Disappointed in Eiyuu RPG

eiyuu rpg top imageYes, I did say I would try Ring * Dream next, and I did just that. I ended up liking it quite a bit so I’ll probably play it on and off from now on. There’ll be plenty of time to post about it even after the Hangame x Success event is over, so there’s no need to rush. Instead I’ll focus on the last game in the event, Eiyuu RPG – Seiiki no Boukensha (Adventurers of the Sacred Land). This shouldn’t take long, because I dropped it quickly.

I was all set to like Eiyuu RPG too, since it was marketed as a dungeon crawler, and I love dungeon crawlers. It’s also a shinier, more polished, simplified and updated version of Eiyuu Chronicle, and heaven knows that game needed updating. What I’m happiest about is that they actually used a proper font for the menus now instead of going with the Japanese equivalent of Arial/Times New Roman. A good font adds a lot. Now the main screen looks like this:

eiyuu rpg main screenAnd your character sheet looks like this:

eiyuu rpg character sheetFewer stats, bigger letters, easier to understand all around. There’s still a lot you can do with your character by way of recreation, reclassing, skill point distribution and so on, but now you at least understand what you’re trying to do.

In short Eiyuu RPG looks snazzier and is much easier to understand than Eiyuu Chronicle. The question now is, does it play better? Or more to the point: does it play at all? Clunky as it was, Chronicle did at least let you fight all those SRPG battles yourself. Eiyuu RPG just makes you sit back and watch as your adventurers go out exploring/fighting/treasure-hunting. It’s much like how Ore ni Hatarake or FFCC: My Life as a King play out where your focus is on training and equipping adventurers rather than on battling yourself. Except those games were honest enough not to market themselves as “dungeon RPGs.” I feel silly that I was ever excited about this game.

Look but don't touch!

Look but don’t touch!

It’s not like that kind of game is bad or anything, but if I’m going to waste time waiting for a browser game to load, waiting for dungeons to load, waiting for stamina bars to fill up, tweaking stats, buying potions and weapons and armors and skills and all the other little annoyances involved in a free-to-play game then I want a proper satisfying experience, not just “You beat some trolls in a cave, the end” kind of messages.

I’m not going to tell Success what kind of game they should or shouldn’t create, but I do know the kind of game I will or won’t spend my time on. Dungeon crawler, yes. Dungeon-looker, no. I didn’t even bother giving it a chance, I just finished the tutorial and hightailed it out of there. Waste of time. Neeeext!

Eiyuu Chronicle – Too slow, too cluttered

The second game I tried for the Hangames challenge I mentioned in my last post. Eiyuu Chronicle is an online SRPG that has you join one of five factions fighting a holy war on a certain continent. The aim is presumably to defeat the other countries and take over the world (I’m guessing. I skipped most of the story) so you regularly attack and try to take over the bases of other countries. The results are updated in real time so you can see the negligible effect you’re having on the war effort as you go.

Eiyuu Chronicle has been around for 4 years and is probably Success’s oldest browser game, which should explain why the interface and graphics lack the shine and polish of more recent games. Here, take a look at the battlefield:

eiyuu chronicle gameplayNot a game you play for the graphics, that’s for sure. But that goes for SRPGs in general. And it looks better than a certain SRPG I played three times in a row that will not be named, so the look of the game isn’t a deterrent. It’s all about how it plays. Sadly, however, Eiyuu Chronicle was just too slow for me. It’s probably my fault for having a slow internet connection. First it takes 3-4 minutes for one battle to load up, then there’s a lag of several seconds every time I want to execute even the simplest attack. There’s just too much sitting around staring at the screen for me to enjoy this.

eiyuu chronicle gameplay2I’m not upset though, ‘cos I was only in it for the event rewards anyway. To get the reward for Eiyuu Chronicle, I had to get through the game prologue and then do the tutorial quests, all seventeen (17!) of them. It took me like 3 days to get through them all because they were just so boring and there was just so much text! Blah blah, thank for you joining, blah blah blah… then 6 pages later “Now I’m going to teach you how to hire a mercenary” blah blah.

Then they show you how to do something basic in the game and you do it to clear the quest. 17 times in a row you have to do stuff like changing your profile picture and buying a potion in a shop just to prove you know how to do it. If it wasn’t for the event I would have quit 5 minutes into the game. That said, those quests do serve a purpose in helping you make your way around the game, because the main screen is just so cluttered.

eiyuu chronicle game interface joinedI had to take three screenshots and join them together to give you the full picture. I can barely see anything written there, and that’s at full size. It’s probably meant for people with really big screens and really good eyes, neither of which apply to me. The busyness and clutteredness extends to other parts of the game like the character status screen:

eiyuu chronicle character statsI don’t even know where to start looking at that. It’s a micromanager’s dream but a nightmare for those of us who play SRPGs because we just want to kill stuff with our friends. Now the tutorial is finally over and I’ve qualified for the reward, I don’t think I’ll be playing this game again. On to the next game, Ring * Dream!

Makai no Pazuruka impressions

makai no pazurukaHangames is a Japanese company that hosts browser games.
One of the games they host is Rakuen Seikatsu Hitsuji Mura.
I’m a regular player of said Rakuen Seikatsu Hitsuji Mura.
The company that makes Hitsuji Mura for Hangames to host is called Success.
Success has 4 other games hosted by Hangames.
Right now Success and Hangames are holding an event where you get rewards for playing all 4 games.
I want the reward for Hitsuji Mura, so I’m playing those games.
The first game I tried is called Makai no Pazuruka.

