What JRPG are you currently playing?

super_furry · 04-05-2012 1:03pm

Retr0gamer wrote: »

The original game was like that. Working Designs bumped up the difficulty for the Western releases.

Hmmm, didn't realise that. Always thought the US releases were perfectly balanced - challenging without ever feeling like you needed to grind.

Retr0gamer · 04-05-2012 1:41pm

I thought the PS1 version of the first was was way too hard and needed grinding to get through. Working Designs always did that and often made the games too hard, in fact they destroyed a few games by messing with the difficulty. Silhouette Mirage is really boring and grindy in comparison to the japanese version, same with Popful Mail. There's another game on the PC Engine they localised that they made next to impossible. Lunar is a pretty breezy feel good RPG so think the grinding spoiled it a little and it's the reason I stopped playing it halfway through.

megaten · 04-05-2012 4:42pm

Actually Victor Ireland was on Retronauts recently and explained why Silhouette Mirage was changed. At the time EB games had a 7 day return no questions asked policy so they made the game more difficult so people would be less inclined to beat it in a week and the company wouldn't be faced with a bunch of their stock being returned.

Retr0gamer · 04-05-2012 4:53pm

megaten wrote: »

Actually Victor Ireland was on Retronauts recently and explained why Silhouette Mirage was changed. At the time EB games had a 7 day return no questions asked policy so they made the game more difficult so people would be less inclined to beat it in a week and the company wouldn't be faced with a bunch of their stock being returned.

I know, it was the reason he did it with all the games. Still made them crapper though especially because they got the balancing way off. The japanese versions of Popful Mail and Silhouette Mirage are much more playable. Silhouette Mirage is a Treasure action game that should be fast paced but in the US release you spend all your time griding the normal enemies for currency which killsthe pace.

I do admire what Victor Ireland did, but sometimes he went a little too far with the difficulty. TBH the people these games were marketed to were never going to trade them in.

ancapailldorcha · 04-05-2012 5:18pm

penev10 wrote: »

Oh no, thats brutal! From your house? very sorry to hear that.

Thanks mate! Had most of my PS3 saves backed up (Thank you Playstation Plus) but was just about to start on

Kefka's tower

in FFVI and had just beaten Cúchulainn in FFT. Gits.

Fergus_ · 07-05-2012 11:32pm

Got loads of JRPGs to run through over the summer holidays

Mindkiller · 17-05-2012 12:11am

Beat Persona 3 FES a minute ago. At least, I think I beat it but after I killed what can only be the big bad they still have me going to school. I'm too tired to watch what happens next, but I hope it doesn't pull another big demon out of its ass like Persona 4 did.

Overall I found it a really tepid grind, even more so than Persona 4. There's a lot to be admired in the Persona games but for the most part 90% of them is like banging your head against a wall for hours on end. If the other 10% wasn't so good I doubt I'd have bothered.

Retr0gamer · 17-05-2012 12:47am

Don't really get that at all. Found as a social sim they were great with some lovely writing. As a dungeon crawler as well they were excellent and it was nice to actually have a game that was challenging. I never had to grind in them either. Sure I lost a lot of progress if I played badly or pushed myself too far but never felt I was going into dungeons just to rack up levels.

Mindkiller · 17-05-2012 1:06am

I didn't need to 'grind' for any bosses, but what I meant was that the whole game itself feels like a grind. Something cool happens at every full moon but the rest of the month is taken up with going to school and stuff. Tartarus drove me nuts. At least in Persona 4 each dungeon was unique and had something to say about each character.

I found the social links extremely dull and ended up x-ing through some of them after a while, speed-reading them. One or two stood out, like the Dying Young Man. But mostly it just felt like another way to grind. Plus there's too much of a disconnect between what goes on in those scenes and how the characters interact with you in the story.

The game's story is very good, better than Persona 4. But you have to do an awful lot of dull crap to get to those parts. If there's a Persona 5 I might just hold on and see if Giantbomb do an endurance run of it. Or better yet, maybe they'll ditch the high-school social link stuff and do something else with it.

Retr0gamer · 17-05-2012 1:17am

I really enjoyed the social links, probably more than the dungeon crawling. Really hope they don't get rid of it and doubt they will.

