Don't have a Wii so can't play this. But I really, really wish Xenogears was released for PAL regions.I always hear so much about it, and it's still NA/JP only.
Don't have a Wii so can't play this. But I really, really wish Xenogears was released for PAL regions.
Bow before the mighty Javoo!
In all seriousness now, I loved Xenoblade Chronicles. It is how I pictured the direction of Final Fantasy to go in the 3D era. SE could learn a lot from this absolute masterpiece.
Unfortunately I think Xenoblade Chronicles will be a gem I'll forever miss. As the Wii falls down into a price I'd be willing to buy it for a few games, XC is going to rise to a rare classics premium I'm not willing to pay. But Nintendo's been getting more on point with their online offerings lately, let's see if they make it happen.
You might not think this way when you actually play it.Originally Posted by Loony BoB
Don't have a Wii so can't play this. But I really, really wish Xenogears was released for PAL regions.
Xenoblade was pretty good. I didn't care for the battle system so much, but the world was amazing.
"Repent your sins through death!" - Ramirez - Skies of Arcadia
8. Mana Khemia: Alchemists of Al-Revis (PS2)
Until the coming of the Atelier Arland games on PS3, there wasn’t any game like Mana Khemia out there. Not so much in terms of combat, but more in terms of the kind of story it would tell. And, as you notice from the high placing, I don’t think any of those games can compare in shear terms of writing. Really most games I don’t think can.
To talk about combat first, it is fluid and fun. Making use of six characters at a time, three active and three that can be switched in mid battle, it has an excellent set up to make use of so many people at once. You have, essentially, gauges to fill to switch people in or out, and you do so either as a follow up attack, or switch out to guard. Different characters even have different abilities and effects in regards to whether they are defending or attacking. Examples include Muppy taking all allies into his shell on a Support Defense, taking the hit of an group attack by himself, or one character doing a counter attack during a support defense.
Though the most fun is had with the card counter, the system that shows you turn order. In addition to character cards, their are blanks. Basically when you go, your card is moved back in the line, and to goes to the next card, skipping over any blanks. Some attacks actually add a card to the field, and each time it’s that cards turn it goes off. The fun comes in with setting up your own abilities, and even abilities that manipulate the cards rather then the battlefield directly. It’s a weird system to try to explain, and something as simple as turn presentation doesn’t seem like much, but it adds a great level of strategy and depth.
Also one of the better uses of the Alchemy of the series, I feel the only game to out-craft this one was Atelier Ayesha. That said, the alchemy is almost used in place of typical leveling. It was by discovering formula’s that you would gain your advancement, using experience points to unlock abilities your alchemy began revealing. Unlike other games of the Atelier series (Which, regardless of name, this is one no doubt),
What really sells this game for me though is you don’t see this kind of story in RPG’s, or for that matter gaming as a whole. The closet you’ll come are games like Rune Factory, but even those don’t quite fit the bill. You aren’t saving the world, you aren’t stopping some government or school conspiracy, you are simply dealing with your own past and it’s relation with the effects it will inevitably have on your localized area. Yet while the problem is localized and small in scale, the superb writings still makes everything thing feel so important to you the player it’s easier to get invested in it then some of gamings most massive and world ending plots.
I’ll leave a spoiler for the next part, because that is what I’ll need to do to truly allow you to understand my love of this game, but the non-spoiler version is this. The writers understood that to make something feel big, it has to both be something extreme in comparison to the world around you, yet not feel like it was done for the sake of being dark. Imagine if, for example, you are playing a normal Harvest Moon game, and close to the end the bubonic plaque hit’s killing 80% of the town. You’re going to call bulltrout on that.
Also think of playing Gears of War, you’re not going to be shocked when various NPC’s start dying. You might be sad if the writings good, but it’s something you would expect to happen. Mana Khemia manages to find a perfect balance here, and deliver one of the more emotional end stretches I have ever scene in gaming. Next I shall spoil that for you.
(SPOILER)The whole game essentially builds up that there is something strange about the main character. His Mana can’t speak to anyone but him, his mana can’t phase away, strange events like reviving the tree happen, and finally reviving a dead party member. As it turns out, it’s not his cat that is the Mana, the cat is a normal every day cat. But our lead himself is the Mana, and the worlds only artificially made Mana at that.
He was created by the person he views as his father, though they never actually met, in an attempt to rectify his own mistakes due to his arrogance, and created a mana who was capable of granting wishes. It didn’t quite end the way he expected though. The Mana he created didn’t simply grant a wish, it looked deep into your heart to grant it’s deepest desires. In the case of his father, he wasn’t able to bear the trouble he caused a girl whose life his Alchemy had greatly shortened. As a result, the Mana had taken his life.
