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Senran Kagura: Estival Versus |OT| Summer Life in Your Hometown

So my game is coming later today in the mail.

So would you guys say that the game is more challenging than SV?

Cause my only real gripe with SV is that the game was super easy even in the hardest levels once my characters got to lvl 50.

Those shinobi girls heart missions would over level your characters super hard, it was ridiculous.
 

SheHateMe

Member
So, I played a little bit last night, and I gotta tell you.....

...dat opening with Ryobi and Ryona....

...the video to start the game...

...the crispness of the PS4...

This game was worth every cent, and I haven't even made it past the first couple of fights.

Amazon sent my game in bubble wrap and crushed my box, however. They never fail to mess something up with me, I tell you what.
 

Demoskinos

Member
So my game is coming later today in the mail.

So would you guys say that the game is more challenging than SV?

Cause my only real gripe with SV is that the game was super easy even in the hardest levels once my characters got to lvl 50.

Those shinobi girls heart missions would over level your characters super hard, it was ridiculous.

The fights on harder settings can be a challenge because some mobs can be extremely aggressive.
 

antitrop

Member
So my game is coming later today in the mail.

So would you guys say that the game is more challenging than SV?

Cause my only real gripe with SV is that the game was super easy even in the hardest levels once my characters got to lvl 50.

Those shinobi girls heart missions would over level your characters super hard, it was ridiculous.

Yes, absolutely. The difficulty balance has been improved across the board, not only with the addition of a Medium difficulty, but Easy and Hard have been better balanced from SV, as well.

SV was an absolute cakewalk to Platinum, I barely even had to "play it". There have been more than a few missions I've failed in Estival on Easy, and that's fine.

The most immediately noticeable difference from playing Estival on PS4 after Shinovi on Vita is that there are WAY MORE enemies on screen at the same time, and they're far more aggressive than they were before. I'm constantly taking little bits of chip damage in Estival that add up over the course of the mission, wherein Shinovi I could finish most levels at full health.
 

Demoskinos

Member
So yo Attention everyone. If any of you are wondering how to unlock the side stories for the girls you need to destroy festival towers in specific story mode missions. If a mission has towers it will tell you how many there are and how many you have.
 

antitrop

Member
So yo Attention everyone. If any of you are wondering how to unlock the side stories for the girls you need to destroy festival towers in specific story mode missions. If a mission has towers it will tell you how many there are and how many you have.

Just a side note that the Towers make one of the Trophies missable. You need to use one of them as a Creative Finish, before you get the Trophy for destroying all 80 of them.

Each unique Creative Finish unlocks a video to buy in the store, which is required for the Trophy of buying everything in the store.
 

FHIZ

Member
Just a side note that the Towers make one of the Trophies missable. You need to use one of them as a Creative Finish, before you get the Trophy for destroying all 80 of them.

Each unique Creative Finish unlocks a video to buy in the store, which is required for the Trophy of buying everything in the store.
Good looking out...

Now how do I do creative finishes and what are these towers?

...too much time was spent in the dressing room last night.
 

antitrop

Member
Good looking out...

Now how do I do creative finishes and what are these towers?

...too much time was spent in the dressing room last night.

You won't start seeing the Festival Towers until you finish Day 0. The mission select screen tells you which missions have Towers in them and how many, so at least that makes that easy.

Creative Finishes are noted by the signs with red exclamation points on them, and if you finish off an enemy shinobi near one of them, it will activate a special finishing animation.
 

joe2187

Banned
This special mission was just an advertisment for the OVA

oh my god.

(Available only in Japan at this time)

WELL WHAT DO YOU WANT ME TO DO GAME!? TELL ME!?
 

SerTapTap

Member
I loved the last games and played a bit of this one in Japanese, but gave it away after struggling to comprehend the stories (which I actually enjoy).

Can anyone give me solid recommendation of Vita/PSTV vs PS4? I have both and honestly portability might out weigh any PS4 upsides, but was curious what those of you that have tried both versions think is the best option.

Game is unquestionably massively better on PS4. And a super strong case for why "simply" far higher resolution and framerate can make a game far more enjoyable. The graphics alone go from "yeah this is pretty nice for a Vita game I guess" to one of the best looking anime games I've seen, period. (Though GG XRD is unfair competition)

So my game is coming later today in the mail.

So would you guys say that the game is more challenging than SV?

Cause my only real gripe with SV is that the game was super easy even in the hardest levels once my characters got to lvl 50.

Those shinobi girls heart missions would over level your characters super hard, it was ridiculous.

