Random thoughts on whatever JRPG you're currently playing?

[deuxhero]

Before World of Ruin, it's almost as linear as a modern game (that isn't an Ubisoft style copy-paste open world).

 

[Abu Antar]

Playing through Fire Emblem Echoes: Shadows of Valentia, and I am enjoying it moire than Awakening, and Fates. This is despite Fates having stronger level layouts. Such is my dislike for the writing in the two games (F and A), that I automatically prefer Echoes. Not that it is free from poor writing...

I'm in act three, and have the ability to swap parties. The game doesn't offer much of a challenge. I had to restart once or twice, mostly because I underestimated the damage output from an enemy, or overestimated the survivability of a unit.

In general, I like the format of the game, even though the older games in the series are still the best. After this one is done, I have both Three Houses and Engage waiting. I know that I will just mash through dialogs on those games, and just focus on battles.

 

[Puukko]

Playing through Fire Emblem Echoes: Shadows of Valentia, and I am enjoying it moire than Awakening, and Fates. This is despite Fates having stronger level layouts. Such is my dislike for the writing in the two games (F and A), that I automatically prefer Echoes. Not that it is free from poor writing...

I'm in act three, and have the ability to swap parties. The game doesn't offer much of a challenge. I had to restart once or twice, mostly because I underestimated the damage output from an enemy, or overestimated the survivability of a unit.

In general, I like the format of the game, even though the older games in the series are still the best. After this one is done, I have both Three Houses and Engage waiting. I know that I will just mash through dialogs on those games, and just focus on battles.

What difficulty are you on? I found Echoes to offer adequate challenge on Hard-Classic, and balancing the two teams added more variety to the usual planning. Some maps took multiple attempts and plenty of RNG finaggling. It's my current FE eternity project though, I believe I was up to chapter 4.

Three Houses isn't so braindead as to not warrant your attention with its story, just that it's undercooked. Engage though... Protect your precious braincells.

 

[Abu Antar]

Doing Hard-Classic. So far, there have been a couple of hairy fights. I had to redo one in the crypt (I think). It was a side quest. I had to class up some dudes, and still redid the fight three or four times. There was one fight in this chapter, where I also overestimated the power of my units. I sent the Pegasus knight sisters to deal with archers, and I would have made it, if not for some unlucky enemy crits.

 

[musouking]

I'm in act three

 

[Abu Antar]

I started Undernauts some time ago, and now I feel like a complete moron, because I do not remember what you need to break walls, lol. Pretty chill difficulty, nothing at all like other DRPGs. Currently, trying to wake up the sleeping warden.

Edit: ffs, I forgot the use of flowers

 

[0sacred]

Bought Unicorn Overlord on Switch because I foolishly trusted a professional reviewer, and he forgot to mention that battles are resolved automatically. The game is heinously boring.

 

[Anonona]

It is similar to other strategy games like Tactics Ogre and Dominion. Before each fight you can customize what will the units actions be, as well as priority of target, conditions of activation, etc. You actually have a lot of control over the units actions and there are numerous unit types with unique skills. In fact compared to other games of the same genre like Fire Emblem, squads have more actions at their disposal and offer more options.

The end result really isnt that different of giving orders one by one, and it helps to make combat fast despite having so many units at the same time. If you haven't played much, I'll suggest to give it a bit more time before passing judgement.

 

[Abu Antar]

I'm in act three

View attachment 52009

Done and done. Actually did it on my first try, but wow, was that map annoying.

 

[Zero CHAR]

I'll be grabbing SMTVV soon enough, but between that and having cleared the Elden Ring expansion, I'm dabbling in some Caligula Effect 2. This is one of those niche JRPGs with a small but autistic dedicated fanbase. It's Hatsune Miku's Wonderland where everybody is carrying a dozen people's worth of baggage.

I never played the first game, and as I understand Overdose made some unsavoury changes, so there's like the one game I could see myself trying out Vita emulation for down the line.

The game so far is heavily carried by its style and especially soundtrack. On a technical level it's sub par at best, with very stiff and repetitive animations, models that are a bit off, and janky cutscenes. I don't know if this even qualifies as AA, more like A+. It's the sort of stuff you just overlook for the actual meat of the game.

The combat has potential but comes with some annoyances I can only hope get sorted later. It's ATB with semi-free movement and area-based attacks. You can delay your attacks to counter enemies and get a bigger party wide hit counter. You can even see the outcome of an attack beforehand. Thing is, the ATB gauge when doing so moves slooow and in real time meaning that when you test if delaying an attack by 5 seconds has the best outcome, nope, make that 6 seconds, repeat, you have to wait every time before it shows the outcome. Furthermore, for comboing you'd want to fine tune each party member in tandem, but once you've locked in one character, you can't change it anymore, so you may change to another character and realize a small tweak on the other would have been perfect, but now you've just got to wing it. I'm very early in the game so it could be these things get addressed, but I'm not holding my breath.