I also liked Tartarus. If you go into an SMT game expecting a breezy JRPG in the vain of FF you are going to be disappointed. SMT games are closer to the old WRPGs like Wizardry or even Rogue likes.

Mindkiller · 17-05-2012 1:27am

I beat Nocturne/Lucifer's Call ages before this so I know how challenging they can be. This was much easier. The only bit that really gave me trouble was the second block when your AI-controlled allies are at their most useless.

That's another stupid thing with this game. The whole AI battle system is so unintuitive and they give you almost no control over it. I found it impossible to stop Junpei from attacking the final boss in its repel-physical form and killing himself unless I put him in 'stand by', but then he just wouldn't attack when the shield was removed. I know they fixed it with the PSP version but I can't get why they thought that was a good idea to begin with.

Anyway, out of the three SMT games I've beaten this goes in the bottom. Persona 4 is much better in near enough every respect bar the story, though I much preferred its characters. Lucifer's Call is a much better RPG than either of them even if it's a little obtuse for the first 15 hours or so. Maybe I should go look at DDS now.

Retr0gamer · 17-05-2012 2:40am

I really didn't mind the AI battle system until the end game when the characters got break spells and used them in stupid situations. Up to that point I had no problems with it. I suppose if you start with Persona 4 though and go back to it it can seem absolutely crazy but from my point of view starting with P3 it worked quite well.

noodler · 17-05-2012 9:58am

Mindkiller wrote: »

Beat Persona 3 FES a minute ago. At least, I think I beat it but after I killed what can only be the big bad they still have me going to school. I'm too tired to watch what happens next, but I hope it doesn't pull another big demon out of its ass like Persona 4 did.

Overall I found it a really tepid grind, even more so than Persona 4. There's a lot to be admired in the Persona games but for the most part 90% of them is like banging your head against a wall for hours on end. If the other 10% wasn't so good I doubt I'd have bothered.

Mindkiller wrote: »

I didn't need to 'grind' for any bosses, but what I meant was that the whole game itself feels like a grind. Something cool happens at every full moon but the rest of the month is taken up with going to school and stuff. Tartarus drove me nuts. At least in Persona 4 each dungeon was unique and had something to say about each character.

I found the social links extremely dull and ended up x-ing through some of them after a while, speed-reading them. One or two stood out, like the Dying Young Man. But mostly it just felt like another way to grind. Plus there's too much of a disconnect between what goes on in those scenes and how the characters interact with you in the story.

The game's story is very good, better than Persona 4. But you have to do an awful lot of dull crap to get to those parts. If there's a Persona 5 I might just hold on and see if Giantbomb do an endurance run of it. Or better yet, maybe they'll ditch the high-school social link stuff and do something else with it.

I could not agree more.

The games could do with some editing imo.

Mindkiller · 17-05-2012 12:54pm

Retr0gamer wrote: »

but from my point of view starting with P3 it worked quite well.

But it didn't work well at all. I had actually started with Persona 3 first but my PS3 yellow-lighted after 20 hours so that's why it took me so long to beat it. I still found it ridiculous the first time around as well. AI battle systems only work when the player can intervene at any point, which you can't in Persona 3. FFXII and FFXIII did it far better.

The 'heal/support' tactic was the worst. Aigis would use -kaja buffs as soon as her own buff ran out while everyone else's was still on, wasting a turn. They would use Diarahan when mediarama would have worked better, diarahan when hardly any health was lost etc. I didn't like how if you set them to 'knock down' they would do just that and 'wait' if they couldn't knock down the enemy. It's just such an annoying game.

Retr0gamer · 17-05-2012 3:20pm

Still don't think it was as bad as you are making out. Found the AI perfectly fine until the end game really. The 'knock down' thing makes sense as well since if you are going for a complete knock down you don't want the character to attack knocking the enemy out of knock down state. As for the heal/support command, if you fought the higher level enemies then this makes sense as well. When fighting them you have to make sure every one has status buffs on every turn, otherwise you are screwed. The AI tactics commands are only really to get you out of a bind of else for the tough bosses otherwise I found the auto fighting was ok. Sure it made a mistake every so often but it really wasn't that prevailant. I can see how some people can get annoyed if they expect complete control over their characters but I just saw it as another take on the same battle system were you were pretty much predicting what the other characters would do.

