What actual games this gen are excellent on a technical level?
So often we say we like a game or its good based on our enjoyment. Or lack of double dipping microtransactions. The experience was entertaining enough, or offered something of unique value that made the time and money investment worthwhile.
But what about the game as a product removed from your own tastes? in a gen thats really had few solid hits with even the big critical acclaim games like Bloodborne, Pillars 2, Breath of the Wild and so on all had at least a few glaring flaws. Didn't stop folks enjoying them but they were not technically excellent.
Example:
I could go on but its an example of a dungeon crawling rpg being so tight and having its balance as close to perfect as they could get it. This doesn't mean every consumer would enjoy it, some less mechanically sound games might even have more appeal to the audience for subjective reasons like taste based on characters, levels and soundtrack/art and so on. But this is a case of a current gen game that from a design standpoint is sincerely excellent and you can tell there was thought put into every decision and how it weighs on every other choice the player can make as they play.
Now can you think of another game this gen that applies to?
Justin Perez
meaning that afk grinding exp and being consistently 4 levels above the current dungeon will let you breeze through it? shit game
Gavin Green
No because the exp required increases at a level that things you outlevel very quickly offer so little xp its not worth the time.
Hunter Roberts
Only faggots and game journos overlevel their characters at the sight of any difficulty spike in a JRPG.
Also overleveling only works for the first two stratums in eov. 3rd stratum mobs curse and confuse your party, making your members OS themselves, and most of these mobs also have extremely high armor and low mdf, requiring you to actually cast spells instead of auto-battling if you don't want fights to take ages.
Besides, gear does everything and levels don't mean much in the short term, meaning that you will spend much less time if you just push forward instead of grinding. Farming only works if you are raising alternate guild members to have another team or new synergies.
Camden Rogers
You don't really need floor skipping when you can just resume from any floor you've reached. Floor skipping was a response to the annoyance of only resuming from geomagnetic poles at the start of each stratum. Two way shortcuts aren't new either.
Jordan Price
Sounds like you haven't been past the first or possibly second stratum then, because later enemies are dangerous enough to fuck you up if you underestimate them. Also advanced is the default difficulty; as in every EO since they introduced the other difficulty levels the hardest has always been the base level that's the closest to the older games. The easier ones are just disguised easy modes.
What actually matters is that you can no longer teleport to any other floor at essentially any time. Being able to start from any floor really means little because shortcuts made it easy to get back with minimal encounters.
Colton Peterson
Say that to prancing parrots and other assorted dog monsters of late 2nd stratum. Not to mention the spike in the 3rd one now that you have acces to advanced classes.
Brayden Green
I've been listening to Etrian Odyssey music but haven't played any yet. Don't have a 3DS, so how are Etrian Odyssey 1-3 on the DS? I don't care about story, which would you recommend trying?
Cooper Murphy
Not a problem, just hit them with lightning and they won't counter. They also alternate between normal attacks and countering, so you always know when not to hit them. Those dogs are fucking tough though. I just reached the 4th stratum and those fucking bats are a pain in the ass. They're like the sleeper flowers from the first three games only faster.
Always release order. People will tell you not to play 1, those people are dumb. Lack of polish may make it hard to go back to later, but it's fine as a first entry. 2 is basically 1 but better and 3 is often considered the best in the series. Play them all.
Michael Taylor
Well I don't know what the fuck is the problem, all three games have some serious frame skip issues for me, no other DS game thus far has had this, will have to try again tomorrow with fresh eyes.
Owen Howard
I only remember EO2 having performance issues on DS, 1 and 3 ran fine for me.
Adam Parker
EO3 is 60fps.
Isaac Martin
Yeah, the only issues I remember were with those animated damage floors on EO2. If there were a lot of them on screen it could cause some slowdown but otherwise it was all fine.
Cooper Gonzalez
This game is incredibly tight from a design standpoint by virtue of removing practically everything it doesn't need. Though a minimalistic game doing something niche will beget only a niche audience, which makes its incredibly positive reception all the more curious. We have barely seen a mix of first-person shooters and arcade game design philosophy, even though that's a massive unexplored area for innovation, and this game could very well be the first step. People are so used to good first-person shooters with large sprawling levels with tons to explore that they can't imagine how a FPS that does away with it entirely would work out. For example:
Julian Green
It's rare to see one game get so much right.
