Jarpig pride worldwide (Let's talk about JRPGs)

[Sumez]

For those into classic FF, internet masochist Seer finished his challenges up to FF4 now.

That video is amazing. I can't believe I ended up watching all of it

[TransatlanticFoe]

Working through the Final Fantasy Pixel Remaster - Final Fantasy II. Having to play with a "where to go next" thin guide though, for the sake of my sanity. It's mostly good fun, even if the levelling system is completely insane in this one. Is your party supposed to end up in three flavours of red mage? There are boatloads of spells, so everyone needs some magic to handle it - but the offensive magic so far is pretty lame and hanging on to MP in dungeons is tough. So I've just been wailing on things with physical attacks and magic is for protect/shell/blink/beserk. Hoping to find a town somewhere with high enough level enemies that I can level some of it up, in case it is needed later!

I can't believe they didn't add the simple quality of life update that is an optional objective marker. I'm headed for Mysidia, but no-one seems to want to tell me where it is. If you can speed up battles and gain extra experience, you sure as hell can give me the option to do away with "wander around until I find the thing, or stumble into a high level area and get wiped".

Also, fuck whoever booby trapped a chest with four Rhyos. Just two of them using bad breath and it's instant party wipe. Still, nice to see the origin story for stumbling on a malboro for the first time in FFX!

[BryanM]

That video is amazing. I can't believe I ended up watching all of it

It really is like catnip to us old autistic bastards, ain't it? His other FF videos are similar, thousands of resets, sometimes having to use a glitch to get around a jam. (Praise be unto Nasir, who always somehow leaves some wiggle room. (Hey, he's Iranian. How random.))

It's disappointing that it isn't really feasible to beat FF1 without money. No way really to reach a place where you can replenish HP for free...

I can't believe they didn't add the simple quality of life update that is an optional objective marker. I'm headed for Mysidia, but no-one seems to want to tell me where it is. If you can speed up battles and gain extra experience, you sure as hell can give me the option to do away with "wander around until I find the thing, or stumble into a high level area and get wiped".

I really do loathe the arrow in modern video games... where you're looking at a map or an arrow and not at the world or learning where things are on your own.

... At that point just take the overworld itself out of these games. Which, point taken, they already have...

that Romancing SaGa 2 mobile port was pretty damn early to be using AI upscaling

I know Persona 3 Portable used something like that. I thought the FF7 Remako project was around the same time, but it came a few years later when GANs were beginning to be useful.

[Blinge]

I'm a ways into Suikoden 1- The remake on steam

Sometimes it's gorgeous, sometimes it looks like Suikoden remade in RPG maker, like fuckin terrible. like the original FF5/6 ports on mobile. The backgrounds that is. Sprites remain unchanged I believe.

I'm not sure how this game got its reputation? So far i've found it pretty meh.
Just seems like 16bit Squaresoft Fare but simpler.

There aren't really dungeons, its super super linear. Sure I can recruit tons of potential characters but the game keeps forcing me to have specific parties..
.. so its back to the store room to fucking faff around trying to scrape gear together for them or unequip people i'm not using. I spend 10 minute stretches doing nothing but inventory management.

[Sima Tuna]

The backgrounds of the Suikoden remake are pretty obviously AI. I'm sure it looks okay sometimes but there's a sense of wrongness that pervades the backgrounds which kept me from buying the remake despite loving Suikoden 1.

I'm not sure how this game got its reputation? So far i've found it pretty meh.
Just seems like 16bit Squaresoft Fare but simpler.

There aren't really dungeons, its super super linear. Sure I can recruit tons of potential characters but the game keeps forcing me to have specific parties..
.. so its back to the store room to fucking faff around trying to scrape gear together for them or unequip people i'm not using. I spend 10 minute stretches doing nothing but inventory management.

I think a lot of the ps1 era JRPGs were able to hit the same nostalgia notes as the SNES classics and came along at the right time to be successful. I personally love Suikoden, but that's because I don't mind a more linear game. The game does force specific parties at times but I also remember using whatever characters I wanted plenty of the time. You can use the rune system to heavily customize the function of party members and develop very particular synergies. The characters aren't exactly blank slates but you can do a lot with them using Runes. I also appreciated the Dragon Quest-style inventory system, for all its headaches. One thing you can do is not bother moving gear around and just buy gear for each party member you want to use + the mandatory story ones. Get them gear that's "good enough" and you don't need to worry about optimizing gear except on the main character.

