2011 game I liked but didn't beat #5: Dragon Quest VI (DS)
DQ6 is the most un-notable RPG in my memory. It doesn't have the emotional resonance of 5, the chapter system of 4 or anything that really makes it stand out. It's got a job/class system but that was already in 3. There aren't any really notable moments in it. I have a hard time even remembering what happened.
And yet I played a good 30-35 hours of it. It's by-the-book to the extreme, which is why nobody ever talks about it or neglects it, but really it's a pretty cool game. The worst thing about the game is my habit of getting lost and not really knowing where to go. DQ games are notorious for this in general but DQ6 features this light/dark world thing that's super hard to keep straight. it's not like LTTP where everything is very black and white. It's just two separate worlds.
I really did enjoy this game. I just hit a point where I didn't have the patience to keep on trucking along.
Twelve months ago, I could make a topic about Tactics Ogre and get like 3 replies. Now? I make a topic about FFT and get told over and over that I need to play Tactics Ogre. Funny what an amazing remake will do.
Tactics Ogre was, for many years, my favourite SRPG. It couldn't hang with FFT in the gameplay department but its branching paths and excruciating story made for a game that I really, really liked. Tactics Ogre PSP takes this and improves it tenfold with great art, the best translation ever (no joke), and tons of much-needed modernization. Make a mistake in battle? Hit the rewind button and go back a turn. Perma-death? No more. Want to see all the paths but don't want to replay the entire game? A new game plus-ish system called WORLD.
And yet, I think I actually like the remake less than the original. Why? Well, they tried to make it noob-friendly by giving classes a permanent level that anyone can join at. This level would let any character join as that class and not have to spend a ton of time leveling up. A decent idea, but what it ended up doing is punishing you for trying out different classes since you'd have to start all over at level 1. You have to spend a dozen battles trying to catch up and your characters can be pretty useless if they're even a couple of levels behind. It really broke the game for me. Don't get me wrong, it's still great. There's a good reason that so many people are just discovering this gem that came out before its time. I think the remake is better than the original for sure. I just wish they hadn't gone that far. This could be on top of my list if they hadn't.
Older game I beat in 2011 #2: Nine Hours, Nine Persons, Nine Doors (DS)
I can't say enough positive things about 999. Its writing is great, only to be outdone by its art. The puzzles are genuinely puzzling. The setting is great and its use of alternate history + numerology is dead on. As far as pure game mechanics and narrative go, 999 is probably the best visual novel type game on the DS. Better than Phoenix Wright. I'll always like PW more because it has main characters that you can get behind as opposed to a game defined by its mystery and setting, but 999 is probably a better game. Even when you hit an ending, you're not sure what happened or why it happened. It's just crazy.
I thought this game was an all-time one -- and then I hit the ending of the game. I'm not going to go too indepth in this topic, but the ending really crushed my feelings on this game. It had this really crazy premise -- nine people trapped in a sinking submarine while a psychotic killer is playing games with you -- and then had some backstory to all the characters that was up to the task. It seemed like it was pressing all the right buttons. And then.... it just kind of went too weird. I barely even remember the ending now because I just sat there saying "uhhh... what? what?"
Play 999. It's gripping. It's got great sound. The way it describes people's insides after they explode is really something. Play 999.
Tactics Ogre is something I'm interested in playing, especially based on that description. FFT is alright to me, but if there's a better story in there plus better gameplay, I'm sold.
-- "When I was a young man, I had liberty, but I did not see it. I had time, but I did not know it."
you should get it when you get your Vita. battery life could be a little messy but otherwise it's great to just lay back in bed and do a fight. I think you'd like it.
you'll get more value out of it than Vita launch titles, anyway. you can easily lose 100 hours in Tactics Ogre if you really get invested.
Tactics Ogre has just a bit too much for me. I got distracted by too many sidequests and stuff and didn't finish Chaos and Neutral route due to getting tired of the game after around 100 hours. I'd rather have done those than the sidequests. The gameplay is also a pretty significant step down from FFT-- classes are lacking a lot in variety. Still a great game and probably my #1 for the year, but I haven't played all that many titles from this year either.