Upon learning what it is he had done, the power begins to stir to grant his own wish. His desire was conflicting. He wanted to disappear, yet also wanted to be with all those around him, spending the last few years making all of these friends, so he wished to disappear with everyone. The dialogue and build up is absolutely beautiful and heartbreaking.
Finally, to end this bit, there is basically an ending for each character, whoever’s arc you end up finishing being the ending you get, and determining to prior scenes, one of which is just before the final boss. You even get an ending if you forsake building your friendships. Though given how awesomely written they are I have no clue as to why you would want to.
8 - Not played (or heard of).
Bow before the mighty Javoo!
7. Final Fantasy VI
I’m going at this one a bit differently then the others. The big one is, who here hasn’t heard everything absolutely wonderful about this game? No, what I’m going to do is firstly say regardless of that, if I were to take off the Nostalgia and memories this game isn’t as high quality as some make it out to be. Don’t get me wrong, this is genuinely an amazing game. But what I am going to do is go into what doesn’t work with the game, and then say why it is I still rank it so high. (It would still probably be on the lower end of 20 regardless.)
Most issues with this game come in after Kefka smurfs with the three statues. It’s around this point where character selection starts becoming useless. Abilities and inherent stats begin fading next to the superiority of magic and per-level esper bonus’s. While it takes a bit for it to happen, it is most certainly unfortunate it does.
The other one is there isn’t as much a sense of unity amongst your group. When collecting people past Setzer, there really isn’t any dialogue between the recruited and recruiters, most of the time there isn’t even any. The stories can be good, but then they just kind of end and the come back to fight Kefka.
There is a problem earlier in game as well, which is some odd balance issues. For the first couple hours having them, Sabin and Edward’s damage output is insane, and lacking in any way to limit that output. Gau, with the right couple rages, can either physically out damage anyone else, or Magically out damage anyone else.
That pretty much ends the games main flaws, though even with those it’s still rightfully an amazing game. Though now I’ll get into just why this game is so amazing for me.
You had Super Mario World, the game that introduced me to gaming. Then there was Final Fantasy IV, the game that introduced me to RPG’s in general. It wasn’t long after that I had picked up VI. This was the game that, in a sense, opened up my eyes. While I enjoyed games prior, this was the game that showed me just what a game was capable of.
You could get a massive world to explore and detail in ways a movie never could. It lacks any kind of time constraint. At the same time, you can tell one epic story without having to worry about episodic breaks and arcs as one would have to do with a TV series. Best yet you could also get some great music and visuals that books could not offer.
What else makes this so great us that this could all be done without having to sacrifice narrative quality. It was this game that allowed me to appreciate the gaming medium, and even games I’d played prior I was able to look at in an all new light. When I actually dived into FF VI, I ‘got it’ in a sense.
So I feel I owe more to Final Fantasy VI then any other game out there, and I don’t think there is a way to deny this game had a massive role in shaping who I ended up becoming today. Whether or not that is a good thing, whose to say. ;P
It's your list, I suppose whether or not a game gave you an epiphany is a fair gauge any day. To me, it's more around the middle of the FF series, but I appreciate why those who grew up on the SNES rank it so highly. It still made my jaw drop when that knight opened his mouth and started singing, and we're talking years and generations after the game had come and gone.
While I love Xenoblade Chronicles, I still think it's a bit overrated sometimes. The world and gameplay is great and the writing is good, but I only really cared for like 3 out of the 7 characters in the game. The main character is very typical, plain and boring for example.
Another thing that's not a big issue - since it's mainly a post-game issue and I only care about it because I'm a post-game addict - is that gaining levels can be bad for stat-development. The SP and AP you gain from enemies depend on their level compared to your own. So beating enemies that are higher level than yourself is the best way to get SP/AP. This means that once you reach level 99, you gain basically no SP at all and only very little AP, except against the super bosses who you would want all of those abilities and such unlocked for anyway. What makes it worse is the fact that you level up so darn quickly during the post-game. It really takes no time at all to hit 99. The super bosses themselves were okay though.
The game is good, but it would probably only make it into top 30 on my list.
Mana Khemia is a great game and very underrated. The final boss battle is incredibly well done and one of my personal favourite final bosses.
FFVI is, for someone who played it only recently, a good game. For me, it is a victim of overhype. People built it up constantly for years, and when I finally actually finished the game... it just didn't seem "all that". The biggest letdown for me was the opera scene, which I found boring. I've seen that song peformed live and found it amazing, but the sound quality back then is so poor compared to what it was just shortly afterwards that I struggled to be captured by it. When playing FFVI on the bus, I would often fall asleep. Compare that to FFIX which I'm playing now and I'm actually really enjoying it now that I've gotten far enough into the game.