I also really like the flavor of Suikoden 1. Suikoden 2's world is much more "generic rpg," while Suiko 1 still has a lot of elements taken directly from the Water Margin it's inspired by. Names are different, but there's the three Ruan brothers, some obvious bandit characters, Liangshan as your little hideout area (a mountain/hill surrounded by a marsh) and the general setup of righteous bandits vs corrupt officials (well, Empire now.) The main character wants to make the king see reason, just as Song Jiang wanted to make the Emperor see reason.

When you look at the other Suikoden games, the only element from Water Margin they keep is the 108 Stars of Destiny.

You would probably like Suiko 2 more than 1 though, since the story is a lot more interesting and the gameplay systems were made deeper.

"16 bit squaresoft but simpler" is a description that applies to a lot of ps1 era jarpigs, is I guess what I meant to say in my opening paragraph. Arc the Lad is a good example of another franchise that could have been SNES games but released on ps1 instead.

[Blinge]

I mean.. yeah it's okay.
I'm just not sure why it's so loved.

I guess I see what you mean with the runes but i just don't have that many.
That said, i've only just got mr OPPENHEIMER lol.
so maybe i'm still too early?

Edit: just learned i can't recruit all the characters/ get a perfect game?? i guess.
because i lost someone in a 1v1 duel (game of RPS with stats)
Apparently you're supposed to have him really levelled and geared up well to survive the duel. Well guess what, i barely ever used him because the games supposed to be about choosing your party from a massive roster of characters, so i chose not to use him.

Never heard of Water Margin much less read it.

[Sumez]

I'm not sure how this game got its reputation? So far i've found it pretty meh.
Just seems like 16bit Squaresoft Fare but simpler.

Isn't it the second game that people go nuts about? I never heard that much praise for Suikoden 1.

[Kino]

Emerald Dragon [PC Engine CD]

The game did initially hook me with it's unique battle system which kinda splits the difference between a traditional turn-based RPG and a tactical RPG; on each turn, all your characters have so many Action Points to move across the field and/or attack enemies with. MP doesn't exist, any magic-users in your party are free to spam spells to their heart's content. The catch? You only have direct control over the main character. The rest of your crew is controlled via the (surprisingly competent) CPU. They don't even give you a DQIV style 'Tactics' option, the most direction you can give your party is what enemy to focus on (most unfortunate... there's no shortage of moments later in the game where you'd really prefer Tamrin fires her death ray.) Combine this with the fact that battles are inescapable, and the system sets itself up for tedium pretty quickly.

Also, that entire chapter where you're stuck on the desert island with no way to get to a casino, and all the equipment costs like $900,000 a piece? Fuck that part straight to hell.

As far as positives.... the production values are relatively high, as expected of a later period CD title. Nicely drawn cutscenes, pleasant enough soundtrack with a couple tunes that'll get stuck in your head. A much-welcomed 'party chat' feature, so you're free to put this game on hold for a few months and not worry about coming back clueless on where to go. Only about 20 hours to reach the end credits, always nice when an RPG respects your time.

Final verdict? I'll grant it a lukewarm recommendation. Not the most interesting of Supper's recent PCECD translations, but firmly in the middle of the pack.

[Blinge]

Isn't it the second game that people go nuts about? I never heard that much praise for Suikoden 1.

Apparently so yeah.
but I was also told that 1and 2 are consistent and something to be taken together, or some such.
Anyway it's over, 5/10.
The only unique pull of the game is the choice of 108 characters and the fact they equalise levels so quickly you could feasibly build your party from anyone.
Then the game constantly forces 2-3 people into your party whether you want them or not because of the bad story, so the choice is an illusion anyway.

[Sima Tuna]

Each their own. I really like Suiko 1.

If you're gonna play ps1 jarpigs then might I suggest the two Arc the Lad games? I don't know if we'll ever see remakes or remasters of them considering how niche they are. Arc 1 is a very short strategy-jarpig hybrid that serves as a bit of a prologue/lead-in to Arc 2, which is massive by comparison.

There's also the remasters of the two Lunar games, which are more accessible if you don't want to emulate... I say to the king's field player.

