Messages

1

General / Re: Odin Sphere for Playstation 2

« on: Apr. 12, 2009, 11:58:13 PM »

It sped up travel across Ys VI considerably (dash jump run technique), and on Nightmare I found it helpful to avoid some of the nastier attacks...

Wow, you used it to move around?  That's...impressive, to say the least.  I couldn't stand that just because it looks dumb.  No, I didn't moonwalk everywhere in Symphony of the Night either.

PS - Enjoyed Vesper Voyages...  Nostalgic.  If compared to existing music it reminded me of a cross between a Falcom game, Snatcher and Mega Man.

I know what you mean.  The less serious music that I write (like that), always winds up with a kind of "old video game music" vibe, but without the chiptune crap.  I guess I still hearken back to the day when game music was largely inspired by Yellow Magic Orchestra.

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General / Re: Odin Sphere for Playstation 2

« on: Apr. 10, 2009, 11:07:59 AM »

I don't know what to say about the controls, I found them natural to pickup making the battles pretty enjoyable, albiet way repetitive.  Gwendolyn : Swoop in, time the dive then, critical if possible;  or do the whirlwind, alt. jump over the whirlwind to make the enemies follow you into the whirlwind [kills em instantly pretty much].  I think games like Crescent Pale Mist or even Ys VI, referring to learning the whirlwind, dash attacks, and dash jumps were far more awkward.  And far from FPS difficulty like Starsiege : Tribes.

Wow, the two of us must have radically different approaches to what we want out of a game's controls then.  You appear to equate "good controls" with a good control scheme.

To me, "good control" is a simple matter of "does the @sshole on the screen do what I want?"

It's telling that you'd bring up something as rarely used as Ys VI's dash jump, a maneuver that is pretty much never used in normal combat, and is in fact completely optional to the game (you need it to get certain treasure, but none of it is required to complete the game).  Something like that is bonus material, and has nothing to do with the game's control.

If you were approaching the issue the same way I do, there's no way you could call Ys VI's controls "awkward" from any perspective.  In that game, you will almost always move in the direction being pressed regardless of what you're doing, and most of the attacks are either short, are allow for control during the attack (like the whirlwind); hence, the @sshole on the screen does what I tell him to do, acting as my proper avatar in that virtual world without significant latency.

...As opposed to a game like Odin Sphere where you press a button and promptly lose all control of your character for several moments.

This is the same reason why I'll always prefer a fighting game like Guilty Gear or Street Fighter (good control) over one like Tekken or Soul Calibur (shitty control).

Sorry if I sound repetitive, just enjoyed dwelling/remembering Odin Sphere as I type 

oh noes, someone has a different opinion ON THE INTERNET.

I think you're reading my posts the wrong way if you feel a need to apologize.  I'm not trying to put you down here, dude.

But it's interesting to me that spending hours doing repetitive things and reloading to get perfect scores doesn't faze you at all, whereas having to learn a semi-complex maneuver in order to get optional treasure is "awkward".

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General / Re: Odin Sphere for Playstation 2

« on: Apr. 09, 2009, 01:12:27 PM »

I used to loveee Final Fantasy Tactics soundtrack, now I find it only so, so... On the other hand I really enjoyed some of Odin Sphere's songs.  Great moody cutscenes.

The music wasn't awful by any stretch.  But it also wasn't ingenious like some of Sakimoto's earlier work.  It provided decent background music, nothing else, just like dozens of other jRPGs with orchestrally-inspired soundtracks.  Nothing about it stood out or was particularly memorable.

In other words, I'm looking for more than "great moody cutscenes" from music before I'm impressed.  I'm fully aware that most people aren't.

You found it hard though?  What difficulty did you play on?  There's an easy mode I think besides hard, and normal [and unlockable difficulties]

No, it wasn't hard as in challenging.  The difficulty in this game was all artificially induced due to piss-poor controls.  If you're OK with reloading every time you take a hit, then you wouldn't have picked up on this.  I wouldn't find that fun, personally.  If the action in the game was the kind of thing I could learn from and get better at (ie - actually challenging), I wouldn't have a problem.

It's good to see you're not trying to defend the absurd item management.

4

General / Re: Odin Sphere for Playstation 2

« on: Apr. 09, 2009, 01:34:17 AM »

Story and voice acting is great, as is the art.