You'll lose in seconds if you play around in Hard mode at a fair or lower level. The difficulty options are way better and AI aggressiveness is directly affected. If anything Hard mode is kind of an example of why you DON'T want realistically aggressive AI in a musou game. (It's not quite unplayable, but in certain swarms you can get comboed for 50-75% of your health in seconds)

So, I played a little bit last night, and I gotta tell you.....

...dat opening with Ryobi and Ryona....

...the video to start the game...

...the crispness of the PS4...

This game was worth every cent, and I haven't even made it past the first couple of fights.

Amazon sent my game in bubble wrap and crushed my box, however. They never fail to mess something up with me, I tell you what.

Agreed. Funny how harsh most critics are on it...one of those games where player reception and critical reception are sure to be completely divergent. (chapter 1 is lame tho, but it gets better again)
 

bobawesome

Member
Prayed to the boobie gods that I get a Miyabi card and I was blessed.

DqFcWn5.gif
 

Akibared

Member
Game is unquestionably massively better on PS4. And a super strong case for why "simply" far higher resolution and framerate can make a game far more enjoyable. The graphics alone go from "yeah this is pretty nice for a Vita game I guess" to one of the best looking anime games I've seen, period. (Though GG XRD is unfair competition)

Agreed it's super pretty and I'm really happy about the way better load times!
 

Nyoro SF

Member
How do you change the difficulty? It seems to have defaulted to Easy.

Unfortunately you don't get mission select option until like four battles into the game. I can see why they did it for the tutorials though, don't want to get your head cracked in while trying to learn mechanics. Speaking of which, is there any downside to doing the aerial rave team combo? I assume it eats a ninja scroll to do it.

Playing on the hardest difficulty is really fun... because you level up so fast, it's kind of crazy. The game doesn't really open up until you get more ninja scrolls to save your butt with, so faster leveling is welcome.

I'm not sure how I feel about some of the combat balance changes. I believe they took out dash canceling of all normals, and the dash is short and slow. You can still guard cancel and jump cancel recovery of moves, but only after their active attack frames are over, which is good balance. Bursts have more recovery. The air stomp was severely nerfed because of this. No more airdashing out of jump normals to avoid bursts.

Hilariously enough, it's even easier to cheese bosses in this game than in SV if you're playing on not-Hard. Supers last way longer and are still invincible for this extended time, so you can just power straight through bursts and hit them in recovery (much easier), and dizzying comes faster.
 
My EU PS4 copy just arrived! Anyone know whether the EU art cards are fixed or random from a selection? If they're random then 3x Yumi was one hell of a haul, especially that bottom left one with
best girl
Ryobi.

I believe they're fixed. I've got the same cards at least, and I don't think they ever mentioned them being random.
 

pariah164

Member
So if the tower that makes the trophy missable is the same tower in the stage that introduces you to the concept of them... WELP. Guess I'm starting a new game.

In further 'wth costmes' news, I managed to get the costumes to stick. However, now every time I play a mission, the hair goes back to default. Stop fucking up my shit, Estival, Jesus.
 

antitrop

Member
So if the tower that makes the trophy missable is the same tower in the stage that introduces you to the concept of them... WELP. Guess I'm starting a new game.

In further 'wth costmes' news, I managed to get the costumes to stick. However, now every time I play a mission, the hair goes back to default. Stop fucking up my shit, Estival, Jesus.

You can use any of the 80 to activate the Creative Finish. It doesn't have to be the first one.
 
Wait, what is this about Shinobi platforms? I'm only a few stages in to the story, but is this something they go over or are you left to figure it out on your own?
 

Demoskinos

Member
Just a side note that the Towers make one of the Trophies missable. You need to use one of them as a Creative Finish, before you get the Trophy for destroying all 80 of them.

Each unique Creative Finish unlocks a video to buy in the store, which is required for the Trophy of buying everything in the store.

I wanna say there is a way to get that even if you do destroy all the towers. Pretty sure anyways. Either way good looking out just in case that isn't true. ^^
 

antitrop

Member
Wait, what is this about Shinobi platforms? I'm only a few stages in to the story, but is this something they go over or are you left to figure it out on your own?

It's tutorialized once you pass Day 0.

I wanna say there is a way to get that even if you do destroy all the towers. Pretty sure anyways. Either way good looking out just in case that isn't true. ^^

Better safe than sorry. :) You're probably pretty likely to activate a finish on one of the platforms purely by accident, anyway.
 

