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Rance Series

Jaedar

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Project: Eternity Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 Pathfinder: Kingmaker
There's Cola:
Cola is a dude ?! (In that version it kinda looks like a dude, but the normal cola looks very much like a woman imo)

Anyway, that's not really the artstyle I mean. compare to this:
9791c5b8cecdcf5efab993c8d5061384.png
 

Sunri

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I finished part 2, and it was rather disappointing both from gameplay perspective and story, i wish they would just end at part 1 and make another game instead of this half-baked epilogue.
Yeah. Although to be fair, I think a lot of the emotional payoff is lost as a lot of Rance's future adventures play during the credits, but it's way too fast and backgroundy to easily translate. The fight against the embodiment of former demon kings is also cool, although my lore checks are not good enough to fully appreciate it.

I think it's an ok ending to the series in terms of story. But having it locked behind "mastery" of the core game, and then have the part 2 gameplay be easier and with some mechanics removed feels really bad.

In other news, I've added avatars to the codex for 01, 02 and RQM. Will likely be adding 03 and VI soon as well. I wish there was a non-female character with the 'divine' artstyle of Alice/Quetzacotl, I really dig it.
Yea i don't mind happy ending for all characters even main boss from part 1 lol the biggest problem for me was that the tone of the game shifted from struggle against overwhelming odds to children adventure with all shōnen stuff tournament arc training arc everything that was interesting happened off-screen during time skip.
So anyway, is there any similar game to Rance? with cool fleshed out fantasy world, a lot of characters and passable gameplay?
 

Jason Liang

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I finished part 2, and it was rather disappointing both from gameplay perspective and story, i wish they would just end at part 1 and make another game instead of this half-baked epilogue.
Yeah. Although to be fair, I think a lot of the emotional payoff is lost as a lot of Rance's future adventures play during the credits, but it's way too fast and backgroundy to easily translate. The fight against the embodiment of former demon kings is also cool, although my lore checks are not good enough to fully appreciate it.

I think it's an ok ending to the series in terms of story. But having it locked behind "mastery" of the core game, and then have the part 2 gameplay be easier and with some mechanics removed feels really bad.

In other news, I've added avatars to the codex for 01, 02 and RQM. Will likely be adding 03 and VI soon as well. I wish there was a non-female character with the 'divine' artstyle of Alice/Quetzacotl, I really dig it.
Yea i don't mind happy ending for all characters even main boss from part 1 lol the biggest problem for me was that the tone of the game shifted from struggle against overwhelming odds to children adventure with all shōnen stuff tournament arc training arc everything that was interesting happened off-screen during time skip.
So anyway, is there any similar game to Rance? with cool fleshed out fantasy world, a lot of characters and passable gameplay?
Nothing close to Rance. You should probably try AliceSoft's Daibanchou and Dohna Dohna next though. Both have English localizations and are pretty fun. There's also the Toushin Toshi series, Widenyo, etc...
 

Jaedar

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Project: Eternity Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 Pathfinder: Kingmaker
So I finished 03. Rambling impressions/review follow:

The big thing is of course voice acting. It added surprisingly much, even with my poor understanding of nihonese. The jokes land better, the catch phrases (like DAAAARLIIING) are more endearing, and the intentionally annoying characters are more annoying. I generally don't care that much for VO, but after 03 I feel I will miss it in every rance game I (re)play after this. The exception to this is sill, who I now strongly dislike. Having to listen to her go HIIIN-HIIIN-HIIIN is very annoying. The random english words and phrases from characters like Sapphire also made me smile every time at how awful the pronunciation is.

In terms of gameplay, I am strongly disappointed. I am seemingly the only person who likes 01 as much as it deserves, and 03 looks like a copy... except they ruined everything that was good about it. Healing is too plentiful, so there's no need to plan your route, and either way you can retreat any time you like to rest. Not that you need it, because if somehow the healing is not enough healing consumables are strong and effectively free (800k to upgrade an attack, versus 1500 for a high tier healing item). But far worse is the actual combat. Each character theoretically has 4 skills, but your slotted skills have a global cap that is consistently smaller than the number of characters you have. Characters also need to be in combat to get xp, and there's no fatigue system. All characters in combat also have an equal chance to get hit, so in practice you just slot the most basic skill from each character 99% of the time (because it's usually 0 CD, and single target skills with CD are never worthwhile). Most of the bosses also feel like massive hp sponges with simple patterns (the final boss is just: aoe attack, heal, random defensive buff, repeat).

