JRPG general discussion

There's not much there to go on. I'm loving the art, looks like Kaneko is back on the art side of things. Also the Lead developer of Nocturne is on board, only good things can come from that. It could be a return to the old style SMT storytelling, it seems to me that there's four characters, the MC, the law hero, chaos hero and a neutral female hero.

It's because it's a PAL game. The aspect ratio is already messed up with the borders on the top and bottom of the screen. It's why I keep telling people to only buy PS1 games from the US PSN. If you are playing the games on a 16:9 TV then the correct aspect ratio should have borders on the left and right side of the screen since these games were made for 4:3 TVs not widescreen 16:9 TVs.

Just tried out a few games on my PS3, I don't have the FF games to test and it looks fine, maybe you are just used to wisescreen and think it's shorter? I even tried out my NES which had a little narrower on the x axis which makes sense since it's a NTSC machine running at 254 instead of 320 pixels on the x axis like a PS1 would.

I thought it looked very boxy myself because I'm used to widescreen stretching games and making things look fat but I measured it. It's a perfect 4:3 aspect ratio. I tried this on both american and Japanese games.

HG101 article on shadow hearts:

http://www.hardcoregaming101.net/shadowhearts/shadowhearts.htm

I've only played the first two games, kodelka was interesting but ultimately crap and I found shadow hearts a bit dull but supposedly the series gets fantastic for SH2 and 3.

Etrian Odyssey announced for the US for the 3DS. Kind of unlikely there'll be an EU release.

Same here. Code of Princess out soon too.

I hope it does get released even though it's meant to be a very weak Dragon Quest with massive pacing issues (you don't open the job system until 20-25 hours in and the game is supposedly 100 hours long skipping side quests). A good 3DS make over would be nice as well since it looked ropey on release on the PS1 let alone how it looks now. Nintendo have been pushing Dragon Quest hard in the West so hopefully they'll step up as publisher if Squenix don't.

SMTIV news:

http://www.siliconera.com/2012/11/30/shin-megami-tensei-ivs-battle-system-detailed-new-screens-of-ruined-tokyo/?utm_source=Siliconera+Feed&utm_medium=facebook&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+siliconera%2FMkOc+%28Siliconera%29&utm_content=FaceBook

Battle system will have demon negotiation like all the main series games. Press turn just like in Nocturne and Persona 3/4 returns and you can attack demons in the field to get a first strike just like Persona 3/4.

Level 5 seem to do a lot better when you are handling some one elses properties. Their best games have been stuff like Dragon Quest and Layton. The problem seems to be Akihiro Hino who just is a terrible writer. While I like their game systems other than their obsession with combining items when Hino is in charge it's usually not great news. The recent anime Gundam AGE which was written by Hino got massive fan backlash recently because the story and writing was so poor. I'm pretty sure Hino is writing this one.

I put together my thoughts on Phantasy Star 3 if anyone is interested. I've also wrote about Phantasy Star 1 and 2 some time back:

http://lifein16bit.blogspot.ie/2012/12/phantasy-star-3-generations-of-doom.html

Also happy 25th anniversary Phantasy Star!

megaten wrote: »

Wasn't the psp release the first devil summoner rather than this one?

Ah you are right.

Fingers crossed we see Devil Summoner get a western release as well, I have it on the saturn but it being in japanese doesn't help at all

some RPG bargains on playasia at the moment. I think these are only up for another few hours.

I think these are only up until tonight but you can get Pokemon Black and White 1& 2, Miles Edgeworth investigations and The three Etrian Odyssey games on playasia for very cheap.

I recommend you get all three etrian odyssey games, they are less than 20 euro and I played the first one and it was one of the best games I ever played. Top it off with the price gouging that these games usually suffer from (they usually sell for 80 euro) then these three are a steal.

Also some of these come with free shipping to boot.

Of course I don't get paid until tomorrow and I'm 5 euro short for Pokemon B&W 2

Just finished off Phantasy Star IV. It really is a wonderful game. It ties the entire series up and finishes it off in the best way possible.