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Post by edmonddantes on Mar 28, 2019 6:32:57 GMT -5
So...
Okay, you guys see the title of this thread, right? It's a discussion of the ending and story themes. Obviously, spoilers.
If you keep reading beyond this point, and the game gets spoiled for you, you have nobody to blame but yourself.
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Anyway, I was discussing this with a friend just recently, how Lunar's ending and essential message is... kinda messed up.
Okay, for those who don't know (and I don't remember if the original Sega CD version was quite the same way), it turns out Ghaleon's whole motivation was because he was there the day Luna decided she wasn't gonna be a goddess anymore, and he decided this was a stupid terrible no good very bad thing, so he was gonna take her place in order to fill the void, because a world without a goddess was a bad thing to him.
Here's the thing...
... I sorta completely agree with him. Not his methods of course, but when he says "I see nothing but misery and death" I can totally understand where he's coming from.
And yes, I'm totally aware of the history of religion in Japan and how Nobunaga tried to use christianity as a bludgeon and that's why nobody trusts it... that's all not the point.
The point is that, part of the reason escapist fantasies about worlds that have gods and stuff are so relaxing for us is because we as humans like the idea that even the highest of our hierarchies have someone to which they too are answerable. In real life, of course, there's no proof of anything beyond the physical, and as such, no reason for a king, dictator, or politician to not--for example--order the death of millions. Unless it results in said evil leader getting mobbed by an uprising, he's never gonna be punished except by some vague afterlife jury he doesn't even know exists.
It's like the problem with Karma. "Oh, if I do something bad, I might get punished for it... in a future life where I won't even remember the thing I'm being punished for therefore it'll come off like just random bad luck." Yeah, that's efficient and logical and totally not stupid. Because everyone who has ever raised kids knows that if they break a television, you wait twenty years and THEN punish them, right? And what's the point if you're then wiping their memory anyway?
Back to Lunar... I tried playing the second game (Sega CD version) and it seems almost to prove my point... about an hour in you get blatantly told that the church of Luna is intentionally staging crap and enforcing a reign of terror. Gee, its almost like now that there isn't an actual Goddess to smack them upside the head and tell them to stop doing that, they're out of control and being selfish! Sort of like children who have lost their parent!
I'm honestly kinda hoping that's the entire point of Lunar 2... much like how Danganronpa 2 was about how too much hope is as bad as too much despair, Lunar 2 could be a counter-argument to the whole "humans don't need a god to control them" thing. I've never beaten either version (lately it seems something always happens whenever I try to play a JRPG) so I don't know for sure. All I do know is I've played a lot of JRPGs that pull the idea that mankind needs to decide its own destiny.
Before anyone takes this the wrong way... I'm not arguing for real-life religion or faith. I mean I just got done saying those are pointless because you can't prove they're based on anything. If our planet has an actual God or gods, then they must be the dumbest beings in the world for not appearing in a public place and showing the world that they exist (and then for not personally monitoring our leaders and making sure they actually work for the people instead of taking advantage of said people).
So I can't understand the mindset where you would invent a world that has these things... and then you'd argue that they don't need them. It's like how superhero comics often have storylines about how things would be better if all the superheroes left. To which anyone with a brain says, "Umm, bullshit. Hope you still agree with that when Mongul or Darkseid come a-knocking."
Anyway yeah, that's my rant. It's been building up for awhile but I only just got to post it because my internet has been garbage.
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Post by Discoalucard on Mar 28, 2019 15:16:39 GMT -5
Beyond Japan's history with Christianity, most religions followed in Japan are not monotheistic in the way Christianity is. I'm hazy on the details from Lunar, but the idea is that if you put any being in total charge, that position can be abused. If that being is benevolent (Althena, New Testament God), then great! If that being is not (Ghaleon, Old Testament God), then it's not so great. So it's better to leave the ruling in the hands of the people rather than having a corruptible (or perhaps, erratic) entity in charge.