Technical note, I couldn't get most changes in ini files to work with this game, so I just grabbed the UE4 unlocker and used the console to tweak the resolution scale since even at 4K with maximum AA the jaggies were pretty bad. It's prone to turning the game into an unplayble stuttery mess depending on the phase of the moon if I try anything else, but attempting to improve games until they break is exactly up my alley. Also, grab the translated lyrics in battle mod from Nexus, it's a bit hard to read depending on the scenario but definitely worth it.

I agree with everything you said. Caligula 2 combat is a middle ground between the autism of the original Caligula PS Vita release and the dead brained Overdose combat. Katana idol is just too broken, she never left the party for me.

I still listen to the OST of both games from time to time.

 

[Abu Antar]

With the whole Dragon Quest III body type drama, I thought that I should go back and finish Dragon Quest XI. Fought the serpent close to the Arborian border, and man, that was a fight and a half. I was not expecting that. I had to use all tricks up my sleeve. Without buffs/debuffs, you would be serpent food.

 

[d1r]

Why is nobody talking about SMTVV? Do you need a copy? Really? Do I have to buy more!?

 

[Eldrin]

Chrono Trigger - still holds up even after all these years. Only game that takes around 10h to complete, but feels like 30h of content - in a very positive way.

Golden Sun - the intro/prologue until you get out of the first village is such a fcking slog...

 

[Damned Registrations]

Why is nobody talking about SMTVV? Do you need a copy? Really? Do I have to buy more!?

I'll need a system to play it on, can you spot me a laptop as well?

 

[Puukko]

I've written about this game before as I played it in chunks over a long time, but I finally finished Scarlet Nexus.

The game goes from good to great in the last third, and much of that is owed to the combat system finally clicking together. Once you gain access to the full party and their associated later bond upgrades, it becomes a lot of fun dealing with all the layers in the combat. The most undercooked aspect I'd say is brain field, as it is a big cooldown... that just massively simplifies combat for about half a minute. Most of the associated upgrades are boring too, boosting EXP gain and such.

The final dungeon pulls no punches, and the final boss is a real treat. Not a wet fart like I've come to expect.

Some story thoughts:

Spoiler

Karen's motivations were undercooked. I don't mean the prospect of going to such lengths for one's love, but we are introduced to Alice late and barely learn anything about her or their relationship. It's not even stated that there is a relationship beyond Karen having a crush on his childhood friend, yet he's willing to make schemes across time for 2000 years and doom the entire world for her. Feels like the meat of that story is missing.

One can certainly do worse than grabbing this on sale to sate a thirst for good animu action.

 

[Elttharion]

I've written about this game before as I played it in chunks over a long time, but I finally finished Scarlet Nexus.

The game goes from good to great in the last third, and much of that is owed to the combat system finally clicking together. Once you gain access to the full party and their associated later bond upgrades, it becomes a lot of fun dealing with all the layers in the combat. The most undercooked aspect I'd say is brain field, as it is a big cooldown... that just massively simplifies combat for about half a minute. Most of the associated upgrades are boring too, boosting EXP gain and such.

The final dungeon pulls no punches, and the final boss is a real treat. Not a wet fart like I've come to expect.

Some story thoughts:

Spoiler

Karen's motivations were undercooked. I don't mean the prospect of going to such lengths for one's love, but we are introduced to Alice late and barely learn anything about her or their relationship. It's not even stated that there is a relationship beyond Karen having a crush on his childhood friend, yet he's willing to make schemes across time for 2000 years and doom the entire world for her. Feels like the meat of that story is missing.

One can certainly do worse than grabbing this on sale to sate a thirst for good animu action.

Kind of a silly thing but I liked how the hideout would be filled with the gifts you gave to your party members.

I remember some of the items and mats for a few of the gifts being a pain in the ass to farm tho.

Also there are a bunch of cool outfits but no swimsuits is a major decline.

 

[Vic]

tales of the abyss sucks
the only thing I like is the asshole protag
so railroaded, why even give me the option of exploring if you don't want me to go anywhere
does it get better?

If you're calling him the asshole protag then you aren't that far into the story yet. Does it get better gameplay wise? No. The best part is the character development of the protag imo.

 

[Vic]

tales of the abyss sucks
the only thing I like is the asshole protag
so railroaded, why even give me the option of exploring if you don't want me to go anywhere
does it get better?

