Seven Chapters (0 to 6) with each taking 30 minutes to an hour.
That was my first playthrough. As your gear gets better and you memorize the level's layout (everything is scripted) it'll take less and less time.
You can replay the chapters (and sections of chapters) at any time for more experience, BP (game's currency) and DNA chips. Experience gains do drop off fairly quickly.
Fuck this shit. Seriously. While I resume playing Xenogears I expect S-E to return the money I spend in good faith. I've never felt this robbed before.
Finished the game. I was alright with the story until they took sixteen left turns at the end, explained little, and left the cast in disarray.
I'll do another run later when I'm not in a daze.
Okay, can't get past the part I'm stuck at. So I bit the bullet and ascended.
For whoever asked what ascending does: Returns you to the HQ. ANYTHING YOU UNLOCKED DURING THE MISSION (EXP, BP, Guns) WILL UNLOCK IN THE HQ. EG: You find a gun in the mission and it would unlock if you got it later? You get it then.
This means you can possibly go back to previous missions and level up and find the guns you're missing.
HOWEVER, AFAIK it'll start you back at the beginning but it isn't as drastic as it appears to be if you are out gunned or frustrated with your progress.
Edit: Oh, yeah, and any clothing damaged stays damaged on ascending. Bucknaked Aya? DEALWITHIT.gif
Need to sit down and do some more of the game and finish chapter 3, but it's too hot around here to game. :/
While I think the plot does suck and make hardly any sense by the end, I really like the worldview of the game. The way Toriyama took the standard gaming concept of "lives" and gave them flesh and blood was genius. Whereas in a normal game you never think twice about losing a life, here the blood curdling screams as you watch the person you were a second ago suffer a horrible death really registered with me. Especially on the bosses where you HAD to sacrifice your own people to win.
It's one of the darkest, bleakest worldviews I've ever seen in a game. Really gives a great feeling that everything is dead, everyone is dying, and this is the end of the world.
It's too bad Toriyama can't actually write plotlines within the worlds he creates. I think his worlds are interesting and his characters are at least ok, but he just cannot write actual stories. He should work with one of the other good SE writers to improve on this.
Whereas in a normal game you never think twice about losing a life, here the blood curdling screams as you watch the person you were a second ago suffer a horrible death really registered with me. Especially on the bosses where you HAD to sacrifice your own people to win.
It's one of the darkest, bleakest worldviews I've ever seen in a game. Really gives a great feeling that everything is dead, everyone is dying, and this is the end of the world.
I really liked the plot in this one. Yes, it is convoluted, the characters never explain anything, etc. but I find the concept of Aya's powers to be fascinating. Some scenes are very memorable i.e.
Until you get sniper rifle, your best bet is using impact weapons and overdiving for high damage over and over. When you get sniper rifle, sacrifice ammo for strength in upgrading and your bullets will do INSANE damage on bosses for each hit. Just don't miss any shots
Whereas in a normal game you never think twice about losing a life, here the blood curdling screams as you watch the person you were a second ago suffer a horrible death really registered with me. Especially on the bosses where you HAD to sacrifice your own people to win.
It's one of the darkest, bleakest worldviews I've ever seen in a game. Really gives a great feeling that everything is dead, everyone is dying, and this is the end of the world.
This may be why I was so stressed out with this game last night. XD
You're right, it freaking BOTHERED me when I'd hear a soldier screaming. I would just stand there in-game and I didn't even want to look at what happened to them or what killed them because I actually felt bad.
By the way is anyone else catching the little TV show references here and there? There's the obvious CTU = CTI one but some of the soldier names... I saw one named Kiefer (Sutherland? lol) and another named William Bell (Fringe?).
The Story... what? No seriously. I think I need a couple paragraphs of spoiler text thrown at me.
So Aya actually didn't shoot eve the first time around. Eve dove into Aya and shot herself so she wouldn't awaken and in doing so destroyed Aya's soul... creating the High Ones, and the death of Aya's soul created the Twisted that were some sort of monsters desperately trying to tunnel back to the past (where she died) on some sort of primal instinct level... I think. Hyde Bore, the original, possibly ordered the murders of Aya and co... for some reason? Or did he just 'awaken' as a high one as soon as Eve was killed at time zero?