Mindkiller · 17-05-2012 4:26pm

Retr0gamer wrote: »

Still don't think it was as bad as you are making out. Found the AI perfectly fine until the end game really. The 'knock down' thing makes sense as well since if you are going for a complete knock down you don't want the character to attack knocking the enemy out of knock down state.

But the problem with this is that you can only change the command when it's the party leader's turn. And then you're doubly screwed if he's out of action. You might find as well that you don't want knock-down on, but you can do nothing about it. Generally speaking there's always at least one or two enemies that aren't knocked down that could just as easily be attacked for some damage without getting in the way of an all-out attack, but the game doesn't seem to realise it.

It doesn't cycle the buffs properly either. Everyone's rakakuja could be gone but Aigis would still go ahead and cast a sukukuja that would affect only her. Using crappy medicines late in the game is annoying as well. I couldn't just sell them all either as I was stuck in Tarturus.

Mitsuru uses mind charge way too much as well. Half the time her mind charge was wasted on a diarahan.

Retr0gamer · 17-05-2012 4:49pm

Mindkiller wrote: »

But the problem with this is that you can only change the command when it's the party leader's turn. And then you're doubly screwed if he's out of action. You might find as well that you don't want knock-down on, but you can do nothing about it. Generally speaking there's always at least one or two enemies that aren't knocked down that could just as easily be attacked for some damage without getting in the way of an all-out attack, but the game doesn't seem to realise it.

I liked that about it though, you had to plan out properly knowing that there's 3 other peoples goes before you can make a change to the strategy. Persona 4's method was definitely preferable but I enjoyed it and it was something different. I think I was just a bit more accepting of the random element and saw it as a challenge unliek yourself. It's understandable.

Mindkiller wrote: »

It doesn't cycle the buffs properly either. Everyone's rakakuja could be gone but Aigis would still go ahead and cast a sukukuja that would affect only her. Using crappy medicines late in the game is annoying as well. I couldn't just sell them all either as I was stuck in Tarturus.

Mitsuru uses mind charge way too much as well. Half the time her mind charge was wasted on a diarahan.

Agree although I found these were late game problems and by that time I was steamrolling Tartarus so it wasn't affecting me as much.

Mindkiller · 17-05-2012 5:03pm

Retr0gamer wrote: »

I liked that about it though, you had to plan out properly knowing that there's 3 other peoples goes before you can make a change to the strategy. Persona 4's method was definitely preferable but I enjoyed it and it was something different. I think I was just a bit more accepting of the random element and saw it as a challenge unliek yourself. It's understandable.

But then it becomes a case where you're fighting with the battle system itself rather than the enemies. Sometimes it feels like you're babysitting a bunch of idiots. There's no effective way of responding to an enemy's attack. You just have to set your commands and try and predict what might happen, hoping that your allies wont do something too retarded. I'm disappointed because Lucifer's Call did the same type of battle system much better, and that game is ancient. It was a genuine challenge, not an artificial one.

Anyway, I finished the last bit off earlier. Had a look at the Answer and I don't think I'll be playing it. Aigis was my least favourite of the characters in Journey and I don't feel like starting from scratch with my personas.

Retr0gamer · 17-05-2012 5:28pm

Mindkiller wrote: »

But then it becomes a case where you're fighting with the battle system itself rather than the enemies. Sometimes it feels like you're babysitting a bunch of idiots. There's no effective way of responding to an enemy's attack. You just have to set your commands and try and predict what might happen, hoping that your allies wont do something too retarded.

I never felt I was fighting the battle system though. Thought there was a lot of strategy to the fights, not just from the press turn system but also from the rogue-like esque resource conservation issues. The AI pretty much did what I wanted it to do until the end game when it no longer mattered. I much prefer it to the auto battle system in FFXII since it kept you more on your toes.

FLOODY777 · 17-05-2012 6:35pm

I've just started Persona 3 Portable. Have any 'problems' from the original version been ironed out for this version? Eg. The AI etc. mentioned in the last few posts?

penev10 · 17-05-2012 8:15pm

Retr0gamer wrote: »

Don't really get that at all. Found as a social sim they were great with some lovely writing. As a dungeon crawler as well they were excellent and it was nice to actually have a game that was challenging. I never had to grind in them either. Sure I lost a lot of progress if I played badly or pushed myself too far but never felt I was going into dungeons just to rack up levels.