Even if you look at it metaphorically, it's an argument between a dictatorship and a democracy. I think you'll seldom find the argument for a dictatorship even in (modern) Western fiction. You're unlikely to find a counterpoint in Lunar because that counterpart is "I want to be ruled and be told what to do". The best chance for a counterpart would be in a totally different series, like Shin Megami Tensei titles with Law/Chaos/Neutral alignments, because that philosophy is the core of Law.
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Post by edmonddantes on Apr 11, 2019 15:40:41 GMT -5
Man, I need to find a SMT game I can get into... I've tried Nocturne and Digital Devil Saga (the one with the mysterious girl in the egg or whatever) and I liked both at first, but the former got too complicated and the latter soon reached a point where it felt like nothing was happening.
It's sad because they might philosophically be interesting.
But yeah what really bugs me about Lunar is that... well, Luna was showed point-blank that her abdication just enabled Ghaleon.
If I'm honest I'm a little biased due to my own personal philosophy, which is that humans can't solve their own inherent problems, any more than a broken computer can fix itself. There's always going to be human leaders who abuse their authority, and they do it because they know they are answerable to no one (this isn't advocating faith, like I said a big invisible man who works in vague and confusing ways is no different than no god at all). If there's an actual, known higher being they do indeed need to answer to who isn't just a myth or legend, then those leaders might not be so power-crazy.
Really if I were living in a fantasy world, and there was no god(dess)... I would build one, like a magic robot or something. One to who even I am answerable, because no human should have power over it.
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Post by mainpatr on Apr 11, 2019 17:21:43 GMT -5
Man, I need to find a SMT game I can get into... I've tried Nocturne and Digital Devil Saga (the one with the mysterious girl in the egg or whatever) and I liked both at first, but the former got too complicated and the latter soon reached a point where it felt like nothing was happening. It's sad because they might philosophically be interesting. But yeah what really bugs me about Lunar is that... well, Luna was showed point-blank that her abdication just enabled Ghaleon. If I'm honest I'm a little biased due to my own personal philosophy, which is that humans can't solve their own inherent problems, any more than a broken computer can fix itself. There's always going to be human leaders who abuse their authority, and they do it because they know they are answerable to no one (this isn't advocating faith, like I said a big invisible man who works in vague and confusing ways is no different than no god at all). If there's an actual, known higher being they do indeed need to answer to who isn't just a myth or legend, then those leaders might not be so power-crazy. Really if I were living in a fantasy world, and there was no god(dess)... I would build one, like a magic robot or something. One to who even I am answerable, because no human should have power over it. PS2 Devil Summoner games,maybe? How about Persona 2:Innocent Sin for PSP? |
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Post by edmonddantes on Apr 12, 2019 12:58:12 GMT -5
I might pick those up, as I honesty always wanted to play Persona but missed it during the PS1 days. Its too bad the PSP remake of Persona 2: Eternal Damnation never got translated.