Ok so eve... well.. SOMETHING happens and Eve in Aya's body wakes up with no memory of who she is. Hyde Bore created an artificial over dive system because the twisted as too weak to go into the past time zero, and people who were close to Eve/Aya at the wedding became High ones that Hyde could control. So he engineered their deaths in the past to make the Twisted more powerful in the present so he could travel back to time Zero, because he was stuck in a loop of time where he perpetually fought the Twisted and eventually dies each and every time.
He wanted to go back to merge with Eve so gain super High One powers or something, to give birth to a race even more powerful than either.
So Eve in Aya's body does stuff in the present and slowly gets glimpses of 'Aya' shooting eve, but it was actually Eve over dived into Aya's body.
No explanation for why Hunter Boss Owen betrayed to in Episode 2...
So Eve gets back to time zero after defeating infinity Hyde Bore and jumps into Aya's body, and realizes that she isn't Aya, but actually Eve. Then Hyde Bore from time Zero is all like 'instead of everything happening as it will happen, merge with me eve and we can create something more powerful than the twisted or the high ones!
But it turns out that even though Aya's soul is destroyed she manages to get up and shoot Hyde Bore. Maybe because she already died and Eve returning to time Zero opened the door to let her come back, somehow.
So Aya still has to die... for some reason... and Aya over dives between the two of them so much that Eve can't keep up and makes Eve shoot Aya.
Eve then uses her 'powers' to wish fora world in which she never existed, but the soul of fiance man sees taht she's attempting to be Aya in this new timeline since Aya killed herself/made Eve shoot her soul. He says that he and Aya are going to search for eternity and that they'll watch over her.
Am I sort of right? This isn't exactly easy to put together.
What the hell was with Fiance guy and Eve walking around as 'possibly existing'
I got my copy today. I was thinking of giving away the 50% discount code for Final Fantasy II, since I have no interest in that game, but then noticed that all EU version come with the code.
The red box made me feel like they went all out for this release.
Any mission you finish you can go back and do as a "training exercise" at any time, as many times as you want. It's in the menu under "Case Training". You don't even have to do the whole thing, you can pick and choose the chapter inside the mission itself.
TheSeks said:
Edit: Oh, yeah, and any clothing damaged stays damaged on ascending. Bucknaked Aya? DEALWITHIT.gif
While I think the plot does suck and make hardly any sense by the end, I really like the worldview of the game. The way Toriyama took the standard gaming concept of "lives" and gave them flesh and blood was genius. Whereas in a normal game you never think twice about losing a life, here the blood curdling screams as you watch the person you were a second ago suffer a horrible death really registered with me. Especially on the bosses where you HAD to sacrifice your own people to win.
It's one of the darkest, bleakest worldviews I've ever seen in a game. Really gives a great feeling that everything is dead, everyone is dying, and this is the end of the world.
It's too bad Toriyama can't actually write plotlines within the worlds he creates. I think his worlds are interesting and his characters are at least ok, but he just cannot write actual stories. He should work with one of the other good SE writers to improve on this.
Indeed, this is why I was referencing Alien 3, not out of specific plot points but the overall bleakness and daring of the presentation. And especially relating to how a viewer/player's enthusiasm to see what happens to favored surviving characters from the previous title crashes into that bleakness.
Such as, in both cases we have a
surviving trio of two protectors (with possible sparks of romance) and young girl
, only to have them encounter a bleaker than expected fate in the third title. Though
Aya and Kyle
had some apparently good times before having the rug yanked out from beneath them at their very happiest. Certainly makes that nice extra PE2 ending
with all three at the museum
that much more bittersweet.
And as regards the screams of the soldiers you overdive into, truly agreed. I often played more sloppily than I needed to by diving back and trying to save them after "abandoning" them even if it wasn't efficient or feat-related.
Started a second run. This game really flows when you know what to do and can concentrate on tactics instead of trying to figure out what crazy scenario you just got dropped.
Also, got the shower scene after episode 1. holysht.
