Disgaea: Hour of Darkness – Why can’t I bring myself to like this game?!

Disgaea Hour Of Darkness COVERIt’s worse than not liking Disgaea: I can’t even bring myself to play it. Three times I have tried to play this game, and three times I have gone down in defeat. The first two times I barely made it past the hour mark. This time I gave it “the mother of all college tries” as I said I would and managed to play 2 hours and 30 minutes before throwing in the towel. This is just not the game for me.

Of course, there’s no need to force myself to play something I don’t like, and even less need to do it three times. The only reason I gave it so many tries is because I love SRPGs, and I’m always on the lookout for new series. If Disgaea had been a success, that would have opened up the way for me to play the original plus the three sequels as well as other related games like La Pucelle (which I have also tried and failed to get into) and Phantom Brave. So it’s a bit unfortunate, to say the least, that things didn’t work out between us.

What makes this particular failure so baffling, though, is that I was certain I could do it this time. I analyzed my past two failures and concluded that I quit so soon because I got intimidated by all the game features. Item world, mentor-pupils, Mana, Dark Assembly, Ranks, Geo Symbols, Geo Panels, Transmigration, Rarity, etc etc etc. I read the in-game tutorials on all those and got turned off before I even gave the game a proper chance. This time, I determined, was going to be different. After all, multiple fans and even an in-game NPC had told me I could ignore all that stuff and just play the game ‘normally.’

Do please go on, this is most interesting →

Dark Cloud 2 – STUCK! :’-(

dark cloud 2 ridepodNot stuck as in I don’t know what to do next. Stuck as in Dark Cloud 2 freezes when I try to move forward. 29 hours, chapter 5, 100% Heim Rada and the game freezes every time Galen starts to launch Paznos. I turned the game on and off three times, tried doing things in a different sequence and tried skipping the cutscene, but to no avail.

According to my Google research, this is a rare but fatal bug that can possibly be solved by:

1. Opening and closing the disk tray (didn’t work)
2. Buying a new power cable (hmm… I’m pretty sure mine is fine.)
3. Buying a brand new copy of the game (for $80+? I don’t think so.)
4. Resurfacing the disk (Hmm. I’ll think about it.)

Or I could just drop the game and forget it ever existed. 🙁 I’m sad. Most of the game I could take and leave, but I was having fun kicking enemy butt in the tremendously repetitive dungeons. Mt. Gundor was nice and long too, and I was hoping maybe I could get another colorful stage like Starlight Canyon next. Now all my hopes have been dashed.

If I write a review now, I’m sure it will be marred by my disappointment at not being able to finish this game. To be honest, I don’t have anything to write yet anyway. “Battles are fun. Everything else is *shrug* Whatever, just let me fight.” The story has more holes than Sonny Corleone’s corpse, but it might make sense once we meet Griffon and hear what his sob story is. However I’m not interested enough in the story to read a summary or watch a playthrough. If I can’t play it myself, then there’s no point. I’ll keep fiddling with the game and with my PS2 to see if I’ll get lucky, but I don’t have much hope. What a sad end to a promising game. >_<

Dark Cloud 2 – Great, but slightly grindy

Dark_Cloud_2I’m so glad I cleared my schedule just to spend time on Dark Cloud 2. In addition to the five-ish hours I’d played already, I also got about 10 hours of playing done yesterday and today. Right now I’m almost done (I think?) with chapter 3, with around 15 hours played. I’ve done as much of Starlight Canyon as the game will let me. Now I’m busy fulfilling the requirements to cure Lin and revive Lao Chao’s bistro and the Starlight Temple. I’d still be playing right now, but the candle puzzle in the church has me stumped, so I took a break to FAQ it. I was trying to play as FAQ-free as possible, so I hope there aren’t any more such puzzles coming up. Btw, the solution to the candle puzzle is to put off candle 1 and 5 on the right and 3 and 7 of the left, working from the door inwards.

The first few hours of the game were a bit rough, but I’ve gotten the hang of the battle system now. In fact, my cocky side is beginning to rear its ugly head. Sure it was hard going at first, when Max had 32 HP (he now has 72) and the Ridepod had 80 Fuel and they both kept getting downed all the time, but right now they’re all both unstoppable (cocky, cocky) and Monica is the only liability in the party. Apart from cutscenes and Red Seal stages, I almost never see her. Why is she in the game, again?

However the reason why I called the game “grindy” in the title isn’t because I’ve been fighting to get stronger. It’s because I spent a lot of time repeating stages so I could earn enough money to complete the Sindain Georama. Things are better in Balance Valley because the enemies are more generous with their money and the chests give lots of materials, but Rainbow Butterfly Wood was just annoying. Fight, fight, buy a couple of logs, fight, fight, buy a few more logs, build one measly house, fight some more, build another measly house, do it again and on and on for 3 or 4 hours and then finally get enough to clear the chapter. I’m a dungeon crawler veteran so I should be used to this sort of thing, but even I was getting a frustrated by the time I revived Jurak (also I’m mad the “boss” didn’t give me any EXP, grumble, grumble).

Do please go on, this is most interesting →

Angelique Trois Aizouhen – The beginning of the end for the series

Angelique trois aizouhen frontApproximately three years ago, I played Neo Angelique Special and was shocked not only by how terrible it was, but also by how great a departure it was from the early days of the series. It was called “Neo,” to be sure, but to me it seemed the game was Angelique in name only. If I had played Angelique Trois before it, I wouldn’t have been so surprised. All the factors that led to the series’ demise (in my opinion only; I know the “Neo” series is wildly successful) were foreshadowed way back in this game.

The first mistake was the removal of a rival. Having someone to compete against added a sense of urgency that isn’t present in this game.

The second was the removal of any sort of a challenge. There is a 115 day deadline to develop the continent, but even on Normal Mode, I got the required 6000 happiness with about 50 days to spare. Not having a rival means happiness only increases, never decreases. It means no one’s trying to stop you, not even La Ga, the so-called bad guy of the game.

If no one’s trying to hinder you or get ahead of you, then you can meet your targets pretty easily, and that means most of the features of the game are useless. For example, compatibility between yourself and guardians, and between guardians themselves, can be completely ignored. Zodiac signs and blood type don’t matter. The questions are the beginning of the game don’t matter. Guardian moods, which, along with the Heart Beat Meter, were newly introduced with this game, can also be ignored. In theory a happier guardian will work harder for you, but you don’t need their hard work so you can ignore them until they get better on their own. Do please go on, this is most interesting →

Final Fantasy Type-0 – One hot mess

Final Fantasy_Type-0-Phantoma-2I’ve played 3 hours and 54 hours of Final Fantasy Type-0, clearing the prologue and the first story mission. After very little thought and very little agonizing, I’ve decided to shelve this for a while. It’s not because I don’t like it, though that’s true, or that I’m finding it difficult, though that’s also true. It’s simply that the controls are clashing with Dark Cloud 2‘s controls in my head, and something has to give.

I like to think I’ve come a long way in my attitude towards action RPGs, from “Ugh, get it out of here!” to “Hmm, I’ll give it a try.” Unfortunately I’m still not good at them yet. In DC2, X is Yes/Attack. In FF Type-0, X is No/Defend/Cure. I can’t play both at the same time, so I’m dropping one temporarily. DC2 wins because 1) I’ve been meaning to play it since September 2) I don’t know how long my PS2 will keep trucking along, 3) I actually like it, and 4) It’s much easier.

Do please go on, this is most interesting →