A story of Vagrancy!

[Slothy]

So I was tired of waiting for Vagrant Story to appear on the North American PSN, and so utterly disappointed when I found a copy that was more than I was willing to pay at the local flea market (the first one I've seen there in years of searching) that I grabbed a copy on Ebay.

It's here in the house now but I won't have the chance to play it until the weekend. As I understand it's a fairly complex game I figured I'd ask the good people here, what should I know going into this game so I don't screw myself over or suffer unduly from being an ignorant sloth whose ten years late to the party?

Also, feel free to discuss the awesomeness of this game (it's by Matsuno, so I naturally assume it is great).

[VeloZer0]

I didn't find it complex at all. There were lots of elements and weaknesses to keep track of, but it was more about making do with what you had. You should be able to figure it out as you go along with no problems.

It has a synthesis system as the main system of item acquisition, so naturally you will do better if you plan everything out before hand. But you can see the result of a combination before you combine them, so I wouldn't bother to read a guide until after you have beaten the game the first time.

[Necronopticous]

The best advice I can give is to exercise patience.

I'm excited for you. You are in for something really incredible this weekend.

[Hot Shot]

I got on my PSP (which is now borken) and I loved it. It was really good but I found it quite hard. I didn't get too far into it, but I loved the very little I did experience. I've heard this is a good game, so cherish it.

[Slothy]

Well, I ended up being too busy on the weekend to play it (arghh!), but I did get to play for about 40 minutes yesterday. Even only 40 minutes in it's awesome. I'm going to have an even harder time finishing off FFXIII now. I've honestly enjoyed that 40 minutes more than I have the 25+ hours I put into FFXIII. God I wish Matsuno hadn't left Square (or would at least make another game soon).

[Wolf Kanno]

My only two pieces of advice is simply to not stick to one weapon and build different weapons to deal with different creatures, it will make the game go by faster, trust me... Second, don't use items haphazardly except stat gaining ones and magic tomes. Some of the items (like the ones that lower Risk) are not very common so don't use them as you get them just cause you think more will pop up, they won't...

Other than that, enjoy the game and hopefully you may join the handful of people in the world that have actually beaten this game (I think there is only six of us outside of the design team).

[Roogle]

My advice for this game is to keep an open mind.

It is a very different game than anything else produced by Squaresoft or Square Enix. The style of the game certainly fits other games by Yasumi Matsuno.

[champagne supernova]

I got it off PSN and it is awesome. Just be aware that some of the bosses can kill you with one hit moves if you're not careful. This can be slightly frustrating. Apart from that, an awesome game.

[Necronopticous]

So what's up? Did you ever play past your initial 40 minutes?

[Slothy]

I did play a bit more, but then my PS3 kicked the bucket and my save file has been lost in the ether. I want to get back to it soon but I'll be starting from scratch. Thankfully I wasn't very far in (wish I could say the same about my Persona 3 save file).

[Necronopticous]

Get in there.

[Wolf Kanno]

You know you will never be trully fulfilled in life until you beat this game so I say start it over, especially since I know how frustrating it is to start over on a MegaTen game so I say let P3 sit for awhile and take your frustration out on VS.

[Slothy]

No worries, I'll definitely be restarting VS again. Persona 3 will have to wait for a while if only because my next attempt to play through it will be my third (the first time I got side tracked by other things and was just better off restarting it a few months back). At least with Vagrant Story I should be able to skip through the cut scenes and get back to where I was in very little actual play time.

[Vagrant]

A month on and have you got back into it yet? This game frustrated the hell out of me at first, especially when trying to block boss moves.

[Slothy]

You know, I'm sad and a little surprised to say that I haven't picked it up again yet. I haven't been able to play my console games as much in the last few weeks and before that I got distracted by InFamous.

I won't have a chance to play until next week, but I think I may just go and put away every game I have except for Vagrant Story so when I do get to play something next week it will be hard to miss.