The Last Story

[Chronixal]

I won't ask if anyone else is keeping an eye on this as the question is redundant; we established this in the last, brief forum-skirmish. So I'll say I am very keen to see how it plays and specifically its combat system. At this stage, I think hoping for ATB is a bit futile but we can live in hope.

 

From what I've seen, it looks very polished. Especially so for a Wii title although I guess that's to be expected given its credentials. I look forward to hearing more about it over the next few months.

[deanb]

As I said I'd like it if it was more ATB style instead of the Action RPG style they seem to be going for.

Regardless there's still Lost Odyssey.

[Chronixal]

I'd love to know why the world fell out with ATB and turn-based combat. I think Pokemon is the only big franchise that sticks to it. It's a shame really.

[Bouchart]

There's a couple of possible reasons for it:

 

1) Gamers are more impatient than before.

2) Turn based combat was really just a holdover from D&D.

3) When computer processing power was more limited, turn based combat was easier to do than real time.

4) General lack of interest in JRPGs this generation of consoles.

[slithy toves]

I'd love to know why the world fell out with ATB and turn-based combat. I think Pokemon is the only big franchise that sticks to it. It's a shame really.

 

i'd like the know the answer to this one as well. i think ATB/turn-based allows for more strategic, as opposed to reactionary, gameplay options myself. i'm always able to find someone else who enjoys it if i'm in a group of gamers so i'm always really confused why developers make the change and say it has something to do w/ what people want. it obviously isn't everyone.

[Yantelope]

Bouchart is mostly correct. I personally think that ATB games were a product of gaming consoles not being able to do much more at the time. With current technology they seem antiquated and boring.

[slithy toves]

Bouchart is mostly correct. I personally think that ATB games were a product of gaming consoles not being able to do much more at the time. With current technology they seem antiquated and boring.

 

meh, i understand some of the reasons and see what bouchart is saying but i feel like sometimes it swaps meaningful strategy w/ button mashing. give me the slower meaningful strategy any day.

[Chronixal]

I would hope a developer with some imagination could pull off ATB with the illusion of something going all the time. I think FFXIII tried to do that and failed.

[Yantelope]

The other problem with ATB is it really isn't "meaningful strategy" most of the time. In the vast majority of ATB games you just level grind.

[StrifeROKs]

ATB will make a comeback, just wait and see

[Chronixal]

One could argue the staying power of the Disgaea series and it's ilk show that there is, however niche, a market for a good old-fashioned, ATB grindfest RPG.

[slithy toves]

The other problem with ATB is it really isn't "meaningful strategy" most of the time. In the vast majority of ATB games you just level grind.

 

touche. 6 of one, half dozen of another sir.

[jimmuhpage]

The other problem with ATB is it really isn't "meaningful strategy" most of the time. In the vast majority of ATB games you just level grind.

 

That's why most games in the minority tend to be favorites of mine. Chrono Cross and Lost Odyssey come to mind as "strategy over EXP" masterpieces.

 

EDIT: nvm, confused ATB with turn-based...

[Yantelope]

Yeah, ATB will always remain a niche market but I don't think it's ever going to regain the popularity it had in the PSX days.

[FMW]

Games were pretty lucky, actually. When the medium was in it's infancy, a developer's options for delivering an enthralling and/or exciting experience were limited. The games couldn't handle much on the screen at one time, nothing looked good, music was incredibly limited, and you could only present a limited number of colors. Oh yes, and everything was in 2D.

 

The result of this was that games developed some really weird patterns. Because developers couldn't make things exciting through spectacle, many games instead became really really hard. The idea was that killing a nigh unrecognizable pixel Dracula would be more exciting if it was super hard, and players had to struggle mightily to do so. This actually worked out pretty well, and still works today (Demon's Souls).

 

Another solution was to back away from blockbuster action, and instead try to appeal to a player's intellect. I think this is why RPGs developed so quickly. Developers could pull from rule sets already established to be basically balanced, and try to capture a more esoteric sort of fun. I reference Fire Emblem as a classic game that was fun because of the turn based nature of the strategy. Players could be entertained for hours staring at a difficult battle grid just trying to figure out what to do. Consider how much money and effort goes into generating a similar hour of single player entertainment in a Call of Duty game.

 

Eventually, turn based combat developed an interesting sibling in the ATB battle systems. ATB allowed the developers to inject more urgency into battles, but they kept the still necessary control over how many sprites would be on the screen and more or less what would be going on. It was ideal for the SNES and N64 eras, when technology sat on the edge of the great 3D-2D divide.

