Messages

176

Podcast Discussion / Re: Episode 301: Mechanical Sphincters

« on: August 16, 2012, 09:39:32 AM »

Everytime James talks about Pandora's Tower, I'm reminded of the fact that I should move my lazy butt and finish it. 

177

General Chat / New Yorkers, tell me where you buy your games.

« on: August 14, 2012, 05:08:28 AM »

Hey there;


I'm going on a uni trip to New York City this November and we'll be given some time to go shopping and I thought I'd go and buy a few games over there. I'd prefer a somewhat smaller shop that also carries rare or "exotic" stuff, mainly in the Manhattan or Jersey City (where our hotel's located) area.


I also want to check out a few shops where you can buy die-cast car models or sth. of the sort.


Any ideas?

178

General Chat / Re: Oklahoma is so hot that street lamps are melting

« on: August 08, 2012, 06:04:10 PM »

and the Allemagne may be the Anglos?

No, the Alemanni, which were mostly located in western and southwestern Germany, the dialects there are often referred to as the "alemanian dialects" (the German spoken in Switzerland is one of these dialects).

179

TalkBack / Re: Tales Characters Could Appear in Super Smash Bros.

« on: August 08, 2012, 04:42:41 PM »

Clever, although I believe it'll come down to characters from the Symphonia titles. Or maybe Yuri from Vesperia since he appears in Project X Zone.

This way you could have a generic(generic meaning similar movesets) tales character, maybe lloyd, and then reskin him as Luke from abyss.  Two tales characters, one moveset, makes more fants happy.

Not quite. If you've played both games, you will notice that except one or two techniques, Lloyd and Luke have a very different fighting style, mostly due to their choice of weapons (Lloyd uses dual blades and Luke fights single-handedly). This may seem like a good idea, but fans will definitely be picky about it.


I personally would prefer more fighters who don't use swords because we will most likely have Link and a Fire Emblem character (plus eventually Pit with his bow-knife-thing) as swordsmen. I'd go for Sheena from Symphonia and either Marta (DotNW) or Jade (Abyss).

180

General Chat / Re: Oklahoma is so hot that street lamps are melting

« on: August 08, 2012, 04:27:35 PM »

Pretty much, the Romans (starting with Julius Caesar) called the region Germania and the people there Germanic; though the people there did not call it that.

Yes, which was mostly due to the reason that the Celts, Goths and Germanic were isolated from the empire's influence. However, the word "Germania" where Germany is derived from also found its way into the language during the christianization of the country, whose preachers were using Latin as their language (the Bible hasn't been translated into German until the 16th century) and the name "Germania" was also given to the personification of the country. Other names for Germany, like the french "Allemagne" or the finnish "Saksa" (and respective alterations of these) were derived from the names of german tribes.

181

General Chat / Re: Oklahoma is so hot that street lamps are melting

« on: August 08, 2012, 09:57:06 AM »

Hey AnGer! I've got a question. Does it bother you that everybody calls your country Germany, when you guys call it Deutschland? I've always wondered...

Nope. I think the only ones who are bothered are those who don't know. Besides, the word "Germany" is quite spread throughout the country.

182

Nintendo Gaming / Re: How Can Nintendo Revitalize the Virtual Console?

« on: August 07, 2012, 02:34:22 PM »

I just looked through the list of available VC titles for Germany and it isn't that bad a selection, yet I miss some games from the SNES era that were quite popular but somehow didn't make it to VC.

I may also suggest adding games that haven't been released in Europe or even outside of Japan before to the library. Nintendo did this already to a certain degree but largely limited it to their own games (Mario Picross, SM RPG or Sin & Punishment) but I think people here'd like to see stuff like Lufia I.

Plus, Nintendo should definitely redo their emulator. I find it very unpleasant that I have to switch my TV's picture to 4:3 mode to play a VC game and then switch it back to play a Wii game. They really should do it like Sony here.

183

General Chat / Re: Oklahoma is so hot that street lamps are melting

« on: August 07, 2012, 05:48:13 AM »

18°C/64°F here. Quite okay, though it could be a little warmer.

184

TalkBack / Re: Mario Isn't Missing

« on: August 05, 2012, 06:01:21 PM »

I'll never suffer from "Mario fatigue" since I am not especially a big Mario fan. I pick up some of the games (I bought SM3DL for example, but mainly because I was lacking a good non-RPG single player experience at the time), but Mario or the lack thereof will never be a deciding factor whether I'll pick up a Nintendo console or not.


