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Is Namco X Capcom worth checking out?
- Thread starter dark10x
- Start date
imastalker co.
Banned
the footage, and the lack of knowing japanese all points to a nice big YES.
it's namco vs capcom. what more do you want out of life?
it's namco vs capcom. what more do you want out of life?
Hurricane_Chris
DDK
dark10x said:
If you're between 1kyu - 2kyu level of Japanese or so then you can play it and enjoy it. Anything below that might be a bit of a struggle (tons of text). The story and seeing alot of old school characters is cool, the actual game is your standard fare but it's so text heavy that my reading was just too slow to continue with it.
I played most of it (I think I kind of left off around mission 35 or something). There don't seem to be any in-depth guides to it like there are for, say, Super Robot Wars games, so if you don't know Japanese your enjoyment of it will be limited to seeing better-drawn versions of characters you know and kicking some ass with them. The gameplay mechanics initially seem novel, as it adds a fighting-game style attack mode into the more traditional turn-based strategy mix.
If you don't know Japanese or are not familiar with the games or franchises from which the characters in Namco X Capcom are drawn, I'd recommend waiting until some in-depth FAQs are completed. Looking at Gamefaqs it seems like the first 6 or so chapters are done, but there's a ways to go since there are 45 plus the 5 prologue chapters making for a total of 50.
If you don't know Japanese or are not familiar with the games or franchises from which the characters in Namco X Capcom are drawn, I'd recommend waiting until some in-depth FAQs are completed. Looking at Gamefaqs it seems like the first 6 or so chapters are done, but there's a ways to go since there are 45 plus the 5 prologue chapters making for a total of 50.
It really depends on what you want out of it. The battles are good in layout but you get all your characters by about 50% into the game and the battle system gets a bit boring once you've seen all your attacks. Since you can't skip any animation or speed it up, you're looking at 1-2 hour battles at first and then 2-3 hour battles later on.
But what comes between the battles is really what makes the game. Between each map there is like 20-45 mins of text-only dialogue which is extremely entertaining, funny, weird, and makes you love all the characters.
If you think you can take sitting through 30mins of text dialogue and then 2 hours of battling x repeat for 80 hours, go for it. Otherwise it probably won't be for you. I really doubt the game appeal to many people but it hooked me enough that I put 79 hours into it and finished the sucker (ending was fantastic). It's like a generic anime epic adventure but with Namco and Capcom characters, and I really loved a lot of the characters (You get really attached to some of the characters and start going "YEAH!!!" when people like Ryu and Ken talk [completely with their homosexual subtexts] or when King gets mistaken for a beast all the time, etcc.)
I'd give it like a B- overall mainly because you really should've been able to have some quicker way to attack and defend + the maps should've been about half the length or half as many maps total for a 40 hour-ish game. I dunno, if you're a game nerd it's worth the time ^^;
But what comes between the battles is really what makes the game. Between each map there is like 20-45 mins of text-only dialogue which is extremely entertaining, funny, weird, and makes you love all the characters.
If you think you can take sitting through 30mins of text dialogue and then 2 hours of battling x repeat for 80 hours, go for it. Otherwise it probably won't be for you. I really doubt the game appeal to many people but it hooked me enough that I put 79 hours into it and finished the sucker (ending was fantastic). It's like a generic anime epic adventure but with Namco and Capcom characters, and I really loved a lot of the characters (You get really attached to some of the characters and start going "YEAH!!!" when people like Ryu and Ken talk [completely with their homosexual subtexts] or when King gets mistaken for a beast all the time, etcc.)
I'd give it like a B- overall mainly because you really should've been able to have some quicker way to attack and defend + the maps should've been about half the length or half as many maps total for a 40 hour-ish game. I dunno, if you're a game nerd it's worth the time ^^;
I'm not up to 2-kyu yet, unfortunately (~750 right now, I'd estimate), but part of my reasoning for playing these RPGs is to keeping on reading/learning even when I'm having fun. If I have to look up some terms, no big deal, I'll learn from it. Playing games has aided me greatly in class, believe it or not...so I certainly don't mind.ddksanrokumaru said:
When you say 1-kyu - 2-kyu, though, that makes it seem as if we're talking newspaper level here or something. Is it really THAT difficult?! None of the media I've viewed featured difficult dialog by any stretch, but that's not a lot to go by.
