Wand of Fortune ~Mirai e no Prologue~

The Wand of Fortune fandisc, useful only to those who have played the original and liked it. I’m sort of, kind of in that category, so I downloaded it and gave it a brief spin.

Can’t say I enjoyed it though. It’s too strict in terms of the choices you’re allowed to make. You’re locked into or out of certain routes depending on the first three choices you make at the beginning. You can do everything right after that and still end up getting the teachers’ ending.

The fandisc is divided into three sections: an original scenario called “Edgar’s Mysterious Loupe” featuring a new character, a long boring story about Cynthia (the blonde-haired Julius freak) and a section where you see what happened between Lulu and her chosen guy after the end of the first game. That’s the only part worth playing IMO. Edgar’s loupe deals with Lulu’s crisis of confidence after getting the “All” element in the first game, and a mopey depressed Lulu isn’t Lulu at all.

Still, I played “Edgar’s Mysterious Loupe” a couple of times. Got Edgar’s, Est’s, Lagi’s and Noel’s endings naturally, then used a FAQ to get Elbart (now known as “Elbert”, what gives) and the “True” Ending. In the process I discovered that I don’t really like Lagi as much as I thought I did, that Noel and Est are awesome and that Mr. E is still my number one. Elbie4Lyfe.

Getting those endings unlocked the post-original scenarios for Est, Lagi, Noel and Elbe/art, allowing me to see how they’re getting on with Lulu. Err, sort of. Apart from Elbert’s route, I fast-forwarded through the others because they were dragging on.

Elbert and Lulu: they aren’t getting on too well because Elbert is embarrassed to admit their relationship in public. As well he should be, the ephebophile. If you’re going to date a student, you should at least take a leaf from Himurocchi’s book and choose a day-school so you can date them outside school on weekends. At least they were both clever enough to pick a school where the principals are okay with it.

In the end Lulu gets tired of him pushing her away and plants a kiss on him, the end. Heh heh, I love it when they get all embarrassed like that. Unfortunately I don’t see much of a future for E&L as long as Elbert continues to be so ball-less. Sorry darling, but it’s the truth.

When we get married, I’m burning this outfit first

Lagi and Lulu: they’re having issues because he can’t hug her and is nice to every other girl but her. Lagi’s a twit for making my Lulu sad, and I’ve had it up to here with his cranky, childish attitude. They did share a nice kiss towards the end, but I have no idea how they got there because I was fast-forwarding my way through.

Noel and Lulu: more awkwardness, more unhappy Lulu. She wants him to be more affectionate and he’s too nervous to do so. Unlike Elbert he doesn’t even have his position as an excuse. I like Noel, he’s a funny guy, but this is unacceptable.

Est and Lulu: have a surprisingly sweet relationship, but I don’t remember much else of what happened in there. Something about him hiding secrets from her, blah blah, I want to share your pain, blah blah, and your colds and fevers too, blah blah blah.  Fast forward for the win.

The older I grow, the shorter my attention span gets, so this outcome was perhaps inevitable. Moreover, while I liked the previous game, I’m still a little burned out from how long and tedious it was, so my opinion doesn’t count for much. Fans of Wand of Fortune won’t go wrong with this fandisc though. It’s nice to find out exactly what happened once they started dating, because a confession doesn’t automatically mean everything’s hunky-dory. The disc also has several new CGs as well as “dream sequences” with all the characters, and each route in each section is fairly short, especially compared to the original. It’s worth at least one playthrough.

Riviera: The Promised Land

I got nostalgic for Riviera: The Promised Land, so I’ve been playing it on and off for the past couple of months. I just finished my third and a half playthrough of this game and got Serene’s ending for the second time.

Since I’ve played it so often, I don’t have much to say about it. I first picked this up in… 2005-ish? Summer of 2005, I believe. It was my first “dating sim-ish” kind of game, the first time my attitude towards my party members had actually affected the ending I got. I had no idea things would turn out that way, but I just went along being nice to Lina and before I knew it, I’d gotten a treasure hunter ending with her. I was hooked!

I immediately started a new game, which also makes Riviera the first game I ever did back-to-back playthroughs for. This time I went for Serene because, like, who doesn’t go for Serene? Got her, yippee, then right away I started another playthrough! I was going for Cierra this time, but then I stopped myself halfway though like, “WTH are you doing? How can you play the same game three times in a row like this? Stop touching that game. Stop it!”

You’ve gotta understand, that was the first time a game had ever had that effect on me, I thought I was going crazy or something. So, believe it or not, I forced myself to stop playing and lent the game to a friend I knew wouldn’t return it. And that was it for Riviera and me until now. Looking back, what the heck was wrong with me?