[BulletMagnet]

For those who haven't seen, Squeenix has put four Final Fantasy titles - 9, 8 remastered, and the DS remakes of 3 and 4 - up on GOG as part of the latter's game preservation program. Hopefully more like them will follow.

[TransatlanticFoe]

Ooft, Squeenix embracing DRM-free! Strange they'd bring titles over like that instead of the pixel remaster collection, but it's a start.

[Blinge]

Started Panzer Dragoon Saga after 1cc'ing the previous shooters in preparation...
man i'm in love already. from the jump

[Sima Tuna]

For those who haven't seen, Squeenix has put four Final Fantasy titles - 9, 8 remastered, and the DS remakes of 3 and 4 - up on GOG as part of the latter's game preservation program. Hopefully more like them will follow.

I was happy for a minute until I read the titles you named. Every FF game I like has been excluded.

I mean, I like 3 and 4 but not the DS versions that run at 5fps and look awful. I really hope they'll consider putting up pixel versions of FF1-6, even if it's not the pixel remasters. At least put up the GBA and SNES versions or something.

I know FF7 Good Version (OG) is on Steam. If it's not on GoG they should put it there too.

[BulletMagnet]

I know FF7 Good Version (OG) is on Steam.

Apparently they plan to replace that with some manner of new version, though they haven't said when it'll happen or what will be different.

[BulletMagnet]

Seems the trend is continuing for the moment, as Final Fantasy 7 has also shown up on GOG.

[Blinge]

Started Panzer Dragoon Saga after 1cc'ing the previous shooters in preparation...
man i'm in love already. from the jump

9/10 game for me. Just finished it.
The only reason it doesn't get a 10 is the tedious 'Tower' area

I really hope Forever Entertainment DON'T remake it. or remaster it, or re-anything.
I don't think panzer dragoon saga is even remakeable. I imagine le modern gamers would say "wtf is this shit. it's boring there's nothing to see."
kinda like what happened with shadow of the colossus remake.

[Sumez]

Fortunately the target audience of such modern ports aren't "modern gamers".

A game like PDS has a pretty large target audience who missed out on the Saturn release due to how expensive it is, nevermind how inaccessible Saturn emulation was for decades.
Lots of people would latch on to a modern port if it came out. It's kinda crazy it didn't.
Definitely a much bigger appeal than the other Panzer Dragoon games.

[Sengoku Strider]

Working through the Final Fantasy Pixel Remaster - Final Fantasy II. Having to play with a "where to go next" thin guide though, for the sake of my sanity. It's mostly good fun, even if the levelling system is completely insane in this one. Is your party supposed to end up in three flavours of red mage? There are boatloads of spells, so everyone needs some magic to handle it - but the offensive magic so far is pretty lame and hanging on to MP in dungeons is tough. So I've just been wailing on things with physical attacks and magic is for protect/shell/blink/beserk. Hoping to find a town somewhere with high enough level enemies that I can level some of it up, in case it is needed later!

I can't believe they didn't add the simple quality of life update that is an optional objective marker. I'm headed for Mysidia, but no-one seems to want to tell me where it is. If you can speed up battles and gain extra experience, you sure as hell can give me the option to do away with "wander around until I find the thing, or stumble into a high level area and get wiped".

I opened this thread for the first time in months only to scroll down and see half of what I was about to type already written, lol. Aside from a brief attempt to get into it back when FF I&II came out on GBA, I'd never played FF II before. I've been really surprised by it, though I don't know how much of it has been changed from the 8-bit game. I don't find it tough to navigate though, it's not a big world, they give you a map and there are only a handful of NPCs in every town so it's easy to find the ones who are the signposts.

I had no idea the character progression system was this advanced, I didn't think Square got into that sort of thing until the Romancing SaGa games. I ended up with a bunch of similar multi-purpose red mages too, the game does seem to funnel you directly toward that as there are so many enemies who appear to only take significant damage from specific elemental spells. So either everyone learns them or is just a pylon in areas full of those enemies. Your intelligence goes up with black magic use, so the more spells you cast, the more potent they become; if magic is not hitting hard just keep casting. Also pay attention to the magic interference % from armour, that affects magic damage I believe. Offensive status effect spells and items on the other hand seem pretty useless, they're an extremely low % move until I presume you get them to a fairly high level by failing at them dozens of times. Maybe my own magic interference is too high, but if so the only way I could see speccing a character into a debuff build is if they were practically naked.

