Old & Aging Game Discussion

[IskatuMesk]

Well, I've killed some more dudes in Demon's Souls (with most recent being the Dragon God), so I think I'm around 1/3 through the game or so right now (maybe a bit less, depending on how large the giant zone is whenever it opens).

The AI in this game really is not that good. We've established this. We've also established that drop rates suck. Well, as it turns out, the way souls scale after a certain point is so ludicrously out of proportion that drops become a null issue because you can farm a place in secret shadowman zone and buy a fuckton of consumables.

This means that Demon's Souls fell for the exact same problem that all the Blizzard games fell for - numbers. I wager the reason why drops are so bad, and why I had such a hard time as a result, is because all the numbers are balanced for you getting the way higher income of souls you get after clearing some bosses. Until then, the cost for stuff is impossibly high without suicide farming shadowmen for an hour. Thus, trying to clear alternate zones from 1-* results in much anguish because there's no healing.

Another fun thing Bill made me aware of is that the glowing harry potter jizz salamanders that drop resources have limited spawns. Something I discovered on my own is that the sack guys in the mine also seem to have limited spawns. So, as far as the "I've got an easy way to get basic mats" goes, I was dead wrong. There's only a single farmable mob and it's in low quantity. I discover this after burning a lot of my mats trying to make alternate weapons, and then reading that these weapons can't get those upgrades I wanted. I became mishappy.

I've also encountered some gayery with world tendency. Notably, my decision to stick to non-networked games means my world tendency remains fairly static unless I die in human form. So, there's some stuff that is white tendency only (that I had to read up on) that I can't conceivably get. At all. Because all the bosses and phantoms in that zone are already dead. Fantastic.

Beyond the hideously broken AI, the hideously broken physics, the strange stat scaling and extremely rough start I had, the necessity to grind until you get a stable income, Demon's Souls biggest problem is that you need to look on the internet to learn anything. A game shouldn't hold your hand, especially through something as complex as crafting, but the crafting in this game is often an all-in kind of deal. Some mats you're only going to get once, if ever. The demon souls can only be used for specific weapons and they all have different upgrade requirements to expose them. This all could have been easily hinted at in the dialogue. You get nothing. At all.

From what bill explains, a lot of these issues evaporate in Dark Souls. I wouldn't say that this game is super bad, just woefully untested. Tons of things would never have survived a single playtest, including the fact that recovering your bloodstain results in this screen-covering message that cannot be quickly skipped. All of the balancing issues and bugs would have been caught in a single playtest. If I found them, anyone would.

I like that the game has kept me playing this long despite the fact I've gotten more mad in it than I have gotten in any game yet, and there's still a lot of content for me to see. This was the first title that's been worth my money on a console for an extremely long time.

[Rocco]

Sorry for the necro, but the topic fits.

I've been thinking of buying The Legend of Dragoon (I've heard great things, a cult hit though it seems) FF 6&7, and the ICO/Shadow of the Colossus bundle over PSN. I've never played any of these games but they've been recommended to me and I've heard a lot of good things.

Suggestions?

[Ricky_Honejasi]

Sorry for the necro, but the topic fits.

I've been thinking of buying The Legend of Dragoon (I've heard great things, a cult hit though it seems) FF 6&7, and the ICO/Shadow of the Colossus bundle over PSN. I've never played any of these games but they've been recommended to me and I've heard a lot of good things.

Suggestions?

Personally, I liked a lot FF6 and FF7 back then. You cannot exactly go wrong with those two. At worst, FF7 might be too old style 3D (ex : very blocky hands) that might be off-putting compared to today's 3D but the gameplay is still very decent nonetheless.

EDIT : If you get FF6, you might want the digital download if possible or the good old SNES one. It's easily possible the PS1 CD versions might add considerable delays for loading battles. I heard it was the case for the PS1 version of Chrono Trigger (also an excellent title) and it was very painful because of that.

[UntamedLoli]

He's talking about PSN versions which are digital. I also don't recall there being any significant loading delays on the PS1 versions anyways, I played both of those on it.

They are worth getting.

[wibod]

Legend of the Dragoon is great, it's full of optional content and it's aged better than FF7 and 8 imo.

[Rocco]

Thanks for the tips, I've downloaded FF6&7 and have Dragoon queued to download next.

Any other PS1 or 2 classics you would recommend? I never owned either console, so now that I have a PS3 I'm finally getting around to playing some of the great titles I've missed out on.

EDIT: I should probably say, I'm mostly interested in RPGs, Strategy and a limited amount of shooters (They've all started to blend together for me)

[Ricky_Honejasi]

Some that could interest you :
- Dragon Quest 8 (PS2)
- Persona 3 and 4 (PS2)
- Odin Sphere (PS2)
- Suidoken 1 and 2 (PS1)
- Dark Cloud 2 (PS2)

[wibod]

I'm disgusted that Ricky didn't mention Disgaea, they're all on the PSN.

[Ricky_Honejasi]

I'm disgusted that Ricky didn't mention Disgaea, they're all on the PSN.

Heh, Disgaea tend to be for more specific tastes in JRPGs. Unless I know he likes ridiculous humor/situations, heavy grinding or big stat numbers, most other RPGs tend to be safer to suggest.

But if you insist :

Disgaea 1 (PS2)
Disgaea 2 (PS2)
Disgaea 3 (PS3)
Disgaea 4 (PS3)

Btw, do not confuse between Disgaea 2 and Disgaea Dimensions 2 which are two different games, the latter being the "true" sequel story-wise (but not in the series) of Disgaea 1.

[Lavarinth]

ICO and Shadow of the Colossus are both beautiful games worth getting.

You guys are mentioning mostly, if not only, RPGs. My history with PS1/2 games was mostly Dynasty Warriors (hack and slash) and RPGs, so my input is also limited RPGs. Someone else might be able to be more informative in this case.

For RPGs, I'd personally recommend any and all Final Fantasy games. That, however, is because I'm a fan. Final Fantasy Tactics would be the longest, most deep version IMO. There's simply too much to do, but that's not a bad thing. Chrono Trigger/Cross I have not been able to get into so much, though I have tried a few times. I know others who love it. Ricky mentioned Dark Cloud 2, I also enjoyed the original first one.

Adventure-type games would be Oddworld: Abe's Oddysee and Exodus are both good games, however the first is being recreated from scratch and due to release soon.

This list of games will always depend on your genre of choice, too.

[wibod]

I'd recommend emulating or getting a PSP to play FFT: War of the Lions. It fixes a lot of the infuriating shit that FFT had (multiple places where the game can be unwinnable) without doing too much.

There's also Valkyria Chronicles on the PS3 which is best strategy game.

The PS1 and PS2 have Valkyrie Profile 1 and 2 respectively that are both top tier, but may be hard to find. The PSP also has a Valkyrie Profile remake that's Valkyrie Profile: Lenneth.