Yeah people played Utawarerumono last blitz for example.
The DS version, although if time permits I might actually finish that game before March lol. It still counts right?Thanks for joining us and good luck! I just saw your entry on the spreadsheet and that's a great set of games, especially DQV. Which version are you playing (mobile, DS, etc.)?
The DS version, although if time permits I might actually finish that game before March lol. It still counts right?
You can start early, you'd just need to finish it after Mar. 1st.
I've been considering grabbing the DS version myself, along with other DS/3DS rpgs before they start to get absurdly expensive. One thing I've found I hate about trying to collect/purchase older portable games is that the owners basically never keep the boxes or manuals. It's basically double the price on eBay for a Complete copy of a DS/3DS game. I don't understand throwing away a game case...
it does now
As someone who is also trying to grow his GBA, DS and 3DS RPG collection it's honestly a godsend that quite a few games don't have the box with them. Less clutter in my home even if the collection value isn't as big.
Just thinking about all those loose carts rattling around is giving me anxiety, haha.
Oh yeah I understand the feeling. It's so exhausting shopping for good, complete copies of older games. I actually think I'm done with the DS now, since I don't feel like paying an arm and a leg for the rare games I don't have (e.g. Dark Spire, Solatorobo). As for the 3DS, I don't feel an urgent need to buy much yet; though I'd keep an eye on certain titles...You can start early, you'd just need to finish it after Mar. 1st.
I've been considering grabbing the DS version myself, along with other DS/3DS rpgs before they start to get absurdly expensive. One thing I've found I hate about trying to collect/purchase older portable games is that the owners basically never keep the boxes or manuals. It's basically double the price on eBay for a Complete copy of a DS/3DS game. I don't understand throwing away a game case...
The prospect of trying to finish DQVII and Persona 5, two among the all-time longest JRPGs, in 3 months makes me nervous -_- sending you my energyThink I'll join the Blitz (and I really should visit the discord more). I've added DQVII, FFI GBA and Persona 5 to the list. The other two games are TBD – the first three are all more than 50% done, so maybe I'll add something new
Haha, thanks! It should be fine – I'm at the casino palace in Persona 5 with like 70 hours of playtime, so it should actually take me less time than most shorter RPGs.The prospect of trying to finish DQVII and Persona 5, two among the all-time longest JRPGs, in 3 months makes me nervous -_- sending you my energy
Completely fine.I'm planning on giving Ys 8 another chance soon so I might join in on the Blitz thing, assuming it's fine to enter with just one game.
Don't worry we envy you playing CT for the first time more than anything else haha. It's a great blitz game too, pretty short and well-paced.Think I'll take part, I have been catching up on a lot of games over the last year but a lot of RPGs kinda get pushed to the side. Just trying to narrow down my picks but for sure it will include Chrono Trigger (yup).
Well, I haven't played an RPG since Octopath Traveller came out and I haven't even finished that. What is the stance of the Blitz on RPG Maker games? Or Borderlands 2?
Was craving an RPG after playing hours of Destiny, MHW and Smash so started FFXII the other day.
When it originally came out I only played for a few hours, so it's basically my first time playing it. I'm enjoying it so far.
Zodiac system is intriguing, but I suspect it is less deep than what I originally thought in terms of assigning licenses to specific characters. Maybe I'm completely wrong though, we'll see.
I like the combat. I know it's divisive and some people find it boring but I personally enjoy it. Probably because it is a nice change of pace from the last games I played.
Music is phenomenal.
I've talked a bit about this on Discord but one of the games on my short list that didn't quite make it was Shining in the Darkness. For those who don't know me I am a massive, massive Shining Force fan but my time with the rest of the Shining series is limited in comparison and it felt like a really good game to play for my blitz which is why it was on my short list. I had played Shining in the Darkness before but never got very far as I've never been a big fan of dungeon crawlers I'm very much a story>gameplay person but when I was trying to decide between this, Terranigma (which won out) and a few others the game really struck a chord with me and I wanted to play it. So I decided to do a little pre-blitz event for myself and play SitD as a bonus game of sorts and now having finished it I'm really glad I did.
Again as someone who doesn't normally like Dungeon Crawlers there were elements of the game that annoyed me at times for one thing I thought that the length of the game was a bit longer then I wanted (maybe 1 less trial and 1 less floor overall) but overall I really enjoyed my time with it. This game is just oozing charm much like the rest of the Shining series. For a game that came out in 1991 it has such a unique personality with its wide cast of supporting characters all of which fit the games world well but all of them look different and are of various different races. You've got elves, drawfs, hobbits, humans, and a few unique races as well.
(Here you have a wolfman, a ratman, an imp, whatever the heck Ghorn is (the Grey fella in the back towards the middle) among others.