And since I have to say it every time you bring it up, I still think you're down on the level system too much. Classes catch up pretty quick and they don't have to do anything but just be brought to the battle to get exp! The only classes that really took effort to catch up to my party were the ones you don't get till like chapter 4... which are basically just the overpowered character specific classes anyway.
-- No problem! This is a cute and pop genocide of love!
I just hate having to do it at all. you say it only takes a few battles -- I see it as carrying around dead weight and hiding them in the corner for the duration of the fight. it's just lame.
imagine if you had to do that in FFT. part of my problem may be coming to it from the original, a game I am intimately familiar with.
In FFT it'd be a lot more significant cause you don't have a 8-12 man squad though. I never had a problem putting one or two guys off to the side for a while because you just don't need all the firepower of your whole squad you for most battles.
And you kinda do have that problem in FFT anyway if you don't wanna grind and want to have an unorthodox class combination. Like I usually like starting one of my characters as Black Mage early, then sending him through the fighter classes to get samurai when katanas show up. Problem is almost all the physical classes have bad magic attack so he just kinda sucks for a while-- not dead weight to the extent of Tactics Ogre low level guys, but at least in Tactics Ogre I don't have to actually use the weaker guys in battle for them to level up.
Random note, one of my biggest problems with Tactics Ogre's battle system is that level factors into the damage equation. If that wasn't the case I bet the lower level guys wouldn't be terrible dead weight. Probably was less of an issue in the original but still, it's a dumb mechanic!
-- No problem! This is a cute and pop genocide of love!
Also for some reason I skipped the first page without realizing it-- missed the MK9 write-up.
if you're high on fighting games with content you just need to play fighters that aren't made by Capcom (and to a lesser extent SNK). Most Guilty Gear games have a lot of single player content. Pretty sure Blazblue games do too. Soul Calibur and (lol) Tekken have a lot. The new King of Fighters has a lot of crap in it too. Capcom always just kinda short ends the stick on that route though. I think Street Fighter Alpha 3 is the only game they have that has any decent amount of single player content, but the genre has it if you look in the right places!
-- No problem! This is a cute and pop genocide of love!
it was actually more of an issue with the original. if you were one level down on the enemies in the original, it was a serious uphill battle. also, permadeath with no chance for revival. Tactics Ogre was a grueling game but also a rewarding one. it took a certain kind of person to appreciate it though.
I always compared TO to FF1 - archaic and merciless in many ways (including a lack of revive options), but ultimately fun. I agree that TO is still behind mechanics-wise to FFT because it still has the same core from 1995. I'd really like to see them go all-in on making a new one in the same vein.
Truly great gameplay design is rare. One of my favourite things about video games is finishing a section of a game and just pausing to marvel in the brilliance of what I just did. It does not happen often, but when it does, there’s nothing like it.
If I were to show off video games as an art form – games that were immaculately crafted and felt just right – then Outland would be one of the first five names out of my mouth. This game has it all: mechanics, introduction of core concepts and the way the game builds upon them, level design, boss design, difficulty curve – I could go on. I could write a full essay about the brilliance of Outland but I think it would be a bit much for anyone that hadn’t already played through and seen everything there is to see.
I’ll be brief: Outland takes a core concept like jumping or switching colours or absorbing bullets and slowly introduces new wrinkles. It’s so subtle that you barely even realize it. For example, the game starts out with you jumping over a pit. Then it’ll have you jumping over a pit with an enemy shooting at you. Next you’re in a similar situation but with a bullet pattern in your way that you have to wait for. Later you’ll have that same pattern but with two colours. Then there will be two colours plus an enemy in the middle that you have to handle. The game just keeps on piling on stuff until you’re a bullet hell machine. After a while you’ll take a step back and say “Wow, what are my hands doing? How did I do this?” You try to think about how to do it and can’t quite figure it out, but get going in motion and your hands are doing some pretty amazing stuff. It’s a natural progression that speaks to the design of the game. There are no real hard parts unless a boss is getting you – and if they are, it’s more than likely your fault.
