What are you playing now?

[Morgoth]

Ok, forget it. I managed to kill those two somehow, but I'm now done with that game as further encounters have become to much of a chore. Nice game, nice art design, nice story, but way too much grinding.

 

Oh yeah, about another JRPG: How's Lost Odyssey? Does it have better balanced combat? Less of a chore?

[WILL THE ALMIGHTY]

I haven't tried it, but it looks a lot more like a classic JRPG. Keep in the mind the main character isn't a 12 year old boy and actually looks like a guy.

[Morgoth]

I haven't tried it, but it looks a lot more like a classic JRPG. Keep in the mind the main character isn't a 12 year old boy and actually looks like a guy.

Good. And The Last Remnant is my first JRPG, so I can't really tell you what a "classical" JRPG is like. Maybe just like TLR?

 

Anyway, I heard some praise for Lost Odessey, so I wanna give it a try. Unless battle is too much of a chore. Long and hard battles are okay, but TLR really exagerrated it at later parts.

[Calax]

Ok, forget it. I managed to kill those two somehow, but I'm now done with that game as further encounters have become to much of a chore. Nice game, nice art design, nice story, but way too much grinding.

 

Oh yeah, about another JRPG: How's Lost Odyssey? Does it have better balanced combat? Less of a chore?

What little I played of Lost Odyssey put me off because I fought my way to the first boss and ran into a brick wall. I mean the game mechanics and style were great, but it was one of those where you were expected to run around and farm levels for 2 hours before taking on a boss.

 

The battle system is more standard than Last Remnant. You get a party and select their actions on your turn, I didn't get very far but I don't think there is anything like a 30 minute battle.

 

If you have a Playstation I'd suggest digging up Final Fantasy's 7+8. 8 is the lesser of the two in my opinion, but those two games kinda created the blueprint for how the genre is percieved.

 

If you like the roaming around with armies, Suikoden V is pretty good (has army battles every so often, but is mainly you running around with a troupe of friends), also Final Fantasy Tactics (now released on the DS) and the Disgea series are turn based strategy games of a sort, but have very japanese feels to them.

Edited April 11, 2009 by Calax

[Morgoth]

Ok, forget it. I managed to kill those two somehow, but I'm now done with that game as further encounters have become to much of a chore. Nice game, nice art design, nice story, but way too much grinding.

 

Oh yeah, about another JRPG: How's Lost Odyssey? Does it have better balanced combat? Less of a chore?

What little I played of Lost Odyssey put me off because I fought my way to the first boss and ran into a brick wall. I mean the game mechanics and style were great, but it was one of those where you were expected to run around and farm levels for 2 hours before taking on a boss.

So, in plain speak it's just another grindfest. Oh great!

 

Why can't those Japs design games accustomed for the 21th century?

[Llyranor]

TLR only has grinding if you make yourself grind, which is what it seems you did.

 

The game requires absolutely no grind, as you can easily avoid all non-boss encounters. Given how the game hands out regular soldiers to you at Athlum, it's very easy to respec your unions in terms of which skillsets you need, and from then on it's a simple matter of figuring out what party setup suits what particular battle best. Going for higher hp unions to absorb boss attacks, vs allowing for more unions in order to provide more flanking opportunities, setting up reserves away from deadlocks in order to heal as needed, and so on. Grinding doesn't actually help - it might actually make the game harder depending on how you do it (stat gains relative to BR).

 

You're just complaining the game is too hard for you. Boohoo. Bioshock might be right up your alley.

 

Lost Odyssey doesn't have very good combat. It also has horrible pacing.

Edited April 11, 2009 by Llyranor

[Morgoth]

Yeah, so? I've no problem admitting that TLR is too hard for me.

 

I mean come on, a dude who can whipe out a union with 1-2 blows.... Don't tell me that's the stuff that easy games are made of.

[Llyranor]

Which is fine, but not the same as blaming 'forced' grinding.

 

You have extra unions to heal your deadlocked one, multiple times each turn if you have to. You can also easily respec your unions to simply put more units in one of them and significantly boost up its hp. I don't see what grinding even remotely has to do with defeating those battles.

 

The game has *already* been made significantly easier in the PC version by removing the limit of how many leaders you can have in your active party.

Edited April 11, 2009 by Llyranor

[Morgoth]

Whatever.

[Deraldin]

Which is fine, but not the same as blaming 'forced' grinding.

 

You have extra unions to heal your deadlocked one, multiple times each turn if you have to. You can also easily respec your unions to simply put more units in one of them and significantly boost up its hp. I don't see what grinding even remotely has to do with defeating those battles.

 

The game has *already* been made significantly easier in the PC version by removing the limit of how many leaders you can have in your active party.

