White Knight Chronicles

[jakonovski]

Giantbomb has a Quick Look on WKC: http://www.giantbomb.com/quick-look-white-knight-chronicles/17-1971/

[Rendakor]

Hows the Combat :: Cutscene ratio? While I loved DC I and II, Rogue Galaxy turned me off because (at least in the first few hours) I was watching more than playing.

... poor so far. It's cutscene-tastic. I'm not far in though, but I've already started skipping cutscenes if they go on for more than a minute to introduce a plot point.

FFFFFFFFFFFUUUUUUUUUUUUU-

[Riggswolfe]

Hows the Combat :: Cutscene ratio? While I loved DC I and II, Rogue Galaxy turned me off because (at least in the first few hours) I was watching more than playing.

Rogue Galaxy turned me off because I got too wrapped up in trying to keep my weapons upgraded and felt like I had to grind to play the game effectively.

That said, if you're whining about cutscenes RPGs might be the wrong genre for you.

[Sauced]

I'm only a little ways in, but it definitely has that Level 5 "Just make it past the first 5 hours and it will get awesome" feel that DC 2 and Rogue Galaxy had.

[Tige]

That said, if you're whining about cutscenes RPGs might be the wrong genre for you.

I've never skipped soooo many cutscenes.  Overall it's a decent game but the cutscenes are really over the top on this one.

I completely forgot about transforming for the boss just prior to the Nordia Caves, just took it down with combos.   Hopefully things will get a bit more technical, it wasn't any more or less difficult than taking down a troll or treant.

[Yegolev]

I think the graph for this game is more of a dromedary.

Nothing in this thread is definitively negative so far.  Complaints could be used on any number of JRPGs.  I'm probably on board.

Maybe the JRPGs you slog through.  We know about Blue Dragon.

And Lost Odyssey.  Did you know that a trait of psychopaths is that they cannot learn from mistakes?

Luckily I learned not to play any more Dragon Quest.

[Kitsune]

This is yet another JRPG that should've come with a 200-page manual.  Don't want to wait for your attack ring to recharge?  Well just string your attacks in a combo!  Of course, we won't tell you what attack does what in a combo, so good luck putting them together!  Collect random shit from places!  We won't tell you what it does or how to use it.  Why are you carrying around a hundred pounds of withered tree branches?  We don't know either, but we're sure it's essential at some point.

I see a lot of potential, but it's going to take a lot of Google and translating Japanese websites to make any fucking sense of the obtuse game mechanics.

And yes, it's pretty.  Unless you made your avatar into a horrible abomination.  Which is all too possible.

[Kitsune]

Additionally: http://wkcinfo.blogspot.com/

[Rendakor]

One complaint I've heard from my coworkers is that your player-created character is not the main character. Is that the case?

[schild]

Seems that way but you can choose who to play (when it's not a forced split like 2 hours in). I assume the in-game character is for multiplayer. Leonard is the storyline "hero."

[Hawkbit]

I'm not far into it, but so far I'm not seeing the bad.  Granted, I haven't played a console true RPG in over four years or so, but it's got everything I need so far. 

[Phildo]

Where I am, I'm pretty disappointed that they moved away from the action-oriented combat of Rogue Galaxy and Dark Cloud for a sit-and-wait system.  Let me tell you how much I enjoy watching timers count down before I do my next move!  This game seems to have an incredibly complex crafting system sitting on top of one of the least complex combat systems I've seen in years.  The combat feels Magna Carta bad right now.

Edit: Actually, it's reminding me a lot of a slower and less complicated Final Fantasy XII.  But I liked FFXII, so I'm still figuring out why this game feels so much worse to me.

[Kitsune]

So far, I think that Rogue Galaxy is the better game.  Which is more that Rogue Galaxy is an excellent game than White Knight is a bad game; WKC is just lacking in some of the pizazz that Rogue Galaxy had.

[Dtrain]

This is yet another JRPG that should've come with a 200-page manual.

They call those strategy guides now-a-days. 

