21.02.11 / Nintendo DS, RPG, Sega, Video game / Author: Kina / Comments: (0)
Tags: grandia xtreme, mystery dungeon, recettear, rogue-like, shiren the wanderer
Baby’s first real rogue-like! I’ve played it for 4 hours total and gotten killed 14 times! That’s, uhh, my math is failing me right now… 3.5 times per hour! In the beginning getting killed was fun. I thought “Okay, I’ve figured it out, next time I’m gonna go for it!” and other encouraging thoughts along that line. And in truth I did go a little further almost every time. I’ve made it all the way to level 14, reached the bottom of Table Mountain. I’ve taken Naoki to Mountaintop Town and paid him 3000g, and Oryu the Blinder has joined my party. For a rogue-like newbie, I’m not doing too terribly right now.
However, playing the same stages and fighting the same enemies 14 times in a row would take a toll on anyone. I’ve never been the most patient gamer in the world either, and I’m always ready to admit it when I suck at something, so it seems now would be a good time to say goodbye to Shiren the Wanderer, at least for this game. I’m sure if I keep playing, I’ll keep slowly progressing, dying occasionally, putting a few things down here and there in warehouses for the future, but what’s the point?
Story is not the strong point of any rogue-like, and this one is no exception. As far as I can tell, Shiren and his weasel (ferret? mink?) companion Koppa are on their way to El Dorado to find the Golden Condor who can make their wishes come true. I’m probably wrong on this score, but anyway it goes something like that. Why does Shiren want to get there? What does he want to wish for? In the beginning I was a little curious, but now I’m like “Whatever it is, it’s not worth 30 hours of my life to find out.”
Of course, as I said, the story is not the point. The point should be the planning, the exploration, the thrill of success, the heart-pounding close escapes, feeling the disappointment of failure only to get up, dust yourself off and try again. And again. If you can enjoy those elements in Shiren the Wanderer and you don’t mind a whole lot of repetitiveness then you might just like this. For me after a while it was just too dull and too punishing. They weren’t kidding when they said the game was unforgiving! Back to Canyon Hamlet again. Back to level 1 again, back to 0 money again, it’s like “Ouch, someone must really hate me!”
Prior to Shiren the Wanderer, the only similar games I’d played were Grandia Xtreme and Recettear, and neither of those were that hard or that unforgiving. Plus they both had interesting characters, something of a story, a permanent level up system and item fusion, all of which I really like in a game. Not to mention Grandia Xtreme had an awesome battle system. I’m glad I tried Shiren though, if only so I can say I did it. Oh, and I really liked the soundtrack, that’s always a plus.
02.11.10 / imageepoch, Nintendo DS, RPG, Sega, Video game / Author: Kina / Comments: (0)
Tags: anime, review, sands of destruction, world destruction, yasunori mitsuda
I’d been looking forward to playing this since it first came out in Japan, but it’s only last week that I finally bought it and settled down to play. What stopped me from playing it earlier was an Amazon.co.jp review I read that said the game’s story was impossible to understand without watching the anime. Having finally played the game I find this was a lie (though it’s easier to enjoy the story if you’ve watched the show), but back then I believed it, so I held off until I had the time to watch the anime.
And I should just say, the anime is pretty good. It’s nothing deep or profound, just three people having one episodic adventure after another. But Taupy is adorable (Yappi!), Morte actually has good reasons for wanting to destroy the world, and Kyrie…well, Kyrie will always be Kyrie. The anime Kyrie is a little better because he tries to talk Morte out of destruction from the start, and it takes him a long while to warm up her romantically.
Now then, so I finally played the game in four or five hectic sessions last week, and I just finished it last night. The ending was awful, but I’m getting ahead of myself here. I have quite a bit to say, so let’s see if I can break it down in an easier to read format. Massive spoilers included, read at your own risk.
What I liked.
