Turn-based jRPG/RPG thread

Wait wut
Oh its nothing then

All of my disgust

It's like comparing apples to oranges, both are good in their own way. Lunar had the Boat Song, a comfy romance story and smoother transitions between plot points, while Grandia had more dynamic character growth (gameplay-wise) and L'arc~en~ciel doing their theme song.

The Shadow Hearts series has a neat battle system through the Judgment Ring (later entries further tweak and nuance it) and a mixture of dark and weird atmosphere (the ration depending on the game) in historical fiction settings (1898-1929 Earth). Really good monster designs and music as well (the composers involved depending on the entry); the nature of the series let them try out all sorts of stuff that might normally feel out of place in a JRPG that manages to still work out well due to the vibe the series has.

Still need to give Lunar and Grandia a go sometime (with the former I'm not entirely looking forward to dealing with Working Designs translations/rewrites), but L'arc en Ciel sounds familiar. Didn't they do the opening song to the movie for the 2003 FMA series?

that 3rd pic looks like mgq

Grandia was on systems i played, Lunar was not. I'm not sure i can make an unbiased comparison, but i CAN say that of the last games in each, Grandia 3 was decent where as Lunar: Dragon Song was an abortion milkshake.

Only underages want action everywhere, since they can't stand chess-like gameplay where you need to think instead of mashing buttons.

iirc DS version has orig songs

and it was fucking trash, the end

There's not much thought needed though, unless the turns are timed you can just sit there for hours on end doing nothing, there's no urgency.

The DS version also has cut content relating to the two games the west never saw as well as bugs thanks to NISA handling it out here, at least from what I know of it.

Suikoden 2
BoF 3
Pokemon Black/White 2 if you like pokemon
Star Ocean 2

But Star Ocean isn't turn based you chuckle fuck

Much as I enjoyed them, you're opening a can of worms there. And it doesn't help matters that some of the stuff that was unique/added to those games required wifi connectivity that is no longer officially available. Haven't played the sixth gen Pokemon games since I don't have a 3DS, but I have to wonder how they handle stuff like Dream World abilities, whether Pokemon with them are natively obtainable or not.

I just remembered that the thread was turn-based JRPG.

I thought it was merely JRPG

Haven't played the DS pokemons yet. but I did like Pokemon Black/White 2 because it felt fresh and different compared to all the older games.

I meant I haven't played the latest pokemons yet, the ones on the 3DS because I also do not have a 3DS

Yeah, I guess you're right.

IIRC, the PS1 versions of the games are slightly better in that regard. There may be things like NPCs of a certain village talking like rednecks for no reason, but at least they don't outright talk about watching Miami Vice or going to Las Vegas.

Yeah. Honestly, I thought it was neat having a bit more of a story focused pair of games, considering I liked how it had been done in Colosseum and Gale of Darkness. Still, I can get that some people might have been turned off by there being a pair of more or less direct sequels to Black and White, rather than a third version (Gray?) and the series moving on to sixth gen sooner.

The music was pretty damn nice though.

Geez, they did that with the Sega CD ones?

Might as well drop these here since I really enjoy the series. WA1 and 2 are also currently marked down on the US PSN this weekend.

Okay, who the fuck thought that upscaling an image like that was a good idea? You can easily go from larger to smaller and retain quality, but not the other way around.

...

wew lad, that game sucks dick.
fuck your roommate, he sounds like a prick.

how cheap are WA1 and WA2?

Right now, they're 60% off on the PSN. So $2.39 each. Not the lowest they've been (seen them in $.99 sales before), but I think they're normally $6 a piece. Or did you mean for physical copies?

They've also got Breath of Fire IV, Final Fantasy V/VI/VIII/IX/Tactics, Megaman Legends, and both PS1 Oddworlds marked down as far as PS1 classics go, and Dark Cloud 2 and Wild Arms 3 are also marked down for people with PS4s.

Gotcha Force user, is that you?

Yes, only with minor NPCs, but it still breaks the immersion.

I got both fully complete for less than $20 on eBay about a year ago. I'm not sure what the prices are now.

$20 sounds about right for physical copies, at least as an average goes, though I've seen them from about $12-25 complete where I live. Depends on the store. WA3 is still the cheapest in the series around here though at $8-12 (I heard from some anons in Australia it's up to $40 out there in rooland).

ACF and WA5 are the expensive ones.

Yeah man. You're still the MVP(oster) in my book. We're lucky to have you Wild Arms Guy.