 

I grinded a little bit, but not optimally apparently. My BR was around 40 when I first went up against Nest of Eagles and got my ass handed to me. I went out and did a bunch of quests (and bought 100 revive herbs). By the time I went back I was at BR46 and just wiped the floor with that encounter. I'm not sure if I can really call what I did grinding even. For most of the game I just killed everyone I came across. I'd do sidequests and wipe out all life in each area till I got bored and went back to the story. I've never gone back into an area just to fight monsters.

 

First time I had to change tactics was in the fight with

that black dude with his flying remnant in Nagapur

. I ended up combining my unions to make 1 strong union for 4000HP to soak damage from the bosses while the other two healed, revived and occasionally got a shot in when they had a chance.

 

The game got a heck of a lot easier once I figured out why I wasn't getting the chance to revive anyone.

[Deadly_Nightshade]

Jade Empire - so far it's on par with, or better than, KotOR.

[Pidesco]

Well, it's the same game with a setting that hasn't been beaten to death, and with combat that is more actiony but just as awful.

 

Oh, and JE has more sex options.

[Morgoth]

Alas, the ancient Chinese setting was just a disguise, nothing more. Bioware didn't even try to make anything interesting out of it.

[Syraxis]

Uplink is pretty good for a puzzle game.

 

[Nightshape]

UPDATE

 

360:

 

Now: Halo 2

So far Halo 2 is prooving to actually be a good and solid console FPS. It's far more enjoyable than Halo: Combat Evolved, visually is not bad, little over zealous on the normal mapping but otherwise pleasing. The colour palette seems alot less harsh and the overall art direction is certainly better. The gameplay feels slicker too, considering I've come into Halo 2 straight from Halo: Combat Evolved, I expected it to be more of the same and extremely stale. I'm being pleasantly surprised.

Next: Halo 3

Previous: Halo: Combat Evolved

I still don't understand why Halo was popular, level asset recycling is done to death, the level design is cookie cutter copy and paste, the art direction is poor.

I don't see any reason why anyone would want to play Halo. It's a pretty horrible game. The story is average, and its certainly not delivered in an engaging manner.

Verdict: 4/10

 

Now: Black

A kinda generic shooter, its a twilight xBox and PS2 release, that still looks and plays well now.

Next: GTA IV.

 

Now: Rainbow Six Vegas 2.

Tactical shooter, not alot to say about it really. I do believe it's extremely challenging.

Next: Gears of War, on Hardcore.

 

Now: Endwar.

I mostly play this online, I've not actually completed the games compaign

Next: Nothing, I only play this occasionally online for an hour or two at a time.

 

Wii:

 

Now: Resident Evil Zero.

I've been playing this for months, I mean that, I have found it to be a game that drags on, alot... It's not bad, mostly I have found it to be dull. I'm waiting for that final push, I just haven't managed to build up the motivation.

Next: Resident Evil.

 

(Virtual Console)

Now: The Legend of Zelda

I've had this sitting around for ages on my Wii, I kinda fooled around with it for 10 minutes, and kinda smiled alot thinking it was a cute game but never bothered to play it properly. Until today when I just sat down and spent some time playing it properly, I've decided to continue playing it and see how it goes.

Next: Zelda II

 

PC:

 

Now: Hellgate: London

I play this at lunch because it allows me to jump in and do a quick quest and not really care about anything other than slaying a bunch of monsters. (Work PC)

Next: Dark Messiah Might and Magic.

 

Now: Bioshock

I don't get what the fuss was about this game when it was released... That said, I don't think it's bad. (Desktop at home, which just broke, as a result I suppose I'll have to postpone these, till I get a new machine, or a slot fills up on another machine.)

Next: The Witcher.

 

Now: Fallout

I've not been playing this aggressively but after playing through FO3 I decided to go back and play FO... I'm enjoying it! And I'm enjoying the more casual pace that I am playing it at. (Laptop at home)

Next: Neverwinter Nights OC.

Edited April 12, 2009 by Nightshape

[Maria Caliban]

Jade Empire - so far it's on par with, or better than, KotOR.

 

Jade Empire is horribly underrated. I wish it had recieved the popularity (and sales) Mass Effect did because it's a much better RPG.

[Blodhemn]

The Witcher - It's fun exploring and the environments are well done but it seems like it takes forever to get through quest to quest either because it isn't the right time of day/circumstance to activate the quests at times and also there seems to be many of these type instances all at once. I don't know, maybe some are buggy. The combat is the only other problem for me. It's pretty tedious and I hardly feel like waiting around to kill something when it starts off the battle in "dodge" mode for about 20 seconds. Oh, and Geralt is freakin LAME.

 

Otherwise, great atmosphere, exploration, areas, RPGness.

