06/17- 7:00PM EST
Welcome to another (almost) all essay
edition of Q&A! With E3 just past us,
there's all kinds of gaming news going
around, but the biggest surprise for me was
a new Donkey Kong Country! I'm glad
Retro Studios is giving the series one more
go. I loved their first effort, and look
forward to seeing the follow up. I've also
been working on a long overdue review for Dead
Island: Riptide so keep an eye out for
that this week!
Now let's get right to it...
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Wheels
Summon the entire RPGamer E3 Ninja Clan!
I need to confirm something!
Final Fantasy XV (aka Versus
XIII)...is it, or is it NOT going to
be available on PlayStation 3!!!???
Most other news sites are sending mixed
messages and twitter is unreliable!
I know they said PS4 and that it RAN (past
tense) on PS3...but...gosh I'm confused!
Thanks!
--Blade
Wheels
I can't blame
you for being confused, they
weren't all that clear on this
issue at all. In all the press
following however, it is very
clear that Final Fantasy XV
will be coming to PS4 and Xbone
only. I'm not sure if they don't
want to release a scaled down
PS3 version, of if the engine no
longer even runs on that system,
or what. It could be that
focusing on these similar
Intel-powered systems has
finally given that game a steady
development progress. We shall
see how the finished product
turns out!
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Shining Force vs Fire Emblem:
A Comparison of my Two Favorite Strategy
RPG's and Thoughts on the Ultimately Supreme
Blending of the Two
The Shining Force and Fire
Emblem series are two of the oldest,
most well known, and most well received
strategy games made in Japan. Even though
they share a genre and both have a loyal
fan-base, they are both very different
games.
Shining Force games tend to be easy
and light hearted, while Fire Emblem
games range from average difficulty to
brutally hard. In Shining Force
battles can be played over and over by
egressing (or retreating) from the battle to
rack up experience as well as to revive
fallen characters. In Fire Emblem
character death is permenent and experience
is limited by the number of chapters in the
game and the players skills at getting it
all/distributing it intelligently. Shining
Force is the sort of game where one
can easily build up all members into an
invincible super team, whereas Fire
Emblem generally requires you to pick
a core team and stick with it while at the
same time the permanent death feature makes
it advisable to train up an extra character
or two... umless the player enjoys restarts.
As Fire Emblem battles can take
pretty long, a restart due to a death caused
by the level boss can be very frustrating.
Another big difference between the games is
that in traditional Fire Emblem
games purchasing is done during the actual
fighting missions by stopping in at stores
in the midst of battle and all character
management is done through menues between
the chapters. By contrast Shining Force
games allow full exploration of well
realized towns, especially the beautiful and
interesting towns in Shining Force III
Scenarios 1-3. As much as the battles
and challenge make Fire Emblem a
real favorite of mine, the towns and
exploration add so much to Shining Force
that it's hard not to miss them in other
strategy RPG's.
Obviously there are aesthetic differences
between the two games, but as that would be
the case between any two games and because I
find the sights and sounds in both series to
be generally quite enjoyable, I'm going to
skip over this issue and move straight on to
the Ultimate Strategy Amalgam!
I believe a combination of the two systems
would work best. If IS made the next Fire
Emblem otherwise as normal, but added
in 2 new features taken from the Shining
Force series, I believe it would make
the Ultimate Strategy Game (for me anyway :)
Adding fully explorable towns and areas
connecting them either freely (ala Shining
Force 2) or chapter based (ala Shining
Force 1 and 3) would
really add to the game. Exploration is a
huge factor in my enjoyment of RPG's, and Fire
Emblem games have very little as they
are currently made, the most recent even
less with it's glowing points of interest
rather than hidden treasure tiles. The other
addition would be the ability to revive
characters, but not en masse like in Shining
Force series. My idea would be that a
healer could learn to use maybe 1 or 2
revive spells per battle. This would allow
for recovery from the random critical hit
without suffering complete devastation or
making the game way to easy.
Or Camalot could make a new Strategy game as
well, if they ever get tired of raking in
the cash on all those lame Mario Sports
titles that is. Shining Force (or
whatever they would end up calling it due to
Sega owning the franchise name) could really
stand to benefit from some additional
difficulty and more strategic battles.
I love both of these games so much, even
though they are quite different. Hopefully
you enjoyed my essay and thank you for the
opportunity to participate in your contest
:)
-Jocelyn
Wheels
Excellent
analysis. Those unfamiliar with
the two series may think Shining
Force was simply Sega
copying Fire Emblem, but
as you have shown the two are
extremely different despite
their similarities. Fire
Emblem: Awakening has a
number of changes to make the
series a bit easier, but I like
your suggestions a bit more. I
really hate having to restart a
battle because of a random
critical hit, so a few revives a
battle to me seems a better way
to curve difficulty than just
eliminating permadeath. I
would also love to see Camelot
give the genre another try,
though I doubt they will ever
make another Shining Force.
How about Golden Sun Force?
Great essay, I'm giving you an
A+.
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Saving the world from evil: That’s what most
RPGs consist of. In Infinite
Undiscovery, you have the recurring
themes of darkness, hope, evil, and courage.
In Lost Odyssey, you have similar
themes of overcoming an evil empire, hope
for a saved future, and courage of the
immortals.
