The Shin Megami Everything Thread

Anything from run & guns to modern RPGs, what else do you play?
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cj iwakura
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Re: The Shin Megami Everything Thread

Post by cj iwakura »

tnc wrote:Did anyone play the smartphone game? https://d2-megaten-l.sega.com
The english version will be released next week. It's a free to play game but hopefully it turns out good.
Not a fan. It's not BAD, but it's the same as every other smartphone game ever. Before long it's 'buy this' and 'upgrade that'.
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tnc
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Re: The Shin Megami Everything Thread

Post by tnc »

cj iwakura wrote:Not a fan. It's not BAD, but it's the same as every other smartphone game ever. Before long it's 'buy this' and 'upgrade that'.
Next I'll try Yakuza Online when it's out though I'm sure it'll be just more of the same formula.
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Blinge
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Re: The Shin Megami Everything Thread

Post by Blinge »

I have begun my strange journey. (redux)

Man.. the atmosphere.. the team, the mission structure.. the story so far.

Atlus are so fucking good with themes. It makes all the difference to what is essentially the same dungeon crawler gameplay.
Makes me wonder why I ever bothered with EO2 as SMT games tend to be more interesting in concept.
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Re: The Shin Megami Everything Thread

Post by Sumez »

As much as I love the SMT dungeon crawlers, and SJ is probably my favourite, I tend to burn out on them, and the demon fusion shit gets really annoying.

The EO series is pure quality. Give EO4 a try if you didn't. It doesn't have the bleak atmosphere of the old games (you can barely take a step in the overworld without running into an NPC), but it does have a lot of fun elements to ease newcomers into the concept.
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Blinge
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Re: The Shin Megami Everything Thread

Post by Blinge »

I can't do it man. not for a good long while.
Eo2 may have been fun and games but the endgame was so brutal i gave up on it. 'oh you didn't have a PERFECTLY set up party from the get go?? well get one shot by all these new bosses, fuckboy!!'

That kinda pissed on my chips, so to speak.

even if SJ does that to me too at least the concept is more interesting and i like the visuals more than woods+ chibi loli warriors.
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Re: The Shin Megami Everything Thread

Post by Sumez »

I know the feeling. I had EO4 preordered and got it on release, but I burned out so hard on EO3 that I couldn't play the next game for nearly five years.

Once I did pick it up, though, I couldn't put it down. I hate planning your party and min-maxing bullshit too, but as far as I'm aware EO4 lets you get away with pretty much any combination you feel makes sense, while EO2 and 3 are generally considered the worst in that regard.
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BryanM
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Re: The Shin Megami Everything Thread

Post by BryanM »

The skill trees being another maze is a part of the games. It was foolish of me trying to play EO3 the first time without a monk, I idiotically thought this might be the first time a JRPG wouldn't require heal party. My ninja and its clone ended up being my real healers, spamming items. Princess's regen? Almost completely worthless. The games are always a cakewalk with a priest though. (Also like how the Beast King's Cow summon also scales very well if you boost the King's strength stat. The best DoT and damage sponge in a jRPG.)

I had tried Persona Q since its sequel was coming out. It was kind of interesting how much overlap of the same characters the casts have - when Aegis and Teddy are having a conversation the game practically screams "these are the same character" at you. Besides their stories being identical, their graphic design is too. From top to bottom: Yellow, peach, blue, white.

The clash of mechanical design between Persona and EO also is apparent in the character roster - characters with melee weapons like Mitsuru who shouldn't be anywhere near the front line due to having low HP and Vit. The designers also seem to have exponentially aggravated both series' hatred of magic based attacks to the extreme.

