Showing posts with label dragon quest. Show all posts
Showing posts with label dragon quest. Show all posts
Sunday, July 14, 2013
The Nintendo Power Retrospectives - Part 18
This week I'm taking a look at Nintendo Power #9 for November & December of 1989.
Wednesday, June 12, 2013
The Nintendo Power Retrospectives - Part 16
Now, at long last, we come to the most current episode of the Nintendo Power Retrospectives, as we come to the first issue of Nintendo Power's second year, where... wait, what? I've reviewed (pretty much) all of these games already? Well that's embarrassing.
Mega Man II Gameplay Footage by http://www.youtube.com/user/ClementJ642
Opening Music: 'Super Buck II' by Estradasphere - http://ocremix.org/remix/OCR00577/
Closing Music: 'Air Shooter' by Joshua Morse - http://ocremix.org/remix/OCR02208/
Monday, April 25, 2011
Dragon Quest V for the DS appears to have been reprinted (and musings on RPG localizations)
So it looks like Amazon is restocking new copies of Dragon Quest V for the DS. You should probably buy this - even though they're $40, per its original retail price, it quickly went out of print, and most online places were selling used copies in excess of $60. (Granted, it's always been $35 at Gamestop, but they are difficult to find and may not even have the case/manual, due to some new policies of keeping them off the store floor to make way for 3DS titles.) It is definitely worth grabbing - it's basically the game that convinced me the Dragon Quest series in general was pretty good, and I still feel it's the best of them, even though the series overall is a little too conservative for my tastes. (Check out the review for a bit of gushing and very slight spoilers for the few hours of the game, of which explanation is necessary to convey why it's so fantastic.) (And apologies for not grabbing any English pics of the DS version of V, or for the DS version of VI at all - I just got the latter one myself last week.)
The case of Dragon Quest V is interesting in relation to how it got to valuable so quickly. Square-Enix prepped up Dragon Quest IV to be a relatively big title, but it looks like they overshipped it and the title underperformed, so copies can still be easily found for $15 and under. As a result, they printed substantially fewer copies of Dragon Quest V, even though that particular entry has a far greater reputation. It must've under sold too, since Nintendo took over marketing and distribution for IX and VI, but now since IX has gained some popularity, more gamers are looking back for the titles they missed, and V has the best word of mouth.
I think a lot of bigger publishers underestimate the power of word of mouth for RPG titles. The type of folks who play RPGs are also usually the types to hang out in forums and converse with other like-minded folk, and have a good idea of what's good and what isn't. If a particular entry in a series is bad, unfortunately, it then suggests that there's no interest in the series at all, cancelling further localization plans. Sure, Front Mission 4 flopped, but that's because it wasn't very good, not because there wasn't interest in Front Mission 5. And what about Valkyria Chronicles 2? It probably also stumbled, not only due to its downgraded release on the PSP, but the general reaction (at least in English speaking territories) of it being substantially inferior, but will that doom the localization of Valkyria Chronicles 3, even though it's purported to be better?
At any rate, buy Dragon Quest V. Show that there's SOME type of interest portable RPGs. I'd rather be playing my games on a TV or computer monitor, but I'd also play them on a portable over not getting to play them in English at all. (And while it's not on sale, you should also get Radiant Historia on the case of it being pretty damn good.)
Sunday, September 26, 2010
The Psychology of Grinding
Etrian Odyssey III came out this past week, and once again, it's another game that will probably sit on my shelf for months until I get the time to really play it. Years after the fact, I'm still not sure if I like Etrian Odyssey. I like the feeling, conceptually, of getting lost in a maze and beating up stuff to awesome Yuzo Koshiro music, but then I realize it will require hours of dedication I just don't have, and then I'll go off to pursue something more immediately gratifying. At least, contrary to this completely wrong RPGamer review, it's got an outstanding soundtrack, easily next to NIER and Scott Pilgrim for Best Video Game OST of 2010.
