Sol Trigger – Stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid.

cvn-soltAnd another 1000 stupids for good measure.

What a stupid game.

And what a stupid gamer I am for seeing it through to the end. I hate Imageepoch so much right now, but I hate myself even more.

*deep breath*

Okay. Let’s do this. But first I must warn you that there’ll be pleeeenty of no-holds-barred spoilers below. If I had my way no one would ever play Sol Trigger again, but I’m putting the warning out just in case.

First, what I liked. Oh, there were a few good things in there. There had to be, or I wouldn’t have made it to the end.

1. Character designs were pretty good. Imageepoch usually does well on that front. They look much better in-game than in their portraits as well, which is rare.

2. The music is good. It sounds similar to the Failure Promise Story soundtrack, except this time it actually fits the mood.

3. Dungeons have a bit of variety. You’re still running around dungeons for 28 hours, but at least the decor changes frequently.

4. Occasionally, very occasionally, they’ll let you skip a cut scene.

5. The battle system is very good. I especially liked the little sliding meter that lets you power up or power down your attacks to meet your needs. They also let you speed up battles a tiny little bit by holding R or O. And I always like games where using a skill levels it up. IMO the battles should have been even faster and there should have been a way of reducing the encounter rate. Apart from that it was great.

sol trigger farel partyThat said, the Hate system and unrecoverable SP in Saigo no Yakusoku no Mongatari was even better – in theory. It was so poorly executed that every battle felt exactly the same, but I was hoping they’d fix the issues and carry the system forward to this game. You just don’t get the same “I barely survived” feel after battles in Sol Trigger. Instead you win so handily with your overpowered skills it’s a mystery why you’re the underdogs.

6. Good character differentiation in battle. This is another thing Imageepoch is usually good at. Every party member has different skills, different equips and different situations where they’re useful. When you’re using Valter you know you’re using Valter. No one’s entirely useless, although some people will always be better than others.

7. The Awaken system for learning new skills was quite interesting. Weapons and armors have potential skills, but they don’t trigger until conditions in battle are just right. For example if your party gets poisoned, that crisis “sparks” the knowledge in Ema’s mind and she learns to remove status effects. It made sense in a way, and I managed to trigger everything fairly easily. I just wish the skill animations had been skippable. They were way too long.

8. The save point warping system was cheap, but lifesaving. It made it easy, too easy even, to go all out with your skills and just warp home to save. The flip side is that the developers expect you do to this, so most skills cost a fortune in Sol to use.

9. The Sol refilling tank was good. My Lars had around 400 Sol naturally, but I was able to dope him with stockpiled sol until he had 2000 before the final boss. I wish other games let you store MP for a rainy day like that.

———————————————————

Okay. That’s it for the good stuff. Let it never be said that I wasn’t fair to Sol Trigger. Now, all the stupidity, which is 99% related to the *spit* story. If you’re scared of spoilers, this is your last chance to look away.

Why this game is so stupid

sol trigger kaiserhaldThe second generation gimmick was all wrong, wrong, wrong. Normally I don’t have anything against “Avenge me, my son!” kind of stories. In this case, however, the son and his friends are annoying and too much time is wasted going over stuff the player already knows by heart. I’m going to have to explain the story in detail, so this is your final, final, final chance to leave.

Still here? Okay. You start off playing Farel, the head of a resistance group known as Sol Trigger. Farel and his troops are “people of the light,” who have the ability to control Sol. The evil church has been capturing their people and using them as living fuel cells to power the country. Pretty nasty stuff, even for video game villains. Sol Trigger comes up with a 5-phase plan to take down the church and free the people of the light. So far, so good.

Towards the end of the story, Farel find outs he needs to unlock his “golden soul” so he can beat the church. The only way he can do this is by fornicating with one of three girls. Oh sure, they dress it up in all kinds of fancy “special bond” kind of language, but that’s the situation. Make Farel sleep with either Ema, Sophy or Fran before the final battle. Pre-final battle sex is the best fertility drug known to man, so of course the girl gets pregnant and has a son, Lars, sometime in the intermission between generations one and two. Farel, of course, dies in the battle, which ends in failure. Not just Farel, it’s a near Total Party Kill. End of Part 1. Still with me? So far, so good. I was moderately cool with the game up to this point. Not crazy about it, but cool.

