I'll see you! ...perhaps. 01/04/2012
Hiya, this's Maryfourdee.I'll be gone for... quite a while. My Internet connection will be cut off for an extended amount of time, so I won't be able to update this blog or anything. I've no idea when I'll be back, but don't hold your breath. I'll also be making my last posts today. PCororo and SkyDX will be relieved of their duties here, and the games I've been working on are cancelled. It was fun while it lasted, and it was definitely an exciting year. Too bad I won't get to celebrate the two year anniversary of this blog, but there's nothing I can do. 
Look ahead, toward your own future!
Take care, everybody. I'll miss ya. Add Comment Of robots, quests and mysteries... 08/10/2011
Hello there everyone! This time it's SkyDX and in my first article I want to share my opinions about Solatorobo: Red The Hunter. First of all a huge thanks goes to Maryfourdee who told me about this great game and provided me with infos about it!  Now to Solatorobo itself, it's an Action RPG for Nintendo DS developed by CyberConnect2 and the spiritual sequel to the PlayStation game Tail Concerto. I haven't played Tail Concerto myself so far but plan to do so later on as it seems like a great game too. As for the connection between the games, you don't have to play Tail Concerto to understand the story of Solatorobo, the games take place in the same so called "Little Tail Bronx" world, albeit in a different area. Tail Concerto takes place in the Prairie Kingdom while Red and his friends experience their adventures in the Shepherd Republic. However this isn't the only conncetion, if you played Tail Concerto you will meet some of the characters again and side-quests will explain what made them travel to the new region. Speaking of side-quests, questing is the heart of Solatorobo, you take on different quests from a quest agency which are distinguished in story and side-quests. But slowly, let's start from the beginning! The game starts with our hero Red and his sister Chocolat approching a flying freighter named Hindenburg (who wants to guess its fate with that name? >.>) in their airship Asmodeus. Flying freighter, airship? Yep! The world of Solatorobo is made of many bigger and smaller flying islands which you explore over the course of the game via a location select menu. Overall the atmosphere kinda reminded me of Hayao Miyazaki's movie Laputa: Castle in the Sky, which is quite nice and there's also quite a bit of French influence in the game, especially the names.  But back to the happenings on the Hindenburg: Red boards it to steal some documents for a client. Our hero is a hunter that means he makes a living by fulfilling quests from a quest agency, how exciting! So yeah, that's the games first mission and soon after the story introductions you will be in control. Gameplay-wise the game plays alot like the classic Megaman Legends which plays out nicely on the DS. The biggest difference though, while Red rides a robot named Dahak he doesn't shoot holes in his enemies, instead he picks them (or objects and projectiles) up and throws them around. As simple as it sounds, there is a bit more to it, the heavier the enemies are, the biggeer is the chance that they counterattack before you lift them up completly. Plus the enemies later on actually require a bit of strategy, for the most part though it's enough to grab them from behind and use the combo system to chain up to three throws together for extra damage till the enemy finally blows up in a hot explosion. This works quite well till Red comes across a section where the Dahak cannot pass, but fear not he isn't glued to it. At almost any time of the game Red can dismount the Dahak and go on by foot to find a way forward, should he encounter an eneny in that state no problem! For these cases Red has a stun gun which does... SHOCK what the name implies. Eventually you find the oh so important documents and a seemingly unimportant amulet too though DUN DUUN DUUUN, as soon as the amulet is taken, hell breaks loose. The Hindenburg goes down and Red manages to flee in the last second while rescuing a mysterious boy while being attack by even more mysterious enemies made up of some black energy and who would have thought, some baddies have set their eyes on the amulet too!  Now you might ask, where is the RPG in all the action? Well there is a level system that grants more HP for each level up and the Dahaks stat points are also customizable with a simple yet effetive Tetris style grid so you can power up how you like but to be honest I haven't noticed much of a terrible difference yet.  Lastly, while reading all this, you might also ask: "Still, why should I play Solatorobo?" That I will sum up in the final part of my post! Well all in all it's a really entertaining game, the gameplay is smooth and fluid, the quests aren't a chore unlike most MMORPG quests and vary quite greatly. Sometimes you have to sort crates, fly around with the Dahak in flight mode, escape from prision, rescue someone from a enemy airship, take part in flying races called Air Robo GP in best Mario Kart tradition (wireless multiplayer included!), find magical books, heck you can even fight in tournaments and I did all that in mere four story chapters so far! Should all this still not be enough, you can download additional quests if you're connected to WiFi, find hidden items to unlock artwork and the soundtrack to listen to it on the Asmodeus. So you see, there is lots to do in Solatorobo and it has a huge amout of variety. All this comes mixed with a beautiful world in the sky which has a mesmerizing atmosphere that will sometimes make you chuckle like when you see the Stardogs Coffee shop.  