Eh, I just like to get word out more on series I don't think get played enough (and unfortunately in the case of now dormant/dead ones, there's not much to drive demand for discussion enough to warrant their own threads; the last time I saw a Wild Arms specific thread here was when WA3 got rereleased on the PS4's PSN some months back). Still working on making some of those infographics up there for Shadow Hearts (it's mainly the mechanics/tips/FAQ portion that I can't get satisfied with; Covenant and FtNW add a lot of little tweaks), and I've also had one in progress for Breath of Fire as well.

zoop fo'real bout as deep a turn based ya'll can get it muh nycka

every fucking time

And who let Bill Cosby in here?

Actually, on that note, rephrasing some stuff actually cleared up the room I was needing to fit one more mechanic I needed to mention in there (Stock) for the Shadow Hearts one without me needing to make the overall space allotted bigger. Still need to give it another looking over, but I might actually be satisfied enough to get it out soon as a more or less finished set of images.

ha ha good one fam das a part of black love man he part of the struggle tho fo'real t

that's DMX monica

nah nycka naw dun git it twisted fam i b user tho

damn man, I can't even keep track of how many charts you've cranked out. Savage quads btw.

sorry fam, fwiw I saw a bunch of filthy black whores getting busted by the cops tonight. Really wanted to shout 'world star'.

I'm playing La Pucelle Ragnarok with English patch on ppsspp using ps4 controller. sadly the dlc change the language of skills and weapons to japanese. his is my favorite Atlier never played ps3 and 4 games. Any fan of JRPG should try Metal Max series.

das what I say when I ejaculate now real talk

but yo while i'm here nycka, should i jus play front mission 1 if i'm finna go down on some front mission? a nycka myt only play da one tho so lyk i know 3 get a lot of love tho.

I'm liking those prices, very reasonable.

There's an episode of Pixelated Audio (vidya music podcast) about Untamed Limbs you guys might enjoy.

Damn niggler, I'm glad to hear you're gonna dabble in Front Mission. I've never played em, but they've been on my radar for some time now. DS version of 1 is best. 3 probably gets love since it was the first localized, IIRC. DS 1 got a reprint, along with Infinite Space. It was none other than chart kun who broke the news to me.

oh damn fam, infinite space on my backlog too nigga good lookin fam real talk

time to throw more o' dem brix on dat flash cart baby

Is there a recommended entry point for Metal Max?

Well, at the moment I've only done a single series one, but a lot of system ones. I've just got a lot of spare time and access to Photoshop and InDesign to make stuff in. Thought of making one for Tales as well, but even just looking at the main series, that's about 16-17 games right there and the series is still alive and kicking.

Shame that only Metal Max Returns and Metal Saga are in English, and Metal Saga saw some pretty mixed reception from what I've seen; might be why Atlus didn't bother with bringing any of the other entries west at all.

Yeah, as far as prices go locally, it's like this (depending on the store:

Did some checking online recently and apparently ACF has been up to about $70-75 complete lately, while WA5 is $50-60 complete. Glad I found my copies for $20 and $35 respectively (WA5 was actually an unplayed copy that came with the outer box and 10th Anniversary artbook as well).

I've generally heard pretty decent stuff about FM1, 3, and 5. FM1 has two options through the SFC one with a fan translation patch, as well as the DS version (with an extra scenario) that they brought west. FM5 is fan translated as well.

Well there's only two in English. Metal Max Returns (a remake of MM1) for the SFC and Metal Saga for the PS2.

Metal Max Returns for snes, its translated in english. Also Metal Saga on ps2, also in english.

My favorite is Metal Max 2 Reload though, even though it was in japanese, i had the most fun with it cause there are lots of content in that particular game.

Forgot I had do not bump on.

Now to figure out if there's a better way to make it more clear where one segment ends and the next begins. I don't like having each mechanic feel like a brick of text, but I'm not sure how much more I can trim from it.

Too bad MM2 has been in fan translation hell, and even then I'm pretty sure it's only been the SFC original that's seen any work done.

man I really need to buy a flash cart.
Is R4 Gold the way to go? Don't want to spend extra for SuperCard DSTwo's GBA emulation capabilities.

Do good condition DS phat's still exist? Chart kun likes his lite, but he also said he broke his first one. I got a clean XL last fall that's treated me well, but I'd like a phat for GBA, ROM dumping, and dpad comparison.

slime hooked a nigga up w/ da cyclo ds monica w/ a blank gba to flash 2 too. n i can't complain neither fam, even tho ya boi technically challenged i just b drag'n n drop'n da roms on it, had to put sum ole homebrew on eem for some shit n it wuz ez too. micro sd or w/e got like mad gaemz on em

Knowing you, I'll bet you make it.

Been meaning to ask you, is it possible to do online co-op for Tales of Destinia or Eternia through emulation? Not all of us can have local co-op buddies you know.

time for sudoku!