Then comes a 19 year timeskip and we open up again with a new cast. The plot, never wonderful to begin with, rapidly begins to fall apart.

sol trigger fran please put some clothes onStupidity 1. If you choose Ema or Sophy as Farel’s partner, the girl you choose will die. The girl you don’t choose will die too. Ifyou don’t choose Fran, she will also die. It’s like this:

Choose Ema = Ema, Fran and Sophy die
Choose Sophy = Ema, Fran and Sophy die
Choose Fran = Ema and Sophy die.

None of them immediately, but all of them definitely. Unavoidably. It sucks to be a girl in that world. And it sucks to be the player who develops a liking for them.

Stupidity 2. Lars doesn’t know anything about himself or about his heritage. Thus the first 5 chapters out of 8 can be summed up as “Tell me about my father!” That’s all good and nice, Lars. It’s just that I, the player, KNOW YOUR FATHER REALLY REALLY WELL! A lot better than I know you, that’s for sure! So I don’t need to go over the past and find out things and meet all these people that I know REALLY REALLY WELL again. It completely kills the momentum of the game.

Stupidity 3. It’s not just about his parentage; Lars doesn’t know anything about the world he lives in. I don’t know how it’s possible for him and his friends to live 19 years in the same city that his parents grew up in and not know the most obvious of truths about Sol and the people of the light. But yet again I have to watch him learn everything from scratch. Watch him get upset and indignant about things I knew full well over 20 hours ago. Things that are no longer even relevant by the time he learns about them.WHY?

What should have been done: Skip all that bildungsroman, journey of discovery stuff for Lars. They did it for Farel and it worked out pretty well, but once was enough. Farel and co. have done the groundwork, Lars knows know he needs to do, now do it and end the game. I don’t need to spend 8-10 hours following the wacky adventures of a horny teen who just joined Sol Trigger, the group that fought so hard and died so miserably, just to make time with a girl he just met.

sol trigger night sceneNow, it’s not like Part 1 was perfect. But if it had ended well, I would have been more than okay with the whole experience. And if Imageepoch had to put in a second generation, a short 3-5 hour epilogue would have been passable. Failing that, swap places. Put Lars and his goof troop first and Farel and his team second. Alternative 4: Make Farel’s part 5 hours long and then focus entirely on Lars. There are so many other, better ways they could have done it.

Stupidity 4. Back to the question of Lars’ heritage (oh, you thought we were done?), what the heck is up with his mother? It almost funny, but not quite, how he’s so interested in getting to know Farel but never once asks about the other half of the equation. And when he finds out eventually it’s more like “Oh. Okay,” than any huge display of interest on his part.

It’s not just Lars, either. No one’s surprised or curious about the mother when they hear Farel has a son. At the very least Valter and Cyril should have asked some questions. They were with Farel the whole time, they can’t have known about his night with Fran, as far as they know Ema and Sophy both died in the battle, suddenly “Farel’s kid” shows up. Wouldn’t a normal friend at least have a few questions?

Not that the mother cares either. Yeah, Fran was damaged years ago. Not enough to stop her roaming the world looking for her darling “daddy” Ishtovan, but just enough to stop her doing anything remotely maternal for her child for 19 years. Once they’re reunited, she’s in no hurry to introduce herself. Or make any real excuses for why she’s been gone. From beginning to end her mind is full of Ishtovan, Ishtovan, Ishtovan, and she couldn’t make it any plainer. Lars is like the embarrassing product of a one-night stand she wishes she could forget. Actually, not “like” – that’s exactly what he is, so I don’t even know what I’m complaining about any more.

Stupidity 5. WHY DOESN’T ANYONE AGE IN 19 YEARS?!?! Apart from Cyril. Aged 9 in Part 1 and around 18 in Part 2, 19 years later. Let that math swirl around your brain for a bit. A 10-year time skip I can understand, but 19 years? And everyone still looks exactly the same? And not just looks, but acts the same as they always did. You try to tell me Fran is Lars’ mom when she’s still walking around in panties at age 38? I can’t take this game seriously at all.

sol trigger lars final partyIt’s the same with the city. Almost nothing has changed in 19 years. The city’s the same, the buildings, the locations. The stuff we destroyed is all back to normal like we never did anything. The characters even comment on it. What’s the point of a large time-skip if everything remains the same?

