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Post by Deleted on Jun 2, 2019 17:13:07 GMT -5
Nice, Xeo. All the more reason for me for giving Front Mission DS a go eventually. I wonder what you'll think of FM3 when you come around to it, gameplay's fun but I didn't care for the story and characters myself.
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Post by Xeogred on Jun 2, 2019 17:21:14 GMT -5
That reminds me of two things, one I meant to point out for you...
1. Unfortunately you have to beat the main campaign to unlock the UCS campaign. So you'd have to replay that portion to get to this new content, unless I'm wrong. Kind of cool how this version has tons of NG+ content and even new special mobile units to unlock. I don't really replay SPRG's. Can't complain though!
2. I know FM3 has two campaigns that are monstrous in size. Online I've seen people say one is like, filled up with shounen filler in a way and longer than it needs to be with pointless missions? Meanwhile the other campaign is supposedly more tightly paced and extra challenging, but the more obscure campaign of the two that doesn't get played as much. So I'm not sure if there's an ideal campaign to play or tackle first or what. If I like one of them I'd probably want to play through both if it's really worth it, but maybe I'd take a huge break in between since they sound massive in scope.
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Post by Deleted on Jun 2, 2019 17:29:30 GMT -5
Alright, apparently I played through the Emma's campaign which is the longer and easier one. So that's definitely the one with the pointless filler missions. Alisa's campaign seems more interesting and considerably shorter. I might consider playing it, actually.
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Post by Xeogred on Jun 2, 2019 17:35:00 GMT -5
Yep, those names sound familiar. Alisa's definitely sounds ideal. I can imagine some might argue "Well Emma's is the intended first playthrough though"... haha. I think Ex beat both campaigns, I believe...
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Post by Ex on Jun 2, 2019 21:49:32 GMT -5
Nice job completely finishing Front Mission DS Xeogred . I'm very much looking forward to vicariously reliving the rest of the series through your future plays. I think Ex beat both campaigns, I believe... Nope, I've only beaten Emma's side. I wouldn't call her campaign massive in scope though; IIRC her campaign took about ~35 hours. I've read reliable sources saying Alisa's side is even shorter due to less filler missions. Someday I'll do Alisa's side to confirm.
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Post by Xeogred on Jun 2, 2019 22:07:35 GMT -5
Heh, my memory seems to be inflating the length of JRPG's lately. I remember FM3 being a bit of a joke from one of my local friends for years, he'd always talk about how the game seemed like it went on forever and would never end. HLTB seems to land around 30-40 hours though so you're probably right.
Guess I could maybe be the first one here to play Alisa's story!
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Post by toei on Jun 3, 2019 0:08:03 GMT -5
I finished Stella Deus last night. There's a lot going on there, but I'll try to keep it compact.
The gameplay is the more interesting aspect. The main concept has to do with how turns work. Each character starts their turn with 100 Action Points, and gets to act until they run out. There is a set cost per attack, depending on the weapon type each character uses, and a cost for each step, so that you may be able to walk, say, 4 steps and attack once, or attack two or three times if the enemy's already close by. The twist is that the amount of AP you don't use in a given turn helps determine when the character's next turn will come. In some cases, it may be possible to walk part of the way to an enemy, stop, and move again before they do, or even attack only once in your turn, stop with plenty of AP left, and unleash your full three attacks the next turn, adding up to four attacks instead of three before they ever get one in. This is something that you can and should manipulate to your advantage as much as possible, as the turn order that will result from any action is indicated before you actually confirm it. You can also choose to spend any amount of AP you want doing nothing if it's beneficial to have another character act first.