[Sengoku Strider]

I'm a ways into Suikoden 1- The remake on steam

Sometimes it's gorgeous, sometimes it looks like Suikoden remade in RPG maker, like fuckin terrible. like the original FF5/6 ports on mobile. The backgrounds that is. Sprites remain unchanged I believe.

I'm not sure how this game got its reputation? So far i've found it pretty meh.
Just seems like 16bit Squaresoft Fare but simpler.

There aren't really dungeons, its super super linear. Sure I can recruit tons of potential characters but the game keeps forcing me to have specific parties..
.. so its back to the store room to fucking faff around trying to scrape gear together for them or unequip people i'm not using. I spend 10 minute stretches doing nothing but inventory management.

When the PlayStation 1 came out Sony wasn't approving RPGs on their system in the West for whatever reason, or 2D games in general (Raiden Project aside). Suikoden was the first jrpg we got, Konami had the cachet to get it approved, so it had the spotlight all to itself. It was an incredibly innovative game; we hadn't seen any console rpg mix so many modes and big ideas like the war scenes (compare what FF VI did) or so many individual characters (we'd had Destiny of an Emperor on NES, but that used a lot of dupe spritework). It's not flawless, it's short and the per-character animation suffered due to such a large cast, but the world, artwork and music were wonderful.

Suikoden II was indeed where the series went from "hey that was pretty good" to "that was one of the best one of these games I've ever played." Suikoden II will take a save from the first game, and your game will change based on how you did in the first one. It had some great combat, an incredibly dramatic plot for a JRPG of the era, some great character work, and the villain is still remembered as one of the most evil in gaming. But most importantly, it has a ton of charm.

[Blinge]

Fortunately the target audience of such modern ports aren't "modern gamers".

A game like PDS has a pretty large target audience who missed out on the Saturn release due to how expensive it is, nevermind how inaccessible Saturn emulation was for decades.
Lots of people would latch on to a modern port if it came out. It's kinda crazy it didn't.
Definitely a much bigger appeal than the other Panzer Dragoon games.

A port would be great.. but if you haven't seen Forever Entertainments work on PD or house of the dead, consider yourself lucky..

[Sumez]

I haven't but I could always hope for someone else to undertake it.

At first when they announced Panzer Dragoon 1, I thought they were just testing the waters for, yeah, a port of Saga.
But then they made the crazy decision to release 1 and 2 as two separate releases, even though it makes sense to tackle and release it as one compilation (I can't imagine who is buying those two games separately in this day and age)
Honestly, I was surprised to hear just now that the second game STILL isn't out?? Why is it taking companies these days so long to release games that already exist? See also that compilation of Irem games which is literally just slapping them on to an emulator. Wtf.

[Blinge]

look at videos of PD2 remake and you will understand lol.
looks like azz

[ryu]

See also that compilation of Irem games which is literally just slapping them on to an emulator. Wtf.

Last time I checked volumes 2 and 3 of that were already available in Japan. The western distributor is just broke and not telling people again is my guess.

[guigui]

I'm currently playing through Chained Echoes

One of the rare JRPG that could get its gripe on me in the last 15 years, still havent drop it after 10 hours or so !
I find the combat system nice enough to offer some strategic elements. The setting and characters are enjoyable too. There are lots of references to others video games stuff and IRL stuff. The story sounds a bit complicated but I'm still reading it.
Something unusual is that characters may be really mean to each other, like a PC actually killing a NPC with a knife in a rage moment, people insulting each others, and more. Really surprising compared to other RPG I could try (not that many actually) where the writing sounded smoother.

[Sima Tuna]

Astlibra is incredible and I've barely started playing it.

The demo was amazing. Chapter 1 was amazing. Now I'm in Chapter 2, still amazing.

Best I can compare it to is the isolation and mood of a souls game but with the gameplay of side-scrolling Ys: Oath in Felghana or Ys Origin. Exceptionally good in all respects. Presentation, music and gameplay. Inspirational.

In terms of indie games, the last time I was this impressed with the total vision/package was probably La-Mulana. It's astounding one person could make this.

[guigui]

Astlibra is incredible and I've barely started playing it.