[Calax]

UPDATE

 

360:

 

Now: Halo 2

So far Halo 2 is prooving to actually be a good and solid console FPS. It's far more enjoyable than Halo: Combat Evolved, visually is not bad, little over zealous on the normal mapping but otherwise pleasing. The colour palette seems alot less harsh and the overall art direction is certainly better. The gameplay feels slicker too, considering I've come into Halo 2 straight from Halo: Combat Evolved, I expected it to be more of the same and extremely stale. I'm being pleasantly surprised.

Next: Halo 3

Previous: Halo: Combat Evolved

I still don't understand why Halo was popular, level asset recycling is done to death, the level design is cookie cutter copy and paste, the art direction is poor.

I don't see any reason why anyone would want to play Halo. It's a pretty horrible game. The story is average, and its certainly not delivered in an engaging manner.

Verdict: 4/10

Halo is beloved because it was the sort of Half Life of Consoles. No other game had managed to produce a control scheme that worked so well.

 

Halo 2 built upon that but was to short and spent most of it's time on the Arbiter rather than Master Chief.

 

Halo 3 was in all honesty a very generic shooter that legions of fans loved because of it's multiplayer (it still competes with COD4 for the "best multiplayer" award for XB360... you either love halo or love COD4's multiplayer modes... rarely both)

[Nightshape]

Halo is beloved because it was the sort of Half Life of Consoles. No other game had managed to produce a control scheme that worked so well.

 

This isn't the first time I've actually played Halo, it's been some years but I played Halo during the initial few weeks of its US release and I didn't have a high opinion of it then. I gave it a shot again to try anf form a more informed opinion, and I'm still simply not impress.

 

I have to admit as far as console shooters go, the controls are indeed excellent, this is actually due to some nice auto-aim tweak. It's almost a crappy aimbot it aids the player so heavily.

 

Halo 2 built upon that but was to short and spent most of it's time on the Arbiter rather than Master Chief.

 

So far Halo 2 is actually prooving to be enjoyable, the whole Arbiter thing aside, this doesn't bother me. You don't spend that much time as the Arbiter from what I have played/read and regardless I don't think it matters as I'm looking at the game on its own, and I have to say, it's significantly better than Halo: Combat Evolved. The level design is actually pretty cleverly done, working for on foot and vechile combat. The art direction is also a hell of alot better... Infact if it wasn't for the setting and characters etc... You wouldn't be able to put the two side by side, That's how different I believe they are. This is obviously related to the fact that Halo 2 uses a different game engine.

 

Halo 3 was in all honesty a very generic shooter that legions of fans loved because of it's multiplayer (it still competes with COD4 for the "best multiplayer" award for XB360... you either love halo or love COD4's multiplayer modes... rarely both)

 

I wouldn't know, I'm certainly not interested in Halo's multiplayer component. COD4 offended me the first time I played it multiplayer, if felt so drastically different to COD on the PC that I was shocked at them being related. I'm sure to have an opinion on Halo 3 at some point I am sure.

 

Cheers

 

Nightshape.

[Monte Carlo]

I'm still only turn 250-something into the MTW:2 Grand Campaign mod, i.e. halfway through.

 

England has established a mighty empire that stretches from Spain (all of the peninsula) to Lithuania. A fledgling English presence is making a nuisance of itself in the Holy Land and nibbling at the Byzantine underbelly (the AI has decided that they will be tough - they field extremely well-equipped armies of heavy infantry and superb cavalry). My long-term strategic plan is (a) to conquer the Americas and (b) to equip the most modern, fantastically led armies and march on the Mongol lands to finally meet a foe worthy of my ire.

 

When this game's over I'll finish Storm of Zehir and then ponder what next. Mount and Blade looks fun.

 

Cheers

MC

[Syraxis]

Jade Empire is horribly underrated. I wish it had recieved the popularity (and sales) Mass Effect did because it's a much better RPG.

 

I was under the impression that Jade Empire actually sold pretty well.

[Kaftan Barlast]

JE was awesome, but I think ME is still very strong on the roleplaying front with the dialogue system. I really liked that the alternatives are logicly sorted by type of response, and that they dont give away the whole line so you never know what your character will actually say.

[Wrath of Dagon]

JE was good until they run out of ideas and time and started to put in filler and recycle KOTOR. Then they said, "hey, we should do that to start with!", and made ME.

[Llyranor]

The main appeal for me re: Halo was co-op and the Legendary difficulty. I can't imagine going through the Library level in singleplayer (or ever again in any fashion, really).

 

And it's true, every RPG Bioware ever made is a rip-off of KOTOR. They used their Bioware time machine to go back in time and design BG/BG2 to be exactly like KOTOR as well.

 

Bioware is completely formulaic, news at Wrath of Dagon.

Edited April 13, 2009 by Llyranor

[WILL THE ALMIGHTY]

The vehicle sections got significantly better in Halo 2, and in Halo 3 they were pretty much the most fun parts for me.

 

That, and the game on legendary gets much more interesting, since by then you need to have some sort of strategy.