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Post by Snake on Apr 12, 2019 13:05:04 GMT -5
If I'm honest I'm a little biased due to my own personal philosophy, which is that humans can't solve their own inherent problems, any more than a broken computer can fix itself. There's always going to be human leaders who abuse their authority, and they do it because they know they are answerable to no one (this isn't advocating faith, like I said a big invisible man who works in vague and confusing ways is no different than no god at all). If there's an actual, known higher being they do indeed need to answer to who isn't just a myth or legend, then those leaders might not be so power-crazy. Really if I were living in a fantasy world, and there was no god(dess)... I would build one, like a magic robot or something. One to who even I am answerable, because no human should have power over it. Humans are solving problems all the time. Unlike computers, which we program, humans have consciousness. Consciousness and creativity is what separates us from the rest animal kingdom, as well as plants, fungus, eukaryotes and prokaryotes. It really depends on frame of mind. How do you think we have better graphics, better processing power, the ability to launch rockets into space, store solar energy into a battery instead of the roundabout way of plants photosynthesizing, growing, dying, and becoming fossil fuels after untold millenia of being pressurized under the Earth, etc Again, it starts with what you believe. If you believe it is possible, you will work towards a solution. If you don't think it's possible, you find another way to spend your time; hopefully something more productive than just, bitch and complain, and wait until you're dead for someone to change the circumstance for you. The people who abuse authority tend to be the ones who seize power by force. Thing is, that is a very small amount of people. Like in a bell curve, you will always have a top 1%. The top 1%, whether it is the Michael Jordans or Michael Schumachers of the world, or the Steve Jobs and Bill Gates, get there by being obsessive and workaholic. You are bending pushing the boundaries and bending any rule in the book, and putting in the extra, extra hours to do it. Most of us, do not want to work that hard, AND blatantly CRUSH your enemies to win. So when you look at governments, rulers, and politicians, who do we tend to find at the very top? Ravenous people in a dog fight, who eat alive the others who competing. The kind, fair representatives we should get, they usually don't win because they try to play nice, not dirty. But people don't need to be subject to a "higher power" to live in happiness and harmony. They just need to be taught that responsibility, understanding, adaptability, etc is more effective in getting the happiness they want, rather than through power or force. |
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Post by dsparil on Apr 12, 2019 14:00:46 GMT -5
Man, I need to find a SMT game I can get into... I've tried Nocturne and Digital Devil Saga (the one with the mysterious girl in the egg or whatever) and I liked both at first, but the former got too complicated and the latter soon reached a point where it felt like nothing was happening. What was the complicated aspect of Nocturne? IV isn't a bad place to start since it's probably the friendliest overall. It doesn't have the moon phase system and the game doesn't end on MC death. You get spells and skills from demons directly and additional abilities from "apps". You also have an AI controlled partner which can be pretty dumb at times. The semi-sequel Apocalypse improves the partner system though. If you're okay with something that's a straight dungeon crawler, Strange Journey Redux is pretty good from a gameplay standpoint. It sands off some of the rough edges of the original version. I do think it's a too long though (8 dungeons plus a 9th if you want one of the new endings). The story is on the weak side though. |
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Post by edmonddantes on Apr 14, 2019 22:00:45 GMT -5
Mainly just the "mons" aspect (and yes I know SMT existed before Pokemon). I just generally don't like this feeling that I have to either have a guide or spend hours experimenting to know the ins and outs of each monster and thus know who is the best for each area/boss fight. I wound up getting to this one boss (some skull guy in a sewer I think?) and I couldn't figure out how to beat him, and I wound up getting bored. IIRC he was one of those who casts status ailments and you have to do things a very specific way or he just outright murders you.
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Post by dsparil on Apr 15, 2019 6:47:59 GMT -5
Mainly just the "mons" aspect (and yes I know SMT existed before Pokemon). I just generally don't like this feeling that I have to either have a guide or spend hours experimenting to know the ins and outs of each monster and thus know who is the best for each area/boss fight. I wound up getting to this one boss (some skull guy in a sewer I think?) and I couldn't figure out how to beat him, and I wound up getting bored. IIRC he was one of those who casts status ailments and you have to do things a very specific way or he just outright murders you. Matador? That's an infamous boss in Nocturne for being a huge difficulty spike. I haven't actually played Nocturne do to it not working in the PS2 for some reason; it freezes when trying to access the menu. I even ended up with two copies thinking that the first one was busted somehow. I have no problems using a guide, but keeping your demons up to your level is generally enough. That does get a little tricky when demons can level up since fusing them can end up with one that's weaker to start. An older game that doesn't have demon leveling is more straightforward in my opinion. Soul Hackers on 3DS might be the most recent game to not have levels although it's basically a straight port of the Saturn/PSX game with voice acting added. It doesn't have alignment so there's a single ending. I like the 90s cyberpunk feel of it though. Maybe starting with the first SMT wouldn't be too bad. There's also the Megami Tensei I and II remake for SFC, but those are straight dungeon crawlers. I haven't gotten around to the second one yet, but the first is all dungeon. |
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Post by kaoru on Apr 15, 2019 6:56:16 GMT -5
Only the first Digital Devil Story: Megami Tensei is a Dungeon Cralwer, Megami Tensei II is pretty much proto SMT2 and plays like the SNES games.
