Lost Odyssey

[Azazel]

I rang MS today to ask why they're still fucking around with parts of my retrofit wireless wheel after a month. They told me the final cable they said would be sent out 2 weeks ago was sent out yesterday. I asked to speak to a T2 supervisor because it's not good enough, and after hearing my long and painful story of "I'm not satisfied as a consumer who bought an item that cost nearly $200 a month ago and have not been able to use it yet" (without swerring or personal abuse) the woman offered me a free game to shut me up. One of the games on the list was this one, and since 3 of the other games from the list are shit and I already own the other 5, I chose Lost Odyssey (after checking an online review).

How nice to log onto f13 and find it's actually quite good.

[schild]

Jesus. Kaim is a great fucking protagonist.

DISC 2 PLZ.

[Yegolev]

How nice to log onto f13 and find it's actually quite good.

Castro retired so he can play this game all day.

[Riggswolfe]

I have to add to the "the dreams are great and depressing" chorus. Jesus, does this guy have any good memories?

[schild]

I have to add to the "the dreams are great and depressing" chorus. Jesus, does this guy have any good memories?

I don't remember anywhere near as many good memories as I do bad ones (I mean 'in real life').

Also, a number of the dreams are bittersweet. Not bad, but definitely not good, but they no doubt bring you closer to Kaim and his journey.

Fuck, he's well characterized.

[Tebonas]

Just got it and didn't have much time to meddle yet, but damn if this game isn't beautiful.

[Phildo]

I feel like they probably watched a lot of Highlander to inspire the flashbacks.

[Lum]

The dream sequences are actually based on a Japanese style of game called Visual novels.

[Wolf]

I've been playing this for a while. No idea what made me pick it up, as I have a lot of prejudice towards JPRGs but I'm fucking loving it. I'm even asking around for other decent games like it to play through after I'm done. You guys touched on the visiuals and the music, they're fucking amazing. The actor that does Seth, however, fucking irritates me. I find myself switching to the Japanese audio quite often because of her. Until I get tired of reading subtitles and missing shit that is. And since we're on the subject of reading, I like the novels, but I also hate reading on screen. Publish a book and I'll read 'em. Right now I'm just mashing the B button as soon as Seth or Kaim start looking weird. First couple of boss battles were a bit rough, yeah. But right now I should be around the middle of the second disk and I can only lose a battle if the power to my apartment cuts out. I think I figured out what's this game's le imba is. Still, I love it and ripping through shit feels awesome :)

[Rasix]

I've been playing this for a while. No idea what made me pick it up, as I have a lot of prejudice towards JPRGs but I'm fucking loving it. I'm even asking around for other decent games like it to play through after I'm done.

Closest game in feel would be Shadow Hearts: Covenant (SH2), although it takes itself way less seriously (and there's like 100% more gayness).   It's recommended to finish Shadow Hearts first, although SH has the problem of being a little bit dated and not nearly as polished as SH2.  Anything you seriously dislike about SH1 is fixed in SH2.  It's just a massive improvement to all of the game systems.  However, the story in SH2 assumes a certain ending from the first and does some major retconning in spots.  It can get on your nerves a little.  Still, best JRPG with a great battle system. 

FF12 is similar in scope and tone, just it plays like a MMO and you might not like that.

Persona 3 was last year's JRPG gem, but it's a different beast altogether.

None of these are going to match the production values for Lost Odyssey.  SH2 does an admirable job for the hardware it's working with.

edit: all ps2 games.  LO is honestly the only really good JRPG on the 360.  Eternal Sonata and Blue Dragon were disappointments. The later especially so.

[Phildo]

Rasix nails it.  Just wanted to add that I absolutely loved the Shadow Hearts games and playing them in order is pretty important.  If you play the 2nd one first, you might as well not play the first one at all which is a shame since the storyline is really artfully done and the first few hours of it are incredible.

[SurfD]

What are the chances of this ever coming to PC.  This sounds, quite seriously, like the kind of game i would be willing to actually buy a 360 to play, even though i loathe the idea of buying a new system for one game.

[Wolf]

Thanks Rasix.

There's some seriously weird shit, gameplay wise, happening around the first third of the third disc. I can get why they did what they did, but it irritates me to no end :/

Also the game really does a poor job of balancing "action" and story telling. 2 hours of non stop random encounters, followed by 3 hours of running around a city topped by 45 minutes of cut scenes. I'm still loving it, though :)

[Driakos]

I'm playing it with German voices.  It's great.

[Phildo]

I sincerely doubt it will ever come to PC.  But I could be wrong.

[Miasma]

Maybe in ten years as part of the Lost Odyssey anthology, coinciding with the release of Lost Odyssey XIII...

[Azazel]

My copy arrived today. Hopefully I'll have tome to check it out on the weekend.

[Fabricated]

Consider me interested when I finally pick up a 360. I hope my utterly destroyed attention span can survive a full-on RPG...I still haven't completed Dragon Quest 8 or FF12 despite really liking both.

