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Post by TheGunheart on Aug 15, 2014 21:41:34 GMT -5
Also on the Mass Effect front is the problem that there's no feedback during combat in the first one. Yeah, gauges drain, but it never really feels like weapons are really doing anything.
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Post by wyrdwad on Aug 15, 2014 23:10:40 GMT -5
I hesitate to say Xenosaga did an excellent job. A lot of those cutscenes went for faaaar too long. Mostly the action ones. If I have any hard criticism against Xenosaga III it's that it could have cutscenes were way too long. Like that bit with KOS-MOS and the other KOS-MOS near the start of that game. But overall I'm glad to see you stand up for cutscenes Tom. Not enough people do that. Bear in mind I'm only talking about Xenosaga Episode I, as that's the only game of the three I've played. It's one of my favorite PS2 titles, but the change in art style and gameplay for Episode II was so jarring to me that I never played it for more than a couple hours... and since I never completed II, I also never played III. I know I should! But you guys know by now just how crazy backlogs can get.  -Tom |
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Post by The Great Klaid on Aug 15, 2014 23:24:29 GMT -5
I hesitate to say Xenosaga did an excellent job. A lot of those cutscenes went for faaaar too long. Mostly the action ones. If I have any hard criticism against Xenosaga III it's that it could have cutscenes were way too long. Like that bit with KOS-MOS and the other KOS-MOS near the start of that game. But overall I'm glad to see you stand up for cutscenes Tom. Not enough people do that. Bear in mind I'm only talking about Xenosaga Episode I, as that's the only game of the three I've played. It's one of my favorite PS2 titles, but the change in art style and gameplay for Episode II was so jarring to me that I never played it for more than a couple hours... and since I never completed II, I also never played III. I know I should! But you guys know by now just how crazy backlogs can get. -Tom I actually never finished the first episode and I never played the second. The third recaps it all, and it is just so good. I still haven't played a JRPG that's come out since it that's surpassed it. I'm still kind of dissapointed about the PS3 that nothing came close. Actually I'm kind of mad that we never had a really good JRPG for the PS3. I do wonder if I'd have like Lost Odyssey more if I'd played it back when it came out, and I wasn't burned out on JRPGs. Actually, that's my entry for the thread. We still haven't had any JRPGs to follow up the PS2 era. No Wild ARMs or Suikodens. In fact the closest thing we've gotten to traditional styled ones is Compile Heart crap. I still can't get over how FF XIII let me down after XII rocked my socks. I had such huge hopes, but nothing really came out of it. The best this generation had was Tales of Xillia, Xenoblade, Arc Rise Fantasia, and White Knight Chronicles II. And I wouldn't even put them very high on a top 50. At least the handheld market went strong. |
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Post by wyrdwad on Aug 16, 2014 0:08:12 GMT -5
I assume you're talking turn-based RPGs specifically, right? I've always preferred action RPGs, and we've been getting plenty of great action RPGs these days, but I'll agree that there haven't been too many fantastic turn-based titles in recent memory. Our own Brave Story: New Traveler on PSP and The Last Story on Wii come to mind, but technically, those aren't on modern platforms, even if they're not really THAT old. (And Last Story is only KINDA SORTA turn-based.) Child of Light, maybe? I've also heard good things about South Park: The Stick of Truth. But I guess neither of those are actually JRPGs -- they're western titles that are emulating JRPG design. I have high hopes for Oreshika: Tainted Bloodlines on Vita, but that's the only modern traditional turn-based JRPG that's really captured my attention -- and it's more of a dungeon-crawler, so I'm not even sure IT quite counts. ...Oh! There is Opoona on Wii. That's one of my favorite games of all time, and technically came after the PS2 era. Though not LONG after it, admittedly. I also think Enchanted Arms was good, despite what people say about it -- though it wasn't GREAT, exactly. And I think both Lost Odyssey and Blue Dragon were pretty rockin'. Everybody seems to ignore Blue Dragon, but that was a really good game! -Tom |
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Post by The Great Klaid on Aug 16, 2014 1:09:04 GMT -5