If you're calling him the asshole protag then you aren't that far into the story yet. Does it get better gameplay wise? No. The best part is the character development of the protag imo.

I said that but I don't think he's an asshole, the first thing I did was type into google "why is tales of the abyss so bad" and it's people complaining the protag has a character instead of being a dweeb
I'll suffer it some more then, I can't help it

He's definitely an asshole at first. I think he was made to be unlikable? It's the setup for his development.

 

[Elttharion]

Thats some very nice enemy design, I almost feel bad beating them

Dungeon Travelers: To Heart 2 in Another World

 

[spookyheart]

rune factory has to be one of the most meh series ever to be made if you ask me

 

[Louis_Cypher]

Tried Lunar: Silver Star Harmony (PSP remake) today. It's veeery slooooooow. Almost impossible to play without at least 2x speed up. The game feels too formulaic of a JRPG, it's like you already know exactly how it will play out before even properly starting. It's one of those cases when you see there's nothing seriously wrong with a game, yet at the same time it gives you no incentive to continue playing it. Actually this is the second time that I tried getting into it, and again I'm leaving before making it through the first dungeon.

I was on this recently, I got about 20 hours in, and have to agree. Wanted to like it.

 

[Talby]

I'm playing the FF series in random order. I beat 5 and just started 7. For extra immersion and realism, I'm keeping the Steal materia equipped to Barret for the whole playthrough.

 

[n0wh3r3]

tales of the abyss sucks
the only thing I like is the asshole protag
so railroaded, why even give me the option of exploring if you don't want me to go anywhere
does it get better?

If you're calling him the asshole protag then you aren't that far into the story yet. Does it get better gameplay wise? No. The best part is the character development of the protag imo.

I said that but I don't think he's an asshole, the first thing I did was type into google "why is tales of the abyss so bad" and it's people complaining the protag has a character instead of being a dweeb
I'll suffer it some more then, I can't help it

He's definitely an asshole at first. I think he was made to be unlikable? It's the setup for his development.

doesn't matter anymore, I switched to Rogue Galaxy
now that's a game!!!

I have plans to play that as well! I have only launched it recently to see if it worked and the introduction amazed me. How far are you in the game?

I'm playing the FF series in random order. I beat 5 and just started 7. For extra immersion and realism, I'm keeping the Steal materia equipped to Barret for the whole playthrough.

My advice for you is the following: instead of playing the regular I, II and IV chapters, go for Final Fantasy Origins (I & II enhanced for PSX) and the PSP remake of FFIV (which includes extra chapters).

As for me, I have big plans about playing old jrpgs. I am currently busy with Final Fantasy Tactics Advance. I must admit that it is a very good and polished game (as I remember, I have only played a tiny bit of it), but it seems to lean towards the easy side.
Has anyone played it?

 

[n0wh3r3]

JRPGs that are keeping me busy: Vandal Hearts, Final Fantasy V, Final Fantasy Tactics Advance, Etrian Odyssey HD I.

About the last one (really loving it!), do you think we will ever see other remastered/ported games from the franchise?

 

[Puukko]

Went back to Drakengard 3 on a whim after a long break. This game fucking sucks, I love it.

Technically I considered myself done with the game in the past but I grabbed a finished save to skip the weapon grind and see the rest of the story. May give the DLC a spin, but for now I'm practicing the final boss. Made it to the fifth phase so far... so probably like halfway done as it only gets nastier.

Speaking of getting nastier, the game also gets hornier as it goes on. It is entertaining to watch the world and characters devolve, none of these people are redeemable.

The areas suck, the enemies suck, the combat sucks and lacks flow, many of the weapons are terribly clunky to use. Intoner mode is fun and it's literally button mashing. The game looks very dated for a late 7th gen title and doesn't really upscale well. I don't think "how could it be improved" is a relevant question, as the answer is "you start over."

Emulation fixes the performance at least. Hunting down the DLC was a bit of a pain and while I wanted to try the JP voices for a change, getting it working proved too much of a hassle as you need to go screwing around with IDs and even the initial solution I tried of replacing the base files with DLC ones only resulted in errors before clearing the first mission. I did at the very least get the fps patch working which had given me grief in the past. Don't trust the Russians when it comes to console releases is my takeaway. One mission (the fifth?) in branch D fails to start, either crashing or getting stuck loading, so there's another reason to grab a complete save so you can skip it.

Is this game worth trying? If it is for you, you likely already know it and don't need my input. I love the soundtrack and the story and characters have a soft spot in my heart, but man if it isn't a stinking turd otherwise. I'll keep defending it.