Yeah, Matador is probably one of the biggest hurdles, due to the fact that you don't even have that many options to counter him that early game. I really don't know what Atlus was thinking when adding the fiends to Nocturne Maniax and deciding to make him unavoidable that early on. It's usually "get a group healer, get as many voiding/resisting his element (I think he uses Zan), be able to debuff his accuracy up - and then pray the RNG isn't too unkind in his attack pattern".
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Post by dsparil on Apr 15, 2019 13:18:30 GMT -5
I meant in the sense that the main gameplay is grid-based dungeon crawling as opposed to Nocturne or IV which are third person and have free movement. MT2 does have top down elements, but the main gameplay is grid-based. MT1 is all dungeon though.
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Post by retr0gamer on Apr 16, 2019 4:12:59 GMT -5
I kind of understand what Atlus was doing with the fiends in Nocturne. The version we got as an update to the original game so anyone playing the update will already know how powerful agility skills were.
Matador doesn't require loads of levelling like some guides will have you think. You just need agility debuffs. The MC by that point can learn a skill that will raise/lower (not sure which) agility by two levels and it makes matador trivial. What catches people off is that stat spells are incredibly useful in SMT compared to other RPGs where they are effectively useless.
I'd actually go back to Nocturne with an aim to min maxing the MC. I made mine a physical powerhouse with agility buffs and debuffs and found the game relatively easy after the initial difficulty hurdle.
SMT4 is probably a better introduction. Again just remember how powerful stat buffs are. After the first two bosses the game gets a lot easier (too easy imo).
As for the mon aspect, just keep fusing monsters to the highest level and you will do ok. Sometimes you might have to get a specific spell to exploit a weakness but a lot of time you can improvise on the fly. Of course some games have major difficulty spikes that require some careful party selection, like the ouroboros fights in Strange Journey.
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Post by kaoru on Apr 16, 2019 5:38:03 GMT -5
I think its Fog Breath the MC can learn around that time, which is a x2 agility debuff. It is THE spell to learn ASAP and never let go.
Honestly, I always thought Digital Devil Saga is a good start. Because it has a lot of the vibes and aspects of the main games, but gets rid of demon collecting/fusing, so you have your one fixed team and new skills learnt don't override old ones. They can also be pretty breezy 20ish hours games. But it's hard to really recommend a Baby's First MegaTen, cause there are so many games of such different variety. Just don't pick one of the bad ones like The Demon Slayer, DemiKids or Revelations: Persona.
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Post by edmonddantes on Apr 17, 2019 2:53:18 GMT -5
When recommending introduction games to me, keep in mind the most recent consoles I own are a PS2, PSP, and Gamecube. Anything after that is out of my reach unless I win the lottery.
Wait, "Revelations: Persona" is considered bad? Is that just because of the translation?
I'm thinking I might start with one of the SNES ones if I give the series another shot. Being a fan of Wizardry I have no problem with tile-based movement.
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Post by retr0gamer on Apr 17, 2019 3:26:09 GMT -5
With regards recommendations you are sorted with a PS2 and PSP. You've Persona 3, Digital Devil Saga and Nocturne which all make good entry points. Maybe Persona 3 as that's how the majority of Megatenists started. Wait, "Revelations: Persona" is considered bad? Is that just because of the translation? Well the translation in the original is bad and they cut out a significant amount of content. Then the PSP version fixed all that but added a soundtrack which is good... but nowhere near as good as the originals soundtrack. I think the main issue is it's a very early CD based RPG so the game can be incredibly slow which makes it a slog. |
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