Demoskinos

Member
Wait, what is this about Shinobi platforms? I'm only a few stages in to the story, but is this something they go over or are you left to figure it out on your own?

These things.

44L6de54e.png


There are a bunch of them through some of the levels in the game. I dont think they start appearing until after you get out of the prologue though. Each of the levels will tell you how many there are. They also are fairly well hidden in some levels so you gotta be clever!
 
Yes, absolutely. The difficulty balance has been improved across the board, not only with the addition of a Medium difficulty, but Easy and Hard have been better balanced from SV, as well.

SV was an absolute cakewalk to Platinum, I barely even had to "play it". There have been more than a few missions I've failed in Estival on Easy, and that's fine.

The most immediately noticeable difference from playing Estival on PS4 after Shinovi on Vita is that there are WAY MORE enemies on screen at the same time, and they're far more aggressive than they were before. I'm constantly taking little bits of chip damage in Estival that add up over the course of the mission, wherein Shinovi I could finish most levels at full health.

You'll lose in seconds if you play around in Hard mode at a fair or lower level. The difficulty options are way better and AI aggressiveness is directly affected. If anything Hard mode is kind of an example of why you DON'T want realistically aggressive AI in a musou game. (It's not quite unplayable, but in certain swarms you can get comboed for 50-75% of your health in seconds)

This is exactly what I want to hear.
 

SerTapTap

Member
Random fact, but there's actually entire stage designs that are only used in the side stories, so don't consider yourself to have seen everything once you beat the story.

I kinda wish the "location finishers" were harder to execute. On several stages I'll accidentally activate it for all 3 opponents, it gets a bit old. Not having to strip first OR use a super to finish makes them crazy easy with how many the updates added. They used to be rare, but they litter the ground now. Some of the new ones are pretty funny so I can't complain too much. (The "cage" ones are far too common and entirely uninteresting though)

These things.

There are a bunch of them through some of the levels in the game. I dont think they start appearing until after you get out of the prologue though. Each of the levels will tell you how many there are. They also are fairly well hidden in some levels so you gotta be clever!

You don't really need to worry about being too anal about collecting all of them the first playthrough either. you'll probably stumble more than half as long as you know they exist and what they look like and finishing up the rest isn't hard.

But if you know you're looking for one they're usually not too hard to find

I wanna say there is a way to get that even if you do destroy all the towers. Pretty sure anyways. Either way good looking out just in case that isn't true. ^^

IIRC, the creative finish in the store for festival platforms actually unlocks when you beat the game or break all platforms. It can't be required for the trophy anyway I think, since that finish was added in after launch anyway.
 

Zonic

Gives all the fucks
*opens LE*

....oh...I got the Hebijo cards.....

Probably should've waited on the artbook, since I have a feeling it just spoiled all of the pics for beating the character specific missions for everyone.
 
*opens LE*

....oh...I got the Hebijo cards.....

Probably should've waited on the artbook, since I have a feeling it just spoiled all of the pics for beating the character specific missions for everyone.

Apparently yes it did. XSeed themselves said most of the art is exactly that.
 

pariah164

Member
So, it turns out that if you restart the game (IE close it out and restart) after changing character hair colors, even if you saved beforehand, the characters' hair goes back to default colors. What fresh bullshit is this?
 

DonkeySauce

Neo Member
Just got my copy, downloading the update now. I got the Hebijo girls cards. That Imu card might be my favorite. I did not expect to dig her as much as I do.
 
Don't go for the tower while doing the campaign.
First the number of towers doesn't appear when you first play the mission. Second you're going to replay those missions anyway , so just play as you see fit.

If you see one , go for it , otherwise , just ignore them.
 

Demoskinos

Member
So, it turns out that if you restart the game (IE close it out and restart) after changing character hair colors, even if you saved beforehand, the characters' hair goes back to default colors. What fresh bullshit is this?

Like saved before you quit? Because it shouldn't do that at all. Game is on the same patch as Japanese version and I never had that problem as long as I saved the game manually after exiting the dressing room before quitting.
 
Don't go for the tower while doing the campaign.
First the number of towers doesn't appear when you first play the mission. Second you're going to replay those missions anyway , so just play as you see fit.

If you see one , go for it , otherwise , just ignore them.

Yeah. Destroying the towers seem to be more of a thing you should do in the post-game.
 

Ultimadrago

Member
Don't go for the tower while doing the campaign.
First the number of towers doesn't appear when you first play the mission. Second you're going to replay those missions anyway , so just play as you see fit.

If you see one , go for it , otherwise , just ignore them.

