What's the deal with Monster Rancher?

[Shard]

I haven't played it, and don't know anything about it. What's so engrossing about the game and what does it play like? I imagine raising strange creatures and then setting them loose on an unsuspecting public to wreak Godzilla-like vengeance.

[Valkysas]

Re: What's the deal with Monster Rancher?

it generates monsters from any CD or DVD. you then raise them and battle them in tournaments. I suck at explaining things too.

[marcus]

Re: What's the deal with Monster Rancher?

It was a cooler version of pokemon. Back in the day when kids ran around trading cards in middle school and battling each other I whipped out my MONSTER RANCHER MERCHANDISE and flashed it in all it's glory blinding their puny eyes.

I only own MR2 and I found it fun and engrossing to see what kind of video games unlocked which monster. I died when I finally got a suezo and a moochi but realised they weren't all that great (at least not suezo who was incredibly stingy).

Also the cartoon was awesome if not horribly generic and poorly dubbed. I'm looking for the entire compilation on ebay. They often sell it with the entire digimon series.

[Valkysas]

Re: What's the deal with Monster Rancher?

suezo's and mocchis are painfully un-rare. mocchis are generated by MR2 itself.

[marcus]

Re: What's the deal with Monster Rancher?

I liked them because they were MR's "cover girl." Did anyone figure out what the alien encounter did? I think it had something to do with the Pheonix (which took me forever to finally get) but I never understood the point in their encounter.

[RPGD]

Re: What's the deal with Monster Rancher?

Let me handle this.

Monster Rancher is a series of games in which you breed monsters generated from household CD/DVDs and pit them against others in battle tournaments. It may sound like a Pokemon-esque game judging from the above, however such is not the case. In fact, it's drastically unlike anything of the sort.

These games have at least one thing going for them: they're extremely deep. They're menu-based most of the time. You organize training regimes for your monster, teach it new abilities via a variety of different mediums, praise and scold accordingly and fight your way through the ranks to gain fame and fortune.... before your monster dies, of course.

It's a lot more engrossing than it sounds, primarily because of the addictive game flow which, albeit transforms significantly with each game, is maintained throughout the series. Getting your monsters' statistics up just right, keeping the beastie in line, the exciting, suspenseful tournaments, the potential tech-teaching excursions which differ greatly with every game, combining two powerful old monsters to produce a hybrid offspring with pimped-out starting stats and abilities, there's so much to do, and so many ways to do them.

What's more, even after you've beaten the core game, there's always still a goal to shoot for: experimenting with different breeds, fine-tuning your raising method to get the most out of your monsters so as to destroy your friends in combat and, in spite of it's being an extremely lofty goal, perhaps even maxxing a monster out completely; a feat which even I have only accomplished once.

Of course, let's not forget giving your entire CD/DVD collection a spin to find the perfect monster for you. Being given an enormous selection for you to choose from freely, instead of being forced to use specific creatures.

That's pretty much MR in a nutshell. Of all the games in history, Monster Rancher sucks me in more than anything. If you get absorbed enough, you might end up finding yourslef playing for 12 consecutive hours daily. Or at least finding yourslef unable to get any work done (Hi, Paul ).

Power to the Suezo. Join the club.

EDIT: I envy you, Paul, whom posesses a treasure-trove of Suezo disks.

Also, Marcus, the "encounter" you mention is key to unlocking a very special breed in lieu of that. Ergo, it's not Phoenix. I cannot picture an alien Phoenix.

I didn't like the anime much, though I found Suezo quite amusing. Nonetheless, I wasn't too fond of the show. Tecmo wasn't happy with it, either.

However, there is a special promo anime for Monster Rancher 5 airing in Japan right now, and will be released on DVD afterwards. It's a given that these DVDs will yeild a secret monster.

[Vonwert]

Re: What's the deal with Monster Rancher?

My Suezo has turned into a greedy little bastard.

Though I wouldn't expect much when his description states that he is a spoiled little monster.

[RPGD]

Re: What's the deal with Monster Rancher?

Suezo's only really good if you can handle him. Try a Henger.

[Vonwert]

Re: What's the deal with Monster Rancher?

Yeah, I am going to try one after mine passes on to the other world.

[Valkysas]

Re: What's the deal with Monster Rancher?

I was using a bug-thing named BEETBOOD before I had to force myself away from the game. I was using a kitty who thought he was a giraffe, but he died. he beat the S rank tournament and then plopped down and started to rot. I then fed his heart to BEETBOOD.

... four more days.

[RPGD]

Re: What's the deal with Monster Rancher?

Send me it's Vs. Data.

An' if you wanna, here: http://www.pavilionboards.com/forum/...ead.php?t=4139

[Valkysas]

Re: What's the deal with Monster Rancher?

ok. tomorrow. I have this "pavilion" thing that I need to work on right now.

[RPGD]

Re: What's the deal with Monster Rancher?

You're still doing that little thing of yours? It'll nevah get you nowhere, whippersnapper! Now go milk dem cows!

[Valkysas]

Re: What's the deal with Monster Rancher?

I'm scanning things. I can type while scanning, I sure can.

[RPGD]

Re: What's the deal with Monster Rancher?

And de cows?

EDIT: To clarify, the above was a jest.