Actually, if I think back, the last strategy guide I did buy was for Dark Cloud 2.

[dusematic]

http://www.rpgfan.com/reviews/White_Knight_Chronicles/index.html

[stray]

http://www.rpgfan.com/reviews/White_Knight_Chronicles/index.html

The opening point is a good one, and one I hate to admit. Western RPG's are getting their day in the sun, and J developers are off their A game. Even the best JRPG out atm (Demon's Souls) is pretty untraditional, a bit on the action side, and very western in art style. Perhaps the second best JRPG (Tales of Vesparia) is a pretty action like too.

Anyhow, I was looking forward to this, but it'll have to wait.

[John Difool]

This game is definately a mixed bag. Combat is ludicrously easy; there's little reason to Transform into a Knight unless you want to speed up the inevitable demise of your foe or you're forced into it by the "story". The voice acting is crippled by the fact that the material they have to work with is so banal. If they had dropped the party "banter" the Metacritic score would gain ten points.The Georama part I find oddly compelling. Unfortunately I've grown my town to the point where I need to start working my GR level up through online questing if I want to expand it (and I do). Crafting I haven't really delved into yet as I don't want to use up goods I've foraged or gotten from drops and chests on marginally upgrading a weapon or armor only to discover that what I used was somewhat rare and a necessity for a key build in my Georama. I'll probably check around online to see whats what in that regard but I was concentrating on getting a straight playthrough in first. I'll have to see how the online quests are before passing final judgement but I can understand why some of the reviews are so harsh.

[Phildo]

The more I've played, the more I just want to play Final Fantasy XII again.  Although I liked the party banter personally, it added a bit of flavor to the tedium of grinding my way through each gigantic level.  The reason the georama works is because, unless I'm mistaken, it's lifted from Dark Cloud 1 so they've had some time to think about improving it.

Has anyone figured out how to make the AI heal status effects without controlling them manually?  Or do anything marginally useful besides cast party healing spells when only one person is injured?

[Margalis]

Is that a new avatar?

[Nightblade]

Slower than FF12 would be FF11, and we all know how invigorating that game's combat was... Actually, looking at these videos, this looks even slower. I didn't even think that was possible.

[Phildo]

Is that a new avatar?

Mine?  Yes.  I was tired of wearing my scarlet letter.

[schild]

Is that a new avatar?

Mine?  Yes.  I was tired of wearing my scarlet letter.

Really though, I should dump one that's even worse on you for choosing such an ugly avatar this time around.

[NiX]

It irritated me, so I adblocked it.

[John Difool]

The more I've played, the more I just want to play Final Fantasy XII again.  Although I liked the party banter personally, it added a bit of flavor to the tedium of grinding my way through each gigantic level.  The reason the georama works is because, unless I'm mistaken, it's lifted from Dark Cloud 1 so they've had some time to think about improving it.

Has anyone figured out how to make the AI heal status effects without controlling them manually?  Or do anything marginally useful besides cast party healing spells when only one person is injured?

Oddly enough I had been doing a replay of FFXII when I picked WKC up. One of my gaming goals in life is to finally obtain the "secret" ultimate clan rank in that game.
Back on topic I didn't see anyway to explicitly set up a 'Status Ailment->Remedy' parameter. There were a few times that they did so on their own but not in any pattern I could discern and certainly not with any regularity. Try stacking all the various cures on the first action bar of your healer and hope the AI takes a cue from that? It's not as if any of the ones you get hit with are particularly debilitating anyways, none of them excepting Poisin last very long and they only serve to lengthen a fight somewhat.

I'll try to get online questing started tonight. My PSN ID is FortusDei and I kept that as my World/Online ID in-game and my toon is named Fortus. Giving that info out in case someone wanted to group or you feel the need to trample my Georama's Herb Garden.

[Lakov_Sanite]

Changing avatars is so 2000's

[Phildo]

Why do you all hate Big Trouble in Little China?