The game itself follows the usual trajectory of my experience with EO games - absolutely love the first stratum. Still ok with the second. And ready for the game to just end by the third. Persona Q is far more irritating than EO in this regard as far as I can tell - at this point of the game there is no way to turn off random encounters 100% like the EO games allow you to. There's no risk, and no reward from them by that point - they're just a complete waste of time. And unlike a Dragon Quest game, entering the "run" command requires five inputs instead of one.
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Re: The Shin Megami Everything Thread

Post by Vanguard »

Sumez wrote:Once I did pick it up, though, I couldn't put it down. I hate planning your party and min-maxing bullshit too, but as far as I'm aware EO4 lets you get away with pretty much any combination you feel makes sense, while EO2 and 3 are generally considered the worst in that regard.
Yeah, 2's classes have clear right and wrong choices (isn't 1 the same way?). 3 is a little different because almost anything can be made to work with the subclassing system, but it's also the easiest one to mess up. And yeah, absolutely any combination of 5 classes is fine in EO4 as long as everyone can get into the row they want.
BryanM wrote:The skill trees being another maze is a part of the games. It was foolish of me trying to play EO3 the first time without a monk, I idiotically thought this might be the first time a JRPG wouldn't require heal party. My ninja and its clone ended up being my real healers, spamming items. Princess's regen? Almost completely worthless.
A princess is a perfectly adequate healer all the way through the postgame. Protect order is stronger than any of the monk's healing skills. You can even get by with passive healing exclusively if you sub ninja for bunshin. You don't need a monk. Even a zodiac or ninja subbed as a monk is good enough.
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Re: The Shin Megami Everything Thread

Post by Klatrymadon »

I tend to find that you can muddle through in EO1 with any classes as long as they are built carefully. Some are better choices than others, of course, but they can all work adequately provided you aren't spreading your skill points around on a range of mediocre abilities. IIRC, with the exception of maybe Beasts the same is largely true of EO2, although the "some are better than others" is a thousand times more pronounced there (Hexers are quite famously huge damage-dealers). :P
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Re: The Shin Megami Everything Thread

Post by Squire Grooktook »

I just super love EO3 for the atmosphere. It's probably my favorite overall soundtrack by Yuzo Koshiro, and the aesthetic of cutesie cartoony warriors beating up cthulhu mythos shit is charming, especially in the moodier stratums.
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Re: The Shin Megami Everything Thread

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Squire Grooktook wrote: and the aesthetic of cutesie cartoony warriors beating up cthulhu mythos shit is charming
It's fucking dumb imo.
I just kinda ignored that in 2.

that's super opinion though and didn't really impact my enjoyment of 1 and pre-credits Eo2
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Re: The Shin Megami Everything Thread

Post by BryanM »

You don't need a monk. Even a zodiac or ninja subbed as a monk is good enough.
... huh? That's... still a monk...

Protect Order takes two turns to do what Heal Party accomplishes in one. And scales off of TEC, aka, it's better on a Zodiac or Monk than a Princess. It was most definitely not enough on its own when used by a main class princess in the final wars. As far as proactive enhancements go, I'd rather put up an Order instead.

I concede it would be a better skill if these games didn't have mana potions in them, however. Cheaty, overpowered mana potions.
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Re: The Shin Megami Everything Thread

Post by Klatrymadon »

Yeah, I've only dipped my toe into EO3 but the soundtrack is knocking it out if the park. It's vital and inspired in a way that you wouldn't really expect from the third title in as many years. Visually it's the strongest expression of the DS games' aesthetics, and it's very unique in terms of setting and class designs, etc. I'm glad it never received a "fixed" and sanitized 3DS update like a lot of the other Atlus DRPGs, tbh - the changes they made to make things more "convenient" to play moment-to-moment ultimately de-emphasised the big-picture view of their labyrinths and ultimately rendered the experiences less meaningful and memorable (and it's worth remembering these were all already bleeding-edge, modern crawlers with QOL considerations everywhere). As it stands it seems to strike a smart balance between innovation and honing the fundamentals.
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Re: The Shin Megami Everything Thread

Post by Sumez »

EO3 is easily my least favourite game in the series though :P

Sorry for derailing the thread so hard.
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Re: The Shin Megami Everything Thread

Post by Klatrymadon »

Me too - do we have an EO thread? I guess it's a decade too late but it'd be great to have one. :P
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Re: The Shin Megami Everything Thread

Post by cj iwakura »

I didn't like EO3 as much as 2 or 1(the best story by a mile) either, but 3's optional strata... woo boy, that's a nightmare. Fond memories of EO1's optional's creeping dread. 2's was too cheerful.
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Re: The Shin Megami Everything Thread

Post by BryanM »

Anyone play Persona Q2? Does it have a way to near 100% shut off encounters by the third strata?