The characters do the rest, Red is a hotblodded hero with a slightly childish attitude which often drives him into a funny pinch with other characters while Chocolat does her best to keep her brother from running into trouble which is really fun to look at. And of course like always with with fantasy stories things aren't that simple as they seem at first, the bigger plot slowly unfolds and the secrets of the characters slowly surface. Especially Red seems to bear a bigger secret, Maryfourdee told me the lyrics of the opening which are Japanese tell of one of his secrets :3 What it is I haven't found out myself yet, like said I'm only up to Chapter 4 as of writing this. The bad guys also aren't that bad :P and cover quite the cliches: So far I have seen a evil boss, a strict right hand, a mysterious guy who doesn't talk alot (he seems to have his own agenda) and a lightheaded almost-idiot, evilness and hilarity ensured!  Okay I think that article got long enough, I could still write many more things about Solatorobo but then I might aswell write a full FAQ which I don't feel like and I hope I could spark enough interested for this great, fun game with my article. That was it from me for now, goodbye, go playing! And lastly a thanks to PCocoro too for helping me with the images and such! Cheers, it's PaulianCornet! (or PCororo) again! Before I start with the actual topic, the Disgaea article is still underway, but I moved so I didn't have the time to finish my research (mostly concerning languages though). Aaaaanyway, today I'll be talking about Paradise Blue, an indie RPG made by Ocean's Dream which Maryfourdee covered a few posts earlier. So, the game was made by a normal guy on his PC at home and not in a colossal game studio. And it's free, so play it. But I digress. There are a lot of indie developers these days, but very few actually any recognition outside of the Internet. (And sometimes not even on the Internet itself) PB was (or is?) quite popular, despite not looking like FF13 or having tons of boobs. And it can actually teach us a lot about game design? What exactly? I'll show you! 
 So these are ten things Paradise Blue can teach us about game design, which is why every fellow RPG makin' dude/tte should try it out and grab some inspiration from. And even if you don't make games you should play it since it's awesome! :P  Hey everyone! This's PaulianCornet and starting today I'll be writing a series of articles that'll cover the strategy RPGS made by Japanese developer Nippon Ichi. Why? Because actual, in-depth coverage of these games is almost-nonexistant. (Other than Hardcore Gaming 101's wonderful article) Nippon Ichi is a small development house in the Gifu Prefecture. Before they became known for their mind-bending strategy games they developed small, dispansable puzzle games. Their first full-blown game was the rather dull Rhapsody: A Musical Adventure (or Marl Kingdom in Japan). The game proved popular enough to warrant two direct sequels and two spin-offs. One of the spin-offs is the PS2 game La Pucelle: Tactics (La Pucelle translates as The Virgin). La Pucelle / La Pucelle Tactics / La Pucelle Ragnarok - Playstation 2, PSP (2004 / 2009) "Long ago, there was a fierce battle between the Goddess Poitreene and the Prince of Darkness. In the darkest hour a young women, dubbed the Maiden of Light, rose to defeat the Dark Prince and restore peace to the world." ...something along these lines serves as the introduction to La Pucelle. As you might have guessed, the story takes quite some religious influence. It revolves three members of La Pucelle, a church devoted to defeating monsters and keeping peace around the world. The main character, Prier ("to pray" in French), dreams of becoming the new maiden of light, but her haughty attidute and foul tongue don't exactly qualify her for the task.  Tagging along is her little brother Culotte (a French piece of clothing), and the very devoted Sister Alouette, who is way calmer and more qualified for becoming the Maiden of Light. The group's first task is to cleanse a sewer of nasty ghosts.  You get more and more people to join you on your quest, all for different reasons and motives. The cast is very colourful, and the writing is always there for a good laugh. The story starts out fairly light-hearted and idealistic, but gets darker and more serious as it progresses, but there are still tons of comic-reliefs thrown in here and there. Before you go to battle you can make preparations in the local town, Pot Au Feu ("Pot on Fire" in French). The townspeople also provide some information, as well as some of the funniest lines in the game. Every character you get has four slots of equipment, and you equip whatever you like. You can equip Prier with four weapons and make her a total powerhouse but sacrifice her defence, and so on. Every new chapter will provide you with more equipment to buy, but it's also important to keep your equipments levels up to date. They go up as you fight while having them equipped, and high-level equipment is actually more important than high character levels, especially during post-game battles. Talking about levels, every stat in this game has one! Your strength stat raises if you attack, yada yada, but it's nowhere as terrible as Final Fantasy II's retarded leveling system. It works a lot smoother, and your characters won't end up completely useless. The max level of any character is also, rather unusually, 9999! Don't be scared though, there's absolutely no need to ever reach that number. In fact, you can beat the final boss without being in your hundreds!  