Stupidity 6. To unlock his “golden soul,” Lars has to have sex with a girl who has the body of an 18 year old and the mind of a 9 year old. In case you didn’t know, this is against the law. And before anyone else tries this, “I was saving the world” is not a valid defense.

Stupidity 7. Lars’ sidekicks Klotho and Wilma don’t belong in this game. They’re generic orphans, they don’t believe in the cause, they don’t like danger and there’s no explanation given as to why they act so much like Gustav/Sophy in battle. They’re just there to sing Lars’ praises morning, afternoon and night. Basically they were just added in a desperate attempt to convince me to give a whoop about Lars. Here’s a shocking suggestion, Imageepoch: instead of telling me how great Lars is, why don’t you just show me? Radical, huh?

And these are just the problems with the characters. It’s not the end of Sol Trigger’s overwhelming stupidity. Fortunately the rest of the explanation will have to wait till tomorrow, because I just crossed the 1900-word line.

Steambot Chronicles – Too hard!

Steambot_Chronicles_CoverartI barely made it two hours into Steambot Chronicles before getting clobbered by some spiky train in a canyon. I like everything about the game: the story so far (amnesia excepted), the characters, the setting, the music, the art (the cover really doesn’t do it justice), everything. I like the hunger stat, the music mini-game, the funny items I get to wear, the multiple-choice responses, seriously everything.

Except the Trotmobiles! I cannot for the life of me pilot the darned things! I can’t aim. I can’t defend. I can’t fight. I can’t even move in a straight line! Even the boss in the tutorial whooped my butt with ease. I managed to beat the first boss somehow, and I BS’ed my way through the station square battle, but now the thing in Wagtail Canyon is… I don’t want to be vulgar and say “reaming my ass” but that’s exactly what it’s doing.

I’ve given it several tries and I’m on the verge of giving up. Let’s see what the FAQs have to say about this battle. Hmm. “You need to jump onto each platform and destroy the cannon on top of it. The blades will block your shots so you need to wait until the platform rises before shooting it or jumping to the next one. Once all the cannons are destroyed jump down and hit the boss one more time to defeat it.”

That sounds easy enough… NOT. But I’ll give it a try.

*10 minutes later*

Nope, nope, nope. I couldn’t even see what I was doing, and then I fell off the cliff and got mashed again. Awwwww ;____; This is when I wish I had a Gameshark and could just BS my way through the whole game. Guess I’ll have to settle for reading/watching a Let’s Play. What a shame.

Zettai Hero Project – Unending Game VS Uninterested Gamer

ZhpUnlosingRangerA pig in lipstick is still a pig.
And a rogue-like in lipstick is still a rogue-like.
And I play rogue-likes not to finish them but to see how many times I die before I lose interest.
So I played Zettai Hero Project for a while, lost interest and quit.
End of report.

You: “That’s it?! I demand details!!”

I’d love to indulge you, but I don’t have much more to say. It’s been almost two months since I dropped the game unceremoniously, and I haven’t looked back. IIRC I made it to chapter 5 or 6, the part in the mine with Oldlama and some ghost or something.

It’s a normal rogue-like for the most part. The “lipstick” is just NIS going overboard with all kinds of beautification attempts and unnecessary additions that just messed up the clean, simple feel I like to get from my rogue-likes. Heh, look at me talking like some kind of expert when all I’ve ever played are the Shiren the Wanderer games. But I know what I like when I play it, and Zettai Hero Project wasn’t it.

