Parakeetman
No one wants a throne you've been sitting on!
I can just see all the complaints and whining now when the game comes out. I have the PSP one and Im pretty sure most folks are not going to understand how the hell to play lol. Let alone like how the game is designed for that matter.
Though story wise Id say its interesting just based off of the fact that its a continuation of the anime cept branches off into a different direction. Dont read unless you are familiar with the series / halfway point "ending" obviously.
story continues off after heathcliff (kayaba akihiko) is defeated by kirito. Cept that instead of being let out of the game they find themselves still trapped and a new floor opens up to them where the battle for survival continues.
Combat system basically is auto attack for normal attacks and from there just like an mmo its managing your skill cooldowns and properly making use of buffs and debuffs. If anyone is unfamiliar with general mmo workings and such, may be a bit of a hurdle. Since it really does make a huge difference with fights I say personally.
Also the way they did general conversations in the game is a bit odd with NPCs as its not actual dialog for generic conversations, just a bunch of random text that makes it seem like they are having a conversation. So besides story / event bits there isnt much dialog from walking around randomly talking to people.
The game most def was a budget title is what I feel. Granted they really tried some different things with the battle system, its quite hit and miss. So its more a game you kinda drudge on through just to get to the story bits. Another thing I hope they fix is the odd "lag" so to speak am not sure if its due to having the DL version first and was a problem with that, but at times the game would stutter messing things up with timing and what not. I have the disc version too but never opened it since just bought it to collect, as I thought the title was made uniquely enough to earn my money twice. But I really can see the average person once again being turned off by how the game plays / is designed.
*Edit
hmm you know I need to really look up if this is just a remake with extra content or if they plan on actually redoing the whole system. Since from some of the screenshots that they show off now makes it look like its using a lot of the same content from the PSP version just cleaned up. Though the early trailer made it look a little different, granted its missing all the HUD elements and what not. PSP one was called "Infinity Moment"
Looks like its a story that takes place in the same setting so I would have to guess that this is a "remake" of Infinity Moment that adds the new content gameplay / storywise for Hollow Fragment. Which is a good thing, since the original was a bit strange as explained above. Do hope that they really work on making the battlesystem better.
Anyways Ill still be picking it up to see how much the game has evolved. If they do a good job with it I can see it selling better. But they do need to put a little more effort into the areas in the game itself. Plus the town felt mostly dead due to little to no interaction with shops and how the conversations with NPCs went.
Truthfully they would have done a far better job of having it designed like Phantasy Star Universe where the SP portion is the story and the MP is the online mode. Would have worked perfectly if they had a team able to pull it off which Bandai Namco does have if they are willing to spare the resources.
