Time for some random thoughts on various games I’ve been playing!

I’ve never actually beaten Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne on Hard mode and I figured this was something that needed to be rectified so I started up a new game a week or two ago. And besides seeing just how well the game holds up after several years in all major ways (art style, soundtrack, gameplay, and story), what really struck me this time is just how fast combat is. First off, the load times are quick. Second, you don’t have to search around in menus much – characters can only have up to 8 special abilities (some of which might be passives or dialogue options) so it just sticks Attack & all of your abilities in a single menu (you can press left or right to bring up other menus like items). Third, animations are really quick. Regular attack animations take all of a second (if that) and special ability animations take just long enough to look cool and give the player all the relevant information. Fourth, there’s no downtime – characters don’t need to run up to attack, there are no ATB meters that need to fill up; you’re either selecting a command or watching a move, and that’s it. All of these small but essential design choices create a game where combat is as fast as possible despite being turn-based and strategic – essential for a game that’s primarily about combat.

Oh and the main character’s default attack is punch. No need for a sword; just punch the devil in the face. Now that’s hardcore.

When Lunar came out on the iPhone & iPad just recently, I made a comment on the Neogaf forums that it looked like the PS1 version was still the best version to get and that I ought to go look for a used copy to replay it (I already owned the sequel, Lunar: Eternal Blue, since it’s one of my favorite games of all time). Vic Ireland of Working Designs (i.e. the company that localized the game in the first place) saw my post and told me “Hey, give me your address, I’ve got an extra copy.” Then free of charge, he shipped me a copy of Lunar for the PS1 and even threw in a Lunar:EB collectible pin. Extremely nice of him and completely unexpected. So I’ve been replaying Lunar & its sequel off and on and it finally dawned on me just why I like this series so much – the Lunar games are simultaneously funny & sincere. Whereas most comedy games go for outright parody, Lunar treats its story and character challenges very seriously…and then throws in fun, quirky characters and silly jokes here and there. This gives the games a very unique feel to them that you rarely see duplicated elsewhere. In many ways, they’re the Prydain Chronicles of video games.

With all the new Vita games coming out this month & next, I was in the mood to play the Vita so I decided to play some more Gravity Rush (love the game but I got distracted by other games so I never finished it). I really think the people who complained that there wasn’t enough to do were completely missing the point. More than most games, Gravity Rush is about immersion. I played through Episodes 12 through 17 last night and when I was done, I felt like I had gone on an actual adventure and not just played a video game. The gorgeous art style, the amazing soundtrack, the excellent controls, the unique gravity-based combat – these all combined to draw me into the world and created an immersive experience the likes of which I’ve rarely experienced.

And finally, the new RPG I’ve spent the most time in the past month (other than Torchlight) – Radiant Historia. There’s a lot I could say about this game, but I’d like to focus on one thing – the changing party. For those unfamiliar with the game, there are two primary timelines that you go back and forth between. Typically you’ll run into a dead-end in one timeline and then have to go to the other time-line to find a solution to it. What’s really neat about this whole setup besides the story implications is how it frequently results in you having access to different playable characters. In most RPGs, you gain party members and they stay in your party but I think there’s a lot of interesting things that could be done in RPGs where your party frequently changes as the story progresses. In fact, I think this is one of the reasons that Final Fantasy IV remains such a popular RPG even today.

And that’s it for today’s random game analyzing! As you can see, I rarely stick to just playing one game at a time. 🙂

4 Responses

  1. @Chris – I probably do not represent the majority of gamers, but my PS3 has been used to play PSX games, particularly those from the PSN, considerably more than PS3 games. The appeal of infinite, secure, memory cards goes a long with with my brand of radical gamer. If any cliche of people are known for specious reasoning, surely gamers are as well.

  2. Well, this is a post that is near and dear to my heart. To start off…

    Radiant Historia. I just recently played it, made it to the final dungeon, and quit. When I got to the final dungeon, and realized just how much of the game I missed, I thought I was being thorough, I just lost the urge to play. I am going to start the game again someday, since I am new to the handheld circuit, got a DSi XL in may, and been loading up on DS rpg’s. I plan on using a walk through for round 2, because I can’t stand not doing everything in a game before I beat it. With the way the histories affect each other, I am looking forward to seeing exactly what changes, as it bummed me out when some of the characters died, and there was a way to prevent it.

    I own the original Lunar 1 and 2, and the playstation versions as well. I liked the originals better over all, random combat, grittier graphics to go with the cheerful cast, and so on. They were the games that cemented Working Designs as tied for my favorite company period, next to Square, when they actually knew what they were doing. The humor drove those games so well, and the simplistic, but complex gear. I liked getting interesting weapons that had unique effects.

    I agree wholeheartedly about the sincere part of your post regarding Lunar. It is hard to hear people talk the way they do in Lunar without grimacing, well, in modern games, but the spoken word in Lunar sounds natural coming from a lot of those characters. Even without the greatest voice actors in the world, just the way the characters were portrayed in text made a lot of the sappy dialogue enjoyable instead of a headache.

    As for Nocturne….that is pretty much one of my top 5 games of all time. You mentioned the music, but one thing that always hits me every time I play that game is how brutal the normal attack sounds from the main character. You mentioned he punches, but the sound of him punching just sounds like it is pounding something into solid concrete, and that really drove home the battle system for me. My ideal game is Nocturne with a crafting system, and more control over customizing my main character. I think Digital Devil Saga would be too much control, but I enjoyed those games too, just no where near as much as nocturnes.

    As for the vita and complaints, its just people are so starved for good games, that when a game comes out it gets looked at with a magnifying glass. The vita has an ok library at the moment, but there isn’t enough variety for fans who like certain kinds of games. One could argue that ps1 games are available now, but people just don’t want a $300+ dollar hand held to play decade old games. That is why ps1 games won’t sell Vitas, only new games will, and in that regard, Vita is not having a very good time of it.

    What is your view on the upcoming Nintendo console, and the 3DS? I wouldnt mind seeing a post about your thoughts on that. For me, I think Nintendo is actually causing me to develop an itch that only they can scratch, and that hasn’t happened since the Super Nintendo.

  3. Lunar Silver Star Story Complete is the only Lunar game I’ve really played. Which is odd, as I loved that game. I think I just became distracted by other things and never came back to the series. It’s a shame. Perhaps your thoughts on it may compel me to track down some of the other titles.

  4. Good observations regarding why Nocturne’s combat system is so good. I think that having sub-menus for spells and items breaks the abstraction. You go from watching a battle, to managing a character sheet. Sub-menus are not a bad thing at all, but I think that not having them is the better method.

    I cannot say enough good things about Radiant Historia. It was class.

    Now, I command you to play Contact on DS.

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