Story/writing wise, I really enjoyed the beginning and the finale. Kanami having to deal with Rance's incompetence is funny and Feliss is interesting as well. And in the finale you are joined by Lia, whose VO is great and made me like a character I was otherwise very ambivalent to. But I got reaaaallly bored of the midgame. There's a very very long section of game that's literally just "Oh no, we have to free another city from Helman, but we are outnumbered and outgunned!" *Rance singlehandedly outplays every general on both sides with his tactical genius, never seen before or after this game* "Easy win! GAHAHAHA". And then that just repeats like 5 times, sometimes with a dungeon in between. My only fond recollection of this part of the game is the constant death flags for Mill. It really makes me want to play Kichikuou, because if they can milk a single prophecied character death that well, I can only imagine how many cool references to Kichikuou I missed over the other games...

How exactly did Helman sneak a full army (or armies even) into the Leazan capitol? There's a lot of mountains and forts in the way! I have also decided to completely ignore the official english spelling of Rance characters. I will not accept Ria, Leira or even Ithere as legit spellings, and you can't make me.

I'm pretty happy I played X before this, because seeing chaos get broken in X was really tense when I didn't know chaos breaking literally happens before he speaks for the first time. I was also expecting something more substantial for chaos to explain why he likes Rance so much, and why Rance is immune to chaos induced insanity, but there was literally nothing. I also really don't get how Patton goes from who he is in this game, to who he is in VI, because it feels like a completely different character, and I don't remember it being adressed at all, but possibly I missed/forgot it.

I skipped most of the optional endgame content, didn't even bother going after hanny king, got one reward from TOWER, didn't get any 0 skills after unlocking the final mission, didn't save computer-chan. I did want to do the happiness chemicals sidequest, but either I completely missed it or it is in another game (it's referenced in X, and the building is prominent in some background art).

Also this ending makes return of the king feel restrained: every single character in the game gets a post credits scene. Followed by a "to be continued" screen that clearly implies 04, but that still hasn't happened and is looking like it never will.
 

Jaedar

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Project: Eternity Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 Pathfinder: Kingmaker
Also some other Rance titles on there too
All that have had official english release looks like. The pricing is a bit weird, RQM more expensive than sengoku.

I kinda wanna buy sengoku just to reward gog for daring to put it on there, but I already own it from MG. I'm also a bit surprised that it says it requires win10, while MG says 7. Did they patch it somehow?
 

Derringer

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Joined
Jan 28, 2020
Messages
1,934
I finished part 2, and it was rather disappointing both from gameplay perspective and story, i wish they would just end at part 1 and make another game instead of this half-baked epilogue.
Yeah. Although to be fair, I think a lot of the emotional payoff is lost as a lot of Rance's future adventures play during the credits, but it's way too fast and backgroundy to easily translate. The fight against the embodiment of former demon kings is also cool, although my lore checks are not good enough to fully appreciate it.

I think it's an ok ending to the series in terms of story. But having it locked behind "mastery" of the core game, and then have the part 2 gameplay be easier and with some mechanics removed feels really bad.

In other news, I've added avatars to the codex for 01, 02 and RQM. Will likely be adding 03 and VI soon as well. I wish there was a non-female character with the 'divine' artstyle of Alice/Quetzacotl, I really dig it.
Yea i don't mind happy ending for all characters even main boss from part 1 lol the biggest problem for me was that the tone of the game shifted from struggle against overwhelming odds to children adventure with all shōnen stuff tournament arc training arc everything that was interesting happened off-screen during time skip.
So anyway, is there any similar game to Rance? with cool fleshed out fantasy world, a lot of characters and passable gameplay?
Nothing close to Rance. You should probably try AliceSoft's Daibanchou and Dohna Dohna next though. Both have English localizations and are pretty fun. There's also the Toushin Toshi series, Widenyo, etc...
There was a budget Toshin Toshi remake for one of the games for the 3DS.
 