I assume you're talking turn-based RPGs specifically, right? I've always preferred action RPGs, and we've been getting plenty of great action RPGs these days, but I'll agree that there haven't been too many fantastic turn-based titles in recent memory. Our own Brave Story: New Traveler on PSP and The Last Story on Wii come to mind, but technically, those aren't on modern platforms, even if they're not really THAT old. (And Last Story is only KINDA SORTA turn-based.) Child of Light, maybe? I've also heard good things about South Park: The Stick of Truth. But I guess neither of those are actually JRPGs -- they're western titles that are emulating JRPG design. I have high hopes for Oreshika: Tainted Bloodlines on Vita, but that's the only modern traditional turn-based JRPG that's really captured my attention -- and it's more of a dungeon-crawler, so I'm not even sure IT quite counts. ...Oh! There is Opoona on Wii. That's one of my favorite games of all time, and technically came after the PS2 era. Though not LONG after it, admittedly. I also think Enchanted Arms was good, despite what people say about it -- though it wasn't GREAT, exactly. And I think both Lost Odyssey and Blue Dragon were pretty rockin'. Everybody seems to ignore Blue Dragon, but that was a really good game! -Tom Yeah I mean turn based. But, I always forget about Brave Story. I don't know why. I freaking loved that game. If you had anything to do with it, then thank you. Like I said, it was great. And don't get me wrong, I've played good ones, but nothing this generation has enthralled me like the PS2 era did. Even Nocturne, which I've found after I got a PS3, has me hooked from time to time. I'll admit, part of it is that I'm not 14 anymore. And that I don't have that same ability to connect with a game like I used to. Personally, I blame my ex. Now I feel like I have to socialize with people and do other things then sit in my room all day playing video games. But, even considering age, I played the hell out of SMTIV. Like, most of my free time last April/May was spent on that game. Once again, I blame my ex, but that line of thought isn't healthy. But, the gameplay and the story made me want more. And I just haven't gotten a lot of that recently. Actually, I brought up Compile Hearts for a reason. I haven't come across a JRPG with a storyline I care about in forever. It's all become super...for lack of a better term...anime. I was playing Mugen Souls Z the other day, and I thought I could enjoy it fairly well, but the story kept going, and the way the characters kept talking...I had to defend X-2 the other day to a guy. I used to hate the way that game acted. Now I'd rather take lines like "Oh poopy" then the crap that Compile Hearts goes on about. I know that was a mess, but I miss when JRPGs used to be big epic quests. That's why I love Xenosaga and Kingdom Hearts and Legend of Dragoon and Final Fantasy. Because it felt like you were doing something. You saw a world and you learned about it. You got to spend hours in it. And you came out feeling good that you saved these imaginary people. I loved how Symphonia built this huge mythology out of half truths. That you spent the game peeling away the layers. Or Abyss, where you saw a world that was on the precipice of hell. And it's only hopes were a bunch of psychotic loonies. But, I cared about them. More then Asbel and his daddy issues. Or Sophie 2.0. Or Malik? I think that was a guy. They never seemed like they had a goal. I actually never did the Future Arc, because I simply didn't care. I played all of Dragoon to find out what happened next. Who was the Hooded Man? What was his plan? Who's Emperor Diaz? Why does Rose know so much? And then you have all the answers and I wanted to know how it all comes together. I don't know why. It just presented itself sincerely enough. It was a journey I was happy to take. It was a rough one, slow and addled with the slowest combat ever, but it made me curious. That's more then most anything that's come out in the last 10 years has done. |
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Post by wyrdwad on Aug 16, 2014 3:48:31 GMT -5
What was it you disliked about Lost Odyssey, then? Because that seems like it's pretty much exactly the sort of thing you were looking for.
Blue Dragon, too, though perhaps to a lesser extent.
And like I said... Opoona! It's a little more light-hearted than what you're describing, but it has an immersiveness unlike anything else.
-Tom
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Post by fullspectrumwarrior on Aug 16, 2014 4:17:44 GMT -5
I didn't mind cutscenes back in the PlayStation 1 or playstation2 era when they were still a novelty and went well with the games. What I'm talking about with cinematics today is every single game, even the most action bro fisted shooting game that has no point in a story whatsoever, they try to shove a story in & its always the same cliche meathead characters and have cutscenesevery 3 minutes taking control away from you constantly. The first time this really starting to piss me off was in Gears of War 3 when I swear to god that game has cutscenes literally every two minutes of gameplay for the whole game and since then I just get aggravated with cut scenes...especially when they're not skippable or when they're constantly taking control away from me over and over. I think this is 1 of the many reasons I no longer play retail games & only play downloadable arcade game such is Mega man 9 or the new strider that has 10 second cutscenes at the most and only at the end of a level.