I still read threads about Etrian Odyssey though, and there's a recurring sentiment that I also see about any old-school type RPG. There's a lot of resentment towards reviewers that claim that there's too much focus on grinding. No, the fans say, you absolutely don't need to grind in Dragon Quest or Etrian Odyssey or any of these games! If you fully explore the map and do all of the subquests and farm all of the supply points, you'll never need to sit around and build levels! Well...that's kind of grinding right there.
The disconnect, it seems, that people can't agree about what constitutes "grinding". Its general definition is mostly "any repetitive aspect which I find tedious", but that bar is completely different for every player. Me, I like the feeling of constant progression. I don't like doing subquests, or anything that strays away from the main goal - I never have and probably never will. But these sort of RPGs aren't built for that mindset, and are definitely for the people who like to explore and take their time.
The concept of leveling up is such an integral part of an RPG that to remove it completely feels like ripping out a spinal cord, but I think there are a few ways to, psychologically, get the player to enjoy this concept, so it doesn't feel like "grinding". (1) Provide more content that's part of the "main" game, and (2) deliver better player progression feedback.
The reason why I'm talking about this is because I'm still embroiled in Ys Seven at the moment. The only real criticism I can dish against the game is that there's almost too much of it. The previous Ys games were pretty short, with minimal weaponry and fairly small areas. Ys Seven is a much, much larger game in every regard, and that includes level design.
All prior Ys games have had copious amounts of grinding, because they're all based on a game that came out in like 1987. Most fans never really minded, because Falcom made it fun, but it's still a valid criticism towards them. In Ys Seven, they tried to fix that. If you break it down to percentages, you probably spend as much time killing enemies in Ys Seven as the previous games, but instead of simply running back and forth between the same few screens, it's spread out over the course of much longer levels, giving a more natural sense of progression.
For this to work, the "checkpoints", the boss battles, need to be well balanced, which Ys Seven is pretty good at. Although there are a handful of difficulty spikes (that stupid bird on the tower), for the most part, if you fight every enemy along the way and don't run past them, then you'll be sufficiently leveled up to take on the boss at a reasonable difficulty. There's no need to branch off and do anything else.
In the cases of Etrian Odyssey there's enough content there so the player just isn't running around in circles, but it's all presented as "optional". It isn't, really, but to people who like to play their games in a straightforward manner, they feel more like roadblocks than anything else.
Dragon Quest always felt the same way to me. If you charge through a dungeon and get to a boss, even if you've fought every random battle along the way and maybe returned to town once or twice to get new equipment, it doesn't always feel like you're QUITE ready for it.
This may actually not be true, which brings me to my second point - random-battle, turn-based RPGs do a TERRIBLE job of communicating to the player how powerful they actually are. Maybe you are well equipped to defeat that boss, but he pulled off that really powerful attack twice in a row on the same character and set you on a course to defeat. When the player dies, they are left to wonder - did I screw up, or am I simply underleveled? Luck plays a reasonable part in the proceedings, and players are aware of this, so I think the general assumption is that they aren't strong enough, which leads them to believe they need to grind some more. Maybe they don't though? But the game isn't making this message clear. One could argue that this feeling of uncertainity is a central aspect of an RPG, especially given how easy it is to liken Dragon Quest to gambling, but it's also not one I'm a fan of.
Ys Seven (and most other Ys games) don't really have this problem, because they're action-based, and it's clearer that you failed because your strategy is flawed or your reflexes aren't up to snuff. Or, if you're only doind single digit damage against a box with 10,000 HP, there's probably a character development issue. Whatever it is, the player has a better idea of what they're doing wrong.
There are numerous other examples of things done right or wrong. Nippon Ichi games, for example, everyone complains those are grindfests. I'm not sure I agree, but given how many options there are for character development, combined with their generally poor balance, makes it easy for them to come off that way. Again, it's all about perception and how it's presented, and these things go a long way towards improving player enjoyment. Maybe they should hire some actual psychologists to look at these things.
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