Judgment Ring: …most actions…require[s] the player

I still use my Lite, but trying to find a good condition used original model DS might be a bit of a crapshoot as while the XLs and even the Lites could still be found new in stores until (I want to say) 2011 or so, I think the original models were discontinued some time before that. I will say that the original model DS is, to my knowledge, a good bit sturdier in build than the Lite, but doesn't have as much battery life. It's been years since I used one though. Main thing with the Lite is to treat it gentler than you might otherwise (and get a decent case if you plan to take it places so the L and R buttons don't get real worn down without even playing).

Still, it might be a good idea to check local independent used game stores; maybe see if they have any that look to be in good condition.

The issue there would be having to update it every year or so whenever a new game (or fan translation comes out).

I'm not sure if it's possible to do co-op through emulation. I kind of doubt it since the way the co-op works is only in combat (Player 1 controls the on-field movement outside of it) and the setup is built around a local couch co-op option (one disc/set of discs, one system, one screen everyone looks at, multiple controllers). Hell, that's probably part of why all of the portable entries are single player only.

Unless there's a way for one person to somehow stream it to another person's computer, with one of them as a designated Player 1, I don't think it's possible. But you might want to ask in an emulation thread just to be sure.

Thanks, I run this stuff through a word processing program before adding it into the InDesign document, but I don't think it catches grammatical errors well. Might dump the current WIP ones in a few if anyone wants to give them a bit of a looking over later.

Who does that refer to? I've only heard Lil Wayne say "What's poppin slime?"

I'm happy to proofread for ya, liking the screenshots you got on the side there.

Less filler, imo.

Sure, give me a few minutes to export and run a Work in Progress transparency filter on them.

Here. I'll be back later tonight/early tomorrow morning; heading out for a while in a few minutes.

okay, I'm gonna sleep for now. Watch out for drunk drivers.

Do dungeon crawlers count? They're a dime a dozen these days but this one get honorable mention for art, music, gameplay and not being waifu-shit like most other modern dungeon crawlers. The story is only passable and the difficulty is overstated by youtubers who are naturally bad at videogames.

This reminds me of when I lost 60 hours in infinite space due to a late game bug the Escondido scenario. I wanna go back and start a fresh save but damn does it hurt to lose so many hours. Have there been any fan patches for the game that may have fixed it?

After I finish The Spongebob Squarepants Movie the next game in my backlog is Wild Arms. I played it briefly in the past, but there were too many distractions at the time.

How could one even compare grandia to this piece of shit in any way is beyond me

So I'm playing some Shin Megami Tensei on the SNES.

This game is NOT easy. Also, map is a bit shitty but better than nothing.

If something does it well, it does it well. If it's done like shit, it's done like shit.

I'm back now, but I'll probably be asleep by the time you're up (assuming you're on a regular sleep schedule). Take your time though; I know it might take a while given how much text there is on those to read through. Just leave the corrections here if the thread's still up when you're done and I'll get around to editing later today when I'm up, and if the thread's somehow 404ed, hold onto them as a text doc or something and post them in another thread like this when the opportunity arises.

Don't forget that Wild Arms 1 has a prologue movie at Arctica if you leave the game on the start screen for a little while (ACF has a version of that scene as well). Actually provides a nice bit of backstory for what's going on a few months prior to the game beginning, and I think people might be prone to accidentally missing that these days (I actually wonder if the manual even mentions it).

If it was made in Japan, I'd say it counts as a JRPG. I think some people have it in there heads that JRPG applies more towards a gameplay or thematic stereotype, but I've seen it as more a simple "region of development" tag, with there being plenty of other tags you can apply to them to get more specific about the gameplay and combat types (same for WRPGs, really).

It still strikes me as odd that the PSN has Grandia and Grandia III now, but Grandia II is still absent in any form. I mean, I've admittedly heard the PS2 version was a rather poor quality port job, but might it be possible for Sony to work out a deal with Sega or Gungho or whoever to get either the Dreamcast original or Anniversary Edition ported to the PS3's PSN (I assume Sony might rather have it for the PS4 instead now, but considering the PS3 PSN has Grandia I and III and the PS4 doesn't even have a PS1 classics store to my knowledge, I think it would make more sense to be on the PS3).

That's rough man. I'd say wait for a while. It might be more interesting to replay after you've forgotten the details.

Eternal Sonata is turn-based, with a twist. On a character's turn, you have a few seconds to move and attack freely. Meanwhile, the rest of the battlefield stands still. The execution requirements are low, so you still get that comfy feel.