- - The battle system concept. Not the execution, the concept. I’ve seen a similar idea in games like Chrono Cross and Xenosaga. You know, you have weak but accurate attacks, and strong but inaccurate attacks, and you can combine them to maximize damage. I also liked that each character had a custom moveset and his/her own buffing and debuffing attacks.
- – Buffs/debuffs actually work. And how! In most games, if you’re doing 100 damage and you use an ATK-UP potion, you go up to, say, 150, or maybe 200. In Sands of Destruction, you can be doing 1 damage against a boss, drink a Herculean potion and then boom, 300-400 damage, just like that! They’re overwhelmingly powerful, which is good when you use them and terrible when the enemies use them against you.
- - The character designs. Not the blurry pixels that showed up on the screen, but the designs as they stand. Not too garish, not too plain, not too sensible, not too dumb. And Taupy is the cutest thing ever, no question.
- - Distinct character abilities and personalities. Unlike some other RPGs, every character has his/her own moveset, abilities, stat growths, etc. so you can really feel the difference between using Taupy and Morte, for example.
- - The characters themselves – except Morte. More on her below. Did I mention that Taupy is awesome? Taupy is awesome.
- - The music isn’t half-bad. I hear Yasunori Mitsuda did some of the tracks, but I’m not all crazy over him like some people are. I do like him, though.
What I hated.
- - All fights are either too hard or too easy with very little in-between. One level too low and you’re doing scratch damage. A level later and you’re wiping the floor with the enemy, it’s ridiculous.
- - Too many useless skills. There are two types of attacks: flurries and blows. But after a bit of tweaking, flurries get so powerful that blows are completely useless. In the same way, magic does such piss-poor damage after the first few levels that you only need healing and buffing spells. On that note, some of the spells are broken, especially Taupy’s skill that revives and heals everyone, and his other skill that buffs every single stat. Not using Taupy would probably raise the game’s challenge by 35%.
- - Characters look tiny and terrible on-screen. The designs are great, but as with everything else in the game, the execution is horrible.
- - Too many enemy palette-swaps. In this day and age, that’s just lazy.
- - Encounter rate is a little too high. Even weak enemies keep jumping out at you when they really should know better. And there’s no spell or item to reduce it at all.
- - Last boss went down in two rounds of flurries, that’s how overpowered flurries are. Or how weak the bosses are . Or both.
- - Too many dumb puzzle stages where you have to pass just the right place and step on just the right thing or else spend hours and hours wandering around the same place. I’m looking at you, Tower of Light! After the first one I went straight to GameFAQs and downloaded all the solutions. Nyaah!
- - Too many unexplained plot points! I can’t even remember them all right now, but let me list the few that really bugged me:
- How did Lacertus Rex get his instructions to them wherever they were?
- How and why did Lacertus select Morte to be his agent? Evidently they had never met or spoken until near the end of the game, but somehow she ended up as his lackey?
- Why is it called the Destruction Committee when it only has one member?
- Why was Morte stupid enough to blindly obey orders that came from who knows where?
- Why would Morte want to destroy the world? The anime gave her a pretty good reason, but in the game she’s got good friends, a nice hometown, a cheerful disposition, and it explicitly states that nothing bad has happened to her to make her want to kill the world. So what the heck’s her problem? This is the biggest wallbanger of them all!
- Why is Morte such a selfish bitch in general? There was no call for killing Elephas Rex, you know.
- Why did the Creator create the Destruct Code? Why would she want to destroy the world?
- How can the Creator have the power to create a Destruct Code, but not to destroy the world herself?
- What was the point of giving Kyrie human feelings and sending him out into the world? What did the Creator hope to achieve by that? And having thrown him into the world with no memory of his real function, why is she so surprised when he won’t do what she says at the end? You had it coming, dumbass!
- Why is Kyrie so selfish and so blase about the fate of the world? He destroys his village and everyone he loves, then forgets about it for ages while he follows a woman around the world, assisting her to destroy more things and put more things in danger for no good reason! When he finally does have an attack of conscience and decides the world shouldn’t be destroyed, it’s because “Then I won’t be able to be with Morte any more” and not for any good reason. And we’re supposed to sympathize with him? Who wrote this crap?!