I didn't mind cutscenes when they were at the beginning and end of a level but now they are constant throughout entire games. I just can't stomach it anymore. The best game in the world with the best story has yet to even top some of the most mediocre movies on the planet and that's one of my major gripes is they keep trying to shoehorninh these stories in but they are never worth it.
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Post by Terrifying on Aug 16, 2014 4:55:06 GMT -5
That's one of the few games which made selling my Xbox 360 a "unpleasant" experience. That, with Star Ocean: The Last Hope, Blue Dragon, Ridge Racer 6, Namco Museum: Virtual Arcade, Tales of Vesperia, and Ninja Gaiden 2... (I sold my 360 and my gigantic collection of games because the console left marks on practically all of the discs while treating both the console and it's games with tremendous care. Something which is completely unacceptable) |
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Post by fullspectrumwarrior on Aug 16, 2014 5:38:59 GMT -5
That's one of the few games which made selling my Xbox 360 a "unpleasant" experience. That, with Star Ocean: The Last Hope, Blue Dragon, Ridge Racer 6, Namco Museum: Virtual Arcade, Tales of Vesperia, and Ninja Gaiden 2... (I sold my 360 and my gigantic collection of games because the console left marks on practically all of the discs while treating both the console and it's games with tremendous care. Something which is completely unacceptable) It's funny the original Xbox was built like a tank but the 360 up until the latest models came out a year or two ago had the most problems I've ever seen. I thought nothing would ever top all the defective PlayStation 2s with DRE errors which seemed to happen to all models after a while. Even developers during the ps2 era said they had to go through multiple systems just developing a game to test it out but the 360 managed to make that look good LOL. |
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Post by The Great Klaid on Aug 16, 2014 12:29:14 GMT -5
What was it you disliked about Lost Odyssey, then? Because that seems like it's pretty much exactly the sort of thing you were looking for. Blue Dragon, too, though perhaps to a lesser extent. And like I said... Opoona! It's a little more light-hearted than what you're describing, but it has an immersiveness unlike anything else. -Tom Actually, I just have to sit down and play Lost Odyssey. I haven't given that game the time it deserves. I picked it up during a rough patch in my life, and it fell through the cracks. Blue Dragon on the other hand I'm not liking very much. Not sure why. |
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Post by Weasel on Aug 16, 2014 13:03:39 GMT -5
I gave Blue Dragon an honest try. I didn't really like how the story was going, the characters felt like raw caricatures of typical anime heroes with no real unique traits, and the amount of slow down in battles was really frustrating. Never managed to beat the first boss, either, and I assume it to be down to my lack of grinding. Considering how generic the story was to that point, I simply didn't care enough to keep trying.
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Post by wyrdwad on Aug 16, 2014 13:09:54 GMT -5
I gave Blue Dragon an honest try. I didn't really like how the story was going, the characters felt like raw caricatures of typical anime heroes with no real unique traits, and the amount of slow down in battles was really frustrating. Never managed to beat the first boss, either, and I assume it to be down to my lack of grinding. Considering how generic the story was to that point, I simply didn't care enough to keep trying. The thing with the story in Blue Dragon is, it's not really generic... it's just insane. It's off-the-rails stupid, and that's what makes it so fun to play. Lasers hidden behind the moon? Sure, why not! This is Blue Dragon -- anything's possible here. -Tom |
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Post by The Great Klaid on Aug 16, 2014 14:58:46 GMT -5
I gave Blue Dragon an honest try. I didn't really like how the story was going, the characters felt like raw caricatures of typical anime heroes with no real unique traits, and the amount of slow down in battles was really frustrating. Never managed to beat the first boss, either, and I assume it to be down to my lack of grinding. Considering how generic the story was to that point, I simply didn't care enough to keep trying. The thing with the story in Blue Dragon is, it's not really generic... it's just insane. It's off-the-rails stupid, and that's what makes it so fun to play. Lasers hidden behind the moon? Sure, why not! This is Blue Dragon -- anything's possible here. -Tom I'd wish I could have made it to something like that. I have to agree with Weasel, it just felt generic. |
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Post by Terrifying on Aug 16, 2014 15:21:11 GMT -5
fullspectrumwarriorIndeed. The first Xbox was absolutely great in terms of hard and software. It is a BIG console, but it is extremely durable, and has the best quality disc-tray ever in my opinion.
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Post by Deleted on Aug 16, 2014 15:55:42 GMT -5
It is a BIG console, but it is extremely durableExcept that there's recently been a rash of OG Xboxes suiciding from corroded hardware? It definitely wasn't built to last. |
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