MR Monster Regeneration on PS3 (DVDs Work With PSX Monster Ranchers!)

[RPGD]

While I've only tested this out with MR4, I've discovered that, when playing Monster Rancher on the PS3, you can regenerate monsters from PC and Mac Discs, which wasn't possible with the PS2 games under normal circumstances. I've tested it extensively with at least a dozen computer discs, most of them PC discs, from software installation discs to OS recovery CDs to printer driver discs, and they all work.

It essentially has the same effect on regeneration as the external USB mod chip for the PS2, the SBox, which I used to use. It probably has something to do with the PS3's lack of regional lockout for BD games or a side effect of PS2 emulation.

I'll test out MR3, and perhaps the other games, as soon as possible.

As an aside, while XBox 360 discs let you regenerate monsters, Wii games apparently don't, at least in MR4's case. They've never gone beyond the checking disc screen. I've tried brand new games and launch titles, and they all yield the same result.

[DarkwingChuck]

Re: MR Monster Regeneration on PS3

Interesting. For a second I thought this was going to be about a new MR game on PS3. I was about to get angry. Monster Hunter was nice enough to get off the PS3 so I might actually get to play it so I hope Monster Rancher will do the same.

[RPGD]

Re: MR Monster Regeneration on PS3

Hey, with Tecmo's recent interest in DS and Wii development, that just might happen. Who knows?

Here are some of the monsters I managed to find:


Adobe Creative Suite 3 Design Premium (Student Edition) Application Disc (Mac): Pancho (Pancho/Pancho)

Adobe Creative Suite 3 Design Premium (Student Edition) Content Disc (Mac): MocchiSaurus (Lesione/Mocchi)

Adobe Creative Suite 3 Design Premium (Student Edition) Video Workshop Disc (Mac): Rubberabby (Hare/KP)

Finale Songwriter ver. 2 (PC/Mac): Aguila (Mogi/Garu)

Macbook Pro Mac OS X Install Disc 1 (Mac OS X version 10.4.5, Disc version 1.2): Henger (Henger/Henger)

Macbook Pro Mac OS X Install Disc 2 (Mac OS X version 10.4.5, Disc version 1.2): Henger (Henger/Henger)

Nintendo Wi-Fi USB Connector Installation Disc: OsakaKnight (Ogyo/Durahan)

Toast 8 Titanium Installation Disc (Mac): Munitan (Gitan/Mocchi)


Most of the PC discs I used were unlabeled, so I didn't list them, hence the PC/Mac disc ratio contradiction.

[RPGD]

Re: MR Monster Regeneration on PS3 (DVDs Work With PSX Monster Ranchers!)

This is absolutely incredible!

I just tried regenerating monsters in MR2 using The Three Stooges Collection Volume 1, and I got a Liquid Cube (KP/Jell). To make sure it wasn't a fluke, I tried out MR3. It worked, too.

I'm still testing it out as I type this, though all the DVDs I've tried have worked, but I think I can safely confirm that playing a Playstation Monster Rancher game on PS3 lets you regenerate monsters not just from CDs, but DVDs as well!

I won't be getting any sleep tonight. Time to get cracking.

[DK]

Re: MR Monster Regeneration on PS3 (DVDs Work With PSX Monster Ranchers!)

A worthy find!

[Sivart the Sloth Trencher]

Re: MR Monster Regeneration on PS3 (DVDs Work With PSX Monster Ranchers!)

NO. WAY. I want a PS3 20 times as badly. You've no idea how many times I tried to regen a monster with Gladiator and the Terminator back when I was a wee lad.

[Goufunaki]

Re: MR Monster Regeneration on PS3 (DVDs Work With PSX Monster Ranchers!)

Aside from random monsters from discs, what is the charm to these games? >_>

[John Mora]

Re: MR Monster Regeneration on PS3 (DVDs Work With PSX Monster Ranchers!)

This topic and the ecstasy contained within is sort of insane.

[Magus]

Re: MR Monster Regeneration on PS3 (DVDs Work With PSX Monster Ranchers!)

Oh pshaw. Wait till we get FFT working. \:3

[RPGD]

Re: MR Monster Regeneration on PS3 (DVDs Work With PSX Monster Ranchers!)

You asked for it.

Monster Rancher is a series of games in which you breed monsters generated from household CD/DVDs and pit them against others in tournaments. The concept may sound a lot like Pokemon, but the actual games are surprisingly different.

The games are unique in that they're extremely deep, yet surprisingly simple. They're largely menu-based, barring the tourneys. You organize training regimes for your monster, teach it new abilities through specialized training, praise and scold accordingly and fight your way through the ranks to gain fame and fortune before your monster grows old and passes on.

It's surprisingly addictive because there's so much do to, and can be played for a few hours a week or twelve hours a day. Unlike most breeding games, you aren't forced to use specific creatures. Rather, you've access to an absolutely massive selection from the get-go. You've no obligation whatsoever to collect them all, or even to collect half of them. Just pop in a few discs and pick whatever you want. Naturally, not all breeds are available from the start, but as you play and work your way up the ranks, you'll eventually unlock them through a variety of events which, barring one or two games, don't happen in any particular order. Everyone's game is different. No one has exactly the same experience. That's one of the main draws of the series.

