhere that it will have all 50 games. Not sure if that was a bad advertisement cause I assume it had more games than 50?
Also, what is everyones thoughts on the new Switch Lite?
I personally am glad that this is available. I can stop using stealing my brothers switch at times! But I prefer the portability to use it anywhere in the house or outside. I have been shifting my game purchases from PS4 to switch now. Who would have known.
Long Live I AM!
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| | "Re(1):PCE Mini(mum Effort)" , posted Mon 15 Jul 20:42
quote:
The only thing more unforgivable than a double-post is Konami’s continued incompetence, so let’s marvel at its extremely weird choice to have the PCE Mini include 26 Japanese language games and 24 English language games to guarantee that no one will be happy! It’s not like they didn’t have standard practices (FC, SFC Mini), best practices (MD Mini), and disastrous practices (PS Classic) to study from, so...what the hell IS this?!
Yeah, the selection is just terrible.
Alien Crush over Devil? PC Genjin 1 but not 2? No Final Match Tennis? No Cotton? No Ys4? Fire Pro Wrestling? Kunio-kun? NO TENGAIMAKYO WTF???
There's a lot of games that were influential at the time but a chore to play now... and even that list is incomplete. Where is Kiki Kaikai?
Konami doesn't care about Hudson, Taito or Spike. Or NEC.
...
Though on second thought, I don't know why I get all worked up on this, since I never intended to buy another box of plastic waste anyway.
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| | "Re(2):No Loading Times Test - PS1 or Saturn?" , posted Wed 28 Aug 14:47:
quote:
Need help to clarify another argument among my group. Does the playstation one have a game(or games) that does not have to go through any loading time anytime after the game is fully booted. By no loading time, that means,
a screen for loading
Now loading screen
interrupting the transition for loading
There are a number of games that either fit that criteria or comes very close to it, albeit the ones I can name are not released in English. If you search for games that were in 2D and played either as an RPG, Strategy, or adventure-style, often utilizing tiled-based graphics, you'll probably find a handful.
From games that I have fond memories of and can still recall, Yuukyuu Gensoukyoku 2 on the Saturn didn't have any sort of loading screen. There were probably transitional loadings but they were extremely short and hardly noticable, playing almost as smooth as a Super Famicom game.
Burger Burger for the PS1, an interesting game that plays like a Burger shop take on Sim City, had no loading screen beyond its initial player name input screen. And from what I understand, Burger Burger 2 had no loading screen whatsoever because they simply omitted a loading note on startup(!), which was a smart choice since it's short enough that you don't really feel it. I unfortunately never had a chance to play the sequel.
Dungeon Shoutenkai (PS1), another game which I liked because of its cozy atmosphere, didn't have any in-game loading screen either as I recall.
[this message was edited by Professor on Wed 28 Aug 15:53] |
| | "Re(1):Ryu Ga Gotoku 7: Like a Persona" , posted Fri 30 Aug 18:48
quote:
In today's Japan makes April Fool's jokes a reality news, the next Yakuza game now has RPG combat.
OK, that might be the moment when RGG became "too real".
The new MC is a fan of DQ, like any old guy in his 40s.
So, like in DQ, you can change jobs at Dorma, since this is an RPG.
Except in-universe, Dorma is actually Hallo Work.
So after having broken your spirits chasing some temp work all day to pay the bills, you can go back home to do the same thing in your escapism game. It's quite chilling, really.
It's also quite telling that the game that used to be "vent your frustration by punching a drunk buchô that has the same name as your own" has transformed into that. It used to be a series for overstressed salarymen, now RGG7 is a game for ex-salarymen who have become freeters or neets because of the worsening of the economy.
... I think I'll go back to Asstral Chain.
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| | "Re(3):13 sentinels aegis whatever" , posted Mon 9 Sep 14:49
quote:
There is a new trailer for 13 Sentinels Aegis Rim
I don't understand half of what they say, and I still don't understand what the gameplay is aside from the visual novel / exploration part.
It seems an... RTS?
Looks almost life tower defense to me, what with defined lanes that creatures can potentially run down and you having a set of things with no/limited mobility that need to destroy them. I'm super intrigued by it all!