Despite that, I fail to understand how people are annoyed by the large number of Mario games coming out. Yes, it is a cash cow and yes, it appears to be the same game all over again (at least the "New" series), but then again, Nintendo can (and will) most likely pour the money into other projects which will maybe not sell like hotcakes.

185

General Gaming / Re: Sony Playstations: Are it Doomed?

« on: August 05, 2012, 11:46:57 AM »

I suppose it comes down to the software. The PSP sold a **** ton of hardware, but the tie-in ratio is no doubt ****.

Yup. Still, Sony deserves credit for being able to penetrate Nintendo's handheld market monopoly on an international level. However, the PSV was a big slap in the face for many gamers who like to purchase their games on UMD.

186

General Gaming / Re: How have your gaming habits changed as you became older?

« on: August 03, 2012, 01:50:43 PM »

In terms of genres, my habits have changed very little, I still like the games I played when I was a kid (I'm 24 fyi). That being said, most of the games I like have a rather old-fashioned style. 


In terms of platforms, there was a rather significant switch from being a person who prefers stationary consoles and did a little PC gaming over a consoles only guy to a handheld/PC gamer which was mainly affected by the time I spend on playing games and the lack of a TV to connect my stationary gaming devices to.

187

General Gaming / Re: What is your most recent gaming purchase?

« on: August 03, 2012, 01:02:02 PM »

Atelier Rorona for PS3. Picked it up for 20€ at an electronics store.

188

TalkBack / Re: Pit Figma Figure Revealed

« on: August 01, 2012, 03:44:50 AM »

I think it looks nice, but I'll pass on it since there's enough stuff in my room which just exists for the sake of collecting dust and I don't own a showcase.

189

Nintendo Gaming / Re: What's the problem with Community Nights?

« on: July 31, 2012, 12:14:40 PM »

I'd love to participate but as I'm living in Germany (CET) I probably won't. Unless we could organize a separate CN for the european members.

190

TalkBack / Re: Kingdom Hearts 3D: Dream Drop Distance Review

« on: July 31, 2012, 04:24:29 AM »

From what I could glean from this and other reviews the story is convoluted and hard to follow, the way problem solving is utilised to push the story forward becomes repetitive and the forced 'switching between characters' mechanic sounds frustrating.

The plots shown in the individual worlds aren't that much part of the main story of the game in any Kingdom Hearts. The switching isn't as frustrating as it may seem, since it is possible to get an item that delays the Drop. You can basically get through parts of the game with one character until you reach a point where you need to switch in order to progress further, then continue with the other character and so on. The only way it becomes annoying is when you can't prevent the Drop anymore and you find yourself in a boss battle and switch because you'll have to redo that fight.

Is it that the 'Flow Motion' combat mechanics are incredible and that the graphics are pretty? Is that the draw here? Having never played a Kingdom Hearts game I was intrigued after playing the demo, but during that demo I was unable to get a feel for what the game was 'about'. The 'Flow Motion' stuff seemed neat but I never got a sense of it's usefulness.

It becomes very useful when fighting groups of enemies, because you can damage more of them. Also, Flow Motion attacks cannot be disabled (unlike deck commands) or interrupted by enemy attacks.

191

TalkBack / Re: The 3DS Download Card Mark-Up Absurdity

« on: July 30, 2012, 09:27:18 AM »

NinSage is trying to argue that console makers won't be able to get their hardware in stores if they don't let stores sell the games.

Well, in my opinion he's not far off track. I personally have never seen a PSPgo at a shop in my home region and only very few retail stores in Munich or Augsburg have carried the go – mostly large chain stores. It may be a little far-fetched, but it appears to me that at least retailers will try to refrain from selling devices which they can't make more money out of. Though this may be only hypothetical.

192

Nintendo Gaming / Re: What will you do with your Wii after you buy a Wii U?

« on: July 30, 2012, 08:51:38 AM »

Keep it and put it on my shelf, right next to my various other consoles which are more or less outdated (though the SNES'll never be outdated), then grab it from time to time to play the one or other game with it. OK, this may not be necessary seeing that the WiiU can play Wii games, but I'll still keep it. I'm not in a rush to buy a WiiU anyway.

193

Reader Reviews / Re: Rate The Last Game You Played

« on: July 30, 2012, 01:26:34 AM »

I finished the story of Kingdom Hearts 3D [Dream Drop Distance] (3DS) just yesterday. There's still some stuff to tackle which I probably will NOT do with this save file since I apparently have a bug that prevents me from getting everything.