After you're done preparing you select one of the maps and fight. The battles seem to be your typical isometric tactical battles at first glance, but they definitely aren't. Any action (sans using items) will switch the view to a sideview battle field, where you see the attack / skill / healing executed. If you attack, everyone sorrounding you will join you in the tussle. Enemies can do the same thing, but you also get to counterattack. The one big problem with these "battle intermissions" is that they make the battles way longer than they could be. In a game where a moderate amount of grinding is necessary this definitely gets annoying, but still bearable.  Your characters will also learn a few combination attacks later on, allthough they eat SP for breakfast and require a lot of levelling until they become really useful. Also new to the whole thing are the Dark Portals. They're streams of dark energy emitting from a central point. They will continously spawn new monsters until you purify, aka close, them. If you do so the energy will be released in the form of the portal's element (Fire, Ice and Wind are the default ones, but you can combinate them), causing every enemy who happens to be standing onto a stream panel to take damage. You can place your characters around to redirect the energy into a circle, which will have a mega-awesome effect, like dealing huge chunks of elemental damage to all enemies, or completely restoring your party's health. One of the big problems with this though is the fact that your allies will counterattack enemies when they attack you during their phase. This will often cause you to defeat all enemies, and thus ending the battle, without being able to pull the chain off, and setting those up requires quite some time, so expect to be frustrated in the end. Also, talking about Purification, there's more to that. While the game doesn't let you create any additional characters aside from the story ones, you can recruit pretty much every monster by puriying them often enough, and then kicking the crap out of them. They will usually start at low levels, but they can become just as strong as your regular characters with some grinding.  The game is divided into several chapters, each of which has multiple endings. There are some special event panels scattered on the map, which will trigger events or additional battles. Activating them all will usually earn you the good ending. While every chapter has multiple endings, the main ending is always the same. The game also has some of the smoothest animation seen in an SRPG. While the sprites aren't particularly high-budget, they're damn well animated! The soundtrack by Tenpei Sato is also first-rate, with some really fresh songs that never fail to capture the mood of the situation. My only complaint is that there aren't enough tracks, but the ones present are wonderful. Since the localised version of La Pucelle's spiritual successor Disgaea was such a success, Mastiff picked the game up for localisation. While the translation is very well done and contains a lot of humour, there is quite some censorship. One of the game's main characters, Croix ("cross" in French), always smokes a cigarette, which was edited out of his character art and sprites. However they didn't alter any of the animations, so you get to see Croix taking out nothing out of his mouth and putting nothing back in. All instances of crosses were also removed, which is quite fatal considering this is a game with heavy religious overtones. The game contains both English and Japanese voiceovers, and both are very high-quality performances. (allthough the Japanese setting has more scenes voiced than the English one, probably due to budget restraints). Prier is voiced by Jennifer Hale, who masterfully captures her attitude problems.  In 2009, Nippon Ichi released a PSP port of the game, titled La Pucelle Ragnarok. It's essentially the same game with some nice updates. A good chunk of the interface has been redone to look nicer and be less number-infested. A lot of characters who didn't have an artwork now have at least one, and all the cutscenes are voiced now, instead of only selected ones. One of the best updates is that you can now set the battle scenes off, which turns the grinding en-masse into a much quicker affair.  There are numerous characters, some of which are DLC, while others can be obtained via post-game content. The biggest addition, of course, is a completely new scenario starring Demon Prier. You get some all-new special abilities and two new plot routes, which allow for actual multiple endings this time, one of which is now considered canon. Sadly, Nippon Ichi of America have officially announced that they won't be localising the port, for whatever reason. It's still rather easy to play with a guide and some minor knowledge of Japanese. While La Pucelle may lack some of the polish that made later NIS games stand out so much, it's still a pleasant experience and highly recommendable for strategy RPG fans. Next time I will be covering Disgaea: Hour of Darkness. Good bye! New Puyo Puyo game - Yay or Nay? 04/21/2011