Anyway, so I got a little wistful late last year and got a rom and played it. It was surprisingly hard to get through, for an unexpected reason: I remember just about everything that ever happened in the game. It’s been almost 7 years, but I still remembered most of the dungeons, most of the skits, the soundtracks, even which way to go and which way not to go. I guess I did play it 2.5 times, it’s only to be expected. The nostalgia trip was fun, though. And now I know I wasn’t crazy. It’s not the best game in the world – the story is cheesy as hell, the Practice Battle system makes things a little too easy and that 15-item limit just has to go. But even after all these years I had a blast with the characters and their interactions, the soundtrack, all the hidden items and traps… All still fun for me to explore after all this time.

I also got to reminisce about the days when I thought Sting was a great developer, based on just this game alone. That was before I went on to play Yggdra UnionStupidly confusing stupidly complicated randomly hard battle system… no, we won’t talk about that game today. It’s like the same way Imageepoch publicly soiled themselves with Final Promise Story. Except I forgave them once I played Criminal Girls while Sting has yet to redeem itself. They’ve got other things like Blaze Union and Gloria Union, but I’m not touching them. A while ago I was downloading random ISOs and came across an SRPG called Gungnir. Oh, a new SRPG, downloaded, fired it up… Sting. *florporplorpl* my gaming boner wilted on the spot.

Yes, I Mad. Although I suppose 6 years is a rather long time to hold a grudge… And maybe I just sucked at YU… No, forget it, I Still Mad. …Yeah, definitely still mad.

Well, that was a nice trip down Memory Lane, but I can’t stay in the past forever. Next up, I’ve been exploring the Wand of Fortune fandisc, Mirai e no Prologue. More about that once I’ve fooled around with it a little more.

The Idolm@ster: Dearly Stars – Not my kind of game

Just finished Hidaka Ai’s route. Meh. Just glad it’s over, that’s all.

The Idolm@ster Dearly Stars disappointed me in nearly every aspect I could think of:

As a raising/life sim

There are only three stats to manage, plus tiredness. All of them are very easy to raise and keep high. You’d expect that as a teenaged idol you’d have to balance your school life with performances while finding time for training and taking care of your health and getting enough food and rest, that sort of thing, but there are no schedules to worry about or deadlines to meet in Dearly Stars. When you have an audition lined up, your rivals and the organizers will wait as many days and weeks as it takes for you to get your act together. There’s no tension at all.

As a music/rhythm game

Dearly Stars is a game about a musician, but it’s not really a music game, per se. What music there is is pretty bad and the songs your idol can sing are fixed, as are her dance and vocal performances for each one. The player’s involvement consists of picking out outfits, adding a few moves and helping her “memorize” lyrics and “learn” dances through minigames. After all that effort, though, your idol’s success in auditions still depends largely on luck. You might as well not even bother.

I’m not a fan of cutesy-poppy idol music in general, and Ai’s voice grated on me. The same songs sung by the other playable idols are slightly more bearable. Ryo has a soothing, boyish voice (being a trap and all) and Eri’s voice is high and sweet, but Ai is just loud, bordering on screechy. Quite a disappointing experience.

As a dress-up game

Idols are supposed to be cute and fashionable, right? Right, Namco? Oh, you didn’t get the memo? Ah, that explains why your idols only have three outfits with a few palette swaps, some ratty-looking accessories and no hairstyle changes at all. There’s no way to buy outfit or accessories either, you have to wait till Sunday and pray a fan sends you one. Just how poor is Studio 876 anyway?

As a minigame collection

The bulk of the “gameplay” consists of using the touchscreen and stylus to give Ai “lessons” through mini-games. To improve your Vocal skills, you have to fill in missing lyrics in hiragana as in the screenshot on the right. To raise Visual expression, you have to tap little smiley faces (I hate that game) and for Dance skills you have to tap out the correct steps when they reach a particular mark. It’s hard to explain.

I appreciated having something to do other than read long conversations and listen to bad music, and the games even grew on me after a while. It’s just that it’s the same three mini-games from beginning to end. No new games, no new levels, no added difficulty, no surprises. Plus Ai just won’t shut up during them, so you’re playing the same things, getting the same results and hearing the same loud comments throughout the game. And at the end of the day none of your hard work even matters, because the auditions are largely down to luck and probability. Waste of effort.

As a visual novel

The point of the Idolm@ster games, as far as I can tell, is to chronicle the rise of an idol from a nobody to a superstar. To make them more interesting, each girl (or trap) has her own story that plays out over the course of the game. Ai’s story is that her mother is a retired famous idol and so she grew up with a complex about it. As the game goes along, her mother returns to the entertainment world and challenges her, and they have a great showdown at the end of it all.