I thought the social links made the game. The dungeons would get dull without all the other stuff to keep you interested.

Mindkiller · 17-05-2012 8:22pm

FLOODY777 wrote: »

I've just started Persona 3 Portable. Have any 'problems' from the original version been ironed out for this version? Eg. The AI etc. mentioned in the last few posts?

You've full control over your party, so you don't even need to bother with AI.

ghostchant · 17-05-2012 9:48pm

Just remember to switch them out of AI mode, since that's what they default as (if I remember correctly). P3P was the version I played and it's probably my favourite RPG ever.

penev10 · 18-05-2012 4:19pm

On the 4th day of Devil Survivor 2 now and it's starting to get a bit more interesting. The character recruitment is less obtuse than the original which is a good thing and it also lets you play with a larger pool of characters before (I'm gathering) you choose a route towards end game (which obviously narrows your pool).

Feels a lot easier than the original. Certainly less grinding. Only been one fight that has given me trouble so far (at the end of Day 2) compared to the multiple difficulty spikes in DS1.

The weak plot/characters initially threw me but the great combat and demon fusing/team tweaking mechanics has dragged me in again.

manicmonoliths · 18-05-2012 6:37pm

Mindkiller wrote: »

Beat Persona 3 FES a minute ago. At least, I think I beat it but after I killed what can only be the big bad they still have me going to school. I'm too tired to watch what happens next, but I hope it doesn't pull another big demon out of its ass like Persona 4 did.

Overall I found it a really tepid grind, even more so than Persona 4. There's a lot to be admired in the Persona games but for the most part 90% of them is like banging your head against a wall for hours on end. If the other 10% wasn't so good I doubt I'd have bothered.

I've actually just finished Persona 3 as well, beat the last boss earlier in the week like yourself, saved and just now watched the ending.

Anyone else get Lost vibes from the ending, the whole remembering eachother stuff was very similar

I was very impressed by the game as a whole although some parts were slightly tedious. I enjoyed fusing Persona's and the social link stuff the most. The combat was great at first, it was always really satisfying to pull off an all out attack. I found it was slightly repetitive by the end though and I experienced similar AI problems too other posters here, but nothing huge, mainly just casting useless spells at the worst times. I found that certain characters, Ken, Koromaru and Aigis were pretty useless in fights compared to the others and Mitsuru got very annoying by contantly casting Tentafroo at the end of battles. The only fights which really gave me difficulty were the last Tartarus boss before the final boss, (the one who was strong against everything and had to be weakened first) and the Reaper. Both of those difficult fights threw up the AI issues surrounding healing and support spells in particular.

The main story was quite interesting, the majority of main characters were pretty likeable, Junpei and Akihiko in particular, though I wasn't too keen on Yukari or Ken. The whole setting was a very nice change of pace from the usual RPG fare although the lack of variety in locations was slightly disappointing particularly in Tartarus.

I enjoyed the Social Links aspect a lot, I thought it was really well done and most of the character plots were very interesting. I'm kind of a completionist though so I was frustrated that I couldn't complete them all, though I managed to at least find all except The Tower, I'm guessing that was linked to another character though. Slightly annoyed that I couldn't fuse all the various Personas due to this and my level not being high enough, think I finished the game around lv. 87. Also never got a chance to explore the area which opens up once beating the Reaper.

I'd like to see the remaining elements of the game, but I don't know if I'd be bothered doing a New Game Plus, can anyone tell me if it's worthwhile? I'd like see the remaining 7 or so social links I didn't finish and complete the persona compendium and the Elizabeth requests but I don't really fancy sinking another 80 or so hours into this. Revisiting every floor of Tartarus again sounds like it could be a bit of a pain the second time round.

I only finished the main quest, is the Answer worth playing? I think I might be slightly burnt out by the game so I'm not sure if I should skip over it or not.

I have Persona 4 waiting on my shelf but I think I'll hold off and play something else so it feels fresher when I do get around to playing it. For now I might try getting into Nier again, I found the combat very tedious, very hack and slash, but I should make the effort. That or play through Xenoblade again.

