1UP Retrospective on Suikoden 1 and why it's awesome.

[Raistlin]

The Rune of Punishment sounds great in theory, but was absolutely worthless for most of the game, at least in IV (it did became badass in Tactics). SIV was so easy that it never mattered, but it's (lack of) usefulness is only rivaled by the V's Dawn Rune, where the first spell is... a group antidote.

I also agree with WK's last post almost completely... but how is II's major battle system your LEAST favorite? It is better than I's and at least involves some strategy. I might even rank it ahead of IV's because it reminds me of having to sail around the world map for half of the game.

[Wolf Kanno]

The Rune of Punishment sounds great in theory, but was absolutely worthless for most of the game, at least in IV (it did became badass in Tactics). SIV was so easy that it never mattered, but it's (lack of) usefulness is only rivaled by the V's Dawn Rune, where the first spell is... a group antidote.

The Punishment Rune wasn't so bad as a last resort rune, it got really useful when you collected all 108 Characters and removed it's negative effects. I mean Hero, Snowe, Ted, and Kika was a pretty unstoppable end game party and being able to double team the Final boss with the Rune of Punishment and Soul Eater was pretty fun.

I'll agree the Dawn Rune was pretty lame, but considering you also get the Dusk and Star True Runes kind of made up for it. It's reminiscent of how useless the True Water Rune is in Suikoden III if Chris gets it, since her magic ability is abysmal, you would only see the Level 4 Spell if you if you chose Chris as the hero and it was given to Hugo, or by hacking the game, or by exploiting the difficult Lv. 99 farming technique in her first chapter.

I also agree with WK's last post almost completely... but how is II's major battle system your LEAST favorite? It is better than I's and at least involves some strategy. I might even rank it ahead of IV's because it reminds me of having to sail around the world map for half of the game.

It's poorly explained, the unit building is limited, and once Harmonia/Grasslanders show up, the rules of engagement work like Tetra Master, where victory is based more on the "Will of the Random Number Generator Gods" than actual careful planning. It tries to be like Ogre Battle, but Ogre Battle itself is more like the Rock/Paper/Scissors mechanics that the first game had, whereas SII doesn't work that way and its about random number crunching. Let's not forget that a good chunk of them are scripted so strategy is not much of a factor, most of the time your strategy is simply "avoid Luca Blight". It's just the least fun element of the game and I feel it's descendents did a much better job of making this part more fun.

[Raistlin]

The negative effects of the Rune of Punishment weren't even that bad, considering the game was so obnoxiously easy (even compared to I and II). It just wasn't very powerful compared to other options. And the Dawn Rune's last spell was actually fairly powerful, but the problem was that it didn't become useful until late-game, and by that time you had all the upper-level runes and weapons you could want.

And yeah, True Water was useless in Chris's hands in III, but its level 4 spells wasn't very important anyway. Who needs more damage when you've already got True Lightning and the True Rune of Self-Immolation?

It's poorly explained, the unit building is limited, and once Harmonia/Grasslanders show up, the rules of engagement work like Tetra Master, where victory is based more on the "Will of the Random Number Generator Gods" than actual careful planning.

To be fair, I's major battle system did not involve much in the way of "careful planning" either. Use your ninjas and thieves first and any other bonuses, and then just guess. I agree that the randomness of II was sometimes annoying, especially when a spell didn't do damage for 5 or 6 straight attempts, but I think even the limited unit building and veneer of battle strategy was a step in the right direction. Unless you choose the Yuber fight which can take forever because you NEVER DAMAGE HIM ARGH (and he only got more annoying in III).

[Wolf Kanno]

I'll agree it was a step in the right direction for the series, but in terms of having a fun experience, I liked Suikoden 1's system over Suikoden 2's. The dialogue options and getting the different special units made the battles fun, whereas the SRPG battles of II just felt flat and had some annoying hang-ups. Though as I said, I feel Suikoden V easily had the best war battle system, by going with a simplified RTS set-up.

As for Yuber in Suikoden III, Geddoe is his Achilles heel, for some reason, Geddoe seems to get bonuses for parry/counters against Yuber and I've seen him one-shot that asshole on enough occasions to make it seem like it's not an actual fluke. It's why I wasn't surprised when the manga adaption of Suikoden III kept having the two of them square off and become rivals throughout the books. Speaking of which, I really wished Konami had translated the novel adaptions for Suikoden I and II, they fill in quite a few gaps in the story and helped flesh out some of the minor 108 stars. Hell, I guess while I'm making pointless wishes, I wish they would finally translate the Suikoden Gaiden games so more fans can experience the awesomness of Nash, or hell, maybe just finally release Suikoden II onto PSN outside of Japan...

[Raistlin]

I had no idea about Geddoe and Yuber. I'll have to keep that in mind for my next playthrough, as Yuber really is a pain in the ass in that game.

And I concur in the desire for a Suikogaiden translation, as Nash is badass.

[NeoCracker]

My first Suikoden was IV.

God I hated that game.

I played a bit of V, and it was enjoyable, though I hadn't played enough to judge it properly. Liked what I saw though.

Same for II, originally I emulated it, though my Laptop pretty much crapped itself before any real progress could be made. Did enjoy that one though.

I figured I wouldn't let IV sully the name of the other games, every series has it's hic ups.

Planning to get II if it ever comes to PSN so I can finally see the hub ub. I'll probably get the first when I have some spare cash to download it.

[Raistlin]

Suikoden IV's existence is justified if only because of The High Seas livejournal group, which... I just discovered that the archive of it is now gone. It used to be located here, but now I get a 404. Do you know, WK?

It was on Live Journal, where a group of people made accounts in the names of IV's characters and acted as if they all have LJs. It was one of the funniest things I've seen on the internet, and if it is gone forever I will cry.

[Wolf Kanno]

It looks like it's gone for good...

Suikoden IV is definetly a step back for the franchise but it does have it's strong points. The Trading system is actually deceptively deep as trading materials back and forth begins to unlock better materials for more profit, where this gets interesting is that the game also allowed you to use these materials to craft armor, so it's kind of the secret to better stuff. The Ship was also a pretty good castle replacement (I love the confessional and playing mah-jong) and Kika (Voiced by the lovely Mary Elizabeth McGlynn) is pretty badass, not to mention the emotional pull of being able to see and use Ted again. Granted Ted kind of breaks the game (just needs a Flowing Rune) but oh well... Suikoden IV also jumps into the better Suikoden Tactics, and the history of the Island Nations actually flows right into Suikoden V since you get to deal with them a little and get some pretty powerful characters from there (Bernadette anyone?). It's still the weakest entry though and you kind of need to play Suikoden I to get several of the references in the game to the rest of the series.

I'd recommend giving the series another shot, I'm actually playing through Suikoden I and while it definetly has its narm moments and some awful translation issues, the game has held up pretty well. I've completely forgot about stuff like the Kelekka Incident and how robust (for it's time) it gives background info about things. I'm just getting into Milich's Territory and have to find Luiken. I'm prepping Pahn for his fateful encounter with Teo as well.

[Madonna]

There appears to be a wanker drifting on my seas.