Good, that’s all well and nice. It’s a bit of a shame that I have to compete with her, because IMO her mom Mai is the greater star. We never get to see her perform, but from what I can see, Mai has better looks, a better sense of style, greater charisma, greater magnetism and just all-around greater “star power.” Ai’s just a loud noisy kid with everyday looks, a squeaky grating voice, average dancing skills and a large head. Hmm, then again apart from the large head part, I just described Japan’s reigning queen of pop Ayumi Hamasaki, so maybe Namco’s on to something here.

That’s just an aside, back to the story. Little things that make visual novels more comfortable to play, like quick saves, quick loading and text-skipping are missing. When you talk to someone and a choice comes up and you get it wrong, they don’t tell you what you did wrong so you can fix it next time. Then there’s the usual visual novel answer choices based purely on guesswork. E.g. “What were you doing?” A. Looking at the boats B. Looking at the sea C. Looking at the whales. Okay, you might guess that C is a little over the top, but why is B “correct” and A “wrong”? And why does it matter what I was looking at?

That’s all minor stuff though. Major problems, I had two. First one: the Stranger’s Family Reunion issue. This is where the game takes things that are new and foreign to the player for granted and doesn’t bother to explain them. Along the way, you’ll meet other idols like Haruka, Yukiho, Makoto, Ami and Azusa that Ai gushes over like they’re the greatest stars on the planet. These events mean nothing to me because I don’t know any of these people. Maybe they’re from previous games or the anime, but how should I know and why should I care?

So anyway, the game goes along, and Ai competes against some of them and gets down on herself on how they’re so much better than her in terms of looks, singing ability, energy etc. That’s easy to believe because Ai sucks so much but still, how should I know? That’s where the second problem comes in: Show, Don’t Tell. Show us their performances, let us hear them sing, let me decide for myself if they’re that awesome or not, don’t make up my mind for me.

Quite frankly, the construction of the game makes these “super-idols” look terrible anyway. If they’re so famous and fantastic, how can Ai stumble her way through the auditions and fall flat on her face several times while performing the same tired songs in the same tired clothes and still beat them handily every time? If I were a fan of those older idols, I’d be quite pissed.

What’s more, since it’s so hard to believe they’re any good at all, the parts of the story that focus on helping Ai work through her inferiority complex and beat these glamorous idols (i.e. the whole game) come across as false and disingenuous. It makes Ai seem like a fraud, like she’s being falsely modest and fishing for compliments when she puts herself down. I just can’t get into a story like that.

Of course, the one time when they did show something, it was completely unimpressive. They make a huge fuss about Hidaka Mai’s hit song “ALIVE” being the greatest song ever, and when you finally get to hear it, it’s a dull, droning Disney-type ballad. Poorly delivered by Ai’s voice actress to boot, like all the other songs before it. That one I could have done without.

Putting my doubts about the way the story was delivered to one side, I must also take issue with the story itself. Not with the ultimate goal of overcoming her mother’s legacy. That part is fine. It’s all the people she faces along the way I have a problem with. They’re not just talentless idols, they’re also lame characters. Why the heck are they so friendly and helpful to their rival? They’re all so eager to compete with her on an even level. They give her advice, they cheer her up when she’s down, they accept their losses like champs.

Damn it, how am I supposed to feel good about my progress when they’re all so kind and generous and my character is a no-talent loudmouth bobblehead? As a result of their cookie-cutter uniform niceness, the only person who did show a bit of personality, Hidaka Mai, became by far the most exciting person in the game. Instead of being all sugar and spice, she could be catty, boastful, playful, mean and crazy in turn. It’s sad when the “last boss” of the game is the one you’re most rooting for by the end.

Conclusion

Whew. I sure wrote a lot for a game I didn’t even enjoy all that much. This is where I add my usual “It wasn’t that bad” disclaimer, and it’s true, it wasn’t that bad. It wasn’t that good either, and the longer it dragged on, the more “not that good” it got. An Idolm@ster with more things to do, better songs, a more likeable main character and a more colorful supporting staff might be a really good game.

I don’t know if the other Idolm@ster games where you play a producer instead of the idol themselves are better at resolving these issues, but I’m not in the mood to find out. I got to see for myself what Idolm@ster is all about, and I’ll have to be satisfied with that.

On to the next game!

The Idolm@ster: Dearly Stars – Hmm…

I wanted something with absolutely no random battles in it, and I haven’t started a new raising sim in a while so… here we are.

The Idolm@ster: Dearly Stars has you playing as a wannabe idol singer who grows from a complete nobody into a famous id0l. I picked Hidaka Ai, the one in the middle, and I’ve currently got her up to a Rank D idol (over 100,000 fans).

The gameplay is simple enough. You have three stats, Vocal, Dance and Visual (looks), and you raise them through lessons that take the form of annoying touchscreen mini-games. Additionally you pick a song and an outfit depending on which one of the three stats is trending that week, then you carry out promotions that help you build up “memories.” After a few of these, you qualify to take part in an audition where you use those “memories” to hold the judges’ interest long enough to pass. Pass, rank up, next audition, pass rank up, etc.