Hi thair! So yeah, Sega recently announced another game in their ever-so-popular Puyo Puyo series. This time it's headed for the DS again, much like Puyo Puyo 7. In case you aren't familiar with Puyo Puyo, then check out this article. Somewhen around Fever, Sega decided to change the character design. What was generic anime before became super-dee-duper-silly-sugary flat designs. A character who once looked like this  now looks like  I mean, okay, she does look cuter, and the armor still looks fine, even though it's heavily simplified like that. But still... I just can't get used to that artstyle. Oh well. At least the good ol' fun is still there!  Not a series for the Western market. The game's due this July. It's only slated for DS release, (and I mean the "old" DS, not 3DS) but miost of the games got ported to multiple platforms, so I'm sure this will also show up on the PSP and 3DS. PS: I have an unhealthy obsession with these games. Bleh... 04/10/2011
...is what I thought this morning. You know, I could write an hour-long excuse why I didn't update for so long, but I won't, since it'll save us both time. I worked on Disillusioned Journey a bit more, and I'll skip the explanation part and just show another comparison picture.  My mapping could still be better, but practice follows improvement they say. Not much more to say about DS for now, just showin' that it's still alive and kicking. Today I'd like to feature some stuff, though. First off is ADALYN A(nother) short contest game by Ocean's Dream. This time it's about a sexy girl with a gun who gets into trouble and shoots her way out of it. You run around and murderize legions of enemies with your gun and knife, all while keeping an eye on your ammo and other vital parameters. Unlike many other games by Ocean the story is rather mature with a lot of satirical humor thrown in. It's an all around pretty good game with only one major flaw. And boy, I really mean major. There's a massive lag in battles. Massive, as in, extremely massive. It's playable, but it can still get nasty, especially when you can't time your attacks correctly. But fear not! Ocean has a new version in the works, and the lag has already been fixed! There will also be... ah no, I won't tell you anything. The old version is still available, so go play it if you wanna kill an hour or two. Go ahead, or get shot. Also, fun fact; Adalyn has been rather popular in Japan.  It says 'BOOBS' BTW The other person I'd like to feature is PaulianCornet and her cool YouTube channel. She's an old friend and ex-roommate of mine, and she uploads gameplay footage of indie games. So, if you want some footage of your game and can't record it on your own, ask her. She already did some for Rubi and... some other game. That's it for today, FOO BYE~ Old games and the hidden truth 03/06/2011
Good morning! You know, after countless HDD crashes, data losses and other troubles, I actually managed to get a backup copy of my first completed game. It was a not-so-special RPG with cute graphics. However, when I tried to play it I remembered something- it's Japanese, so all the text now looks like this  making a translation completely impossible. And now I have to tell you people the horrible truth- Disillusioned Journey is a remake of the above mentioned game! There you have it. I decided to update the game to add more to the gameplay and make it playable for those with no knowledge of Japanese (or gibberish). I'll try to be as faithful as possible, but still expand on the original storyline (which was quite lame) and make it longer than two hours. Oh and in case you're curious what the scene looks like now...  Well I sure hope I won't disappoint. G'bye~! ZHP and Cheap Tricks 03/01/2011
Why, hallo thair! I know I haven't been updating for a while, so sorry! (I still flooded my Twitter account, but who cares?) And again, I have to say that there's nothing I could update about! I haven't touched Disillusioned Journey in, like, forever and have been sucked in by work. Buuuut I can still share my opinion about games, which has already overtaken RPG Maker updates here. Sooo, lately I've been spending a lot of time into one of Nippon Ichi's newest games:  Zettai Hero Project: Unlosing Ranger VS Darkdeath Evilman! (Bleh, what a mouthfoul) So what's this game about? It's a dungeon crawler! But being from NIS there's more to it than that. It's not one of those 08/15 stock games with boring dungeon and hours of unrewarding grinding. Oooh no! This game is a humorous masterpiece with deep mechanics and rewarding gameplay. The story's all about a superhero getting run over by a car during a mission to save the world- and in a last act he hands a completely normal bystander his authority and passes away. The problem? You're weak. You're a nobody. You're weak. You've got no experience. Did I mention that you're weak? And what's the solution? Train, train and train. And once you're done training, train some more! And pay living expenses to your wife. There's a lot to the gameplay- much more than I feel like explaining, actually, so you'll have to check out this awesome article for more details. The game offers some bonus dungeons, which will let you fight and eventually unlock secret characters. Characters from various anime and manga series, to be precise. These dungeons are naturally much tougher than the others. I only beat one of them so far, and I probably wasn't even supposed to. I used a really cheap (or intelligent?) trick to do so. I pulled myself through until the boss stage- there I equipped a Prinny Hat (more to that later) and threw everything I had at the boss and WHAM- she was defeated before she could even reach me! How was this possible?  