The game has a simple story and design. You are a Knight in the kingdom of Thornwood and the Princess Jessa has been captured by the evil Dark Sol who is willing to free her if the King is willing to give up his kingdom to him. Why does Dark Sol want the Kingdom? It's never explained. Story is pretty light for the most part I'd say you spend 90% dungeon crawling 5% in town upgrading gear/healing and 5% story. So with no one left to turn to the King tasks you to find the Princess and save the Kingdom. You are eventually joined by your two friends Milo a Hobbit fighter/healer and Pyra an elven mage. The hero doesn't have any magic but can use the best equipment and easily deals the most damage on single targets while Milo makes for a great fighter in every regard hes got AoE magic thats quite powerful, he hits quite hard, and hes also the healer. Milo is great and maybe a bit OP XD. Pyra is also really good she starts off with low level magic but eventually learns group spells as well as various support abilities and can equip whips which hit a group of enemies at once.
The game is split up between 3 locations. You've got the castle where almost all of the story events happen and which you return to after completing each new aspect of the dungeon to progress the story. You have the dungeon itself where you explore various maze like areas, find traps and treasures and fight monsters as you search for the missing Princess and the town where you can save, heal, revive dead characters, upgrade equipment, and talk to various npcs in the tavern. It's a game on a relatively small scale compared to other games you aren't going to save the world or visiting multiple kingdoms and dungeons but because of that I feel like it works to its advantage because its on such a smaller scale the developers had a lot time to flesh out this smaller world.
(Look at those eyes, she knows a sucker when she sees one!)
Unlike many other games even compared to modern ones each shop keeper is different. So many other games including other Shining games have the NPC's that sell you stuff or where you save all be the same looking person no matter where you are which isn't a big deal really but having each of these NPC's defined helps build up immersion. It helps that the art is just fantastic, again for a game that came out in 1991 this game looks really amazing with each NPC having a very distinct look and feel as do enemies which while still having palate swaps offer a ton of variety and some really unique designs. Some of which you can see how they were repurposed into Shining Force (which would come out 2 years later) but others are just kinda crazy I mean look at these things...
(Yes those are Eggs with faces with wooden legs that look to be wearing Christmas hats and shoes.)
While there are plenty of your typical enemies (slimes, dragons, goblins, ect) there are a ton of really different designs as well. Some of them are certainly weird but they oddly don't feel out of place at all due to the art style of the world.
While I do like the enemy designs its a shame the actual dungeon graphics are so limited in comparison. In the game the labyrinth itself leads to 4 trials all of which have the same look as you can see from the Clodhopper screen shot above. It's disappointing its just that and the levels in the labyrinth itself are all just palate swaps of the same look except for the final floor. It's not especially bad per say but when you compare it to how varied and detailed everything else is it is something that clearly stands out for not being nearly as interesting. The actual meat of the game I said is the dungeon crawling so it is what you are looking at most of the time. Thankfully despite the graphics not being all that unique the frequent introduction of new enemy designs helps keep from the dungeon crawling from really feeling tedious.
Each floor of the dungeon is a large maze on a 30x30 layout which makes mapping it out pretty easy once you get used to it and while there isn't a ton of traps there are pitfalls and specific areas that can drain your MP (which is a major resource) with certain special enemies showing up around certain areas like rather strong Water creatures coming up from pools of water or these giant crab monsters that can appear out of the side of pathways as you approach them. Along with that the game does a good job of gating off certain items and areas until you acquire the right equipment which gives you reasons to go back and explore older areas eventually which is a nice touch. There are also very strong monsters that can appear in chests that will absolutely tear your party to pieces if you aren't expecting them.
(These things are the devil)
The game is challenging but not overly difficult. You get frequent upgrades either from purchasing items or just finding gear in the dungeon itself (later on you can craft some of the strongest weapons/armor in the game with Mithril and Dark Cubes you find in the dungeon) which helps even out the odds against the ever increasingly strong monsters that show up. HP and MP are your obvious main resources but MP is what matters most as your inventory space is extremely limited. You have 8 inventory slots but 4 of those are always taken up by a weapon and three pieces of armor and you also have key items you will frequently need to keep on you so generally each character only has 2-3 slots open and thats if you don't take healing or other items with you (and you should always take an Angel Feather with you which will teleport you out of the dungeon in case you get in trouble) so your MP gets spent on dealing out damage to enemies but also for a vast majority of your healing and if you run out of MP you likely won't get much farther exploring before having to exit to risk getting wiped in battle which results in you losing half of your gold. That may not sound that bad but when you are frequently needing money to upgrade gear getting wiped can set you back a lot. Thankfully you don't lose items or experience or just have to go back to your last save or anything. It's not THAT punishing but still something you have to consider as you explore.
Theres a lot I like about the game, the spell system for one is absolutely fantastic and very similar to what I already have seen in the Shining Force games. Each spell is fairly obvious in what it does and each spell has up to 4 levels with a bar representing what level of the spell you are casting and how much it costs along with a name and a picture of the spell itself. I don't think this gets mentioned enough but the UI in general in the Shining series is so good and spot on and seeing how it started here they really nailed it. It's simple yet intuitive and instead of messing around with just a list of menu options and names of various things the 4 directional UI just works great and the pictures show exactly what each option does and combine that with the simple and easy to use UI for magic and its easily one of the best UI's in gaming that really doesn't get talked about enough.