Yet, despite similarities, you have a world
bound in chains, a penniless musician
whose destiny is to eventually save the
world, and a myriad of characters that aid
in saving the world from evil. The
game focuses on building relationships with
friends that Capell meets along the
way. And focuses on his cowardness
turning into bravery. IN the end, the
world is saved because he had enough courage
to stand up and fight for what was
important.
Within the Lost Odyssey, you
encounter evil nations at war with each
other. The theme of family is instilled in
the game where the characters find missing
relatives. Love and loss are recurring
themes in the game followed by victory at a
price of friendship. The evil
immortals seek to destroy the portal
between themselves and the mortals in order
to gain power. IN the end, sacrifices
are made to bring peace to all nations.
Families are united and memories are
treasured.
I found these two games similar yet
contrasting in nature. And I may have not
said it in the best way, but I do feel that
it fits for this contest.
-Michelle
Wheels
I think you
said it quite well enough. These
are not two games I would have
thought to compare, but then
again I have not yet played Infinite
Undiscovery. If nothing
else it's a good way to show
that not all "save the world"
stories are alike. It is an
overused trope for sure, but I
don't think that means it
shouldn't be used at all.
There's plenty of interesting
things that can be done with it,
as this game shows. I'll give
you a solid B.
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Dear Professor Wheels:
Thanks for extending the deadline for our
essays. I’m sure the class will come through
for you. You wanted an essay comparing and
contrasting two RPGs with a clear thesis?
Try this on for size.
The cast of randomly- or user-generated
characters in Dragon Quest III (DQ3)
may have had less personality than the
memorable crew depicted in Dragon Quest
IV (DQ4), but the enticement to
try out all of the classes and experiment
with different class combinations imbued DQ3
with a much higher level of replayability.
Contrasting Dragon Quest III (DQ3)
with Dragon Quest IV (DQ4)
indicates that Class of Heroes 2
will be a perfect fit for RPGamers who love
statistical character development.
DQ3 gave RPGamers nearly
unprecedented freedom in the character
creation process. It started with the Hero,
which could be male or female and bore the
name the player chose. Players could select
the other three members of the party from a
group of pre-generated characters or create
them from scratch, choosing gender, class
and name for each. Added to that was a range
of starting statistics for every character
class that added an element of randomness.
The result was a character system that was
deep in customization but consequently
shallow in background story.
By contrast, DQ4 featured a set cast
of characters with built-in names,
personalities, classes, and abilities.
Players learned about each of the main
characters and his or her motivation, making
for a very memorable story with
significantly less control over how the
characters developed than offered by DQ3.
When RPGamers finished playing DQ3,
the available character customization
produced the lingering questions about
gameplay mechanics. How would a party of the
Hero and three mages perform against
Baramos? With the Hero as a backup healer,
can I support two warriors and a cleric and
just run with meat shields? Feeling inspired
to see how different class combinations
worked, some enthusiasts of statistical
character development would opt to start
anew to see how their new party fared in
low- or mid-level story content rather than
create extra characters in a game with all
the bosses cleared.
On the other hand, DQ4 left RPGamers
thinking about the characters’
personalities. Would Taloon go on to found
the GQ4-equivalent of Wal*Mart? Would Celia,
a fallen Zenithian, become a naturalized
citizen, or would she be deported as an
illegal immigrant? Even if these particular
questions did not occur to every player, it
certainly was the characters and their
stories in DQ4 that had a lasting
impression.
Noting the differences in DQ3 and DQ4,
RPGamers who love statistical character
development would be more likely to replay DQ3
even if they thought DQ4 was a
better game overall with its episodic
storytelling. Once a player experienced the
story in DQ4, there was little
motivation to replay the game. While debates
about the value of the more durable Mara
versus the more powerful Brey had merit,
they paled in comparison to the absolute
freedom afforded by DQ3’s character
system.
As the launch date for Class of Heroes 2
draws near, it emerges as the perfect fit
for RPGamers who love statistical character
development. The ability for players to
create a party made of up character classes
of their choosing lends itself to many
replays even after the game is completed.
The story could end up thinner than many
RPGs, as could be argued about DQ3,
but RPGamers will find themselves lying
awake at night wondering “Could I really run
a party of all gunners and sorcerers?”
Determination to answer that question might
lead to enough replays to make it happen.
Yours,
Danny
Wheels
Fantastic essay! This does a
great job of showing why games
with player created parties
often have such devoted
fanbases. These fanbases
participate in challenges where
they try odd class combinations
to see if they can make it
through the whole game. RPGs
with set characters of course
have just as many fans, but I
don't think they get quite the
same amount of replay. I prefer
the best of both worlds, where
you have set characters but
choose and adjust their classes
such as Final Fantasy V.
There's also the case of games
like Final Fantasy Tactics
where you have a main character
with his own personality, but
can change his class and create
your own party members as well.
Going for a balanced approach
seems to apply more to story
based games, as dungeons
crawlers do just fine as they
are. I hope in the future more
story based RPGs recognize the
importance of allowing heavy
character customization. I give
your essay an A+.
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That's it for this week! Send in some
questions. I'm sure you all have many along
with some commentary after a busy E3!
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