And yet it’s only #2 (though by the slimmest of margins). That’s because there’s more to games than just pure gameplay. Outland’s art style may be the first thing you notice when you play it but it’s actually quite distracting. The game zooms out quite regularly and you can often lose your character thanks to all the bullet hell madness on-screen. Everything is blue and red and when you get hit, you flash in ways that are really deceiving, making you think you’re of the wrong colour. This is especially bad on the fourth boss where you’re just trying to see where the hell you are.
The story of the game is also pretty crappy. It’s totally skippable and isn’t a real drawback, but games like this usually benefit from some form of atmosphere and Outland is lacking in that department. When you play Outland you’re doing it solely for the gameplay.
It’s a good thing then that Outland is so good on that front. It probably has the best 2d boss designs this generation and is in the running for best ever. The mechanics are super fun to play with and the level design encourages you to do some really crazy stuff. It’s a lovely game.
I only played a little past the first boss of Outland, but what I played was extremely disappointing. It seems like the ultimate style-over-substance game. It's got really awesome graphics and animations, but the pace is staggeringly slow, the combat and puzzles are super easy and super simplistic, and the exploration so far was a joke. It seems like it's going for Metroid but it forgot what made Metroid fun. Maybe it gets better but that first area left some a bad impression on me, especially since I played it right after Bastion which was one of my favorite games of the year.
did you even get two colours? I thought the first 5-10 minutes of Outland was really underwhelming because you couldn't do anything. it takes Outland a while to get going because it's introducing concepts.
here's a random example of what Outland turns into -
Speaking of Outland, just finished the Mother of Eyes boss. Good boss from a technical standpoint, but having to start all over from the very beginning every time you die is kinda annoying.
Xenoblade begins with a massive battle between humans -- or “Homs” as the game calls them -- and a mechanical species known as the Mechon. People are getting vaporized and the hero of this battle, Dunban, is giving his life to push these evil machines back. This huge-scale battle feels like the ultimate struggle for humanity until the camera pans out to show that you are mere specks of dust living on the bodies of two dead gods. The battle doesn’t even bother to end; after all, it never ends. These two races/species/whatever will be fighting for all eternity.
Seconds later, you’re dropped in the middle of a field. A massive field. The scene shows two regular guys wandering around this field that is actually the foot of one of the dead gods, the Bionis. The Colony 9 theme -- one of the best town themes ever written – kicks in and some lighthearted chatter happens. From there you simply explore. You can go in whatever direction you want. You can kill whatever you want in a fast and addictive battle system. You fight, you get tons of loot, you listen to cool music and you just go sightseeing. It feels good.
After a few minutes you get to a town -- a town so huge that you will spend a good 90 minutes wandering around it. By the time you leave, you will have inherited at least 20 quests, met several key characters and have a goal to go to a cave. But chances are you don’t go to that cave. You probably want to just walk around the fields some more. You want to collect more items. You want to get more rewards. You want to see what’s in that remote corner that’s quite literally miles in the distance thanks to the game’s insane draw distance. You want to jump straight off the side of a mountain into a body of water, curious about what’s there. That cave will sit there waiting for you for hours; someday you’ll go there. You plan to go there next but there’s just one more thing that you want to see. On your way you will find three other things that will catch your eye. All told, you probably will not get to that cave tonight. You’re having way too much fun just taking in the surroundings and seeing what this world has to offer. You want to know why there’s a rainbow on the other side of the Bionis' foot and what’s hiding there.
That right there is the magic of Xenoblade. In a game with a fairly compelling narrative, good characterization, heart-tugging scenes and enough battle depth to keep your head spinning for the first few hours, all you really want to do is look at the sights. Sometimes you’ll wander to a foreign area where level 87 enemies are waiting for you to make a false move. You know they’re going to kill you, but it’s okay because there’s no real punishment for dying. After all, this is a game that gives you experience points for finding a new area. This is a game where quests will automatically give you your reward when you collect 5 shells or whatever. This is a game that lets you save anywhere and lets you warp to anywhere in the world instantly. This is a game with a day/night cycle that you can control by simply going into the menu and setting the time. This is a game that gives you an achievement for jumping to your death -- and every achievement that you get will also randomly give you exp and money. Why? Because it’s fun to get those things. It’s fun to jump off a giant’s arm and land on his knee, even if it kills you. Xenoblade is a japanese RPG that sets out to eliminate all the crappy aspects of the genre that have gone on for far too long. It feels innovative and fresh by the developers simply asking “what’s fun?” and maximizing those aspects.
