Odd, I thought you were going to post Persona 4 next instead, hell while I'm thinking about it, where's BoFIV because although you snub the fifth entry you would expect a man to have the missing entry from your list.
Odd, I thought you were going to post Persona 4 next instead, hell while I'm thinking about it, where's BoFIV because although you snub the fifth entry you would expect a man to have the missing entry from your list.
True beauty exists in things that last only for a moment.
Current Mood: And it's been a long December and there's reason to believe. Maybe this year will be better than the last. I can't remember all the times I tried to tell myself. To hold on to these moments as they pass...
3 - Not played.
2 - Not played.
Bow before the mighty Javoo!
In regards to IV, I never played more then a third of it, and never got the chance to finish it. I do however have it on PSN now, so I plan too!Originally Posted by Wolf Kanno
And right, I was going to post P4 next...
And smurf I deleted the write up. The plan was, since I wiped it from my list by mistake, to insert it as 3.5 as I did with a couple game earlier. Though I think I deleted it along with P3 when that one was posted.
The only Xenosaga game that I really liked was the first one. The others felt rushed(due to the series being shortened from 6 to 3 games). I was always a much bigger fan of Xenogears... but I'd rather not open up that can of worms right now.
In regards to IV, I never played more then a third of it, and never got the chance to finish it. I do however have it on PSN now, so I plan too!
IV is pretty decent, but I've always preferred III. The main villain in IV is my favorite bad guy in the series though.
And right, I was going to post P4 next...
And smurf I deleted the write up. The plan was, since I wiped it from my list by mistake, to insert it as 3.5 as I did with a couple game earlier. Though I think I deleted it along with P3 when that one was posted.
So you are ranking it somewhere between Persona 3 and Xenosaga?
"Repent your sins through death!" - Ramirez - Skies of Arcadia
Yeah, ranked just after Persona 3. I deleted it of the actual list by mistake when re-arranging it a while back, and wipped the write up by mistake when I deleted my Persona 3 write up after posting it.
And yeah.... I am so sorry for this one.
1. Final Fantasy VII: Dirge of Cerberus
You know, this game get’s a lot of flack, and for the life of me I could never understand why that was. Vincent, a fan favorite of FF VII, finally get’s his own game, and it’s executed wonderfully. A great mix of RPG elements and shooter elements gives you an extension to FF VII which is not only good, but I felt surpassed anything if FF VII itself. Regardless of my dislike of the compilation as a whole, Dirge of Cerberus really stands out to me as the exception.
To start off with is some absolutely stellar voice work. Look no farther then Vincent himself voiced by Stephen Blum. Normally it takes great voice acting to really make it worth mentioning, but this game has it. Hell, the only way it could have been made better was to somehow get Crispin Freeman involved.
The thing about the VA’s is how much it adds to the characters. For the most part, the characters don’t fall to far from archetypes, but the performances given really give life to them, and you kind of forget some of the stereotypical nature of them. For example, Yuffie introducing herself to Vincent was classic. It switched from a goofy intro to a very sincere and touching conversation between the two, especially when Vincent actually thanks Yuffie.
Speaking on Gameplay for a minute, the game does have some shortcomings. The controls are simple, and easy to get into. It is true at times it can feel sluggish, but once you adjust it’s no wear near as bad as some people have said. It comes with a good variety of customization. What I loved most though was the way they showed FF VII’s gameplay in a non-turn based an action sense. The combat looks smooth and sharp, admittedly more so then it is in practice.
Though what I liked most about this, and I know I’m going to get trout for this, was the revelation of Genesis. Now I know what you are thinking, and I’ll agree he was handled poorly later, but during this game he seemed to be a lot more the Sephiroth was, a villain who stood out amongst the others of the game. I want to give credit to Dirge of Cerberus for getting more more invested in the FF VII world then FF VII could. I was kind of sad the rest of the compilation went tit’s up, but at least there was still this gem.
Ha ha ha.
EDIT: "1" - Not played.I own it, though. I'll play it probably once I'm done with the main series.
Bow before the mighty Javoo!
I'm not even going to bother reading that :chuckle:
1. Final Fantasy VII: Dirge of Cerberus
You're joking, right?
If not, consider me "shocked" to say the least... but I think you are. So nice one.
"Repent your sins through death!" - Ramirez - Skies of Arcadia
April Fools was a while ago, Cracker.
Come on guys, no one seriously thinks Cracker thinks DoC is a better game than FFVI, FFIX, Chrono Trigger, etc., do they? If he was going to put a joke at #1 it should've been a less obvious one.
It was worth a try anyway.
1. Shin Megami Tensai: Persona 4 (PS2)
This game is absolute gold. In the end, it’s not really a comparison to even the other top five games for me. It took everything that I absolutely loved about Persona 3 and pretty much made it better, with a couple minor exceptions. So, I guess it is time to get into greater detail.