(Each Icon has a little animation like this in and out of battle that helps show various aspects of the UI)
Its a shame that the game will never get a proper remaster as I do think a few things could be fleshed out a little better. The main thing I think is that I feel like the MC should have some of the spells the other characters have. Milo is just way to OP having both great attack and defense but also great attack, support, and healing magic. While some of Pyra's spells could just fit better on the Hero. If It were up to me I'd give the Hero the low level healing spells that Pyra gets (heal 1 and 2), Egress (which is something the Heroes in the Force games always have instead of a mage) and also give him Milo's Burst spell (so the Hero has an AoE spell but its weak yet hits ALL enemies not just a group unlike Milo's other attacking spell Blast) as well as the Quick Spell. This gives the hero limited options for spell casting to be a bit more useful then just single target damage while also limiting Milo's overall power just a bit and freeing up Pyra to focus just on either damage dealing or support abilities.
I'm still not the biggest fan of Dungeon Crawlers but this was a fun experience and very much in spirit of the blitz with me playing a game I've had for god knows how long but never beating and branching out a bit and trying a type of RPG I don't normally play. It was a lot of fun and now more then ever I'm in the spirit of the blitz! Bring on the games!
Not a remaster, but Shining the Holy Ark on Saturn is sort of like a spiritual sequel.
Its a shame that the game will never get a proper remaster as I do think a few things could be fleshed out a little better
Thanks, its good but Shining Force 1-2 are even better (although different as they are SRPGs)!Nice writeup! I have this in the Sega Genesis Classics collection on Switch and I'm looking forward to playing a bit of it once I've finished Landstalker.
Yeah I've played a lot more of The Holy Ark but I never finished it, at some point I'll need to get back to it as I really liked that game.Not a remaster, but Shining the Holy Ark on Saturn is sort of like a spiritual sequel.
If all else fails, learn Harm.
https://pcgamingwiki.com/wiki/Arcanum:_Of_Steamworks_&_Magick_Obscura#Essential_improvementsAny mods or something of the sort required?
EDIT: I might as well join the blitz since I'm planning on playing Arcanum and PoE soon anyways
All this talk about Shining Force reminded me that I've owned the PSP remake of Tactics Ogre since launch and still haven't played it. In fact, it's the game I've owned the longest without completing it. I should play it one of these days.
Pretty sure that's an actual sin. What are you doing with your life?
Play it. It's the GOAT.
What's going on with the stats sheet? In particular, what's the relation between the graphical and numerical representations of the stats (or are those bars representing something else?)?
Yup. Not the issues section as well, in case you run into any.Thanks, looks like the multiverse edition is the way to go, right?
Thanks!
Got it, thanks!Yup. Not the issues section as well, in case you run into any.
Don't try to walk a middle path of magic or guns (unless you're not investing in either). Certain enemies have magical inclination and I recall going slightly towards technology made them harder to hit (especially with guns), but if you go hard technology (~100% on the magic/tech chart that you can lookup somehow) they're much easier. I'm guessing the reverse is true of technology enemies - the more extreme you are on the side, the easier a time you'll have.
If you're in turn-based mode, action points are king, and one of the early inventions you can put points toward (IIRC electrical lv2) is a ring that gives you two action points per turn. You can make four of them early, give two each to yourself and Virgil, and you'll get at least one extra attack per turn each. The first forge invention, balanced sword, is also very good because it's powerful and costs only 2AP per turn to attack (vs 3 or 4 for most weapons). Keep in mind that if you're recruiting an earlyish companion (~2 hours in?) he unlocks that invention also, but you have to wait awhile to get there and the early game is rough.
Guns suck early, but get much better once you find/invent better weaponry. Unfortunately, you don't get much benefit later on from dropping points in melee/dodge early, so you may just have to deal with restarting some unlucky fights.
Persuasion is very situational. I can only think of two places where it's actually used (although where it is used it saves you from some rough fights). I probably wouldn't put points in it again if I replayed.
The background "beat with an ugly stick" is really powerful, particularly for melee characters but IIRC the net stat boost is really good. You can offset the initial attitude malus easily, via a quest you find in the first area. Rarely does that malus affect conversations beyond the first round, where it'll improve initially. I would only not use it if using one of the other special backgrounds (e.g. Teacher, which lets you give allies apprenticeships/expert skills they wouldn't otherwise get).
God I really need to finally play Tactics Ogre. That's been on the backlog for so long, hell it might legitimately be the oldest thing I've had on there in terms of when it got "backlogged." I picked that up around the LUCT launch and...yea.
Also blitz starts tomorrow so - if there's anyone else who wants to join in, feel free! We've got a ton more people participating this time, it's great.