The music was pretty good too, though I think Sakimoto is capable of much better.  But then, I'm a music guy too, so I'm going to be more picky about that than most people.  Sadly, Sakimoto fell back on mostly filler orchestral drudgery for the soundtrack, like he's been doing with his other soundtracks lately.  Nothing like the thoughtful motifs found in Final Fantasy Tactics here, nor the driving contrasts of Radiant Silvergun.

But oh good God, the gameplay.  The gameplay is really fucking annoying.  A few points:

- The game artificially makes the game challenging in incredibly stupid ways
- There was no reason to make item management as silly as they did.
- As you stated, the game is set up as something of an arcade-style side-scrolling action game.  Unfortunately, most egregious of all, the control is terrible!  This game has the kind of control where you have to plan every move ahead, because every button initializes a series of (admittedly pretty) animations that you have no control of your character during.

It's a shame, because this game could have been one of the greatest with just a couple of slightly less boneheaded design decisions.

I really REALLY wanted to like it too.

EDIT: The story is really cool though.  I made it through 2 and a half of the stories myself, and I really wanted to do more, but I just couldn't take the game deciding to kill me for no good reason anymore.

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General / Re: Ys Utopia !

« on: Apr. 08, 2009, 12:09:50 AM »

I see Justus and then immediately notice a "Vesper Voyagers v.4" link at his sig, so I click it, but you get a File Not Found error after you click their Download File link. You will fix, yesss, Justus??

Ah!  Apparently at some point Zshare.net started sucking 9 dicks in hell.

Well, I'll try switching it to Tindeck.  It started out only working for the Something Awful forums, but I think it works everywhere now.  Guess we'll find out.

Far be it for me to fail to subject everyone possible to my awful awful music.

I'm definitely finally done revising that particular track.  Four revisions of the same music is way too much.  I just couldn't resist doing it with analog synthesizers and some of my newer post-production equipment (including my homemade equalizer).

This is the sort of thing you have to look forward to if I ever get around to writing that Ys 6 alternative soundtrack (only I'll probably use much more 80s-tastic sounds like the old PCE soundtracks)

6

General / Re: Hobbies other than Ys.

« on: Apr. 07, 2009, 10:04:42 AM »

Electronics is big for me right now.  Fixing things and inventing things.

Music has always been a very big part of my life too.  Writing music, playing my violin, learning piano, guitar, and drums, as well as recording, production, and post-production of audio.  Though actually I don't know if I can call it a hobby since I'm a professional.

Ever since I discovered that it makes me about 10 times better at the violin, I've been really into Yoga too.

I read a lot.  It used to be mostly sci-fi crap, but as I've gotten older, I've gotten more into classic literature as well as more instructive books.  I'm currently reading Don Quixote.

I used to watch anime and read manga, but I stopped a couple of years ago.  I don't have any particular hatred of the medium, but after some radical personality changes I went through, I found that I just can't relate to it meaningfully anymore.  I wouldn't say anything as condescending as "I outgrew it" though.

I also don't play video games as much as I used to.  For instance, the ones that are basically like watching anime (for the above mentioned reasons).  But I still find enough games I enjoy to still call myself a gamer.

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General / Re: Ys Utopia !

« on: Apr. 07, 2009, 09:37:30 AM »

Good to see these forums back up.  I honestly never expected to see them again.

It's been a hell of a two years for me, mostly spent working my ass off to keep putting food on my table as an entrepreneur in the entertainment sector (in the midwest at that) during these economic troubles while frantically cramming in night classes to work towards a more stable career.

It's not all bad though, since I've always wanted to learn more about electrical engineering anyways, and I still manage a relatively consistent flow of clientele.  And I've discovered that I can pick up some of the financial slack by repairing Xbox 360s (red ring of death is HILARIOUSLY easy to fix it turns out).

Maybe someday (perhaps when I graduate 1 year from now), I'll actually be able to live off of working only 40 hours a week, and will have spare time for extra things (if you know what I mean).

tldr - I probably still won't post or participate much, but it's still good to see it around.

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General / Re: What are YOU watching on youtube at the moment?

« on: Mar. 29, 2007, 04:30:17 PM »

Man, grip shift actually looks kind of fun.

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General / Re: Speculation: what is Falcom next project?

« on: Mar. 29, 2007, 02:09:37 AM »

I can't speak for Felghana, but I got the distinct impression that Origin was trying to be more of an action game, which I personally appreciated happening once, but I wouldn't mind the next game having more exploration/puzzles, to be honest.