Why not take them out in the campaign so I don't have to worry about them the next go round?

*Using a guide because I totally will for getting them all.
 

pariah164

Member
Like saved before you quit? Because it shouldn't do that at all. Game is on the same patch as Japanese version and I never had that problem as long as I saved the game manually after exiting the dressing room before quitting.
Yep. I did a mission with the hair colors intact, saved at the end. I went to the dressing room, hair colors were intact, so I left the dressing room, then manually saved. Once that was done, I exited the game to check something, and when I rebooted the game, hair colors went back to default. It's very annoying.

Another question: on the mission menu, I saw that the ones I cleared have a small blue star next to the grade. What's the meaning of that?
 

SerTapTap

Member
I just assume any art book has massive spoilers in it, really.

Why not take them out in the campaign so I don't have to worry about them the next go round?

*Using a guide because I totally will for getting them all.

Seriously dont' worry so much about the towers. You don't need a guide and they don't take long, and you'll probably clear more than half as long as you pay attention while playing the story.

*opens LE*

....oh...I got the Hebijo cards.....

Probably should've waited on the artbook, since I have a feeling it just spoiled all of the pics for beating the character specific missions for everyone.

I'll take those if you don't want them, I need that ryouna card (if mine isn't hebijo cards anyway)

So, it turns out that if you restart the game (IE close it out and restart) after changing character hair colors, even if you saved beforehand, the characters' hair goes back to default colors. What fresh bullshit is this?

Did you actually save the game, or just confirm the dressing room changes? If you don't use the PS4's save menu you haven't saved anything.

The series SERIOUSLY needs to start auto saving though. There's absolutely no reason for it not to.

This game is way better than it has any right to be (playing PS4 version). I'm impressed.

I can see why one would say this, but Tamsoft has clearly been putting in a lot of work to correct the wrongs of prior games each time. They're a good dev regardless of subject matter. They're just not a famous or high budget dev.
 
I got Gessen Girls cards which is fine because they are my favorite so far.
Not sure how I feel, Burst is more of a brawler whereas Versus is a musou. It is interesting though. Think I am leaning toward Burst but we shall see.
 

SerTapTap

Member
I left the dressing room, went to 'Records', then hit Save and saved the game. Also, I'm on Vita.

Hmmm. I actually don't know if I've ever changed hair colors (since it's the easiest way to identify characters besides the eyes)...but I can't imagine that's right. Maybe a bug, I'll try to check it tonight. I know it saves color for non-hair because I change that a lot. I gave most of the cast rabbit/cat ears in the JP version. Lost my will to re-dress 25+ characters for now so I haven't touched anything in the dressing room yet.

I got Gessen Girls cards which is fine because they are my favorite so far.
Not sure how I feel, Burst is more of a brawler whereas Versus is a musou. It is interesting though. Think I am leaning toward Burst but we shall see.

Oh jeez. Play more because I frankly can't imagine anyone preferring Burst over Estival no matter how much they love 2D brawlers. Maybe SK2 over EV, that's a matter of preference, but Burst is so primitive and performs like crap. I can't even go back to SV on Vita after playing EV on PS4.
 

L.O.R.D

Member
if anyone want to compare Burst to a game, let that game be "code of princess"

because both of them are crap in term of gameplay and quality.
 

Pimpbaa

Member
My suspicions were correct and the story picks up again after chapter 1 & 2, with the start of 3 getting somewhat more serious. A shame, as I'm 90% sure most review sites only played chapter 1 before their negative reviews

This is the type of game you don't read reviews for because no one is going to give it a fair shake due to the sexual nature of the game. Especially with so many of them striving to be..."politically correct". We also got a lot of game critics who NEVER give musou games or musou like games a fair shot.
 

pariah164

Member
Hmmm. I actually don't know if I've ever changed hair colors (since it's the easiest way to identify characters besides the eyes)...but I can't imagine that's right. Maybe a bug, I'll try to check it tonight. I know it saves color for non-hair because I change that a lot. I gave most of the cast rabbit/cat ears in the JP version. Lost my will to re-dress 25+ characters for now so I haven't touched anything in the dressing room yet.
If it's a bug, it's an annoying one.
 
Why not take them out in the campaign so I don't have to worry about them the next go round?

*Using a guide because I totally will for getting them all.

The best way to enjoy the game is to clear those towers while enjoying the campaign.

If you're using a guide it's fine , but doing it post-game has the advantage of using time to level up your characters even more.while doing so if you plan to go in Multiplayer.
 
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