The demo was amazing. Chapter 1 was amazing. Now I'm in Chapter 2, still amazing.

Best I can compare it to is the isolation and mood of a souls game but with the gameplay of side-scrolling Ys: Oath in Felghana or Ys Origin. Exceptionally good in all respects. Presentation, music and gameplay. Inspirational.

In terms of indie games, the last time I was this impressed with the total vision/package was probably La-Mulana. It's astounding one person could make this.

On the NSW there are 2 Astlibra games, is one of them the one you're talking about ?

Astlibra Revision : https://www.dekudeals.com/items/astlibra-revision
Astlibra Gaiden : https://www.dekudeals.com/items/astlibr ... antom-mist

[Sima Tuna]

Astlibra is incredible and I've barely started playing it.

The demo was amazing. Chapter 1 was amazing. Now I'm in Chapter 2, still amazing.

Best I can compare it to is the isolation and mood of a souls game but with the gameplay of side-scrolling Ys: Oath in Felghana or Ys Origin. Exceptionally good in all respects. Presentation, music and gameplay. Inspirational.

In terms of indie games, the last time I was this impressed with the total vision/package was probably La-Mulana. It's astounding one person could make this.

On the NSW there are 2 Astlibra games, is one of them the one you're talking about ?

Astlibra Revision : https://www.dekudeals.com/items/astlibra-revision
Astlibra Gaiden : https://www.dekudeals.com/items/astlibr ... antom-mist

So, Gaiden is actually listed as "DLC" on Steam, which can't even be played without the base game supposedly.

Astlibra Revision is the game you want. It's the actual "game" game. Gaiden is a roguelike dlc add-on which is sold for some reason separately as its own game on Switch. But the fact it costs less might clue you in that it's not the main (big) adventure. I haven't played Gaiden. Reactions to it are mixed. It sounds fun enough on its face but I wonder how well the jarpig elements of actual Astlibra survive the transition to a roguelike.

[guigui]

Great thank you.

[Obiwanshinobi]

When the PlayStation 1 came out Sony wasn't approving RPGs on their system in the West for whatever reason, or 2D games in general (Raiden Project aside). Suikoden was the first jrpg we got, Konami had the cachet to get it approved, so it had the spotlight all to itself. It was an incredibly innovative game; we hadn't seen any console rpg mix so many modes and big ideas like the war scenes (compare what FF VI did) or so many individual characters (we'd had Destiny of an Emperor on NES, but that used a lot of dupe spritework). It's not flawless, it's short and the per-character animation suffered due to such a large cast, but the world, artwork and music were wonderful.

Suikoden II was indeed where the series went from "hey that was pretty good" to "that was one of the best one of these games I've ever played." Suikoden II will take a save from the first game, and your game will change based on how you did in the first one. It had some great combat, an incredibly dramatic plot for a JRPG of the era, some great character work, and the villain is still remembered as one of the most evil in gaming. But most importantly, it has a ton of charm.

I'm not quite sure what REALLY makes or breaks a jRPG for me. A game can be technically a console RPG made in Japan, pretty EXCELLENT for my money too, but NOT feel like a jRPG to me at all (Breath of Fire V: Dragon Quarter). Another one can totally FEEL like a jRPG, but disappoint me sorely (Dragon Quest VIII - one of very few games I literally fell asleep playing).
I take it's pretty difficult for those who fund development to stay in touch with the way actual gameplaying experience unfolds. Before it's too late NOT to pretend it's any good and hope it sells at least moderately well. The only way I can explain something as impressive auduovisually as Xenogears being such a complete bitch to actually play the thing.
Back to the first Suikoden, I suppose it was just derivative enough not to fix what wasn't broken about trusted jRPG formula, whilst having something of its own character, somehow. Your playable protagonist dude isn't emo amnesiac orphan (initially, at least), but playing as him you get to commit some pretty fucked up thing you don't NORMALLY do even in videogames. I recall that as a pretty unconventional trait of an otherwise derivative game. Even expansive cast of playable characters in a fairly conventional jRPG was done by 1992 Shining Force before. But Suikoden's paramilitary force management was, I think, Konami's own addition to the mix.
I have yet to really play MGS: Peace Walker, but isn't it at least a bit like Suikoden in this regard? I wouldn't really know...