I still enjoyed FFVI, don't get me wrong, but everything that people built up as amazing parts of the game didn't meet the hype for me. Well, okay, Ultros did.What I loved about FFVI: Ultros, Edgar, Sabin, Celes, Umaro throwing people around, General Leo, the amusing humour. Kefka was a good villain, too. I enjoyed the battle system for the most part.
Bow before the mighty Javoo!
Sabin and EdwardSabin and Edward’s
As a fan of the Figaro Brothers I don't know what to say.:glare:
It's Sabin Rene Figaro and Edgar Roni Figaro. gOSh.
6. Chrono Trigger (SNES)
What can I possibly say about this game at this point? The shear volume of love this game gets is immense, and it’s understandable why that is. Chrono Trigger pushes really close to being a flawless title, but there are things that keep it from being perfect, mostly small things and nit picks that are likely a product of tech limits and minor oversights, but nothing major.
If I were to get one of those things out of the way, it’s the awkward acceptance of whats going on to some characters. Not so much Crono, Marle, Lucca, Magus, or Robo, but with Frog and Ayla. It’s as if the moment they realize there is time travel they simply shrug their shoulders and go ‘Makes sense to me’ and proceed un phased. That always bothered me a little.
Still though, everything good about this game makes things like that almost UN-noticable. The characters are all absolutely wonderful. Even Lucca, my least favorite, is fun and has a genuinely sad ending after Lavos is defeated. Robo leaving back to a future he may not exist in was kind of heartbreaking in a way. I mean Cross said he did in fact live, though I think that may have been a mystery better left un answered, though I digress.
Frog and Magus, in terms of story, are easily the best written in the game, and I’d argue best characters as well. There is so much history these to have not only together, but apart. And when all is said and done, I even like how Magus never really becomes a good guy, even when helping you out. This is also one of the only games besides Breath of Fire that really sells the silent protagonist with a good personality.
And while by end game, as it usually does, Dual and Triple techs become a bit pointless when you have doom bringing spells like Luminaire, Flare, and Dark Matter at your disposal, for the majority of the game they add a lot of variety and wonderful visuals. Seeing Crono just shock the trout out of Ayla only for her to go to town and some poor Shmuck? Priceless.
Hell, this was about the only RPG in it’s day that took into account enemy and ally positioning across the map, making various abilities more viable at different times. This is something difficult as all hell to do in a JRPG, and almost every time it happens it flops, such as Wild Arms 3. Again, late game abilities kind of nullify this, but at the very least it’s late game.
It’s also an entirely different kind of villain you face compared to most other games, especially of it’s time. You aren’t fighting some malevolent force, or some misguided man trying to do good, or anything of the sort. You are fighting against a force of nature. A being who really is only following it’s own natural survival instincts, it just happens to be at the cost of every ones life. Now, it is more complex then that, with it gaining more intelligence and what not, but at it’s core this is what the fight is over.
And the time travel was handled wonderfully. The explained just enough to rationalize it, but didn’t try to explain to much so you could start poking holes in it. The a time Travel Story should be. Mind you, I still liked Dark Cloud 2‘s method of not explaining trout and just running with it, but Trigger found a much more clever way to go about it.
And did I mention how absolutely wonderful this game looks? It pretty much blows any other SNES game out of the water in terms of shear graphics as well as design. While I still think the BoF 2 in battle spites were superior in design, it hardly makes up for it when the entirety of Trigger is so wonderfully done.
One last thing I like, that I don’t think it really get’s talked about much, if at all, is the leveling. It’s pretty standard, but what I love about it is you definitely have an advantage with characters you use more often, having acquired more AP, but the fact other members still gain experience allows you to not have to worry about grinding characters you normally don’t use as they will be leveled when forced to use them, all while keeping your more focused party the most viable.
In a couple days comes the final chunk of 'bad games'!
In my time as a player of RPGs and a reader of their discussions, the three super-hyped games I eventually got to playing were Final Fantasy VI, Xenogears, and Chrono Trigger. 2 out of 3 just did not live up to it, and probably looked even worse in my eyes because of the overhype. Chrono Trigger was the odd man out that really was just as good as everyone said it was. Not enough to break into my personal top 10, but very close to a flawless game.
One thing I can say for certain: it sure as hell didn't handle time travel as well as Final Fantasy VIII!!!! Has that been on this list yet?
Oh, I've played this one, too. I can't remember much about it, though. I mean, I can remember certain 'screenshots' in my head, but I can't remember the plot itself or anything. I suppose that's a good thing because it means I can enjoy the game to it's fullest if/when I play it again.
Can't remember if I finished or not, either. I remember at least four of the playable characters, a bunch of the environments, etc.
Bow before the mighty Javoo!
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