Prinnies are sinner-penguins (eh, it's complicated) who explode upon impact. Equipping the Prinny Hat in ZHP will make everything you throw explode, which deals ridicolous amounts of damage. Really, you could throw the last piece of garbage to deal ~300 damage. But wait, of course there's a drawback: If you equip it, you yourself will explode when thrown as well. So if there's any enemy with a throwing ability around? Run for it or unequip this thing! Oh and the character I unlocked would be this one~  Yeah, she's from a really retarded (but definitely enjoyable) anime that's all about bloodily murdering an innocent boy. And well, that's about it. But before I leave...  Adios~ A Weekend With Rubi 02/05/2011
Recently there was a contest over at RMN about making a game within three days. One of these games is Rubi, a short action game starring a magical loli made by indie veteran Ocean's Dream.  The story is pretty simple and straightforward: you're a little girl called Rubi who can see and talk to the spirits, who is sent onto a quest to rescue the frozen spirits. However, frozen spirits still move and you have to fight them in order to free them from their curse! While it's not the most epic story ever told it's very cute and nicely presentated, and the NPCs have pretty amusing lines. The game's main draw lies in its fun and fast battle system. Once you get in touch with one of the frozen spirits the game switches to a battle arena where you engage your enemies. You can either attack them directly with your stick, or use one of your four skills; Ring, Line, Wall and Slow. It all depends on how far the enemy and you are from each other and where you're facing. It's pretty fun to burn your enemies to a crisp, but beating them with a stick can also be pretty stress-reducing.  There are also three kinds of items, which restore your HP, MP and cure status effects. While the battle system isn't that deep, it's a lot of fun, and the game is short enough for the battles to not get boring. There are also a few bugs and quirks here and there, like the dropped items still moving and the likes, but it's free from any critical bugs. Graphics-wise the game is first rate. Unlike msot of Ocean's other games it uses mostly rips, but Rubi and some of the monsters and NPCs are self-made, just in the style of Secret of Mana and Seiken Densetsu 3, like the rest of the game. It's very consistent and nice to look at, with lush green scenery and relaxing beach areas. Rubi and her enemies are pretty well animated too, especially if you consider the short amount of time the game was created in. The music, also unlike Ocean's other games, is public domain this time, but it's still nothing short of greatness. It always fits and is also pretty consistent. The sound effects are also just fine, nothing to write home about. So, if you have one or two hours to spare Rubi is the game for you to play! Just don't expect another Star Ocean in terms of gameplay and you'll find it to be a thoroughly enjoyable experience. Another Factory of Runes 01/15/2011
Having a really punny morning. Ho-hum. Not sure if I already mentioned this, but there's a new Rune Factory game in the work! It's called Rune Factory Oceans and will be coming out for Wii and PS3. And there's a trailer to boot! (Actually the game was announced last fall, but heeeeey!) While it doesn't seem that impressive graphics-wise (they probably wanted to grant equality between the PS3 and Wii versions, which is neat), but the gameplay and bachelores/rettes look rock-solid! One of the design choices I don't like is the use of 3D models instead of character art, like the other games in the series. I mean, why do they have to show them on-screen like that? Can't they just zoom in and show the characters talking? Oh well, shouldn't complain unless I can do better, huh?  My guess is that it'll look more lively in motion, but it has been proven to work with 2D as well; look at Trinity Universe or Neptunia for instance. The game also seems to be more combat-oriented, like the earlier Rune Factory 3.  One of the biggest additions, though, is that you can now play as a girl! Sure, you could play as your loli daughter in RF2, but this time the female lead will be available from the very start! That's a neat addition, and I'm sure it'll attract an even bigger female audience, especially with all the hunky guys available for marriage. But this game also raises several questions: What will the differences between the Wii and PS3 version be? Will time still pass in buildings, like in RF3? Will you be able to have a child? Will it ever be published outside of Japan? And most importantly: WHO will publish it then? I for myself really hope XSEED will, because Natsume's translations are always such a swig-swag between good and horrible. Oh well, we'll see! And that's all I have to say today. Have a wonderful day, victi- er... "viewers". | Thanks to SkyDX for that awesome headline image♥
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