Great, I hate both genres.
I like Vanillaware but this time I think I should pass.
I'm aggressively uninterested in abstracted 3d RTS games. But I'll support anything Vanillaware makes! The characters and story are enough for me!
I was just talking with a friend (who is a super excellent self taught artist and animator) about Vanillaware and he commented that to this day they seem to be the only people that can make natural looking walk and run cycles with puppet/2.5D animation and haha oh man, it's so true!
They are one of the major pioneers of this style (along with the Super Robot Wars team as well as Hentai devs like Tinklebell). I'm pretty sure the animation program Spine was largely made to emulate the look and workings of Vanillaware's games. It's actually become the defacto way to make 2d games now, which when you figure in all the Steam and Mobile games out there now, means it's possibly even more common than 3d games these days! Sometimes I worry that now that everyone does stuff in this style (every Waifu game, Dota/MOBA wallpapers, every bubble shooter, ever mobile CCG etc) that there's no longer any novelty in what Vanillaware does. But they don't need novelty. They just keep delivering the highest quality 2d stuff out there. They're still on top of the game! They do so many things that others dont even think of.
One thing that I think Vanillaware is especially great at is modulating the frame rate of their animations, not unlike say how Arcsys approaches 3d. Just because they can have super smooth interpolated tweens all the time, doesn't mean you should actually do it. Too many 2.5D games just look so damn GOOPY. Like every Korean Waifu game, it's as if the entire character is made out of jiggly breast material. And a lot of Western developed stuff is very technically impressive, but again, it's overly smooth to the point where nothing feels solid. Everything comes across as if they're made of puffy marshmallow material. When everything is pushed to that extreme, nothing has impact. It's like putting bacon on everything. There's no variety. No impact.
Vanillaware keeps stuff classy by using just enough frames to convey whatever it is they want to convey. And you don't even notice it, you just feel it. I'd say it's actually a lot less conspicuous than Xrd which is consciously low frame rate. Vanillaware mixes it up so you don't even notice. Bless em, I'm still learning so much from them all these years later!
BTW I'll be at TGS this year. I'm a total neophyte for this event, and quite frankly I'm really out of touch with what games are coming out lately. Please let me know what games/studios you think I should keep track of! I might even be able to go check out their booths for ya!
www.art-eater.com
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| | "River City Girls" , posted Mon 9 Sep 15:03
Anyone playing River City Girls? It just came out on console/steam. I'm really enjoying it! I absolutely ADORE the sprite art. It's the best sprite art and 2d animation i've seen from a new game in years. They absolutely nailed the feeling of snappy classic 2d Capcom/SNK fighters. This is my absolute favorite style of animation and it's so good to see those skills alive and well in a new game! Also so interesting how much Game Dev has changed where Japanese publishers go to North America if they want a top notch 2d brawler!
Most of the animation in the game was actually done by a single artist toO! You can follow them on Twitter here:
https://twitter.com/kaynimatic
They are an AMAZING artist. They actually go straight to pixel art! No need for rough pencils! And on top of that, they animate STRAIGHT AHEAD instead of pose to pose! This blows my mind because these animations are so EFFICIENT. Every frame is so perfect. Obviously this animator is a very hard worker who has put in their time, but someone who can do this straight ahead, they also probably have a lot of natural talent and very good intuition for animation. It's spectacular stuff! God I love good GAME animation!
The game is a blast with two players too! I have some criticisms, but I'd love to hear everyone's thoughts on the game first! I highly recommend this game if you love:
-good sprite art
-specifically Capcom/SNK sprite art
-specifically Waku Waku 7-like sprite art!
-brawlers
-the original River City Ransom (this is a good update)
Oh yeah the character designs by REM (creator of Devil's Candy) are also really dang good!
https://twitter.com/tsulala/status/1170913875736158209
Full disclosure, I personally know a few folks who worked on this game, and I've worked for Way Forward in the past, so of course I have a personal vested interest in this game doing well. But the reason I know those folks and worked with that company in the first place is cos I really like what they make! They're very passionate, skilled, hard working people! Their games are made with love. And River City Girls is the most impressive game they've ever made! Please play it!
www.art-eater.com
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| | "Re(1):River City Girls" , posted Wed 11 Sep 10:45:
quote:
Anyone playing River City Girls? It just came out on console/steam. I'm really enjoying it! I absolutely ADORE the sprite art.