There are issues, of course. The game wears out its welcome thanks to being some 75 hours long, and the ending leaves much to be desired. But even if you’re allergic to long RPGs or have sworn off JRPGs ever since they started to suck a few years ago, you should give this one a shot. Because it’s really, really, really good.
Outland's cool, but the last world's getting a bit on my nerves. Too much unexpected and frantic switching as opposed to it being solvable with analysis.
-- SomeC - sheer explosives since meeting that crazy hobo. SuperNiceDog. Best friend.
I felt that way when I was first doing it. it turns out that you kinda suck. I did it a second time and died just once. it's challenging but not overly so.
I think the difficulty ramps up smoothly. the last level is the hardest, yes, but that's the way it's supposed to be. also, you can go back and find life upgrades if you need them. that helped me on the last boss.
Hmm. I honestly never really had much trouble with the first four worlds. To me the gap in difficulty going from 4 to 5 is being a bit bigger than the gap from 1 to 4.
-- SomeC - sheer explosives since meeting that crazy hobo. SuperNiceDog. Best friend.
The one thing I'm truly bitter about in regards to Outland is that there is a missable money pot in the game's prologue. The missing money pot in my inventory will haunt me for eternity.
And I'm still playing through Xenoblade. About fifty hours in and I just got to Mechonis. I sort of want to use new characters because I've been using Shulk/Reyne/Sharla exclusively the whole game and combat strategy has been essentially the same the whole time. Plus Reyne has been less than stellar drawing Aggro away from Shulk so maybe Dunban or someone else would do a better job.
--
"It's a magical world, Hobbes ol' buddy...let's go exploring!" - Calvin http://img.imgcake.com/calvinfinalpngpy.png
I used Dunban instead or Reyn. Dunban should be pretty negligible - a little bit more damage, less HP and def. my choice was made when I heard 'what a bunch of jokers' one too many times!
if you want to mix it up, use Melia. I've heard that you have to control her to really do good stuff though. I always felt awkward using anyone but Shulk because of the Monado.
I have the game on Japanese language because I heard the complaints about the battle lines being super repetitive. They still are, but they just sound like Link-esque grunts to me, basically.
Melia seemed fairly interesting from the brief segment where you are forced to use her. But yeah, it seems like you really need to control Shulk for him to be effective. All his arts are based on position according to the enemy, and the Monado arts are super useful at times.
--
"It's a magical world, Hobbes ol' buddy...let's go exploring!" - Calvin http://img.imgcake.com/calvinfinalpngpy.png
so this seems like a pretty good list but I have almost not played anything on here, all i played that's on the main list is Ghost Trick and besides that I also played Catherine.
I really liked Ghost Trick myself, the game looked great, I liked the characters and the game was pretty uh... unique. I don't even remember the stealth sequence you guys talk about anymore though, I think I did get stuck in the game like twice for a bit but I don't think I really got frustrated with it even then and besides ghost trick is also responsible for this video
Catherine I really wanted to love, but I don't know. if we'll still end up with Persona 5 like we're supposed to I'm fine with it, but if P5 won't happen because the persona team was too busy making block puzzles it would be pretty stupid. I have the exact same problem with the story you do, but I did like most of the characters. Vincent was not that great but he works for the game. his friends all are pretty cool and I liked how their backstories slowly get explained throughout the game mostly through subtle hints. the one I probably remember the best is Erica's because it's also the 'weirdest' one but I feel like they handled that subject pretty tastefully as well. this game along with P4 really makes me feel like creating characters is one of the things the persona team is pretty good at.
also I should really get around to playing xenoblade, I've had that game lying around for a while now but I don't have a classic controller pro.