Hmmm...
dark10x said:
Played any Super Robot Wars titles? Dialogue is on the same level as those if you have. If you're 3-kyuu and I'm pretty sure you're past that even if you don't think so (the gap between 3-kyuu -> 2-kyuu is like "I know phrases -> I can read". If you're reading rpgs and you get it you're already past 3-kyuu) you'd do ok. Just remember that 99% of the dialogue is not voiced and there is a lot of kanji. But the kanji tends to be game kanji which means it's nothing like reading a newspaper. I guess that's why I never like to classify stuff by 1-4 kyuu since reading games, watching anime/JPN live-action uses a completely different vocab set than say reading a newspaper or watching the news on TV.
OK, that's not so bad. You're right, though, the vocabulary set required for gaming is very different from news material. I might go ahead and give it a shot sometime, though I had forgotten that Rogue Galaxy is being released this week....so I dunno about now. I've had a lot of free time, so I've been tearing through RPGs pretty quickly. Tales of Legendia has been pretty perfect right now, reading wise. Perfect level, I'd say. Haven't had to look up too many words and most of the dialog is pretty easy to understand. Though, I've had a bit of difficulty with Moses. 
I usually have to stop and think carefully about it in order to get it...which always interrupts the scene flow.
The game has been pretty enjoyable (the story is engaging enough -more so than the other Tales games- and the music is amazing)...but the battles are still a bit too simplistic and the dungeons aren't even dungeons at all (just walk around a linear path until you reach the next plot point).
I usually have to stop and think carefully about it in order to get it...which always interrupts the scene flow.The game has been pretty enjoyable (the story is engaging enough -more so than the other Tales games- and the music is amazing)...but the battles are still a bit too simplistic and the dungeons aren't even dungeons at all (just walk around a linear path until you reach the next plot point).
dark10x said:
The Tales dungeons have been so bad lately. At least the ones in Legendia look pretty :\ In Rebirth they were ugly repeating screens of the same low-res bland 2d backdrops. ToL's battle engine will pick up a bit when you get more throws and start getting awesome moves but yea that takes quite a while to happen. It'd be really nice is Abyss turns out well. Story-aside, Symphonia had fun dungeons and the battle system was great even if it was a little simpler than say Destiny 2.
Yeah, the dungeons are all beautiful (the visuals in general are absolutely lovely)...but simple. Somebody was claiming Rebirth to be the best in the series just the other day, oddly enough, but that sounds pretty awful to me. I do see the potential in the throw system, though. Hopefully that leads somewhere. I found that switching the battles to manual mode makes them feel a tad more interesting, as you actually have to input directions rather than spamming the attack buttons. It's also a bit more enjoyable when battle difficulty is raised, as it requires you to play a bit more carefully. The fact that you can switch at any time is nice as well.Bebpo said:
Abyss comes out NEXT week, doesn't it? Geez, two games I'm interested in this week, and like four next week (Abyss and 3 PSP titles). Crazy. :\
I agree that Symphonia was pretty good, though. The dungeons were a bit small, but were WAY ahead of the recent games. Abyss is being developed by the same team, isn't it? Hopefully they go even further with the quality this time AND manage to deliver an interesting story (oh, and 60 fps would be nice too...like ToS).
Hurricane_Chris
DDK
Bebpo said:
Interesting. While messing with MXC I was also trying to decide on 1kyu vs 2kyu for me to take next year. I guess it's 'cause I was studying and messing with the game at the same time I saw a huge number of the 2kyu required kanji in the game.
Not to derail the thread but have you taken 2kyu or 1kyu Bepo? I'm leaning toward chickening out and doing 2kyu next year although my teacher is pressuring me to go all out and prepare for 1....1 scares the hell out of me and many of my Japanese friends who I showed the prep materials said it was hard Japanese even for them....
dark10x said:
I played through the entire game and enjoyed it quite a bit, especially the dialogues, like Bebpo has mentioned. The battle has that Valkyrie Profile feel to it, which is great but also can get a bit old after 20-30 hours. The game itself is a bit on the easy side. Battles can get long later but I tend to focus on things to speed up the battle (i.e. giving enemies very very few turns to attack and having some units just obsorb all the damages, it's almost like cheating).
ddksanrokumaru said:
I studied 4-5 months or so for the 2kyu and, but at the last minute I decided that going to Sendai (the nearest place I could take it from Aomori) would cost me $300-400 for travel+lodging and I really didn't think it was worth spending that money for a mark that probably wouldn't do anything for me in the long run.
I may take the test from the US next year. But if I'm gonna bother to pay the $50 fee and study again it's 1kyu or nothing. I've looked through the materials of all 4 ranges when I was studying for 2kyu and I really don't see much of a difference between 1 and 2kyu besides more kanji/vocab. Also its an annoying test becuase like you said even Japanese people find it hard because the questions are often written in misleading ways to try to throw you off, which I think is pretty f@cked up. I mean it's supposed to determine how good your Japanese level is, not try to trick you and make you fail :\