Is that enough backstory for you? Then let’s get on with it. Makai no Pazuruka is a match-3 card battling game. You collect powerful cards and use them in action against dungeon monsters and other players. There’s no story so you just dive right in and fight anything that’s available. “Combat” looks like this:

makai no pazuruka gameplayThe pieces on the right side of the chain are your pieces, those on the left are the opponent’s. Match a piece with a sword icon on it with two or more other pieces of the same color to launch an attack. Match three shield pieces to remove all sword icons from the enemy’s pieces. Pieces matched also fill up the karma gauge of monsters with the same element (blue pieces -> water, red -> fire, etc) even if they don’t contain the sword icon. When the karma gauge builds up high enough, the card monster can use a special attack, complete with a special CG like so:

makai no pazuruka special attackBattles versus regular enemies give you three moves for every move the enemy makes. Against bosses it’s 1-1. If you’re lucky enough and one of your moves leads to a chain of 5 or more matches, you get the “fever” status that lets you move one more time. That means you need a combination of really good cards, a moderate amount of skill at the match-3 game and a good amount of luck to get far in this game. Otherwise even the best deck in the world can’t save you if you don’t even get a turn because your enemy keeps triggering fever mode. That’s only happened to me once since I started two days ago, but it’s going to be something to watch out for as the stages get tougher, especially in player-versus-player situations.

Not that I have to worry about any of that, because I doubt I’ll be playing much Pazuruka once the collaboration event is over. Although I’m fond of match-3 games due to the influence of Candy Crush, matches in this game rarely last more than one or two moves per round with only 2-3 rounds per match. It usually takes longer for a puzzle to load than it does to play it.

pazuruka deckEven worse, the AP cost for each battle is so high and your overall AP pool is so low that you’ll only be battling two or three times per login session. At level 27, my max AP is 29 but I need 11 AP per dive into a main dungeon. So I log in, “fight” two main battles, do one super-easy monster dungeon for 6 AP then that’s it for the next 3 hours. It takes 6 minutes for just 1 AP to refill so it’s not worth sitting around waiting either. It’s really unsatisfying all around.

Also I’m not really an expert on card battlers or anything – this is actually my first one – but I can tell just at a glance that any card less than an SR is just junk and filler, created only to be fed to your SR cards to power them up. There are a few problems with this. First, your rewards for dungeon-diving are usually N and N+ cards, i.e. rubbish you don’t really want. Secondly, while you do get money from the dungeons, the amount is so paltry and the cost for fusing is so high that the whole thing turns into a grind. You can see from the screenshot below that it’s going to take half my existing funds just to power up my card once. Fight, fight, fight, save, save, save, power up your cards once or twice and then start again from scratch.

makai no pazuruka monster mergeThe third problem is that SR cards don’t seem very easy to get.You either take part in events, which I have no intention of doing, or you pay for “gacha” which is a lottery where you give Success/Hangames money in exchange for the chance to get a rare card. I don’t know about Pazuruka, but I hear the chances of getting rare cards in other games can be as low as 3%. Dunno about you, but I’d rather spend that money on a physical game instead. Or heck, just a nice meal and a drink to go with it, then at least I know where the money went.

Plus even if you do get a rare card, these games are set up so your best cards quickly become obsolete and you keep having to get the latest and shiniest ones just to stay competitive. You can’t win. Not that this would deter me if I were actually determined to play the game, mind you. There’s plenty of fun to be had in seeing how far you can get without paying in a “free-to-play” game. In Pazuruka‘s case, though, the gameplay isn’t satisfying enough and the cards aren’t pretty enough or plentiful enough to hold my attention. Once this event ends, I am outta here. Time to try the next game, Eiyuu Chronicle!

Rezel Cross – Dropped due to a stupid stealth mission

rezel cross world mapJust posting this for closure. I knew the stealth missions would be the end of me and Rezel Cross, I just didn’t think it would be as soon as chapter 13. I’ve spent almost  week on that section where you have to evade two guards with a third one sleeping just beyond so you can make it to the Gilmore boss’s headquarters. I’m sick of it now and I don’t care what happens with the boss any more. If I wanted Metal Gear I would play Metal Gear, not a turn-based RPG. I don’t even like this game that much anyway <sour grapes to the max>.

That’s that for Rezel Cross. I’ve already moved  on and now I’m playing Issho ni Gohan. (a really boring otome game) and Little Witch Parfait (a really boring moe-girl-does-alchemy sim). And I haven’t played any Dragon Shadow Spell in a while, but it’s still in the cards for now. Updates on them to follow when I get round to it.

Rezel Cross – Nice game. Pity about the stealth missions

rezel cross front coverRezel Cross is a PSP turn-based RPG about the lives of five people who suddenly (or not so suddenly) find out they have superpowers. They spend the game running around the map pursuing their own agendas, but fate keeps throwing them together in unexpected ways.

Ail – A young beast hunter seeking revenge on the man who killed his father. When he finds him, will all go as planned? Wait, does he even have a plan in the first place? Do please go on, this is most interesting →