Safe Stroll is so necessary for me to play more of these clones.
Klatrymadon wrote:Me too - do we have an EO thread? I guess it's a decade too late but it'd be great to have one. :P
Yeah, it's the Wizardry thread. And tertiary in this one.
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Re: The Shin Megami Everything Thread

Post by Squire Grooktook »

Blinge wrote:
Squire Grooktook wrote: and the aesthetic of cutesie cartoony warriors beating up cthulhu mythos shit is charming
It's fucking dumb imo.
YOU'RE DUMB imo

But honestly, I think I've come to like EO's aesthetic more than the games themselves. The atmosphere is surprisingly great, with just the right balance of moodiness vs sweetness, and I like the quirky npc characterizations. Very cute. Very charming.

They're nice dungeon crawlers too, but I'm not much of a number grinding freak so that's just icing on the cake really. It's been a few years since I realized that (with the exceptions of SRPG's with terrain and such) I cannot enjoy a turn based video game if I don't like the world/setting/characters/aesthetic, no matter how brilliant the gameplay is.
RegalSin wrote:Japan an almost perfect society always threatened by outsiders....................

Instead I am stuck in the America's where women rule with an iron crotch, and a man could get arrested for sitting behind a computer too long.
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Re: The Shin Megami Everything Thread

Post by Vanguard »

As far as soundtracks go, my stance is that EO3 is packed to brim with outstanding music, but it's held back a lot because the ones you hear the most, the random encounter themes, are mediocre. EO4 is the reverse where it's hit or miss in general but the random encounter music is pretty good.
BryanM wrote:... huh? That's... still a monk...

Protect Order takes two turns to do what Heal Party accomplishes in one. And scales off of TEC, aka, it's better on a Zodiac or Monk than a Princess. It was most definitely not enough on its own when used by a main class princess in the final wars. As far as proactive enhancements go, I'd rather put up an Order instead.

I concede it would be a better skill if these games didn't have mana potions in them, however. Cheaty, overpowered mana potions.
It's better to cast protect order at the start of the fight and maintain it rather than to cast it as a response to something bad happening. Yeah it takes two turns to set up, but after that you get a full party heal every turn while only spending half of your turns keeping it going. A princess's mediocre TEC is made up for by protect order having by far the best formula of any healing skill. It's 2.4x as strong as party heal. I like to go P/N or N/P to double up on reinforce and royal veil and focus on attack/guard/prevent/rally orders instead and the only thing that can't keep up with is the abyssal god. For him just buy some somas. Also equip one of the buff limit skills on your princess so you can pull out an extra party-wide reinforce heal when you need it.
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Re: The Shin Megami Everything Thread

Post by BryanM »

Vanguard wrote:A princess's mediocre TEC is made up for by protect order having by far the best formula of any healing skill. It's 2.4x as strong as party heal.
Ah, you've been skimming through the guides.

Healing Power is an additional multiplier applied to the monk's heal spells. It scales from 2.4 (less, for classes with lower TEC) to 3 as a Monk levels. Party Heal is a 25% bigger heal per turn. (Form Qi brings it up to double, but Qi scaling applies to Prevent Order too if it's used on a Monk Main. So we don't bring that up.) Throughput of +400 to 500 HP a turn in endgame.

In terms of efficiency, Prevent Order is 3 times as TP efficient (more with the TP recovery skills) if all of its healing is utilized. Turn efficiency, it can be about the same to much worse depending on circumstances.

__

Making my own skill guide for Etrian Odyssey 2 since none existed at the time was very.. labyrinthine indeed. What does this skill do? "Does some fire damage." Define some. "I dunno." The game's certainly not going to tell you. Ah... good 'ole Japanese design philosophy.