Preparation outside of battle is also extremely important. The total weight of the equipment you have on affect the cost of moving in battle; you also have four slots for accessories or items, and an enormous variety of accessories available that affect your stats in various ways and give you various effects. Each character has skills, too, and you both decide which you learn among those available, and which you equip for any given battle, with a set number of slots available for three different categories of skill - spells and special moves, skills that affect the equipped character's stats, and skills that affect all allies or enemies close by. All this to say that there is a lot of customization possible between each battle, and it's essential that you learn how the game works and what stats do as you progress through it, because a difference of even a few points is significant in practice. Of course, you don't need to assimilate all that at once; I chose to ignore the tutorials in the beginning, and I was still figuring new things out regularly up until about two thirds through. But to make the most of it, and avoid grinding, you will have to be attentive to your current weaknesses and blind spots, and ready to experiment to solve them. You'll want to experiment with fusing items, too, as it'll often provide solutions to particular problems; few characters get a skill that prevents petrification on their own, for example, but you can fuse two items into a scroll that lets them learn it, so that you stand a chance against bosses that have the Stone skill. There is more to it, including powerful Team Attacks that are very satisfying to set up and execute and Ranks that can be promoted a few times during the game for stats boosts and newly-unlocked skills, but that's the short version.
The story is nothing amazing, and even a bit lame in parts, but its telling is a bit above-average. It does a decent job of giving the different characters, friend or foe, believable motivations beyond the usual nonsense, though there is a bit of nonsense as well. The villains are most interesting than the protagonists for the most part, with one exception (Nebula, a very typical JRPG villain), as none of the main cast members have a very strong personality. At least they're not annoying. The dialogue is often surprisingly well-written - I especially liked the appearances of a mercenary named Jade, though he's only a secondary character. The disparity in quality between plot and writing may be due to the involvement of fantasy novelist Ryo Mizuno of Record of Lodoss War fame, who supervised the script, but wasn't its main writer, and of a high-quality translation by Atlus. I turned off the voices from the start as I hate voice acting in RPGs, and I suggest doing the same.
A random gameplay video. As you can see, the voice acting kinda sucks, and those sprites are nice.
The game hits a lull in the middle, which is when the filler comes in, both in terms of story and battles. Thankfully, it does end on a high note with a series of six consecutive boss battles where you get to settle all your scores once and for all and some cool side-quests where characters have to fight solo in order to obtain Legendary weapons which boost their power like crazy (a RPG trope I've always enjoyed), so it did leave me with a good impression. I liked the optional side-quests in general, too, of which there are tons. You should do as many of them as you can, as they often provide unique items, money, experience, and some nice little character moments; the side-quests you encounter in the first few hours also let you recruit a bunch of optional generic characters which can fill out spots in your roster early on, before you get all your story characters. I never bothered with the Catacombs, the game's mind-numbingly repetitive 100-levels grinding superstructure, and neither should anyone else.
So that's about it. Other flaws include a high level of repetition in enemy types (though their skills and stats do change) and visuals, and some dubious AI, though not at all times. I liked that the game is mostly 2D, though.
I'm glad I played it. I'd have played a sequel, and it's convinced me to check out Hoshigami, which was developed by some of the same people, despite its poor reputation. It gave me more desperate battles where you win with the last of your strength that any single RPG in the first half, and I enjoyed both figuring out and applying its gameplay system. It'd have been great at 30 hours instead of 40, with the mid-game bloat removed, or even at 40 hours with more world and character building; I'd stay it's still very good. I'd give a 8.
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Post by Sarge on Jun 3, 2019 0:42:24 GMT -5
Great review, and I reckon the game is back on my radar now!
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Post by toei on Jun 3, 2019 1:39:30 GMT -5
Great review, and I reckon the game is back on my radar now! The micromanagement aspect reminded me a bit of Growlanser, in the way that messing around with skills and equipment can completely turn things around. I know some people don't like that kind of stuff, but I do. Though Growlanser takes it a step further with the way skills can affect one another and multiply each other's effects; it's pretty crazy what you can do in that series. Funny thing about Stella Deus is that during the bloat, I was ready for it to end and started playing it less, yet when it got back on track at the end I would have taken more. It goes to show that the problem isn't so much that it's too long (40 hours is still reasonable), it's just that there's no enough proper story and variety to support that length, so the middle feels stretched out. I'm curious to see what you'll think if you do play it. The filler I'm talking about, specifically, is the part where you have to collect the power of the 4 Elemental Spirits (though it still has some nice boss battles).
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Post by Deleted on Jun 3, 2019 2:01:36 GMT -5
Sounds pretty promising, I'll definitely give it a shot soon-ish. I'm just glad you can check the turn order at the top of the screen.
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