I haven’t watched the Idolm@ster anime, and this is the first IM game I’m playing but I hear they’re all quite similar. While this isn’t quite the experience I was hoping for, I can (sort of) see what the attraction of this game would be. It’s like the anti-Princess Maker, made for people who find “regular” raising sims long, tiring and/or confusing. They just want to play with a cute girl and they already know what they want her to be. No need to mess with all those stats and jobs and lessons and multiple endings and stress and time limits and stuff like that. Just a linear story, simple mini-games and lots of anime girls to ogle. Makes sense.

It’s not really for me though. I’m going to finish it and everything, but it’s not really doing anything for me. The foregone conclusion (Ai wins “Idol Ultimate” and becomes a top star like her mother) is painful enough without adding the repetitive gameplay and the vaguely irritating story to the mix. At each stage they try to throw an obstacle in Ai’s way, but with the player at the helm and the auditions so easy to win, they just end up looking ridiculous. For example right now I have to beat an idol named Hoshii Miki in an audition. There’s no way I’m going to lose as long as I take lessons and follow the trends, but the game is acting like it’s this insurmountable obstacle that I could never overcome in a million years, blah blah blah. Pathetic.

Anyway, I’m going to finish it. Apart from being piss-easy and highly repetitive, it’s not exactly bad, and it shouldn’t take too long at the rate I’m going. After this I still won’t be ready to take on any random battles, so… hmm… I’ll probably pick up an otome game.

Hero’s Saga Laevatein Tactics (2)

After blathering on about my “gamer’s pride” in the previous post, I felt a bit silly walking away from the Immortal King without a fight, so I went back and killed him. The King himself wasn’t all that tough. It was those zombie magicians with the crazy range and full Valhalla gauges that decimated my party last time. This time I got a little lucky and two of them came down early to their doom. The troublesome one in the middle I took out with a Valhalla attack from one cleric and the rest weren’t much trouble. Victoly!

After all that, it turned out the Immortal King wasn’t even the final boss. It was Ahriman, who was more like Yu Yevon to IKing’s Jecht than any credible threat. I rubbed him out quickly, thinking the game would be over then, but nooo. Not even a credit roll. My hero Ernesto promised IK that he’d gather up all the Vaettir Arms on the continent and return them to him, so I’m supposed to help out with that. In the meantime the NPC that started everything got herself frozen in a time crystal and I have to find out a way to undo that and get her back.

…Or not. I ain’t gonna do it. Even if the credits haven’t rolled, I still consider the game over. If there’s anything else the game wants me to do, it should be short and to the point. Instead, right now I have 50% of the Arms and no clue how many more battles I have to fight to get the number I need to return. I also have no idea how I’m supposed to rescue Valerie. Most likely I’m supposed to fight and fight and fight and every couple of fights they’ll give me another clue until the chapter is over. DO NOT LIKE. So that’s it for me and Hero’s Saga, for real this time.

Overall impressions of Hero’s Saga: Laevatein Tactics: the story was shallow. Like, really really shallow. It lacked most of the twists that SRPGs usually have, and character motivations rarely made any sense at all. This bad guy developed all these weapons that hurt people on all sides and wasn’t even sorry for it, but because he’s an NPC’s father, he’s magically forgiven. Stuff like that.

Character interaction is rare and usually pointless. There were only about 5 or 6 story characters, so they have no real excuse. They seemed to be building a nice love-triangle between our MC Ernesto, his brother Claudio and his fiancee Diana, but then they chickened out and paired Ernesto with Valerie at the end, entirely unconvincingly. Boo, hiss.

Story and characters aside, everything else was pretty good. The battle music was okay, the graphics were okay, the character designs were meh, but passable. The battle system needed a little more balancing though. Higher-level enemies dodge like crazy, especially in the post-game chapter. No matter how high your morale is, once the enemies gets to more than one or two levels above you, prepare to miss just about every hit. You can use Phalanx for a guaranteed hit, but then prepare to do piss-all damage.

Magicians decimate your parties with ease. In most games, magicians are strong against other magicians, but in this game they’re weak against everything when it comes to being hit and strong against everything when it comes to dealing damage. And somehow enemy mages always do more damage to you than vice-versa. Some elements seem to be far stronger and more useful than others. Lightning and Earth especially, even though all four elements are supposed to be even. Valhalla Breaks are just evil. Yet somehow the enemy seems to have very good survivability against them lately.

Etc, etc. It needed a bit of tweaking in all regards and doesn’t stand out in any one aspect. If you like SRPGs you won’t regret playing it, but you won’t miss anything if you don’t get it either.