The super secret speed multiplier on weapons is probably the most evil thing they have in those games. While I hate that it basically kills the weapon slot for Medics until they get one of the post game speedy staves, I do like how it keeps Ninjas as a sort of soft hitting "clean up" role as Rogues in old Wizardry games had.
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Re: The Shin Megami Everything Thread

Post by Vanguard »

400-500 a turn is really good and a main class princess isn't likely to compete with that. But they can still hit 200-300 healing per turn which is all you need. Not much does more than that in the first place and EO3 is full of ways to mitigate damage.
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Re: The Shin Megami Everything Thread

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Vanguard wrote:ninja subbed as a monk
An obsessive compulsive ninja?
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Re: The Shin Megami Everything Thread

Post by Blinge »

SJ: Cool, a new area.. OMG *dead*

wuh? Better fuse some new demons.. I can make... one. It sucks. I can't combo attack with it any more because alignments are a thing! This is new to me.
Okay I'll go through the process of recruiting this Melchom guy.. go through all that. "you're not a high enough level" ARGH.
Okay i'll go through the process of recruiting this Angel bird. Give her a life stone, give her some MP, let her suck half my blood out.
"Nah we're incompatible babes. now fuck off"
FFFFFF

Okay I've got some neutral basic bitches to combo attack with me but the only element we have is Fire... oh.
:|
So this is the real SMT, huh..

I can't figure out if I should 'delete' all the demons I have waiting in the wings (outside the compendium) because it seems they're getting some experience despite not fighting. But I'm broke so I can't summon them back in at will..
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Re: The Shin Megami Everything Thread

Post by MX7 »

If you think Strange Journey is hard you should try I/II/If... ;)

But stick with it, it's amazing. Assuming you're playing the original DS game and not the shitty remake?
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Re: The Shin Megami Everything Thread

Post by Blinge »

for fuck sake.
i'm playing the 'shitty' remake. Without the original to compare it to!
I also specified it was Redux in my post above.

It's annoying reading that tbh, when I consider the cash i spent and time region-unlocking my console.

I/II? as in SMT or the very first megaten?
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Re: The Shin Megami Everything Thread

Post by Klatrymadon »

Presumably SMT, since it has an absolutely ruthless encounter rate even by the high standard of the originals. :P

(So much so that I once played it using savestates to record my progress and managed to put myself in an inescapable situation about 30 hours into it. If you play it, use the terminals and don't do anything to try and save time!)

SMT If... was translated into English last year, in case anyone here missed it. It's easy to find the patch, or even a pre-patched rom, and it's extremely good.
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Re: The Shin Megami Everything Thread

Post by cj iwakura »

To elaborate, it's considered 'shitty' because of the anime-ification of the original Kaneko art, namely adding blushing portraits(WTF).

Gameplay wise, though, I haven't heard anything bad about it.
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Re: The Shin Megami Everything Thread

Post by MX7 »

I'm sure it plays fine. Probably lots of QOL improvements too (though the original was silky smooth and perfectly optimised for 20 minute bursts), but my god, it looks horrible.

It looked and sounded so good, and it didn't even come out that long ago. Why bother :( :( :(

@Blinge: region unlocking your 3DS us a great investment! My US one broke years back. No one could fix it. So many unplayable games. Need to look in to hacking my PAL 3DS.
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Re: The Shin Megami Everything Thread

Post by Blinge »

MX7 wrote: It looked and sounded so good, and it didn't even come out that long ago. Why bother :( :( :(
Saw a video, it looked like hammered shit. Not that you can do much better on the DS.

Oh the portraits might be annoying if I wanted to compare, but i don't. Nor do i want buyer's remorse.
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Re: The Shin Megami Everything Thread

Post by BryanM »

To be a cruel jerk >0_o)> all of the endings were changed I hear. Sounds more of a remix than a strict upgrade.

..But the ending is never really the point of fiction, it's all about the Journey getting there. <(o_O<
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