Happy New Year! The number 2015 sounds so accomplished and mature somehow, so that means I have to be mature and accomplished about my gaming choices this year. Or I could just take the easy route and play whatever catches my eye like I always do. Decisions, decisions…
Last year I only managed to play 3 of the 6 games I put on the list, which is a failing grade in any class in the world. The three I didn’t get round to will get gaming priority early this year, and then I’ll be tackling sequels to games I mostly regretted playing. Why play the sequels then? Because I’m a secret masochist, that’s why. Without my further ado, my 2015 list:
1. Shining Ark (PSP) – Shining Blade was terrible, but its flaws are fairly easily fixed: better story, no more cameos and challenging enemies to use the excellent battle system against. I have faith in Sega’s ability to fix these problems, but just because they can do something doesn’t mean they will. I won’t force myself to finish Shining Ark if it proves to be as bad as its predecessor.
2. 7th Dragon 2020-II (PSP) – 7th Dragon was fun, but flawed. 7th Dragon 2020 was less fun but also less flawed. I’m banking my hopes on 2020-II being the happy medium, with the freedom and grand scale of the original added to the gameplay improvements of the second. Besides, I’ve played the first two so I might as well finish the trilogy.
3. Ao no Kiseki (PSP) – Every time I have attempted one of Falcom’s Kiseki games, I have come away tired, frustrated and full of regret. That said, Zero no Kiseki was the least bad of the lot, pretty good for 80% of it then the whole thing fell apart in the end game. The ending was also satisfying enough that I didn’t plan to play the sequel, but… Yeah, I’m a masochist.
4. Valkyrie Profile: Covenant of the Plume (DS) – I didn’t finish Valkyrie Profile Lenneth and I haven’t played Silmeria, but I hear this is an SRPG and you know me and SRPGs. I don’t have any particular attachment to the VP mythos, so if this sucks I’ll dump it like I did the others.
5. Tales of Hearts (DS) – This is… a really bad idea on my part given my history with other Tales games, but hope springs eternal in the human breast and all that. I will find a Tales game I like. I will find a Tales game I like. I will find a Tales game I like. Come to think of it, I was really liking Legendia. Maybe I’ll give that another try as well, using a FAQ for the stupid puzzles. –> Just realized Tales of Hearts was one of my resolutions for 2013. Uh… ah… let’s just pretend it wasn’t, okay?
6. Izuna 2 & Fuurai no Shiren 5 (DS) – Two rogue-likes for the price of one! I wanted to include just one on the list, but I couldn’t decide which one, so I put both down. I was going to play both of them anyway, along with a couple of other rogue-likes like Torneko and Thousand Arms Azure Dreams. And I still haven’t given up on finishing the original Shiren one day.
There, that should do it for starters. I don’t have much by way of personal resolutions. Just 2 Peter 3:18 and being in bed by midnight every night. No more late night gaming sessions!
I found Shining Ark’s story to be even less sensical than Blade, the difficulty wasn’t any better either from what I remembered. It’s a shame really because the system is actually quite good. On the other hand, oh man 7th Dragon 2020-2, I think you’ll probably rip this game apart. Not only does recycle pretty much everything from the first game, it also manage to give you even less freedom to boot. While I did finish it because I simply just enjoy the combat that much, it is without a doubt the worse of the two.
As for Ao no Kiseki, I’m a pretty big Falcom fan, mostly because of the music, so I can look past most of its faults. That said, the game does “up the stake” so to speak and it stop being less ridiculous with all the kitty rescues and herb gathering. Still it’s a hallmark of Falcom game to give their all their NPCs some story so side quests probably will still feel tedious if you don’t care about those kind of mini-episodes. While the Bright kids still show up, they have much less screen-time than in Zero so there’s that. I have to admit I have a certain fondness for those two, probably because I played Trail in the Sky a long time ago when I WAS a teenager. 😛
I thought for sure that since Ark was successful enough for Sega to put Resonance on the PS3 that they had fixed all these issues… 7th Dragon I’ll get there when I get there.
I didn’t mind the early kitty rescues in Zero no Kiseki, it’s just frustrating to me when the writers KNOW they have a story to tell but deliberately delay it and stack it all at the end of the game instead of doling it out in measured amounts from start to finish. You get the situation where the first 40 hours of the game could be cut out completely with no loss to meaning, and that’s a frustrating thing for a gamer to experience.
thousand arms isn’t a roguelike! it’s a standard rpg with dating sim element added to it, maybe you were thinking of azure dreams who also has dating sim element to it on top of being a roguelike?
Aha, Azure Dreams! Why do I keep confusing the two? But I’m going to play both anyway 🙂
Happy New Year! I’m looking forward to reading your review of Tales of Hearts. I have a mixed relationship with this series: for each element or feature that I love, there is one that I hate and would like to see removed. But since I purchased the Vita remake of Hearts lately, I really hope that it will turn out to be a good game. 🙂
I hope for my own sake that it will too. I don’t think my sanity meter can handle any more bad Tales games.