Perhaps the greatest advantage it has over other breeding games is that you can take any monster, literally any monster at all, and make it extremely powerful. This is due to the fact that you don't grind your monsters to boost their stats as a whole, but you actually get to work on their stats individually. And not through battles, but via specifically-tailored drills. You can raise them with any sort of statistical emphasis you want. As opposed to what we commonly consider statistical strengths and weaknesses, certain stats go up more easily with certain monsters than others. Some monsters' speed can go up quickly, but have a hard time getting their defense up. Likewise, some monsters get great gains from physical attack training, but need some extra work for their accuracy to go up.

While the main monster species themselves aren't as numerous as other games of its ilk, averaging at about thirty in any given game, the games are unique in that every breed has at least a few, and usually several, subspecies, each with their own unique characteristics and statgains. Monsters in Monster Rancher are categorized by their main breed and sub breed (or main type and sub/secondary type, whichever you prefer). The main breed indicates which species the monster belongs to, while the sub breed indicates the subspecies within the main breed's hierarchy. The common pure breeds of monsters have the same main and subtype, whereas the subspecies are actually hybrids of two monsters.

For example, Hornie, a subspecies of Suezo, a yellow monster that resembles a giant eyeball, has Suezo as its main type. Its secondary type is Tiger, a blue wolf-like monster with horns. Hornie differs from other Suezos in that it's covered in white and blue fur, has a canine eye resembling Tiger's, and a long, white horn on its head. Also, its faster than normal Suezo, and has equally high, if not higher, accuracy, depending on the game, and lower defense. Monster subspecies can look quite similar to the pure breed, or surprisingly different, and tend to differ in appearance from game to game. As you can imagine, the Monster Rancher games allow you to combine two monsters to produce one of several different types of offspring depending on the number of subspecies available between the two.

Additionally, if the parents have been raised for a few years (in-game, mind), the combination can result in a newborn with superior starting statistics, better than you could get from any disc. Combining another generation of monsters like this lets you produce even stronger offspring.

Contrary to what you might think, raising a certain subspecies tends to be fairly different from raising another, be it due to temperament, statgains, nature, tastes or even life patterns. There are literally hundreds of possible combinations. Throughout the series' lifetime, there have been well over 3,000 monsters counting all the games. There's certainly no shortage of variety.

However, not every monster can be obtained through combination. There are certain, particularly unique monster subspecies that can only be obtained using CD/DVDs. These monsters are called special breeds, and are categorized by a ? subtype. They can be anything from a Suezo resembling a golf ball on a tee (complete with a green tongue) or a giant eggplant to a walking TV set or a group of Power Ranger parody monsters. These subspecies are more often than not drastically different than any other subspecies of any given breed in every possible way, from completely different statgain patterns and temperaments to much longer/shorter lifespans and tastes that fit their bizarre motifs. They're very amusing to look at, and are usually directly related to the discs that regenerate them. For example, in MR2, when you pop in the Terminator 2 soundtrack, you'll get a Jell monster called Metal Jell (you can imagine what it looks like). And in MR3, if you use the Armageddon DVD, you will get a cute little Mocchi monster called Cosmocchi, complete with a space suit. There's usually one or two of these for each breed, at least.

The battles themselves are much more suspenseful than in other breeding games. Battles are usually a minute long, including attack execution time (MR4 being the only exception, the timer pausing during attacks). After 60 seconds are up, the monster with the highest remaining life (HP) is declared the winner, unless one of them is knocked out during the match, in which case the match ends immediately. No matter how bad things look, it's entirely possible for a losing monster to turn the match completely around at the very last second with one lucky hit, provided it has enough willpower to use the desired move before the timer hits zero.

Inspired by the old barcode battlers, you move your monster, or the CPU does if you decide to let your monster fight on its own, towards or away from the opponent and use attacks based on the distance between them. They're usually split into close, medium and far range attacks. Monsters can learn several of them, once more depending on the game, and each move requires a certain amount of "Guts" (the aforementioned willpower) to use. A monster's Guts constantly increases during battle, the speed at which it goes up depending on its main and subtype, starting at 50 at the beginning of a match and maxing out at 99. The bigger the attack, the higher the Guts cost.

The attacks themselves are split between physical attacks, their strength determined by the monster's power stat, and special attacks, whose power is influenced by its intelligence. The speed stat doesn't so much determine the monster's walking speed as it does its evasiveness. The higher the speed, the harder it is to hit. Accuracy, defense and life are self-explanatory.

In addition to damage potential, attacks have other attributes, including critical hit ratio, individual accuracy and guts damage. Some attacks connect relatively easily, some cause very little damage yet greatly reduce the opponent's guts, and some are immensely powerful kamikaze moves that might, if not always, damage the user.