I've only played a few minutes.
Pressing the attack button to perform screen transitions is an idea that never should have made it through testing. It would be much safer if the transition was triggered by a direction push instead. As is, it is difficult to fight near a door or stairwell without accidentally triggering a screen transition.
I'm not that fond of the English voice actors for the girls. The voice actors are talents and are probably delivering exactly the performance they were hired to deliver. As I've had similar issues with voice choices in US dubs of various anime, my issue is probably more with the performance they were hired to deliver than the delivery itself. Kiyoko is too overdone; she sounds like an exaggerated take on an already exaggerated idea. I cannot even bring myself to play as Kiyoko due to her voice. Misako is much more bearable, but there the issue is that she sounds too much like a 25-30 year old woman doing the voice acting for a teen. (My issue isn't the age of the voice actor, just something about the voice itself doesn't quite click.) Honestly, I'd probably be more accepting of Misako if I wasn't so annoyed by Kiyoko.
EDIT: Kiyoko's voice does get a bit less annoying as I play, which does indeed make me feel better about Misako's voice.
Still not sure how I feel about the gameplay itself. It is fine, but some stuff can be annoying.
You unlock your earliest moves so fast that I'm not sure why they were locked in the first place. It just makes the fighting seem more limited for the first few rooms, where you only have around three moves available there. You have to level up to unlock basic abilities like being able to perform a jumping hard attack.
I'm not sure if there is a trick to recruiting enemies. Right now, it feels fairly random when someone chooses to switch sides. It feels almost like a mechanic to sometimes discourage you from attacking as fast as possible.
I cannot decide how much the game wants me to be using the parry. Some enemies are clearly designed to encourage the player to parry, both due to their attacks and their tendency to block. At least I assume that is why you lack a guard-break move. At the same time, I'm having issues grabbing the exact timing for the parry. I end up blocking too fast for the slower attacks, and too slow for the faster attacks. I never parried Misuzu at all, and I don't know if it is because her attacks cannot be parried or if it was just that I always got the timing wrong.
Similar to fighting at transition points, it can be annoying fighting near dropped weapons. If you don't want to pick up a weapon, you have to either move away from the area or only rely on heavy attacks.
The pause menu move list also doesn't seem to do a good job of describing the moves. "X Rapidly" doesn't mean a Lightning Leg button mash input; instead it means the follow-up attacks of your basic combo. Moves triggered against fallen opponents give no indication that they are only triggered against fallen opponents. Commands for throws only say that they are done from a grab, omitting whether a particular throw requires a front or back grab specifically.
[this message was edited by Baines on Wed 11 Sep 12:38] |
| PSN: zonepharaoh
XBL: n/a
Wii: n/a
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CFN: zonepharaoh
| "Re(6):SaGa City Girls" , posted Thu 12 Sep 02:40
quote:
In other news, the English translation of Romancing Sa.Ga3 is trash.
https://twitter.com/SquareEnix/status/1171770617529425921
"Morastrum" ? Was any combination of "Death" and "Eclipse" too difficult? Why "Sinistral"? Why translate the Holy King into "the Matriarch"?
I don't understand why you'd take a very easy scenario told in very simple ways, and just make it more obscure. Keep your Fl'cie and L'cie in the lesser series and keep SaGa normal and well written, SQEX.
I think it reflects a localization trend at least as old as Vagrant Story and continuing through FFXII and all the Ivalice games. Alexander O. Smith's command of Shakespearean Early Modern English is impressive, and people seemed to really enjoy the English versions of the game, but I always had the suspicion that transforming approachable modern Japanese text into more "distant" older English could sometimes put a distance between the player and the game world. It's not even a case here of "the original text wasn't very sophisticated, the English version is," as is arguably the case in NOA's work or similar, but just that a perfectly fine text is now characterized differently.