Justin Cox
Rez: Infinite
Cameron Lewis
Well I figured it out, it wasn't the frame skip or emu settings at all, for some reason if the LC layout was either 'Main screen first' or "Subscreen first" the screens would interchange rapidly and cause the flicker. If I just put top/bottom first option, it works normally. Weird, but thanks, now I can start.
Charles Peterson
EO3 was my first and it immediately became one of my favorite games of all time.
I know that other user said differently, but tbh I think EO2 and EO1 are skippable, having gone back and played them after EO3. EO4 is also excellent after EO3.
Ryan Myers
...
Ryder Martin
Everyone always praises EO3's music but I think EO2 had the best. It had the cutest grills too.
Julian Hill
Well I began with EO3 as it was the first was I got to work, and so far have been tasked with making the map for the first floor of the labyrinth. I went with save states to start with at least, because some Great Lynx came and one shotted my entire party. I guess this game is about grinding?
Would you suggest going with a full six party members or less?
Kevin Richardson
Dear lord. Just wait until you meet these fuckers.
Jeremiah Morgan
You're a fucking casual. Using save states removes the entire risk/reward question that's part of the fun of the game, so don't, and learn to judge when you're at risk of getting wiped if you push on, it's never going to come with no warning at all - if you ran around in the rear part of floor 1 with a half dead party that's your own fault, there's always going to be a chance of a particularily dangerous encounter. Just take things at a cautious pace, run when things could potentially get ugly, and always bring threads as soon as you get to buy them.
Noah James
Ok then.
Wyatt Myers
I'm glad I don't come to Holla Forums often anymore with users like this posting here
Austin Johnson
OP didn't post Persona 5.
Tyler Allen
Persona 5 is an unbalanced joke.
Nicholas Jenkins
If you have to grind for an Etrian Odyssey game and you're not doing some gimmick team run You're a casual
Also EO3 best soundtrack.
Colton Cooper
Don't worry now, I stopped using save states now, in the second level of the forest now with those floating lizard spheres. Can't really say there's no need to level up somewhat when going down, since shit almost oneshots you again. Lvl 7 now and it's definitely not an easy game. My party is Gladiator, Zodiac, Monk, Arbalist and Princess if that seems okay. One for hits, one for magic, one for healing, one for ranged and one for buffs, seems pretty decent to me, but getting enough money for equipment doesn't seem to be easy, and to get money it's either grinding for monster loot or fishing, so again I don't understand what would be the issue of "not grinding". Is there some cash mechanic I'm unaware?
Thomas Kelly
Your party is fine, slightly on the frail side but should be stable enough. Sea exploration, especially charting paths to landmarks is a great way of making money if you need some, conditional monster drops or resource gathering at spots is also useful (don't pick up gathering skills on your main party, just get a few farmers for that). You usually can pick up on some hints for drops, tricks or monster weaknesses at the bar when talking to the patrons, or do quests when you feel somewhat weak since those grant XP but be careful not to pick up a quest that's way too hard for your current level. Also, there's a trick to surviving Floor 2 without grinding. You're supposed to come at night. That's when the Largebills don't spawn.
Austin Sanchez
Don't worry, the first stratum is always the hardest in EO. Don't feel that you have to buy every new piece of gear you unlock, it gets expensive. You'll do fine with just upgrading armor every now and then, but make sure your attackers always have the best weapons available.
Bentley Cox
Yeah I noticed that when doing the centipede quest and the guy at the bar told me after the fact as well.
I've been picking up some yellow colored weapons that have no attack but five bars of a status like sleep, paralysis. These will probably come in handy at some point so selling a no-no?
Benjamin Moore
They're occasionally useful for getting rare drops if nobody in your party can inflict those ailments, yeah.
Xavier Carter
Can be situationally useful on support characters that wouldn't get good damage on normal attacks anyway.
Connor Bennett
Bump because Etrian Odyssey deserves it
Christopher Flores
EO5 does a lot of stuff right at the outset, all the classes are pretty new compared to the previous sets, and some are really cool mechanically, like Necros.
Matthew Phillips
I've been enjoying it so far. Are necromancers actually any good? I haven't used one yet but looking at their skills makes it look like they aren't good at any one thing but are more jacks of all trades, which makes them useless in a party based RPG.
Jackson Edwards
They get really good after the second stratum which lets you have access to master titles.