Almost...

[Toaster]

List off the game you've played, that were damn near flawless--or just really good. Then they had to go and screw up one aspect that ruined EVERYTHING.

Here's my list:

Vagrant Story
battle system, weapon building. battle system. battle system.

Killer 7
gameplay, on-rails exploration

Gunstar Super Heroes
everytime you die, go back to title screen. ugh.

Legend of Mana
absurdly easy = no fun.

Castlevania: SotN
i find this one to be way too easy, and in retrospect the inverted castle wasn't all that great. the Sorrow games are my favoties of the series.

Xenosaga
still love the game even though it was more like watching an anime than playing a game. but the exploration and battles? battles lasted too long, and exploration was lame. not to mention you had no background music. wtf.

[John Mora]

Re: Almost...

The battle system in VS was brilliant. {:3

[Toaster]

Re: Almost...

Care to ellaborate?

[tjoris9]

Re: Almost...

Legend of Mana
absurdly easy = no fun.

Let's elaborate a little. It's so easy, that most of the "fun" customization stuff was pointless.

[John Mora]

Re: Almost...

Care to ellaborate?

The fact that you can attack each limb of your opponent, searching for weak points was a brilliant move. And individual healths for each part was cool, too. Destroy the legs and the enemy’s movement was reduced by 50%. And affinities were quite sophisticated and intuitive once you learned them. Attack lots of lizards and your weapon will become good at killing lizards. Get attacked by a bunch of lizards and your armor will become good at resisting lizard attacks. Not to mention the game made it easy to acquire affinities since it gave you training dummies you could practice chains on. Plus, the risk system gave a balance against just attacking willy nilly, although a high risk rating increased magical power. And weapon building wasn’t bad at all, especially since you could see what you were building before you committed to it. The system was a carefully balanced masterpiece of pros and cons.

[Patryn]

Re: Almost...

KoTOR
Loading times. Lord god almighty, those LOADING TIMES.

Dragon Quest VIII
The Ice Wall spell or whatever. Enix, if your major new innovation in the battle system was adding in the psyching up stuff, why did you give all the final bosses a spell that would immediately wipe out any saved energy and then make them use it every other round? Way to take the knees out of your system, geniuses.

[IRC]

Re: Almost...

The battle system in VS was brilliant. {:3

But you're still just chaining over and over and over and over and over and over.

[Jamos]

Re: Almost...

I liked Vagrant Story 'n all, but I have to agree with SHFC. That is all you do during combat.

[John Mora]

Re: Almost...

And all you do in KH and KH2 is hit X over and over and over. At least in VS there's clever timing and different techniques to worry about. Plus, chaining into infinity costs you Risk, like I was talking about.

[Toaster]

Re: Almost...

Well I thought that the game's vision, while fresh, felt stilted in it's execution. Weapon buliding was also a massive chore thanks to the training dummies.

[Patryn]

Re: Almost...

I also give points to how as your RISK increased, so did your magic power, but also your magic defenses weakened. It was a nicely balanced system where you could be cautious and rely on skills and magic in order to keep your RISK low, or go balls out and get that RISK up to 100 and live on the edge.


So I'll stand up as a fan of the battle system. After all, it IS one of my favorite games of all time.

[Doyleman]

Re: Almost...

Hmm....

Children of Mana - I loved the rebound battle system, and the different attacks; each for about 5 minutes, at which nothing new came up.

There's a few more, but they aren't comming to mind, yet.

[John Mora]

Re: Almost...

I dare someone to find the RPG where stat building ISN'T a tremendous chore.

[Toaster]

Re: Almost...

Chrono Cross.

[John Mora]

Re: Almost...

eetoo