As for 3d...it's always a little nerve-racking when your favorite 2d games go 3d.  But I think we could trust Falcom to do a good job of it.  I thought Gurumin was pretty well-executed in 3d.

Now for some different speculation: a return to the bash-into-things-to-kill-them gameplay or no?  I think it would be tops to revist that in full 3d, personally.

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General / Re: Speculation: what is Falcom next project?

« on: Mar. 26, 2007, 06:26:20 AM »

I seriously doubt it.  I know it seems like Ys 1&2 gets remade a lot, but it's only been remade ONCE by Falcom themselves (and no, I'm not counting Eternal's transformation to Complete).  It's too soon for a new remake 

I personally think they'll do something original next.  They've been focusing on Legend of Heroes and Ys lately, and it's been a long time since they've released anything competely original.  Was Gurumin the last one?  That was over two years ago!

Of course, we can't really speculate on something new and original...so let's instead speculate on what the next Ys will be!

I think there are only two possibilities:
1) They do yet another spinoff game or remake using the Ys 6 engine (Remake of Ys IV maybe?)
2) Finally a brand new engine, which will almost certainly be Ys VII

EDIT: NEW VANTAGE MASTER!  heh heh.

11

General / Re: At last....

« on: Mar. 07, 2007, 10:55:54 PM »

Well, I seem to remember Konami going after the Dracula X Restoration project as soon as they heard about it.

I forget exactly, but I THINK it was a project the Castlevania Dungeon was hosting, that revolved around dumping the CD and somehow making it directly playable on Windows (without using an emulator).

Anyone else remember better?

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General / Re: Ys Online

« on: Mar. 06, 2007, 11:58:26 AM »

He said he was 18 when he did Actraiser 

Wait, are you serious?  I'm not saying I think you're consciously lying you understand, but something doesn't add up.  Actraiser was in '91.  Wasn't Xanadu scenario 2 in '84?  Wouldn't that make him 11 years old when he started writing game music professionally?  If nothing else, that certainly makes him 14 when he wrote the music for Ys I (1987), unless he just wrote the Actraiser soundtrack years before the game was made.

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General / Re: Ys Online

« on: Mar. 05, 2007, 11:10:10 AM »

I've been hearing about it off and on ever since Ys 6 came out 3 1/2 years ago.  I don't know how much is true, but the rumors I've heard are:

 - It's being developed by a team of Falcom and South Korean online game developer eSofnet
 - It takes place 1000 years after Adol's adventures
 - Every player character is a descendant of Adol

That's all I've got.  That, and these three screenshots from Famitsu last August.

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General / Re: Visual Novel Translations~

« on: Mar. 03, 2007, 12:33:43 AM »

Snatcher is sort of an anomoly of a game that falls somewhere in between being a visual novel and a game like Shadowgate or Deja Vu.  It's a Kojima game, of COURSE it's an anomoly.

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General / Happy Birthday Deuce and omgfloofy!

« on: Mar. 02, 2007, 12:39:54 PM »

Congratulations, you're 33 and 28 respectively and have lived to see it!  Having somehow managed to survive to 27 myself with my sanity intact, I'd say that's quite noteworthy.

But I didn't make this thread just to be a useless birthday thread.  I was looking through the calendar, and it suddenly struck me how most of the members here are older than your typical internet denizens.  The average age seem solidly around the later 20s, with plenty of members in their early 30s as well.  Gillian Seed and I were even born on the exact same day (Dec. 21, 1979).

Maybe I'm off my rocker, but isn't it a bit rare for teenagers to be in the definite minority on an internet forum, particularly one about video games?

I suppose the people who grew up with Turbo Grafx/PC Engine explain some of it, but not necessarily the Falcom crowd, which is made up of more than just the Turbo crowd.  I think of myself as being more of the latter.  I own and adore a Duo-R, but it was something I discovered later in life personally.

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General / Re: Visual Novel Translations~

« on: Mar. 02, 2007, 12:22:53 PM »

I've played some, back when I used to be a lot more into anime and manga.  In all honesty, I think most visual novels are little more than alternative manga.  The storylines, and in fact the entire experience, is very similar.  There's usually no real gameplay to speak of.

So if you like typical manga, visual novels offer a unique experience, with high resolution full color artwork, usually some limited animation, a few sound effects, a musical soundtrack, and usually a more detailed prose than what's in most manga.  Hmm...putting it like that almost makes it sound halfway between anime and manga...with detailed prose. 