Sniper Rifles are god send for those monsters who shoot green sludge ball things. They close up and you had to shoot its asshole with the sniper rifle which reopens the monster while giving you the chance to do an Overdive attack.
I really really hate those monsters as well as Snatchers.
How come I didn't get the shower scene? When I was told I could take a shower I checked every single stall but Aya won't take a shower.
While I think the plot does suck and make hardly any sense by the end, I really like the worldview of the game. The way Toriyama took the standard gaming concept of "lives" and gave them flesh and blood was genius. Whereas in a normal game you never think twice about losing a life, here the blood curdling screams as you watch the person you were a second ago suffer a horrible death really registered with me. Especially on the bosses where you HAD to sacrifice your own people to win.
It's one of the darkest, bleakest worldviews I've ever seen in a game. Really gives a great feeling that everything is dead, everyone is dying, and this is the end of the world.
It's too bad Toriyama can't actually write plotlines within the worlds he creates. I think his worlds are interesting and his characters are at least ok, but he just cannot write actual stories. He should work with one of the other good SE writers to improve on this.
It's too bad Toriyama can't actually write plotlines within the worlds he creates. I think his worlds are interesting and his characters are at least ok, but he just cannot write actual stories. He should work with one of the other good SE writers to improve on this.
seriously. not to get off topic, but the WORLD of FFXIII was so interesting, but the plot just sucked so much and made little sense whatsoever, or had incredibly predictable plot twists. it's a shame to hear the same thing going on here. I was looking forward to this. =\
Sniper Rifles are god send for those monsters who shoot green sludge ball things. They close up and you had to shoot its asshole with the sniper rifle which reopens the monster while giving you the chance to do an Overdive attack.
I really really hate those monsters as well as Snatchers.
How come I didn't get the shower scene? When I was told I could take a shower I checked every single stall but Aya won't take a shower.
The Story... what? No seriously. I think I need a couple paragraphs of spoiler text thrown at me.
So Aya actually didn't shoot eve the first time around. Eve dove into Aya and shot herself so she wouldn't awaken and in doing so destroyed Aya's soul... creating the High Ones, and the death of Aya's soul created the Twisted that were some sort of monsters desperately trying to tunnel back to the past (where she died) on some sort of primal instinct level... I think. Hyde Bore, the original, possibly ordered the murders of Aya and co... for some reason? Or did he just 'awaken' as a high one as soon as Eve was killed at time zero?
Ok so eve... well.. SOMETHING happens and Eve in Aya's body wakes up with no memory of who she is. Hyde Bore created an artificial over dive system because the twisted as too weak to go into the past time zero, and people who were close to Eve/Aya at the wedding became High ones that Hyde could control. So he engineered their deaths in the past to make the Twisted more powerful in the present so he could travel back to time Zero, because he was stuck in a loop of time where he perpetually fought the Twisted and eventually dies each and every time.
He wanted to go back to merge with Eve so gain super High One powers or something, to give birth to a race even more powerful than either.
So Eve in Aya's body does stuff in the present and slowly gets glimpses of 'Aya' shooting eve, but it was actually Eve over dived into Aya's body.
No explanation for why Hunter Boss Owen betrayed to in Episode 2...
So Eve gets back to time zero after defeating infinity Hyde Bore and jumps into Aya's body, and realizes that she isn't Aya, but actually Eve. Then Hyde Bore from time Zero is all like 'instead of everything happening as it will happen, merge with me eve and we can create something more powerful than the twisted or the high ones!
But it turns out that even though Aya's soul is destroyed she manages to get up and shoot Hyde Bore. Maybe because she already died and Eve returning to time Zero opened the door to let her come back, somehow.
So Aya still has to die... for some reason... and Aya over dives between the two of them so much that Eve can't keep up and makes Eve shoot Aya.
Eve then uses her 'powers' to wish fora world in which she never existed, but the soul of fiance man sees taht she's attempting to be Aya in this new timeline since Aya killed herself/made Eve shoot her soul. He says that he and Aya are going to search for eternity and that they'll watch over her.
Am I sort of right? This isn't exactly easy to put together.