Mindkiller · 18-05-2012 7:03pm

manicmonoliths wrote: »

The main story was quite interesting, the majority of main characters were pretty likeable, Junpei and Akihiko in particular, though I wasn't too keen on Yukari or Ken. The whole setting was a very nice change of pace from the usual RPG fare although the lack of variety in locations was slightly disappointing particularly in Tartarus.

I agree with this, but I'd include Aigis in the list of rubbish characters. I hated her. I only played 30 minutes of the Answer so I don't know if it's worth playing but I'm not too keen on it if she's the main character. I'm a bit burnt out on Persona like yourself so I'll give it a few months before I try it properly.

The strongest parts of the game for me was the music and the story. Although I really hated some of the themes that played during the day. They grated after about the 50th time or so.

On a new game + the main character retains his level, items, money, weapons and personas (but only in the demon compendium). You also retain your Charm, Academics and Courage but not your Social Links. I think the secret area automatically opens up so long as you killed the Reaper in your first playthrough, so you could powerlevel really quickly there if you wanted. You can get about 20000-30000 exp with an exp card, and that's at high levels. You'll obviously get more at low levels.

I'm not planning on a NG+ though. The grinding is one thing, but I don't want to go through all the stuff with Kenji and the French student again.

I was thinking of replaying Lucifer's Call. I'm not that interested in checking out DDS and it's been so long since I've played LC that I've forgotten most of it. It was my favourite game at the time when I played it so it should be be interested to see if it holds up.

Retr0gamer · 18-05-2012 7:16pm

manicmonoliths wrote: »

I'd like to see the remaining elements of the game, but I don't know if I'd be bothered doing a New Game Plus, can anyone tell me if it's worthwhile? I'd like see the remaining 7 or so social links I didn't finish and complete the persona compendium and the Elizabeth requests but I don't really fancy sinking another 80 or so hours into this. Revisiting every floor of Tartarus again sounds like it could be a bit of a pain the second time round.

TBH, youtube them.

manicmonoliths wrote: »

I only finished the main quest, is the Answer worth playing? I think I might be slightly burnt out by the game so I'm not sure if I should skip over it or not.

I played a few hours of the Answer before getting sick of it. It's really high level stuff so you have to grind for ages and also there's no way to heal before a boss so you end up making at least two runs through a dungeon, once to level and the second time avoiding all the enemies to get to the boss. I heard people say it's not worth it but I would like to go back. I wasn't enjoying it though.

manicmonoliths wrote: »

I have Persona 4 waiting on my shelf but I think I'll hold off and play something else so it feels fresher when I do get around to playing it. For now I might try getting into Nier again, I found the combat very tedious, very hack and slash, but I should make the effort. That or play through Xenoblade again.

Play something else, you'll burn out on Persona. Nier is well worth sticking with. Combat isn't great but the story, characters and music make up for it and some of the bosses are excellent. Also the new game plus is amazing!

Fergus_ · 18-05-2012 11:50pm

Just started FFV. It's my last FF to be played (Still gotta complete XII and I-III though)

Which version is recommended? I'm playing the GBA version.

Retr0gamer · 19-05-2012 12:21am

I'd go with the SNES translated version really. The PS1 translation is a disgrace as are the load times. The GBA version is a good port with a good translation but the music sucks compared to the excellent original SNES music.

manicmonoliths · 23-05-2012 8:01pm

Retr0gamer wrote: »

Play something else, you'll burn out on Persona. Nier is well worth sticking with. Combat isn't great but the story, characters and music make up for it and some of the bosses are excellent. Also the new game plus is amazing!

I gave Nier another chance, I gave up when I couldn't figure out the fishing minigame last time, glad to see the game picks up remarkably from that point! I finished the first play through and I'm almost finished new game plus. Some nice mini additions in the new game, but I'm guessing the really good extra stuff will be focused on the ending which I'm looking forward to. I love how overpowered you feel in the new game, it really makes the combat a lot more enjoyable when you're not constantly running out of MP. I know there are 4 endings, but I might just stop at 2 given the requirements for getting the others and the fact that my import copy of Baten Kaitos Origins just arrived!

What JRPG are you currently playing?

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