[Riggswolfe]

Consider me interested when I finally pick up a 360. I hope my utterly destroyed attention span can survive a full-on RPG...I still haven't completed Dragon Quest 8 or FF12 despite really liking both.

FF12 I can sort of understand, the story was very meh. But DQVIII? That's one of my favorite RPGs ever, though in all fairness I'm not sure I can tell you why since it has very little story and the game is "cute".

[Rasix]

DQ8 was balls.  I quit the second I realized I'd have to grind to beat the first sub-boss and then later the first official boss. Persona 3 grinding I could take, but I have issues with it when it's just there because of antiquated ideas on RPG design still holding sway.  Or perhaps it was just the game started you out at too low of a power curve (LO almost did this) and then failed to grab me at all with its story.

edit: hah, I thought I was responding to Phil. His irrational love of that game still burns brightly in my eyes.

[Yegolev]

I'm tempted to suggest other MegaTen games than Persona 3, but to enjoy those you really have to enjoy the combat.  A lot.  I adore the combat system, myself, especially the streamlined version in Digital Devil Saga, but it's really not for everyone.

I played DQVIII until the final boss, where I discovered that I wasn't quite powerful enough, but the idea of grinding more levels made my asshole clench.  I'll grind if it's fun, but that wasn't fun.

[Lum]

DQ8 is strictly for people who enjoy old-school "pixel people" JRPG grindy games. It's basically Final Fantasy 4 or 5 updated to the PS2.

(Note: I am one of those people. I think I own about 5 copies of FFV on various platforms.)

[schild]

DQ8 feels nothing like FF4 or 5. it feels like DQ1.

Which was the damn problem.

[Yegolev]

I agree with schild, and I didn't even play DQ1.  Of course, FF was patterened after DQ so it's probably just nitpicking.

[schild]

Nah, really wasn't. Final Fantasy is about 500x faster, and less Toriyamagay.

Now, if you mean DQ and FF defined the JRPG style of gaming, well, yea.

DQ is still overrated grindy ugly dreck.

[Yegolev]

I'm remembering some interview or something from Sakaguchi where he was using DQ as a model or inspiration for Square's last-ditch effort to stay in business.  I'm not trying to say FF didn't improve on DQ, don't get me wrong.  "Inspired by" might be a better phrase, or maybe everyone just liked blue backgrounds.  I enjoyed the shit out of Final Fantasy.  DQVIII was more grindy than FF1.  Also Toriyama can suck my left nut.

[Fabricated]

Dragon Quest has always done really really well in Japan I think. DQ8 certainly had great music and something resembling a sense of freedom despite being so linear. It was insanely difficult though and required pretty intensive grinding. I got to a point where you had to go get attacked by some dragon that casts a flash spell and use an item to absorb the flash so you can enter some stupid dungeon and I got tired of sailing around and quit.

FF12 I was wrapped up in but life got busy and I loaned it to a friend, I have yet to get it back. The whole gambit thing kinda got on my nerves.

[Margalis]

This is just slightly off topic but only a little. I have a friend who works at S-E. Recently there have been some interviews with him and some others at Square on places like Gamasutra where they discuss the typical way that Square operates. It's odd. Basically they start with concept art, characters, story, etc, the game is driven by what they call "planners" and the actual gameplay comes in much later. They don't re-use any tools or code. It's a very slow and expensive way of doing development, and explains things like "The Bouncer."

[Phildo]

I hardly believe my OWN irrational love for DQ8.  I just wanted to finish the damn thing, and if I ever see another metal slime in my life, I'll probably implode.

[schild]

This is just slightly off topic but only a little. I have a friend who works at S-E. Recently there have been some interviews with him and some others at Square on places like Gamasutra where they discuss the typical way that Square operates. It's odd. Basically they start with concept art, characters, story, etc, the game is driven by what they call "planners" and the actual gameplay comes in much later. They don't re-use any tools or code. It's a very slow and expensive way of doing development, and explains things like "The Bouncer."

The White Engine is the first engine they plan on using for a lot of shit.

[Samwise]

XBox exclusive, eh?  Weak.

[Rasix]

PC only gamers suddenly craving jRPGs?  Or just an excuse to make a textual funneh?

How nice to log onto f13 and find it's actually quite good.

Temper your expectations if you're not a fan of the genre.  Just fair warning.

[Phildo]

Yes, temper your expectations into STEEL!   

[Velorath]

This is just slightly off topic but only a little. I have a friend who works at S-E. Recently there have been some interviews with him and some others at Square on places like Gamasutra where they discuss the typical way that Square operates. It's odd. Basically they start with concept art, characters, story, etc, the game is driven by what they call "planners" and the actual gameplay comes in much later. They don't re-use any tools or code. It's a very slow and expensive way of doing development, and explains things like "The Bouncer."

The White Engine is the first engine they plan on using for a lot of shit.

Which is now going by the suckier name of Crystal Tools.

[schild]

Crystal Tools is what Squeenix is without Inoue, Uematsu and Sakaguchi. It's a great name for them.

Square should have picked up the staff from Nautilus when they had a chance.