What the hell was with Fiance guy and Eve walking around as 'possibly existing'
wtf is wrong with the chapter 1 boss,i'm about to throw my psp against the wall,i'm killing these fucking little twisters for 60 minutes now,now and then i can overdive into the boss but i have no idea how to trigger it,then he goes mad and install kills all my soldiers,wtf is this shit,i'm only on normal mode...reaper before was the same bullshit,what were they thinking
wtf is wrong with the chapter 1 boss,i'm about to throw my psp against the wall,i'm killing these fucking little twisters for 60 minutes now,now and then i can overdive into the boss but i have no idea how to trigger it,then he goes mad and install kills all my soldiers,wtf is this shit,i'm only on normal mode...reaper before was the same bullshit,what were they thinking
The boss is invincible until you weaken him with overdrive initially. The twisters are there so you can kill them and fill up your liberation gauge. Once you fill it up (or if you have it filled already at the start of the boss battle) press the triangle+circle to activate ovderdrive and shoot at the boss. This will weaken him and afterwards you can start killing him with your normal weapons.
I think I died 3 times to the Chapter 1 boss before I got it down pat. He's tough but you need to
do whatever you can to increase your Liberation gauge and then trigger a full burst on him. At the end of the Liberation you'll be able to do an Overdive and that will knock off his "shield" so that your normal shots can hurt him
. The little Twisters are just there to be annoying and increase your Liberation gauge.
Beaten!
And also, I'm seriously enjoying the gameplay in this one. The writing and voice acting is mediocre to bad but the atmosphere, music and most importantly gameplay are all pretty awesome. I've died a bunch, even on normal, but I still keep coming back because I'm enjoying myself that much.
Sniper Rifles are god send for those monsters who shoot green sludge ball things. They close up and you had to shoot its asshole with the sniper rifle which reopens the monster while giving you the chance to do an Overdive attack.
I really really hate those monsters as well as Snatchers.
I guess I'll have to play with them a bit. Like I said, I don't carry them into battle/missions willingly after seeing the 6 round only ability in addition to no lock-on/ability to move the camera (so whatever direction Aya is facing is where the camera moves). I abuse the auto-aim system in this game since there is no proper second nub/camera control for third person on the PSP. :/
Been ill since late last week, so I amused myself by converting my recently purchased copies of PE 1 and PE2 to a conveniently portable PSP format. I finished PE1 surprisingly quickly. PE2 is going slower since I've returned to work, but soon enough I should be ready for PE3!
Brought a Sniper into Chapter 3. Fucking frustrating chapter. Mostly because of the
Snatchers
and having to abuse the sniper at a distance. I still REALLY DON'T LIKE the snipers in this. Mostly because one nub + sway + having to hit a small weak point (which is what benefits from the rifles) = HARD. It's REALLY working against me. Is there an upgrade or skill that prevents sway or is there some button combo I'm missing to where you can have Aya hold her breath/steady her shots like Call of Duty et. al. have?
Anyway, the boss battle is flipping annoying due to
so many snatchers. It isn't really a boss battle.
Took me three-five attempts to do mostly because I kept getting caught and there was no reinforcements in time to dive into to prevent my death. Passed it.
Story wise:
Eve doesn't exist anymore? Wait, what? So Parasite Eve 2 didn't happen? Kyle and Aya were going to be married, but were gunned down, still unexplained so far. Eve is a catalyst for Twisted monsters/time-travel... I guess?
Cray killed his whole unit? On purpose because his kid was killed by the Twisted so he had no reason to go on living? I'm not getting him continuing to live if he was that depressed/mournful except to train Aya to prevent the Twisted or at least stop them from harming more people?
I'm starting to see what you guys mean by Toriyama being a hacked writer. I'm hoping the last 3 chapters start filling things in as the story (while picking up and explaining a few things/connecting to the other Parasite Eve's) still is murky. :/
Oh well, I'll start Chapter 4 tomorrow evening. I've gotta do a few things tomorrow and I really need to head to bed.
But gameplay wise: Despite it being a repetitive dungeon crawler-shooter-hybrid I do find the gameplay fun. I do wish there was a second nub on the PSP for proper third person shooting controls however.