If you dislike manga, or have some kind of caveat about what "should and should not be a video game" limiting what kind of software should be permissable for putting on a computer, then you'll probably hate visual novels.

I will say that visual novels tend to lack the scope of genre present in manga.  Currently, visual novels tend to almost ALWAYS contain an overflow of young female characters and are usually about romance (and pornographic for that matter).  Even the setting is the typical "modern day Japan in high school" thing, though I have seen a few with sci-fi themes or something.

It's that way because of the typical fanbase.  The medium itself has quite a lot of untapped potential...that will likely continue to be untapped.  I don't really care for visual novels anymore for the same reason I don't watch much anime or read manga anymore.  I got older and expanded my life experiences, and the stories are made to appeal to people with issues I don't have anymore.  There are things I can find appealing: the artwork is some of the most ridiculously detailed stuff you'll ever see and every now and then the music is good too (though usually in that Japanese "elevator music but more harmonically complex and less repetitive" kind of way).  Ultimately, it's not enough to make it worth sitting through any more Japanese coming-of-age stories for me.  The typical sexualization of cartoon schoolgirls is a deterrant for me as well.

I feel that anime, manga, and visual novels are all artistic mediums that could have a lot of potential if the market wasn't so completely locked on Japanese adolescent males.

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Ys IV: The Dawn of Ys / Re: Anyone had this happen?

« on: Feb. 21, 2007, 01:51:32 AM »

Try burning at 1X.  Those burns seem to work better for me.  Also, if you're shopping for CD brands, Verbatim.

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General / Re: Gurumin on PSP rocks!

« on: Feb. 18, 2007, 07:36:56 PM »

Well for one thing, LoH on PSP was programmed by Bandai, and are VERY different from the originals on PC.  PSP Gurumin (as well as PSP LoH6) were both developed in-house by Falcom themselves, and are attempts at just being ports instead of re-inventions like Bandai's LoH.  And yes, Mastiff's localization is way better than Bandai's.  All "issues" aside, the English in Gurumin flows much better, and actually reads like English is supposed to, where Bandai's translation for LoH was horribly awkward sounding, and had many highly visible language errors (both grammatical and otherwise).

Gameplay-wise...honestly, it feels like a cross between Ys and Mario 64.  I'm having a blast with it.  I actually miss platformers.

19

Ys I & II Complete / Re: new ys site at falcom

« on: Feb. 16, 2007, 05:19:14 PM »

Hmm.  I noticed they're having another illustration contest!  I wonder if anyone from around these parts is going to submit something for it this time.

I wish they'd have a music contest.  I'd do something for that in a heartbeat!

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General / Re: Gurumin on PSP rocks!

« on: Feb. 16, 2007, 05:11:45 PM »

And possibly the only reason Psycho DeuceBag and I are being picky about voice acting is because we've both attempted it before.

It's funny, but one of the reasons I wanted to try acting was to try to attain some tolerance for bad dubs.  I thought that maybe if I understood how difficult it was, I'd be more tolerant.  Oddly, it had the exact opposite effect and I'm now less tolerant than ever.

On another note, I'm getting further in the game and hearing more voices.  I'm still sticking to my original synopsis: it's a mixed bag.  A lot of the acting, per se, is decent.  But something else I hadn't thought of before leaps out at me: the characterization.  For instance, why does one mole brother have a country twang and the other an Italian accent?  I mean sure, OK, Doug is a "country mole" while his brother is a "city mole", but that doesn't explain why a pair of brothers raised in the same family environment would have two completely different accents.  Also, apropos or no, Roger's voice gets on my nerves.  OK fine, they had to make him sound like "Queer as Folk", but did it have to be THAT flamboyant?

All of that sounds like a negative attitude, and really this voice acting is indeed better than what I hear in a lot of games, ESPECIALLY cartoony games like this.

I'm not saying I like Working Designs' voice acting, but I think it's a little unfair to classify it in the same category as Valis or Shining Force III (favorite quote ".....TAAAAA?!?!?!?").  Actually, to be honest, I always rather liked the acting on Lunar 2, particularly closer to the end.

Also, they took the fuzzy nudity out of the healing point sequence....which really warrants a good hearty "LOL" more than anything else.

All in all, I think it's a rather amazing port.  The fact that Falcom themselves handled it really shows.  Some annoying framerate issues aside, it's remarkably accurate.  Even the analog stick seems to respond the way I want it to (this is the first PSP game I've ever played in which I REALLY felt able to use it)

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General / Re: Gurumin on PSP rocks!