- When the hell did Morte fall in love with Kyrie? This has gotta be the most sudden turnabout since Rinoa and Squall in FF8, and even then there were hints that Squall could get to like her. Here it was like “BLARGH I’M DEAD” “Oh no, I was in love with you all along, boo hoo!”
- Who sent the letter to Muffy? (not that it matters, all’s well that ends well)
- Last, but not the least, what kind of world did Morte and Kyrie create at the end? It looked to me like all ferals were either eliminated or turned to animals except Taupy, and all the sand was changed to sea water. Whoopie. They killed off the ruling system of the world just for that? And what’s more, who’s going to rule the cities now all the Rexes are dead? Can someone say “civil war”?
Replay value? None. I will not play this game again. Not because I hate it or anything, though it could have been much better, but because there’s nothing to do after one playthrough and it’s not interesting enough to merit a second one. I’m glad I played it to satisfy my own curiosity, but I don’t see myself going through this ever again.
01.11.10 / Japanese, Nintendo DS, RPG, Sega, Video game / Author: Kina / Comments: (2)
Tags: bale, cocotte, grizeria, jin, miriam, review, shining force feather
I loved Shining Force I and II on the Genesis all those years ago, so now I sit up and bark whenever I hear the word “Shining” in front of any game. But Shining Wind, Shining Tears, all those games weren’t really “it”. At last another Shining Force is out, is what I thought when this game was announced, so I bought it as soon as I could and now I just finished it.
Overall thoughts: It was really short, not more than 15 hours or so, but it was a good 15 hours. The action never stopped and the story moved at a brisk pace so there was never a dull moment. It was a worthy purchase, and I just might play it again in the near future.
Story: You play Jin, a treasure hunter who comes across a mysterious girl when he’s looting some ruins. The girl’s name is Alfin, and she leads Jin to an ancient airship, which he promptly decides to sell for cash. The earlier parts of the game are taken up by Jin’s attempts to fix the crash-prone ship up so he can flog it for mega-bucks, and then the later parts involve the usual “save the world” stuff. It’s nothing original, and since the game is so short nothing is fully developed, but it’s interesting enough while it lasts.
Characters: A total of 9 playable characters and a few interesting NPCs. Alfin is never able to join you in battle, despite what the cover might lead you to expect. There’s Jin, his best friend Bale (a centaur and the best battle character, period), Miriam the elf, Julius the snooty noble, Tida the half-beast (another excellent fighter), Rush the hotblooded treasure-hunter, Grizeria the magician, …some minotaur whose name I can’t recall and Cocotte, the angel with next-to-no relevance at all.
Their interactions throughout the game tend to be very funny indeed, especially Miriam’s dumb innocent ways. Jin’s airship has a lounge where he can talk to the characters and find out what’s on their mind. Make sure you don’t miss the one where Miriam asks Jin where babies come from 
. Unfortunately the endings aren’t character-dependent: there’s only one ending and you get it regardless of how you get along people. I really wish there had been 9 endings and more of a focus on relationships, because the characters were great!
Ooof, I’m tired from typing all this. >_< I’ll continue with the battle system, music and graphics tomorrow.
Baby’s first real rogue-like! I’ve played it for 4 hours total and gotten killed 14 times! That’s, uhh, my math is failing me right now… 3.5 times per hour! In the beginning getting killed was fun. I thought “Okay, I’ve figured it out, next time I’m gonna go for it!” and other encouraging thoughts along that line. And in truth I did go a little further almost every time. I’ve made it all the way to level 14, reached the bottom of Table Mountain. I’ve taken Naoki to Mountaintop Town and paid him 3000g, and Oryu the Blinder has joined my party. For a rogue-like newbie, I’m not doing too terribly right now.