The game itself is still very good despite having a few issues that come with it. Like its predecessor and direct inspiration Birth by Sleep its balancing is... odd. In the beginning, the game throws relatively easy adversaries at you with the exception of a boss or two and its demands rise rather slowly until the last two worlds you visit – suddenly you need to face large numbers of fairly powerful enemies and a series of strong boss fights to end a up in a finale which is rather... cheap.

Considering the well told plot and the large number of possibilities concerning the use of Dream Eaters as well as the technical issues and the balancing, I'd give the game a 8/10.

194

General Chat / Re: Nintendo Free Radio: Forum Cast (RFN Doppelganger Podcast)

« on: July 28, 2012, 05:16:00 AM »

I strongly disagree with the idea of trophies/achievements being an indicator about how skilled you are. Though there are many games where the achievements are hard to get (e.g. Bayonetta, where you need to beat the game on higher difficulties to get trophies), there are also many games out there where it's a walk in the park to get a platinum trophy – and yes, people buy these games because they want to brag with how many trophies/achievements they have despite those being recieved through simply playing a game like Megamind. Then there are games where you can get about 80-90% by simply playing through the game normally and the rest just means taking your time to level up or doing something blatantly stupid like the 9000 meter fall in Portal.

Rewards for being highly skilled at a game should be things that can really give you an advantage in the game. Better weapons, special skills – you name it. But NOT something that people can or will use as an e-penis.

195

Nintendo Gaming / Re: Nintendo's reasoning for not including an AC Adapter with the 3DS XL...

« on: July 27, 2012, 10:08:48 AM »

It's probably because Nintendo fans are more loyal than Sony fans, but at the same time, they're more strict. At least that's what I can tell from my experience.

196

Nintendo Gaming / Re: What are your three favorite 3DS games and why?

« on: July 27, 2012, 06:00:53 AM »

1. Kid Icarus: Uprising – This is basically one of the kinds of game I really love. Mission structure with a high replay value, over-the-top action, crazy dialogues and even more crazy enemies that keep you up at 100%.


2. Kingdom Hearts 3D [Dream Drop Distance] – I'm a sucker for the franchise and this game has deepened my love for it even more. Plus, I'm someone who considers the Kingdom Hearts spin-offs to be better (gameplay-wise) than the mainline games.


3. Mario Kart 7 – The game I've played the most to date. By far. I'm not a big fan of multiplayer games, but when I pick one up, I spend a lot of time with it.

197

General Chat / Re: Questions for the NWR Japan crew

« on: July 26, 2012, 01:13:44 PM »

How do japanese people react when you're playing a video game in public (on a portable game system or a smartphone)? Do they brush it aside stoically or do they give you the looks that say "what a nutjob"?

198

Nintendo Gaming / Kingdom Hearts 3D [Dream Drop Distance]

« on: July 26, 2012, 08:13:12 AM »

So I haven't found a thread here on the forums.


Well then, this ought to be the official thread for Kingdom Hearts 3D.


I'm going to start off with a few impressions from what I've seen so far (spoiler-free of course):


Gameplay:
The combat system is loosely based on what has been used in the PSP installment of the series, Birth by Sleep: You get a "deck" of combat commands which are divided into three groups: Special attacks, magic and items. Like in BbS, there are no MP and the commands need to recharge before they can be used again (except for items where you get a fixed number of the concerning item which goes down every time you use it and automatically restocks when you exit combat). Over the course of the game, your deck's capacity will be extended by defeating bosses or winning other special fights (possibly even mini-games though I am yet to come across one of these). Other abilities, such as the high jump, glide or block/counter abilities are found in a separate part of your deck.


The first novelty is the "free flow action system", which is activated by jumping against a wall or other objects and pressing the Y button. By pressing the Y button again, you can zip around and do REALLY crazy moves. If you press the A button while in the free flow state, a special attack can be unleashed (which is usually friggin' strong).


Up next are the "Spirits". They are one of two kinds of "Dream Eaters", the critters that run around the game (enemy Dream Eaters are called "Nightmares") and you can raise them to be your companions in battle. This can be accomplished by entering a sub-menu in the main menu and selecting "create Spirit". To create spirits, you need to gather materials which can be found in chests or by defeating enemies. There are also rare Spirits which can be created by using rare materials. After the creation, you can move them into your party where a total of three Spirits is available. To raise the dream eaters, you need to feed them special food found in the game or play a mini-game or just pet them. You will be given "Link Points" which you can use on the "Link Board" to get new combat commands or abilities (like Combo+, Ice Boost or HP Up). To use these, the respective Spirit needs to be in your party – something I think kinda sucks because if you switch Spirits, you need to gather Link Points again to get abilities you already had back. Fortunately, Link Points are shared between Sora and Riku and the two can also use the same Spirits – so there's no need to create separate Spirits for each character. In combat, the Spirits attack the enemy or use their power to aid you by giving you positive status changes such as Protect or Shell. Attacking also fills up their Link Gauge which – when it is full – enables you to use the Link command via button shortcut or touchscreen. You can Link together with either one or two Spirits and the results are different for each combination of Spirits and character – Sora performs a Team Attack (e.g. swinging a Spirit like a morning star) and Riku absorbs the Spirit(s) to get a power up like the Blade Aura from BbS.