Some of the unnecessary additions I’m talking about:

  • A largely unwilling protagonist. Rogue-likes are brutal enough to play and watch even when your character wants to be there. When he doesn’t want to, and when on top of that other characters keep insulting and putting him down, well, just imagine how that makes me feel. The putdowns were more mean-spirited than funny to begin with, and they just got worse as the game progressed. This was about 90% of the reason I quit the game.
  • Too much stuff to fiddle with, all with little discernible benefit. Too many items, too many facilities, too many options. The insurance office, the church, the item synthesis thing, the medical doctor and all those colored blocks. All of that. All unnecessary stress. Just give me somewhere to stash my items and a way to get home and then leave me alone. 9% of the reason I quit.
  • Too many battles with Darkdeath Evilman. After the first 2 they should have cut out all the rest. We already know how they’re going to turn out.
  • Too much moralization. Why must there be a moral in every chapter? I’m busy trying to survive here, I really don’t need to be preached at on top of my woes.
  • Time-wasting character stories. I’m busy training to save your sorry asses. Stop dragging me into your stupid social dramas. The only ones worth keeping were those directly related to the story, like Superbaby’s mom.
  • Some amusing scenes, but even more scenes that just fell flat in their weak attempts at humor. They even lapsed into vulgarity at times (his *bleep* is as big as a …what?)
  • Unnecessary added stress with decaying armor/weapons. At least slow down the rate of decay.
  • The dungeon music was annoying and distracting. I get the whole “sentai” theme thing, but there should have been an option to turn it off entirely.
  • The slight stat boosts you got from failing were insulting. I felt patronized. Like, I know what I’m getting into when I play a rogue-like, okay? You don’t have to baby me or give me pity points for failing. How old do you think I am?

And so on and so forth. Oh it wasn’t all bad, since I played it for quite a while. I liked the art style, I liked the generally cheerful and silly mood, I’m glad they tried to be funny and I liked the general premise of the hero training for the battle against the final boss.

And it’s not like I was planning to finish in the first place. I would have stopped sooner or later anyway; the flaws just hastened the process. So when I’d had enough and wanted to quit, I quit.

The end. Seriously.

Rune Factory Frontier – Progress Report 3 (finished)

Done, done and done. I met all the Rune Factory Frontier goals I set for myself last time, so here I am for the final round up.Rune-factory-frontier_iris-blanche

1. Getting married to Iris was a bigger ordeal than I’d thought. First I had to raise both girls to 10 LP. Then they inexplicably fell sick and I couldn’t figure out how to cure them. After checking several FAQs, I learned I had to wait a week for a book to show up at the library. Now, how was I supposed to know that? In fact there were a lot of “How was I supposed to know that” moments in this game, but this was probably the worst.

Long story short, I jumped through all the necessary hoops, waited almost a month to propose and got myself a lovely young wife. Lost Iris Noire in the process, which was a bit sad. But it was for the best.

Having a wife is embarrassing! But sweet. But embarrassing! Whenever I try to leave the house, she gives me a goodbye kiss! With a closeup! AAAAAAH! I can’t play that in front of anyone! >_< But she’s really cute.

2. I crafted almost everything on the crafts lists and made almost all the recipes. Apart from the ultimate hoe I also fully upgraded all my farming tools. Good times.

3. I beat both bosses. Turns out they don’t start out in hypermode unless you’ve fought them at least once before. The Snow Ruins snake was annoying, but not that hard. The Whale Island squid was a little harder, but I was sick of running and dodging by that point. I just loaded up on healing items and foods and beat the crap out of him. I’m not going to bother getting revenge on the Chicken boss, though. I doubt he’d drop anything worth my while.

4. I grew almost all the crops. The only things I didn’t get were Red Crystal Flowers and Pompom Grass. Growing almost everything was a lot of tedious time and repetitive effort, so I want to say “Never again!” but the items and weapons I made from the results served me well, so I can’t. I just wish there was some other way to get them, like a rare monster drop or a quest reward.

Final roundup (quick notes)

– Farming. A real drag. Especially since you couldn’t muster an army of monsters to do the heavy lifting. When Tides of Destiny came out and I heard the farming element had been simplified to hell, I was livid. Now I’m much more interested and ready to forgive. I’d be sad if they took farming out completely, but I don’t mind if they take the stress and tedium out of it.

Fishing– Fishing. Very useful, but not interesting at all. My fishing level was the lowest of all my stats when I finished. Maybe more varieties of fish? More fish dishes? A more interesting mini-game? Dunno.