I don't think I found any other small changes like the ones I listed above. I dislike your use of parentheses, but that's a style thing. If you'd like, I could rewrite a section to show you what I mean. I don't want to step on your toes though.

I'm enjoying this game so far, I started with EO IV too so the lack of QoL improvements doesn't bother me (it helps that the DS EO games run at 60 FPS while the 3DS ones run at 30).

I dont think you understand how they work. There must be a way to cut down on all that text mate

Why does 60 fps matter in EO?

Labyrinth of Touhou 2 is a great dungeon crawler JRPG, almost all improvements over the already good first part. It is almost more of a puzzle game in that you have to figure out what kind of party to bring to a given boss fight and how to pilot it, and it gives you the toolbox depth and ease of swapping characters to make the concept work. Shows what you can do with what I strongly suspect to be RPG Maker, as long as you know how the genre works and have a focused design.
The one issue I have is that the complete lack of punishments on death makes the crawling portion less exciting.

My nigga. That's the best SMT game, in my opinion.

Just got to the part where I recruited the heroine. I love how the story is told in this game. It can have emotional scenes without showing or telling too much.

Only SMT game I played besides this one is Strange Journey. I hope the dungeons in this game aren't going to get as confusing as that.

What are the chances that Ubisoft does this right? I liked the story, exploration, and look of the Stick of Truth, but the RPG aspects are woefully lacking. I'm just hoping that we can get some actual stats, that there are actual differences between the classes, and that it's not nearly 100% linear this time.

I'm trying to keep my hype levels down because it's being made by Ubisoft and I don't want to be disappointed when they don't do much to make the combat and character building more complex.

Forgot pic

Wait until the game actually opens up, things get sprawling.

It's not really important but personally I like how smooth the dungeon crawl is in EO II and EO III compared to the 3DS ones.

Or you can just use Hina/Parsee and blow through everything.

Aside from that - yes, this game is fucking excellent and everyone needs to play it. The first one is just as good too, if not riddled with bugs. 2hu labyrinth 3 when?

archive.org/details/msdos_Redhooks_Revenge_1993

Sure, give it a try if you want.

There's two main things: Much as I liked Koudelka, it's more than a bit clunky (and the game expects you to have access to the manual, as there's very few ingame tutorials or hints), so for that, I wanted to give people a bit of advice to make things a bit more enjoyable. With the PS2 games, I wanted to give a brief description of the major mechanics (the ingame help section goes into a lot more detail on specifics, as well as more minor aspects). I do agree though about it being wall of textish though. Maybe I ought to cut it down to the elements that apply to all three games, rather than just one or two, and mention the newer additions elsewhere?

EO2 had some very noticable framedrops when turning around in a wide open room.

There's so many broken things about Hina but I can't stop using her, my debuff specialist fetish is too great.

all the ones i could think of

ebin

Really it all depends on how much control Parker and Stone have over the game. I'm positive all of the good ideas in Stick of Truth came from them rather than anyone at Ubisoft.

Yes indeed. They didn't try hard enough with her "downside" of debuffing all of your teammates. Considering you can mitigate or outright turn those debuffs into buffs with half your party, or invest into reducing the negatives with Hina's passives, it just wasn't enough. That, and her stat growth is pretty respectable, especially when you factor that she's near-constantly running at double.

At that point, she's just too valuable not to use. She ends up being a better tank to most enemies than Tenshi herself, and gives Komachi a run for her money. Her MAG stat is high enough that you can even do some damage to a properly debuffed and elementally weak enemy/boss. With proper titles, she can even self-regenerate HP/MP, albeit at a lesser rate than otherwise would be normal.

She is truly a godly 2hu. I don't understand how people can go through that game without using her for ez-modo.

Options:

Wow so much thinking. Turn based combat is only good for abstraction, which is only good if the game gives a damn about its story.

Pic related, most people admit the gameplay is technically shitty and boring, but it's necessary to remain believable and make the wasteland seem like a dark place.

If an RPG only has turn-based combat for the sake of gameplay, it can fuck right off

Seriously? No mention of Skies of Arcadia? One of my all-time favourite, turn based JRPGs.

You're one of them there morans. Most RPGs that use that system have a reason to let you examine and choose the best move. SMT games can fuck you if you use the wrong move on an enemy. Planning your team and switching when appropriate is part of the thinking in that case.

Well, it's not as if Sega's done much to keep it relevant in people's minds these days (having done nothing with the IP beyond the Dreamcast original, a GC port, and cameos in various other games, with no sequel or further ports for thirteen years), but yeah, really enjoyable game.

Skies of Arcadia is a fantastic game. It captured the feeling of adventure and discovery better than any game that's come out since.