What are you playing?

[rabidtictac]

Well, I did retranslate it from japanese in Googletranslate after I used Babelfish to translate my original text in Nipponese.

Basically Ys= Record of the Lodoss War and the Falcom devs, old and new have always made it clear that Deedlit, Pirotess and Nessie are best waifus. Them putting two characters in Tokyo Xanadu who parrot 2D supremacy is basically a PSA to those who haven't been Falcom customers these past 30 years.

Record of the Lodoss War really takes me back. That's an old pull, mate. I used to love reading the mangoes for lodoss war. I can see the similarity between Ys and RoLW now that you mention it. Both should be way shittier than they are. Both play to stereotypes, but somehow make that a strength.

[VoiceOfReasonPast]

It's all about the execution, I guess.

And oh noes, one of the two Tokyo Xanadu weebs is having second thoughts about 3D waifus thanks to the temptation of the pop idol. This plot is really keeping me at the edge of my seat

The difference is that there's much more nuance to the controls and that that level is the single hardest in the game. It's intentionally bullshit. The games are also based on actual Trials.

Man, Kamen Rider needs to step up its game when it comes to bike stunts.

[ban]

Mumen Rider needs to do way more

Record of the Lodoss War really takes me back. That's an old pull, mate. I used to love reading the mangoes for lodoss war. I can see the similarity between Ys and RoLW now that you mention it. Both should be way shittier than they are. Both play to stereotypes, but somehow make that a strength.

It kinda hit me back when you and others mentioned how Lord of the Rings is basically the daddy of all modern High Fantasy and how everything was a copy of it for a lot of years? Records of the Lodoss War is the same thing, despite being the retellings of some DnD campaigns from people who had nothing to do between making vidya or animating. After that, Lodoss basically became the LotR of Japan in the sense that every high fantasy manga, anime, vidya, hentai of any sort or Light Novels that comes out uses RotLW as its template. Even those fucking isekai shits. Fire Emblem, the early games up until the gamecube one, and of course the various games Falcom made are basically "Not Record of the Lodoss War 2.0". The most shameful clone of Lodoss is Fire Emblem Genealogy of the Holy War though, which may as well be "Lodoss War : Strategy RPG".

[rabidtictac]

I'm gonna play playing SMT 4 sometime soon and I started up a new file in Strange Journey (original DS version, not the new remake that apparently makes the game easier.) I forgot how brutal strange journey can be in the early game. Early demons are trash and you have really low defense, so the main character gets wiped a lot. Main dude in strange journey is also much worse than the demi-fiend, since he can't learn skills permanently and his skillset is tied to weaponry. Example: Switching out of the starting machine gun means you gain damage but lose the "hit all enemies with shot damage" move the starting gun has. But if you keep the starting machine gun, you're limited to that move set for all fights.

Still, it's legitimately hard and uncompromising. I love it for that, if nothing else. It lacks the atmosphere and spectacle of Nocturne and it doesn't use the Press Turn system, but it's fun.

[VoiceOfReasonPast]

Is early Strange Journey more or less fun than getting your teeth kicked in by that Matador Fiend until you git gud?

[rabidtictac]

Is early Strange Journey more or less fun than getting your teeth kicked in by that Matador Fiend until you git gud?

You have more time to get ready for Matador and Daisoujou than you do in Strange Journey. It's completely possible to get your ass raped by random encounters in Strange Journey about 2 minutes after stepping outside of the tutorial cutscenes and picking up your first demon (Pixie, of course.) The standard demons can easily focus fire your main character down in a single turn and recruiting demons requires you to play the little RNG conversation game. If you fuck it up, and it's largely random, then the demon will get a free turn for its entire party.

[VoiceOfReasonPast]

Man, you know how to pique my interest :3

[Complicity]

I started up a new file in Strange Journey (original DS version, not the new remake that apparently makes the game easier.)

Granted that i haven't played the ds version in a long time, but i believe the reason Redux is easier is because it has many more new dungeons and boss battles you can use to grind.

The ds version is like playing Nocturne from start to finish without ever setting foot in the Amala dungeons (which i think they were added in an enhanced version of the game, in Europe we only got that one and the game here is called SMT Lucifer's call).
Maybe i am remembering it wrong and they also nerfed the ice cave and the first boss who kills Commander Nigger.

Overall i don't remember any significant difference between the boss battles of the 2 versions, only that i struggled a little bit more in Redux vs Zelenin, Jimenez and the final boss (the original one, not the additional new one).

[Guest]

The ds version is like playing Nocturne from start to finish without ever setting foot in the Amala dungeons (which i think they were added in an enhanced version of the game, in Europe we only got that one and the game here is called SMT Lucifer's call).

All English versions of the game are based on that the "Maniax" edition. In glorious nippon it was re-released in the deluxe edition of Raidou 2 where Raidou replaced DANTE FROM THE DEVIL MAY CRY SERIES. That was finally fan translated at some point, although it's mostly just the English version of Nocturne copy pasted over, natch.

[ban]

Pet peeve of mine but I fucking hate First Person RPGs with a goddamn passion. The only one I give a pass to is Lost Heroes since it tricks you into thinking it's FP but it's that way so you can see the emchas and heroes attacking the enemies without doing excessive camera working and navigating the dungeons easier. I had a real hard time playing Wizardry because of this but no other RPG deserves to be played over that.

Played some Golden Sun the other day. I really miss Camelot RPGs...I really miss the SHining series as well.