– Fighting. No problems there, except like fishing it was a little dull. I also prefer the other RF systems where you could equip both magic and weapons and use them interchangeably. It also took me a while to figure out when an enemy was dead so I could stop slashing, but no biggie. And some of the boss battles were a little too long.

– Controls. Generally good, but bad for farm work. Every single motion takes way too long to execute. Walking or riding everywhere on such a large map was a pain. I thought I’d get a warp item/spell by the end, but I never did. Also it was annoying have to pull up a menu every time I wanted to switch the smallest item.

– Characters. The village felt a little sparse. I thought new people would move in later, since the place was so big and empty, but they never did. Apart from the Irises I didn’t like anyone very much. I also went ages without seeing most of them because my paths never took me their way. People like Danny and Turner might as well not have been in the game. Same with Brodik – what the heck was his problem?

Apart from taking useless guys like those out, I’d like future games to make it so character’s lines and reactions towards you change as their affection (both love and friendship) grows. It’s so boring how they only speak the same 2 or 3 lines day after day after year after year. How am I supposed to believe Laguna and Iris are in love when all she ever says to him is “I love tomato juice!”?

– Mail quests. Pointless. Unrewarding. No fun. I don’t see why I have to give an item to the mailman when I can hand it over in person. Plus all I got was a “thank you” for handing over a Fairy Dust it took me 3 days of farming to get. Never again.

rff_battle– Dungeons. Dungeon layout was good, monster density was just right. I never felt overwhelmed by the number of enemies, but there was always something around the corner. The shortcut system was an excellent idea.

The only thing I disliked about dungeons was the unclear requirements needed to unlock them. After the Green Ruins I wandered around for days before I noticed the sprout on the Mountain Path. After finishing the flame dungeon, no one told me I was supposed to use the relic on the stone by the library until I FAQ’ed it. Once I got stuck in the Snow Ruins, I had no way of knowing I was supposed to either ride an animal or go to the side of the church – a place I never go and where nothing else ever happens – and wait for an event to trigger.

– Crafting, cooking, forging, alchemy. All good. The mini-game that lets you boost the level of the finished item was good too. No matter how many kinds of items they let me make, it would never have been enough so no complaints about the number. But there really should have been a mass-production option. They should show you in advance how much RP/HP it will consume and let you whether to proceed or not.

– Runeys. Time-consuming and inconvenient. They’re not quite as bad as I was led to believe, but even with a grass factory they’re annoying to manage. The reason I’m not too mad is because Marvelous has already seen the error of their ways and taken them out for good.

– Time management. Time moves too slowly. There should be an option that lets you skip up to 6 hours ahead in a day.

– Graphics, music. Haha, you know I never pay much attention to these things. No, actually the music was pretty good. The character designs were a bit lacking, and the town layout was rather poor. Too many places that take too long to get to and where nothing ever happens.

– Overall feeling about the game. Largely positive. It took a while to get going and the story wasn’t that interesting. And I didn’t like the characters much, didn’t like the farming either. But I still played 89 hours of it in record time, so eh. It was a little better than “just okay” but not by much. Quite a few things could have been improved, and I hope to see some of those changes reflected in Tides of Destiny.

– Where to next. Tides of Destiny and Arc Rise Fantasia are the only Wii RPGs I have left to try. I’ll start them in a couple of weeks, next time I’m back home. On the PS2 I’ve started Steambot Chronicles. On the PSP I’ve finished Story Mode in Phantasy Star Portable 2, but I can’t stop doing open missions. If/when I ever tear myself away, I plan to start Sol Trigger. That’s it for today.

Tokimeki Memorial 3 – Emi Tachibana GET!

tokimeki memorial 3_frontTokimeki Memorial 3 is the black sheep of the Tokimemo family, the least-praised, least-loved and least-remembered today. Fans complained about the dumbed-down system and 3D character design when the game was released, but I believe all would have been forgiven if the cast of girls had been even slightly attractive and memorable. Now I’m no Tokimemo expert beyond games 1, 4 and the Girls’ Side games. Even when I put myself into the shoes of a Tokimemo fan, though, I’m hard pressed to figure out what Konami expected me to like about this game.