Do I find it to top Parasite Eve 2 (my favorite outing), though? No, not really. And it doesn't top 1 either. But as far as a "Parasite Eve" (making fans of 1 cry, making fans of the series that actually "changes up" more than Final Fantasy happy with going in different directions/game-genres), I'll take it.
To use sniper rifles, first you center the camera BEFORE going into scope, then you move the camera with the d-pad or lock on with a non-sniper rifle weapon and THEN you go into scope so you are instantly pointing straight at them. Then just minor adjustments from cover to hit weakpoints and kill them in 2 hits
But yeah, I think everyone (even the devs) agree the game would have been better on PS3/X360 with two analogs. Hopefully they can make their HD sequel.
But yeah, I think everyone (even the devs) agree the game would have been better on PS3/X360 with two analogs. Hopefully they can make their HD sequel.
Valkyria Chronicles started on PS3 but then went PSP for the sequels. While the developers made all sorts of excuses, in the end it boiled down to it being much less expensive to develop for the PSP along with a lot more people owning PSPs.
It's one of the reasons the NGP doesn't have video out, with that it could replace the PS3 completely.
How do weapons unlock? I know how the special ones work (beat the game at the various difficulty levels) but how do you unlock the regular guns?
maeda's voice acting was particularly obnoxious. also, the amount of whimpering and moaning aya does throughout 90% of every cutscene made my roomie think i was watching porn on my psp.
Can`t beat the second Boss on easy lol...at one point they tell me to get a better view and move upstairs or higher but I can`t figure out how,I don`t see anyone higher that I could overdrive into...I shouldn`t of bought the shotgun as well,completly useless for this fight and I have 9 bullets with it...
Can`t beat the second Boss on easy lol...at one point they tell me to get a better view and move upstairs or higher but I can`t figure out how,I don`t see anyone higher that I could overdrive into...I shouldn`t of bought the shotgun as well,completly useless for this fight and I have 9 bullets with it...
From where you start, if you move to the far opposite corner on the right there are stairs. Once up there, you should be able to tell what to do. You can just knock out one of its legs to stun it and get by him.
From where you start, if you move to the far opposite corner on the right there are stairs. Once up there, you should be able to tell what to do. You can just knock out one of its legs to stun it and get by him.
The first thing you should do in any encounter is to overdive into the individual soldiers and spread them out. This not only makes crossfires more effective but means they'll take less damage overall.
I had a lot of trouble with that boss as well. :-/
Can`t beat the second Boss on easy lol...at one point they tell me to get a better view and move upstairs or higher but I can`t figure out how,I don`t see anyone higher that I could overdrive into...I shouldn`t of bought the shotgun as well,completly useless for this fight and I have 9 bullets with it...
Go to the far right corner, shoot the thing that's blocking it then go up. Once at the top, spam your grenades and shoot. It'll start shooting back (just retreat a bit), then climb the building. At that point, Overdive to other Soldiers and shoot its exposed back, probably even do Crossfire.
I think I'm on the next to last chapter. Sometimes this game lets me have some fun and the mechanics work. I'm taking down things and overdriving myself up the wall.
Other times the camera is fighting me to death and the lock on isn't working. Enemies take way to many shot and I'm running out of ammo for my main guns, :/
Holy shit. How the hell do you pass Chapter 4's little stand-off before
Facing Kyle
? They don't even let you have a checkpoint and upgrade guns and change settings before this. Brutal.
Nevermind. Took a little practice, but passed it. Still hate the snipers as sometimes I lose my aim-down-sight and am hit even though I'm holding L on my PSP-1000. :/
I also wish you could switch the default pistol/infinte ammo pistol out for another one in a trade-off for ammo/whatever. I understand why they don't (have an infinite ammo backup in case you DO run out of ammo) but still you're gimping yourself if you use another pistol without having an assault rifle to fall back on.
Finished my first play-through, liked it a lot, although the game felt a bit frustrating during certain encounters.
The end was sad, and the story somewhat confusing, but I've liked that too.
So, now I need to complete it 50 times to unlock the shower scene?!