Put another way: I wonder what people would have thought if FFVI's straightforward and well-characterized Japanese text had been made flowery, rather than translated into straightforward and well-characterized English text (at least in the original Woolsey version).
人間はいつも私を驚かせてくれる。不思議なものだな、人間という存在は．．．
|
| | "Re(7):SaGa City Girls" , posted Thu 12 Sep 05:38
quote:
I think it reflects a localization trend at least as old as Vagrant Story and continuing through FFXII and all the Ivalice games. Alexander O. Smith's command of Shakespearean Early Modern English is impressive, and people seemed to really enjoy the English versions of the game, but I always had the suspicion that transforming approachable modern Japanese text into more "distant" older English could sometimes put a distance between the player and the game world. It's not even a case here of "the original text wasn't very sophisticated, the English version is," as is arguably the case in NOA's work or similar, but just that a perfectly fine text is now characterized differently.
The thing is, Kawazu's writing is very subdued, with a lot of personality expressed in tiny grammatical details. The text is always very simple, because our lord hates everything that gets in the way of the player, like cutscenes, scenario, wasting time in pointlessly big cities, or even walking on a map from point A to point B.
But it's incredibly difficult to translate, because either you stick to the information conveyed and it's dry and boring, or you try to express the personality of the characters and suddenly you have to over-translate and be super verbose, because western languages don't work like Japanese.
Both choices are bad, and finding a balance between the two is extremely challenging. In any case, making up words to obscure the meaning when the Japanese is crystal clear is not the way to do it.
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| | "Re(6):River City Girls" , posted Thu 12 Sep 11:18
It feels like the more I play, the more minor annoyances creep in.
The basic attack button being used to trigger screen exits has not improved. In some ways it has gotten worse, as pressing the normal attack button near a bus stop will pop up the bus menu and pressing the normal attack near a (rare) talkable person will stop the game for that conversation. PC gamers have apparently already made mods to rebind the "interact" actions, though.
Considering River City Ransom was somewhat revolutionary for letting you run up and punch an enemy while they were still delivering their intro speech, it is somewhat disappointing that RSG pauses the action to deliver full conversations.
Apparently WayForward didn't consider that PCs would be able to run the game at faster than 60fps, as there are apparently some action inputs that become inconsistent at higher frame rates.
Much less critical is apparently that the game code sets the max stamina at a value rather higher than the maximum stamina you can actually obtain within the game, which has led to some players being confused when they can no longer increase their stamina even though it isn't maxed?
Inconsistent or incomplete information seems to be a running theme with the game. I've already mentioned the overly vague move command list. That gets worse when you start getting more moves. Buying moves from shops has a similar matter; the game will helpfully show you an animation of the move before you buy it, but doesn't tell you how the move is performed. Then there is the food information inconsistency. Stores will display the effects of food only after you've eaten it at least once, but your inventory will display the effects even if you've never eaten it. Also, eating food in the shop won't show any stat increase effects, while eating from your inventory screen will?
Again, the game isn't bad. It just has a lot of careless or questionable design issues that shouldn't exist.
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| | "River City Girls and the image of RCR" , posted Tue 17 Sep 05:42:
At one point in River City Girls, Kyoko asks why the city is so violent.
This bit of joke dialogue struck me for a couple of reasons.
First, the world the game displays does not match Kyoko's description. Kyoko says everyone is violent, but the game decorates stages with plenty of "background" characters that will not fight even if you try to attack them. Kyoko also describes a world where fist fights randomly erupt, but the game displays a world where the entire violent portion of the population has teamed up to specifically target Misako and Kyoko. While this is functionally what you saw in RCR, the difference comes in the following...
The fighting in RCR, and the Kunio games in general, made sense as gang fights. It wasn't that the entire city was violent, it was just teenage gang members. It also made sense to not see enemies fighting each other, as any area's enemies would all be from the same gang.
That isn't true in RCG. In RCG, there are no coherent gangs and everyone fights. The very first screen has Misako and Kyoko attacked by random classmates, on orders from the school principal. You continue to get attacked by random teams, then cops, and then WayForward goes wild. You start getting attacked by pro-wrestlers, dominatrixes, robot palette swaps, sledgehammer-wielding punks, Arnold Schwarzenegger cyborg/robots, ...