Competing in tourneys is another major element of the games. There are six monster ranks, from E to S, S being the highest. Your overall goal as a breeder is to compete in the official tournaments, in addition to the regular competitions, to raise your monster's rank. Beating the official E qualifies your monster for D Rank tourneys, beating the official D gets it into C, etc., and also increases your breeder's rank, opening up more event possibilities.

The tournaments are usually in one of two different formats; swiss and elimination. With the exception of elimination, even if your monster loses once or twice, depending on the number of opponents, it's still possible for you to win the tournament. If you beat the official S, you'll be eligible to compete in even tougher tournaments, and eventually achieve Master Rank, the ultimate goal for breeders.

Even after raising a champ monster and beating the game (which could take a good long while, depending on the game), it never truly ends. You can try out different breeds, experiment with different raising methods and try to get the most out of your monsters, constantly bettering yourself, and go up against your friends' monsters (you can set matches to CPU Vs. CPU and bet on the winner if you felt like it). I've been playing these games for nearly ten years, and I'm still discovering new favorites and nifty tricks to squeeze a little more out of my partners. In fact, you aren't even pushed to fly through the ranks with your first monster, or even your 31st monster. You can play at a pace that best suits you. Not many games have that kind of longevity.

That's the long and short of it. Monster Rancher the most engrossing and rewarding game series I have ever played, and if I could only play it and nothing else for the rest of my life, that'd be alright with me.

[Red Dragon]

Re: MR Monster Regeneration on PS3 (DVDs Work With PSX Monster Ranchers!)

Woe is the PS3 and backwards compatability. Does it work with phased out 80gb models as well?

Also, I really wish they would make a MR2-esque game again. I know the GBA version were like that, and maybe the DS (Is that out/ever gonna be in the states yet?) Yet the series really ticked me off with the "Adventure Mode" things. Especially in 4/Evo where you HAD to do them if you wanted to proceed.

Or when they decided to change combining so that the changes would either be so small it would seems almost a waste of time.

Aside from a couple complaints I really like the series.

[RPGD]

Re: MR Monster Regeneration on PS3 (DVDs Work With PSX Monster Ranchers!)

You'll be happy to know that mandatory exploring is exclusive to MR4 and Evo, and that combination in MFDS has absolutely insane results (of course, the game is very MR2-like), and it's hardly a chore elsewhere, barring monsters getting lost in MR1.

Ever seen a newborn with nearly 500 in every stat when two decent one and a half year olds are combined?

To note, MR4 is the only game with combination stat caps. Every other game gets you really killer babies if you've raised the parents well.

Back on topic, though, I tested this all out with the 80GB model. I'm not 100% sure it works with the older ones, but I'll find out within the next few weeks.

[Red Dragon]

Re: MR Monster Regeneration on PS3 (DVDs Work With PSX Monster Ranchers!)

You'll be happy to know that mandatory exploring is exclusive to MR4 and Evo, and that combination in MFDS has absolutely insane results.

Ever seen a newborn with nearly 500 in every stat when two decent one and a half year olds are combined?

So I ask again.

WHEN DOES IT COME STATE SIDE?!?!?!



I thought it did well! Come on!

And on-topic, yeah, it just goes to show you though that Sony, NEEDS backwards compatability, to the fact that it can actually enhance games.

[RPGD]

Re: MR Monster Regeneration on PS3 (DVDs Work With PSX Monster Ranchers!)

No word yet, but it sold better than all the other handheld games, so it or an inevitable sequel should come over eventually. They're focused on MFO right now.

EDIT: Uncharted: Drake's Fortune just got me a Scaled Plant (Plant/Zuum).

...what the hell?

[RPGD]

Re: MR Monster Regeneration on PS3 (DVDs Work With PSX Monster Ranchers!)

Now this is just strange. Strange in a good way, mind. You can actually regenerate monsters from PS3 games in MR2. Both of the games I have here at present worked. Unfortunately, I left most of my PS3 games in crumpet town, so that's as extensively as I can test it at present.

Paul, if you'd be so kind, could you help me out here? What does Oblivion get you?

Also, I tried out several XBox 360 games, and all of them got me Gaboos, with the same stats nonetheless. Unless I'm mistaken, playing MR2 on an emulator using the actual disc and trying to regenerate anything gives you the same results. So it looks like they're all we're getting out of 360 disks. Not really a bad thing if you really like Gaboos, though.

Now, MR1 yields some very bizarre results. DVDs certainly work with it, but strangely enough, I got nothing but pure breeds. Not just one specific one, either. I've gotten Golem, Tiger, Gali, Jell, Worm, etc. and they're all pure. Every PS2 game I've tried got me Dino, barring one which got me Monol. Dino also popped up a few times with some DVD movies, including four out of six of my Black Adder Collection discs. I haven't tried many 360 games yet, but thus far they all give Dino. The two PS3 games got me Worm and Dino.

Both games don't like Wii discs.

I'll try MR3 and some more MR2 a bit later.