 

Fast forward to today, when technology no longer hinders developers like it once did. It is no longer necessary to find alternative ways to entertain players beyond the traditional. Games like Call of Duty are the biggest bread winners, just as The Expendables earned a ridiculous amount of money. It would be easy at this point for the gaming industry to follow the pattern of the movie industry, releasing fewer titles and following roughly the same genres. I'm not sure what we would offer to the romantic comedy crowd, but I'm sure someone would think of something.

 

But wait! That isn't how things are turning out! Why? Because games evolved so damn quickly. Both the creators and consumers of our earlier games are still around and spending money. This creates a very strange market situation indeed. The market for turn based combat and sprite graphics is roughly equivalent to a market for movies that are black and white or silent. There was rarely a great vision for turn based combat, it was forced by technological constraints.

 

As long as there is a market for retro games, they will be created. That's why JRPGs still exist. WRPGs convey all the same gameplay elements, but with more urgency and excitement. Usually better graphics too, but that's more of a toss up. Anyway, we have this weird market where there remain a select few who developed a taste for the slower, more methodical strategy of turn based action and still want it despite the development of newer flashier game technologies.

 

So what is the future for these classic game styles? I think they will live on as long as their audience does, but only proportionally to their audience. Advance Wars has an audience, sure, but not nearly as large as Starcraft's. This smaller audience means that JRPG budgets will usually be smaller than other games, forcing JRPGs to cut corners in graphics and audio technology. Ironically, the fans keeping these games alive probably won't mind too much. That's what they were weaned on, after all.

 

ATB battle systems in particular though? I think they're doomed. ATB helped span a technology gap that no longer exists. If a developer wants to keep battles frantic, they can do that just by letting it all happen at once. The processors can handle it. Likewise if a game opts to aim for the retro gamer demographic, it is more likely to be uncompromising and remain steadfastly turn based. It's easier to balance and again, it's not like retro gamers are clamoring for the prettiest, most instantly gratifying experiences. In fact, they want the opposite.

 

So I think that ATB was a step to compromise two different styles of game that have since seen their audiences separate. Only games that try to appeal to multiple RPG audiences are really messing with it anymore. We have FFXIII that tried to appeal to fans while still be exciting enough for the newer crowd, and we have Fallout which is similarly compromising between fans of older RPGs and fans of shooters. These games are few and far in between. I think that ATB will continue on this path to eventual oblivion.

[Yantelope V2]

So Kotaku's review is out and they pretty much loved it.

 

http://kotaku.com/5889812/the-last-story-the-kotaku-review

 

I'm a total sucker for Sakagachi's games so I'll probably buy this too but the points in the review about the system advancing and the story being great really get me excited. Anyone else getting this?

[Strangelove]

I know Ill sound like a total dickbag, but I wish people stopped releasing shit on the Wii. 3rd party releases sell like shit on there and this will be no exception.

Which is a tragedy because im sure there are tons of Mistwalker/Sakaguchi/FF fans who would happily shell out 60 bucks if it were on the 360/ps3.

 

And yeah, I know this is a tired argument, but I really feel strongly about it.

[WTF]

The game is ok but the story has far too many loose ends, lacks some coherence and the voice acting is atrocious for some of the actors. It's like they took a bunch of panto and theatrical hams and said hey lets get them on board. If they are definitely good voice actors then I blame the voice direction but that's one thing that irked me about this game.

[excel_excel]

I know Ill sound like a total dickbag, but I wish people stopped releasing shit on the Wii. 3rd party releases sell like shit on there and this will be no exception.

Which is a tragedy because im sure there are tons of Mistwalker/Sakaguchi/FF fans who would happily shell out 60 bucks if it were on the 360/ps3.

 

And yeah, I know this is a tired argument, but I really feel strongly about it.

 

That's not exactly true. Monster Hunter Tri is the best selling Monster Hunter released in the West. There are quite a lot of third party titles that have done well, I mean how did No More Heroes actually do on PS3 and 360? Also how well did Lost Odyssey do? Its not as if that lit up the sale charts. With Nintendo's backing behind it (this was a Nintendo published game and they collaborated with Mistwalker on the development) it'll be at least moderately successful in the West, and it did great in Japan. In fact, its not even a third party title.

[Strangelove]

I know Ill sound like a total dickbag, but I wish people stopped releasing shit on the Wii. 3rd party releases sell like shit on there and this will be no exception.

Which is a tragedy because im sure there are tons of Mistwalker/Sakaguchi/FF fans who would happily shell out 60 bucks if it were on the 360/ps3.

 

And yeah, I know this is a tired argument, but I really feel strongly about it.

 

That's not exactly true. Monster Hunter Tri is the best selling Monster Hunter released in the West. There are quite a lot of third party titles that have done well, I mean how did No More Heroes actually do on PS3 and 360? Also how well did Lost Odyssey do? Its not as if that lit up the sale charts. With Nintendo's backing behind it (this was a Nintendo published game and they collaborated with Mistwalker on the development) it'll be at least moderately successful in the West, and it did great in Japan. In fact, its not even a third party title.