The third defining gameplay element is "Drop". While playing the game, the Drop Gauge next to your character's portrait fills up. When it is full, a countdown starts and after that, you will be taken to a menu where you can trade Drop Points (which can be acquired by defeating Enemies) for bonuses (e.g. a deck command, stronger attacks or a slower Drop Gauge) and munny (the game's currency). Then, you get to play as the other main character. You can also Drop by using a symbol on the touch screen in the main menu or in the pause menu during combat. While it is necessary to Drop from time to time (or you'll be unable to advance the story), it can be somewhat irritating during combat, especially since your foes' HP are back to full once you switch characters again – if this happens to you during a boss fight it means you need to repeat it. You can however prolong the time you can play with one character by using a certain item while the status effect sleep (or the usage of certain techniques) speeds up your Drop Gauge.


Plot (no details):
The plot itself takes place after Kingdom Hearts Re: Coded. While it may seem necessary to have played all its predecessors it is actually not. The game comes with a full glossary of all important terms, character profiles and even summaries of the previous installments. So basically it does not matter if you've skipped a Kingdom Hearts game (I skipped Re:Coded) or are new to the series altogether, you will still be able to understand the story fine.


Tech:
The game itself looks good graphically, in fact, I'd place it among the best-looking 3DS games so far, right next to Mario Kart 7 and Kid Icarus: Uprising. However, Square still managed to put in one of the mostly encountered technical problems within the franchise, namely frame rate slowdowns. Despite not being as extreme as they were on the PS2 (Kingdom Hearts I & II had some serious frame rate drops, especially when you defeated enemies that dropped great amounts of munny), you will get some slowdowns when fighting larger groups of enemies.


The sound is overall very good, despite not always employing Disney tracks (so far, I've heard only one background score taken directly from a Disney movie), the VAs are also good (in my opinion, the english version of the characters is the best of all) despite missing lip synchronicity.


I will post a final impression when I'm finished (which may take some time) but all in all, I can really recommend this game. That is unless you strongly dislike Kingdom Hearts or jRPGs altogether. But everyone else should really play it.

199

Nintendo Gaming / Re: People Need To Stop Bitching

« on: June 29, 2012, 06:49:19 AM »

But is it any better to have people be disappointed from the start than it is to get them excited then have them be disappointed?  Either one seems like a negative to me.


I can understand them not wanting to say too much about games that are a ways down the line but why not a little tease of games further off, especially with the launch of a new system, a system that is supposedly going to cater more to the core crowd?  A little tease of an HD Zelda, any sort of small piece of information about the next Smash Bros.  Something to get people excited about what's coming down the road beyond the launch window, which while not bad by any means, doesn't look like anything that is going to attract current non-Nintendo gamers.

This. While the 3DS launch was somewhat disappointing and the pricing policy also can be considered an utter failure (or at least a slap in the face of the customers), there was at least an outlook on what's in store for the device over the course of the first two years.


They should have at least shown one or two games for 2013/2014, but... well, we shall see what they've really got up their sleeve.

200

Nintendo Gaming / Re: Nintendo and the Decline of the Japanese Gaming Industry

« on: June 24, 2012, 11:01:09 AM »

As far as the idea of "westernized" games made by japanese companies goes, I am watching that trend with some sort of disdain.


On the one hand, there are games with that concept in mind that just work. Take Demon's/Dark Souls, Dragon's Dogma or Xenoblade. Then on the other side there's Resident Evil – a game where the idea changed from a survival horror game to some sort of mixture between Uncharted and Call of Duty: Lots of cutscenes, very linear, many foes that you have to take down and of course the obnoxious QTE.


I agree on the part where they say there's a need for variation, a need for more dynamic gameplay. But then again, I love japanese games for what they are, how they are played and yes, even for the art design. The day that japanese gaming companies will only make games that try to appeal to a western audience or stop making games altogether will be the day I will consider gaming to be dead.