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Comments
Protip: once you get to the Eurozone area, don't go through Germany. That area is for much later.
Words cannot express my glee.
Besides swords
My name's not Alex, but I think the most important thing for a fantasy RPG story to have is a motivation for the plot. This means getting the setting details straight so it makes sense to the player why they're out doing what thye're doing, at all times during the game. There can be more than one motivation, separated by plot twists, but you need at least one.
Dark Souls was too expensive, so I got Demon's Souls. And surprise, surprise, I did rather badly. Well, not that bad, I think, but I didn't get very far, not with my knight, not with my vagabond. I have to say that fighting there is actually quite fun, though.
But it seems that it's not possible to raise attributes at the beginning. The manual says that I have to talk to the Black/Dark Maiden for that, but I didn't see her anywhere in the nexus.
That place needs more save stations.
Oh god, don't remind me of the Phazon mines. I remember killing the Omega Pirate and being all happy about not having to go back there and then game goes "Nope, you still have to pick two artiphacts there"
Bluh, those artifacts. I've already got two, I should see how many I can pick up at this point to make less work later.
I'm also not looking forward to the Omega Pirate.
You should. It doesn't feel like a ten year old game at all.
If you're playing with the Wii controls, then the Omega Pirate is possibly the most annoying fight in the entire game.
Personally, I don't think fantasy RPG stories are necessarily that important as long as they're
a) there, and
b) not stupid enough to interrupt the experience.
What's far more important is the lore of the world and how that comes through the mechanics. For a fantasy RPG to be successful, a playerbase has to have a strong experience that puts them in some other world. And frankly, I can name way more good fantasy RPGs than I can name good fantasy RPG stories, and I think The Witcher games have the only stories you could transfer to some other medium.
Not that a good story is a bad thing by any measure, but fantasy RPGs are first and foremost about experiencing the world you've been thrown into. If the story kinda sucks but the world and mechanics are intriguing, then you've still essentially got a good fantasy RPG experience on your hands. Games just don't carry conventional storytelling that well, even stuff like Legend of Zelda having to tell a simpler story than it would in a different medium.
On the other hand?
Have a good villain. A good villain isn't just narrative payoff in games, but mechanical payoff during the eventual boss fight.
I remember that fight being a bitch anyway, though.
Okay, I just pre-ordered Torchlight II and I got an extra copy of Torchlight 1.
If you would like the extra copy, please message me on Steam.
If you don't have my Steam name it's Sword Brother Crimsonis.
^It's MUCH worse on the Wii since weapon switching takes much more time.
^Can't right now, but can I message you in the morning about it?
^ let us fight til the death over it. >
pistols, tomorrow at dawn.
Makes sense.
Anyway, just got the X-ray Visor, and I'm sort of just farting around and grabbing the missile expansions I've missed.
I'm kind of looking forward to 2 and 3; I don't think I played them nearly as much as I did 1, so it'll be more of a new experience.
no, fuck you all. i'm stealing that copy >
Well, I'll probably play Demon's Souls today too. And with "play", I mean "fail". But all in all, I got what I hoped for. When I heard that it's difficult but fair, I imagined it like the boss battles in Rondo of Blood, where I never got the feeling that the game screwed me over, but that I screwed up. That nearly every damage I received could have been easily avoided/lessened, if I had played better. And... well, that's pretty much what I got. And that's good, because I have trouble dealing with high difficulty, but games that are difficult in such a way are rather motivating, instead if discouraging (really, I hate boss battles and find difficult ones highly frustrating, but I actually like the ones from Rondo of Blood)
Maybe I'll figure out how to defeat the one enemy, that always killed me and which I could barely scratch. And maybe, just maybe, I'll be able to take a look at the first boss. Before he effortlessly kills me.
Also, I want to buy games on Desura today. Turns out, one can actually directly download from the site, without the actual Desura software. Considering that my own bad connection pretty much forces me to go to an internet cafe for bigger downloads, that's great. I don't know what I'll get, but I consider Dungeons of Dredmore (how appropriate) and Uplink. I may also get Mount and Blade Warband some time (not today, though), since it seems that Steam isn't necessary for the version on Desura. Amnesia is relevant to my interests too, but lik M&B, I'll get it later.
Amnesia is really good both mechanically and narratively. I don't think I've played a scarier game, ever. It even trumps the classic Silent Hill games in that regard.
That one has to avoid enemies, instead of fighting them, reminds me of Clocktower. That is certainly a good sign.
Not that I think that it's influenced by CT (or is it?), but that was one of the things that made CT quite scary.
Change of plans, I will double-post buy Amnesia today. Unless I change my mind again.
Other than that... I dunno. Maybe DoD and/or Uplink as I said before. Maybe DEFCON, by the same guys who made Uplink. Maybe I'll even get that Indie Royal thing, but I'm not sure how interesting the games in there are. Valley of the Wind seems nice too, but I wanted to get the demo first, before I decide.
Well, I'll look a bit through Desura's catalogue first.
There's a Valley of the Wind game?
Anyways, there's a demo for A Valley Without Wind. Uplink and DEFCON are nice games, and you should get Amnesia.
Speaking of that, I should finish that game sometime.
And I want to get Legend of Grimrock.
On an unrelated note, played Jagged Alliance 2 recently, and I'm kicking some ass.
Yeah, that's what I meant. I got some names mixed up.
I also wanted to get Legend of Grimrock, but I'll probably get it later.
It's actually quite likely that I'll get Uplink. That's the only one I played a demo of, many, many, many, many years ago, and I always wanted to get the full version, but... well, never got it. Of course, by now my memory about it is very fuzzy.
> Valley of the Wind game
Is this at all related to the Nausicaa series?
> Torchlight
I kinda want it but someone else wants it more so go right ahead.
> fantasy RPGs and fantasy RPG stories
Ladies and gentlemen: The difference between JRPGs and WRPGs.
You're both biased by what you want from a game.
I really like it, but I think the "run away from the splashy thingy" segment was a bit hard. I tried like twenty times, failed each one, then quit, my immersion thoroughly broken by frustration.
This is why I think a lot of JRPGs have problems. They used to be the only genre you could go to for a good story, but now they're not (and in fact, a lot of them, especially the older ones, have fairly subpar plots in comparison to more modern games), and yet a lot of them from a mechanical perspective are about as fun as doing paperwork.
(N.B. I like a lot of JRPGs. I'm mostly talking about the Final Fantasy games I've played).
Well, in an odd way I actually agree with Alex.
It's just that I find a good story, with compelling characters and story that makes me care about their struggles and about what they're trying to accomplish in their setting, the best way to make me engrossed in a world.
So far, at least. Haven't really had a good WRPG experience yet. Give me some time to play around with Avadon.
I'd like to see a semi-real-time battle system in a JRPG, where you take control of a character for a small period of time, a la the "six seconds" rule in D&D, for each turn that character takes. You can do anything in that time, such as move, attack, cast magic, etc., but when that time is up you can't do anything else (other than wait for after effects to be resolved).
Glenn: I think there are good WRPGs in terms of plots that manage to create a sense of agency and emergency, as well as empathy with the main character just as much as there are JRPGs that do so. My issue is simply that I don't think that the different approaches between the two mean that either of them really falters on plot.