Sunri

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Apr 16, 2020
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Thanks for recommendations, but i don't think other alicesoft games will fit the void that Rance left it is so weird that no one copied this series you can make similar games in rpg maker after all you just click events and have typical jrpg battles crazy.
 

Sunri

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Wow after playing rance 9 It's hard to believe it was made by the same team that made other entries what a shit gameplay worst in the series killing hundreds of the same enemies over and over now I'm not sure which is worse rance 5 or this hard choice.
 

Jason Liang

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Wow after playing rance 9 It's hard to believe it was made by the same team that made other entries what a shit gameplay worst in the series killing hundreds of the same enemies over and over now I'm not sure which is worse rance 5 or this hard choice.
It's not worth playing if you can't follow the story.
 

Sunri

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Wow after playing rance 9 It's hard to believe it was made by the same team that made other entries what a shit gameplay worst in the series killing hundreds of the same enemies over and over now I'm not sure which is worse rance 5 or this hard choice.
It's not worth playing if you can't follow the story.
Story is good and i like new characters, I'm just surprised how bad the gameplay is i finished rance 4 before this both games have similar tactical combat but rance 4 was better in every way.
 

Jaedar

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Project: Eternity Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 Pathfinder: Kingmaker
I now dread playing Rance 9.

Thanks Sunri.

I'm thinking of going back to X. Still need to kill both la sisters to unlock apocalypse angel fight in aftermode. Might do some kind of challenge mode run where I don't allow myself to use any 0 ap attacks. But I'd also be aiming for JAPAN on turn 8. Alternatively turn 16 demon king kill, but I have a strong suspicion that one is impossible.
 

Jason Liang

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I now dread playing Rance 9.

Thanks Sunri.

I'm thinking of going back to X. Still need to kill both la sisters to unlock apocalypse angel fight in aftermode. Might do some kind of challenge mode run where I don't allow myself to use any 0 ap attacks. But I'd also be aiming for JAPAN on turn 8. Alternatively turn 16 demon king kill, but I have a strong suspicion that one is impossible.
Well, you can't go wrong with rock bottom expectations :D

Like I said in a previous post, the word to describe Rance 9's gameplay is "functional."

If it helps, the battle system is not the #1 thing I would change about Rance 9's gameplay.
 

Sunri

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Your typical battle in Rance 9 but don't worry during the course of the battle game will spawn 3x more bandits

IYlokh0.png
 

Sunri

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hahaha this game is getting better and better i need to stop enemy from escaping battle starts one guy runs off before i can even move and i get game over :5/5:
vYmxj9g.png
 

Jaedar

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Project: Eternity Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 Pathfinder: Kingmaker
Decided I wanted to fight Waswald in X. Any tips on how to force specific rare cards to drop? According to the wiki you need all 4 la sister cards to unlock the fight, and I don't know how to make them drop faster beyond mealticketing both of them to the max asap.

Also did the Kaith/Kawanakajima mission for the first time. Crook sure is the true protagonist of the story. Although I am upset we never get to kill alice. But not upset enough to play RQM 3 times so unlock the fight there.

I also got Arios and Nina to drop, so might try for a legit turn 6 kayblis kill, although I kinda doubt I will succeed because I've been phoning this playthrough in quite a bit.
 

Jaedar

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Project: Eternity Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 Pathfinder: Kingmaker

Jaedar

Arcane
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Joined
Aug 5, 2009
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10,145
Project: Eternity Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 Pathfinder: Kingmaker
Well, I almost got all the cards to drop before turn 6, still need yuki. I did try fighting demon king, but even with op arios it's not doable since I phoned everything in (and the difficulty is 4). So I guess I'll continue to a japan ending.
 

Sunri

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I finally finished all Rance X endings clocked 280h great game, but I'm still missing a lot of things from the collection it's insane how much stuff is in this game.

XpD5a2L.png


97sRv6F.png





FHOdTUX.png
svME7L8.png



xI40wFC.png
 

Jermu

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Aug 13, 2017
Messages
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is there interface patch for rance 9-10? would like to play em but I prefer to wait if menus and stuff are not translated. dont mind machine translation story
 

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