The Dungeon Design is seriously ramped up. Not so much in practice, but in visual design. Don’t get me wrong, some of the area specific alterations, such as the blacked out floor at the strip tease, are fun changes, but it’s still basically a bunch of connected hallways. Though the actual visual designs are now more then just reskins, they actually look a hell of a lot more personalized based on whose mind the world had been created from. The Dungeons end up with a lot more personality that lacked in Persona 3, and it’s a much appriciated improvement.
Even the battle system was improved upon. While I was saddened by Physical attacks no longer having types, the improvements more then made up for it. The biggest being alterations to what could grant you a follow up turn due to weakness exploitation and Critical hits. The strategy got deeper as both you and your opponents had more ways to exploit each other. And, while I liked the great A.I. set up of three, I do enjoy being able to fully control my party this time around. I don’t know if 3‘s system of A.I. is one I’d like to see done in to many games.
Speaking of battle changes, the difficulty was handled so much better in this game. It manages to dispense with a lot of the B.S. deaths, and actually ended up being the far fair game, while keeping an extremely high level of difficulty. Better yet, at no point does the difficulty take a nose dive like it did in Persona 3.
One thing I also find it did better, and as usual Wolf is going to disagree on this, but your characters awakening to their Persona’s second form I felt was handled better. I loved the way in which a person obtained their Persona, and by going through their individual social links you would awaken the true form. It may not have had the dramatic impact that P3‘s catalyst event did, but at the same time when they obtain it you get this real sense of accomplishment, and it truly feels like the characters have overcome the problems they faced to begin with.
Now moving on to Social Links, while I don’t think any single link from P4 had quite the impact of Sun from 3, the writing I felt was a lot better across the bored. The occasional glimpses into other peoples links while doing one added a lot to making the town you are in feel a lot more connected, where as 3 all the links felt pretty damn isolated from one another.
Best of all? It keeps all the great atmosphere that was present in Persona 3, the symbolism isn’t quite up to the same standard but really damn close, and it has a damn good narrative going on from the games beginning to end. Everything is set up perfectly for the games finale, and it’s on a constant build to that point.
And on a hole your party is absolutely amazing. Probably the only one of your party that feels wasted is Chie, as she just seems like the only reason she’s even here is Yukiko is here. Still though, she’s pleasent enough. And beats the living hell out of Yukari from P3. A high point for me, is after my second playthrough, Naoto became my favorite character of the game, and one of my favorite characters of all time.
And this is involving the games “villain”, so I’ll spoil it to discuss something else I loved. And anyone who has beaten it will know why Villain is in quotation marks.
(SPOILER)Firstly, I loved it was the smurfing goofball rookie detective who had been the one behind killing everyone. Though what I love about him so much, is regardless of his power trip and other flaws, when it comes time to save Nanako I love how he just let’s you chase after her. He seems to genuinely care about you and your family, and seemed like he didn’t want anything bad to happen to Nanime. You get a genuine feeling of regret from him that she’s the one getting mixed up in all of this. I appreciate the game going out of it’s way like it did to still make him seem like a caring human being, while making sure you still had every reason to want him to fail.
Now, this spoiler is for the one moment in the game I just smacking myself in the head. It involves the video game world, so if you dont’ know what I mean, it means you shouldn’t look at the spoiler unless you just don’t care.
(SPOILER)Alright, I’ll buy the party thinking the fat kid was actually the killer at first, I forget his name off the top of my head, but that’s not important. When you reach him in the Shadow World though, and he immediately doesn’t realize that Yukiko and others were thrown in as well, your party should have at least had some kind of suspicion the killing was not over. The game pushed the suspension of disbelief way to far with that. I know it was likely to make Naoto appear smarter, though that would have happened regardless. She would come out looking amazing even if your party at the time didn’t seem so god awfully stupid.
With that out of the way, this game is absolutely beautiful in pretty much every way. If you haven’t played it yet, do so. Really, any of the Shin Megami Tensai Games. It’s easy to tell the passion and creativity of the games these guys make, and their ability to create gaming experiences that no one else out there offers.
I totally agree with P4 at number 1. If you have a Vita, then Golden is an absolute must play for you. It improves upon the original in nearly every possible way.
"Repent your sins through death!" - Ramirez - Skies of Arcadia
1 - Not played.
Bow before the mighty Javoo!
EDIT: Even though I haven't played the majority of games on the list I still thoroughly enjoyed the thread. Good effort, Mr Cracker!
I'm pretty sure that not many people would agree with your ordering in the slightest but that is what personal lists are all about.
Last edited by Bubba; 04-13-2013 at 03:35 PM.
Posting Permissions
Reply With Quote