I will say, though, that this isn’t a bad game. It’s easily the worst Tokimemo game, but it does have some things going for it. I actually liked the much-criticized 3D character designs. They moved just enough to be lively without being spastic like, say, the girls from Love Plus.

Another nice thing TM3 did was to seriously ramp up the number and variety of dates. Movies, plays, game shows, robot shows, water slides, body surfing, lots and lots of things to do. I never went on the same date twice unless I wanted to – there was that much variety.

I also liked having to get a girl’s telephone number directly from her instead of from your stalker friend. I’ve always found it a bit creepy how your friend just gives out girls’ phone numbers without their permission. I feel better calling her as well, because she wouldn’t give me her number if she didn’t want me to call, right? ^_^ It’s too bad they dropped that system to pacify the weak-willed herbivore otaku in TokiMemo 4.

That’s about it as far as it goes, though. The game wasn’t bad, but it sure was boring.

1. The girls. I chose Emi Tachibana not because I especially liked her but because she was the best card in a bad hand. Visually all the girls are fairly cute, but personality-wise there’s not much to choose between them. Yukiko was cute, but dull. Rika had a screechy annoying voice and looked too “loli” to take seriously. Oda Mari was unfriendly and not that pretty. Also I don’t see how being an actress’s daughter automatically makes her a “lady”. Chitose with her green hair and bad Engrish was annoying. Also she bombed me. And I avoided meeting whoever the last girl was by ignoring the flags. That left me with Emi by default. Nice girl, but not nice enough to save the game.

2. Bombs. You meet some guy/girl once and they quickly start spreading nasty rumors about you because you won’t date them. Normally I take it as part of the game, but TM3 really messed things up. For some bizarre reason asking a girl on a date, giving her a present or even outright dating her is not sufficient to diffuse a bomb. I have no idea what they intended me to do about it, but by the end of the game every single girl except Chitose and Emi were threatening to bomb me. And the only reason why Chitose wasn’t bombing me was because hers had already blown up. I was confused all the way through.

emi3. Clothing inspections. Each girl has a very specific outfit she wants you to wear on dates. Even if it makes no sense for a high school kid to wear a business suit to the beach. If you don’t please her, she’ll either look upset and disappointed or flat out walk off and leave you hanging. And she sure as hell won’t tell you what you did wrong so you can fix it.

4. A little too easy. Your raiseable stats are reduced to 4: literature, science, arts and exercise. Your stats go up really quickly, and according to the FAQs, most girls need only one date and 1 stat to be at a certain low level in order to win them. Oda Mari, for example, needs only 1 date, an arts level of 30 and lovey-dovey status. Emi needs 1 date, sports level 20 (extremely low) and lovey-dovey status. You barely need to put in any effort at all.

5. Your friends. I hesitate to even call them “friends,” because they don’t like you at all. I suspect the almost excessive bro-ness of your buddies in TM4 was a direct response to the unfriendliness of your ‘buddies’ in this game. They’re useful for nothing, they hang up on you when you call them, they almost never hang out with you and I can’t remember any conversations with them that didn’t involve one or both parties sneering at each other. Terrible.

6. School. Non-school activities like dates and festivals were really well done, but school sucked. Nothing interesting happens on sports day or at the school festival, interaction with teachers and classmates is basically zero. It made me question the point of setting the game in a high school, apart from tradition.

7. Dating Emi Tachibana. Sweet, ladylike girl. More of a well-bred lady than Oda Mari, at any rate. Does her aikido, goes on her dates, gets on with her life without needing anyone. While Emi had some club-related drama going on, she solved it all by herself without ever involving me. That was the problem, really. We’re supposed to be dating, supposed to be in love with each other, but she never opened up to me at all. I actually got the option to pry into the matters that bother her in post-date conversations, but she always kept you at arm’s length. “Oh yeah I’m totally fine, don’t worry about it.” A cold, distant relationship like that is mere acquaintance, not even friendship, much less dating.

Unfortunately nothing about the game suggests that dating other girls would be any different. I also didn’t enjoy my one, long playthrough enough to venture another one. None of the other TM/GS games have been perfect, but they’ve had some characters or some fun quirks that invited more than one run from me. I guess in the end the biggest flaw of Tokimeki Memorial 3 is that it’s just no fun at all.