 

NMH on the PS3 was a port, it wasnt even a very good one. Ports hardly ever do that well unless theyre old "classics" from a previous generation. NMH on the Wii was not a classic. Truth is, NMH was never going to be a huge success no matter on what platform.

As for Lost Odyssey, That shit came out a really long time ago(2008?) when jrpgs were very few and very shitty on new consoles. At that time, MS was buying up the exclusive rights to every and any jrpg it could get its grubby hands on so the Japanese would like the 360. That shit failed big time. Something like Lost Odyssey now in 2012 on the PS3/360 would be a huge success. Things have changed a lot in the last 3 years.

Despite how much people may love it, the Wii is on it's way out and has been in a decline for the last year. Some would say longer than that. The PS3/360 are still pretty alive and I think a lot of it's fans have a craving for a Sakaguchi game(no matter how overrated I think he is.)

[WTF]

Have to agree with excel in the fact that rpgs need not sell decently on other consoles. However that said the last story barely managed to do more than 180k LTD and that's pretty low for a game with its budget. Putting into perspective even tales of graces on the wii did more and that was a flop (TLS opened at 115k and ToG at 150k). Actually a lot of rpgs sell more than that in Japan. The thing is the last story wasn't/isn't a particularly great RPG and that's what the sales and opinions reflect. If you're going to play this right after Xenoblade I'd recommend keeping your expectations low. It's not terrible, just it's not that good. Lost Odyssey was a lot better than this. Even Blue Dragon (if you can overlook Toriyama's artwork) can be said to be fairly better than this.

 

However it looks very pretty, much prettier than the Mistwalker 360 titles despite not being HD.

Pandora's tower ends the wii rpg late release trio and that's eh okayish. Comes out here on April 13th.

[excel_excel]

I know Ill sound like a total dickbag, but I wish people stopped releasing shit on the Wii. 3rd party releases sell like shit on there and this will be no exception.

Which is a tragedy because im sure there are tons of Mistwalker/Sakaguchi/FF fans who would happily shell out 60 bucks if it were on the 360/ps3.

 

And yeah, I know this is a tired argument, but I really feel strongly about it.

 

That's not exactly true. Monster Hunter Tri is the best selling Monster Hunter released in the West. There are quite a lot of third party titles that have done well, I mean how did No More Heroes actually do on PS3 and 360? Also how well did Lost Odyssey do? Its not as if that lit up the sale charts. With Nintendo's backing behind it (this was a Nintendo published game and they collaborated with Mistwalker on the development) it'll be at least moderately successful in the West, and it did great in Japan. In fact, its not even a third party title.

 

NMH on the PS3 was a port, it wasnt even a very good one. Ports hardly ever do that well unless theyre old "classics" from a previous generation. NMH on the Wii was not a classic. Truth is, NMH was never going to be a huge success no matter on what platform.

As for Lost Odyssey, That shit came out a really long time ago(2008?) when jrpgs were very few and very shitty on new consoles. At that time, MS was buying up the exclusive rights to every and any jrpg it could get its grubby hands on so the Japanese would like the 360. That shit failed big time. Something like Lost Odyssey now in 2012 on the PS3/360 would be a huge success. Things have changed a lot in the last 3 years.

Despite how much people may love it, the Wii is on it's way out and has been in a decline for the last year. Some would say longer than that. The PS3/360 are still pretty alive and I think a lot of it's fans have a craving for a Sakaguchi game(no matter how overrated I think he is.)

 

How have things changed a lot in 3 years? I mean sure there's more 360s out there and in more JRPG fans hands, but still the game didn't do well. In fact saying that there were less quality JRPGs could have only been a good thing for Lost Odyssey as it should have stood out. These days it would likely be buried even harder then it was.

[MasterDex]

It looks like I'm the only one really enjoying the game!

 

I won't go into to much detail on my opinion as I plan to do a review of it for PXOD but to keep things concise, I'll say that I like the story so far and the characters are believable. The battle system is well done and fun to play but I lament the lack of the original Japanese VA and the slowdown and stuttering can be irritating but not enough for me to stop enjoying the game.

 

RE: The fact that it's on the Wii.

 

I don't think sales were the reason they chose the Wii. I believe they did it to keep the costs low while allowing them to keep the scale relatively big. For that reason, the wii makes more sense than releasing on the PS3 or 360. Also, Strangelove, if they were true Sakaguchi fans, they would have bought a Wii to play it, like I did!

[Mal]

At one point or another, we all, more or less, had Wiis. Now its suffering a slow death at my cousin's place. Believe me, I want to play this game but... damn it.