« on: Feb. 15, 2007, 02:32:17 PM »

I only just started on it.  It's impressive how accurate a port it is.  It really feels the same as playing the PC version!  I have to disagree about the voice acting though.  It's not wonderful (or terrible), but kind of a mixed bag.  Parin's voice in particular really lacks dynamics.  I'm not saying it needs to be as wildly expressive as some English voice acting (and most Japanese acting), but there should be a little dynamic to it! 

I suppose that puts it ahead of the curve for most voice acting though.

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Ys: The Oath In Felghana / Re: OK, this is silly

« on: Feb. 12, 2007, 10:36:40 AM »

much like that Ys IV dubbing project... *hint hint* *wink wink*

Yup, that old idea's pretty dead OR IS IT? *hint hint* *wink wink*

It's a shame about that Zwei! guy.  I don't suppose anyone knows how he started?  I can hardly imagine it was by sending an email to nihon@falcom.co.jp

"Hi, I'd like to order some stuff but if you could also pass this note on to corporate, I'd really appreciate it.  Thanks."

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General / Re: What are YOU watching on youtube at the moment?

« on: Feb. 11, 2007, 06:25:40 PM »

Cyborg CatI love battle-bots.

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Ys: The Oath In Felghana / Re: OK, this is silly

« on: Feb. 11, 2007, 05:58:25 PM »

And yet most of the people I show Ys to often say things like "I didn't know such games could be played on a computer" or even "I would support PC gaming a lot more if they made more games like this".  The fact of the matter is that very nearly 100% of the people I've shown Ys to, Ys 1&2 Eternal, Ys 6, Oath in Felghana, or Origins, have all really REALLY liked it...and I live in middle America for God's sake!

Ask yourself, how many people do you know who consider themselves "console gamers" but who still have a basic machine for browsing the internet and stuff?  The computers these guys have might not be able to run Brothers in Arms, or Unreal Tournament 2007 when it comes out, but most of them can play Ys!  There are a LOT of people like that, and that is EXACTLY the kind of person who would purchase Ys if they only knew about and had a way to purchase it in English easily and for a reasonable sum of money.

A publisher could make such a package even MORE attractive by striking a deal with a third party to throw in a free USB-PSX controller adapter in every box, and REALLY directly appeal to the demographic (many of whom aren't even aware such adapters exist).

I think it could do really well with the right advertising (cheap advertising on the internet even).

EDIT: Back when Felghana came out, I lent my copy to a friend who was in the engineering fraternity at the University of Central Oklahoma, many of whom are understandably avid gamers.  Over the next couple of months, the fever spread like wildfire, and I DON'T mean piracy.  Falcom got at LEAST 30 or 40 new orders from that school, and those are just the ones I know about!  Most of them were honestly surprised that A) fun games could be played on their junky PCs (besides emulators) and B) Japan actually makes cool games for PC too!  The same thing happened later that year when I discovered the Touhou series of shmups.

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Ys: The Oath In Felghana / OK, this is silly

« on: Feb. 11, 2007, 04:54:47 AM »

Maybe I'm just a giant fucking moron, but why is there no way to make these translations official?

Nightwolve obviously wants compensation and recognition for his hard work.  Falcom surely couldn't MIND having another country to sell in if it doesn't cost them anything.  Getting a publisher and putting disks in a good looking box with a nice manual printed in English would be really sweet, but personally I'd be very happy to pay money just for a patch, and I think a number of other people would be too.

It just seems as if everyone would win.  Has anyone ever tried asking someone at Falcom about this?  They have to be aware that these patches exist...right?

PS - There's a reason I haven't donated yet, NW.  Just wait until after your 12-day countdown 

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Ys I & II Complete / Re: how do i jump?

« on: Jan. 15, 2007, 10:11:55 PM »

Well actually, if you think about it, there are now more Ys games that you jump in than there are ones that you don't

Ys games you jump in: 3, 5, 6, Oath, Origin
Ys games you don't jump in: 1, 2, 4(x2)

Therefore, 5 games in you jump in, 4 games you don't.
Ys 4 counts twice cus Mask and Dawn are completely different.  Same with 3 and Oath.  I don't count Ys Eternal different though cus it's still basically the same game.

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Ys: The Oath In Felghana / Re: Wanna help finish the Felghana patch? I need volunteers for remaining tasks!

« on: Jan. 14, 2007, 08:32:53 AM »

I like the way that looks better than the original.