Kyoko's statement reflects an exaggerated fan view of RCR and the Kunio games, and RCG's design takes that exaggerated view and exaggerates it further. This is a game that starts with the school principal publicly ordering the entire school to attack two students. This is a game where a fashion designer fights you while flying high above the ground and summoning robots to assist her. This is a game where a regular enemy is an Arnold Schwarzenegger robot with extending arms.
[this message was edited by Baines on Tue 17 Sep 05:43] |
| | "River City Rival Showdown vs River City Girls" , posted Wed 18 Sep 00:57
So I finally got around to playing River City Rival Showdown on the 3DS, which I was actually really looking forward to!
IT IS EXTREMELY GOOD GO PLAY IT NOW
So it is a re-creation of River City Ransom but now heavily informed by more modern games, while being a loving tribute to River City Ransom. It has a few notable gameplay tweaks relative to the original RCR (the wheel-type weapons are gone, thrown weapons don't bounce off walls quite as dramatically as before, pitfalls are gone, the variety of takeout food is much much smaller, eating at any sit-down eatery is a full HP restore, stat buffs from food are temporary, etc.), a few MAJOR STRUCTURAL CHANGES relative to the original RCR (the game takes place over 3 days where time passes in real time where there is a day-night cycle and you encounter story events across the map/days).
The first truly amazing thing about the game's realization of the city is how ALIVE the city feels. There are TONS of different NPC sprites which have no combat participation filling the city, and these change over the course of the day. One of the most lively parts of the game is how at night various parts of the city become full of these special NPC sprites, except they are gangs, and they are just hanging out! You don't even fight these guys!
Much like RCG's derided "press punch to interact", you also press punch to talk with people here, but if you accidentally punch certain people, the cops get called on you and I do not believe you can defeat the cop (though I have tried!). The fighting is almost entirely between school factions (and the plot and events are usually about that, as well), though occasionally you get into fights with club hosts and neighbourhood toughs. Even a "random individual" who fights you has some motivation for it. The people in the city are aware of the punks, but it's not like everybody in the city is raring for a fight. There are moms with babies, drunken salarymen, tourists to Japan, etc.
The game's story and world has been brought into the 2000's since it involves netcafes and cellphones!
Art/technical thing:
The game uses a combination of 3D things and pure 2D pixel art. The backgrounds are textured 3D objects with a deliberate low-resolution texturing style that gives it a PSX/pixel-esque look that is charming. The characters for the most part use a single textured polygon so that they can be affected by lighting, but due to the camera it makes them look slightly "muddy" as a result of texture interpolation. This becomes extremely apparent whenever a super move is done and it zooms way in on them. HOWEVER, the person doing the super move transitions into a pure pixel art representation which is razor sharp! This is a really unique trick which I haven't seen done anywhere else! The lighting and slight muddiness gives an interesting sense of haze and being in a humid summer day, which I guess fits perfectly with the hot-blooded life of Kunio. Whenever you enter a shop, it uses pure pixel art, and again the contrast of sharpness in color and line is sharply evident.... as if it wasn't already evident enough by the lower screen minimap that is also entirely pure pixel art.
As a love letter to RCR, one of the cool unlockable features you get once you have gone through one run of the game is an Encyclopedia and Jukebox. In the Encyclopedia, you get needlessly detailed character descriptions of seemingly every NPC in the game! In the Jukebox, you not only get to play every track and have a note about where that track appears in the game, you can flip between this game's arrangement of the track and the original NES version of the track! It's surprising how big the difference is, even though when you're playing the game you just feel "yeah, this is how RCR's music sounded (but with punchier percussion)!".
The real comparison that ought to be done is between River City Rival Showdown, The Friends of Ringo Ishikawa, and Yakuza. All three feature a city you roam around in on your whims. Actually, given River City Rival Showdown's structure, you could probably put Majora's Mask in there.
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Oh Naka-san, do you know how meme your character has become on the internet 
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