Edit: Do the other characters only use abilities that have been assigned to their hotbars?  That would mean a ton of micromanaging if you wanted to make a hybrid mage.

[Tige]

Edit: Do the other characters only use abilities that have been assigned to their hotbars?  That would mean a ton of micromanaging if you wanted to make a hybrid mage.

That is a very good question.  I maxxed Leonard on longsword then gave him a bunch of healing abilities then watched a fight from my avatar.  Never saw him heal once.  He was set to fight as he sees fit while yulie was heal first but there where a few times Leonard should have healed but didn't.

The biggest bitch about wkc I have is the difficulty but I'm not sure the design of character control could handle anything more.

[John Difool]

Phildo I have no clue how the AI chooses which actions to use. I had set my party members up with some nice combos but they never used them. Possibly if I had chosen 'All Out' for their behaviour they might have. Once I realized that there was little reason to use anything other than the default base attack though I didn't bother studying the combat mechanics further.

[schild]

I keep my AI characters with one row of stuff and a heal and rez at the end and they always heal and rez when needed. Two slots are regular attacks and the other two are combos (and they use them).

[John Difool]

Schild how do you have them set up as far as behaviour and the R3 button command? I'm through with the single player currently but if I do NG+ or want to bring a different character through I'd be interested in knowing how you got that working.

[schild]

Schild how do you have them set up as far as behaviour and the R3 button command? I'm through with the single player currently but if I do NG+ or want to bring a different character through I'd be interested in knowing how you got that working.

Focus one target.

[John Difool]

Focus one target.

Hmmm. That's what I had as well. What setting do you have for their general temperament or whatever that's called? I know I had Yulie as 'Heal First' and Leonard was 'Mixed Action' I think? Will have to check exactly but he wasn't Heal or the All Out setting.

Edit: Leonard is set to 'Auto'

[Yegolev]

If you think combat is slow with a melee, try a pure mage.

Anyway, not important since you can switch to anyone whenever.  Combat is pretty easy but slow.  I mean that anything takes forever to kill and usually it won't kill me if I am paying attention at all.  Even transforming barely helps against a troll or treant, at least while I am around level 6.  Maybe I need to stock up on inspectacles.

I can tell you that a NPC will use whatever is in the action bar you left him on, tested with my character who has a Wind bar, a Fire bar and an Earth bar.

I still like it.  Everything that isn't combat is enjoyable.

Yegolev.Island

[Hawkbit]

Ok, so I'm delving into this a bit and have a few issues.  I'm not so hot on the combat and I'm hoping to get some advice to make the best of it.  Otherwise, it's a pretty neat game. 

1.  I've heard that armor type determines length of time between attacks.  Is there a way to determine what type an armor is by looking at it?  There's no descriptor that says if it's heavy, medium or light.  Do I simply have to guess at them?  Some are easy, like a Copper Chestplate is obviously a heavy armor and Cotton Gloves are obviously light.  But I have an item called Adventurer's Pants....  wtf is that? 

2.  Is there a simple method for setting up character AI?  I made my character a sword tank and I can control him pretty well, but I want to make sure others are actually doing the things I set them up for.  How in the world do I set up combos for them and myself that are efficient?   There's so many abilities that seem like they're doing the exact same thing as others and I haven't determined how they should be used situationally. 

The combat feels like getting a game without an instruction manual. 

[Dtrain]

So I'm finally getting into this, and I'm surprised I haven't seen too much about this, but this game is just about ruined by it's interface. Seriously, it's one of the worst UIs that I can recall in recent memory.

1. What do these stats do? LOL I DUNNO WUT
2. For every hour of game time I end up spending 20 minutes fucking around with combos and skill choices.
3. Why do the descriptions for the skills give me such pointless descriptions. This one is "A vertical chop." This one is "A horrizontal chop." Thanks for that.
4. Need your ally to do something specific? Mash R3 and watch as they pick something at random, with a 3/4 chance that it won't be the most effective element.
5. Geonet. LAWL.

And it's sad, because I think I really could have liked this game.