Hmmm, it's not something I really pay attention too actually. But now that you mention it, Kallen is Z2 was a bit weird.
On the other side, I'm playing UX right now and once he gets the Zabanya, Lockon gets a second Haro, meaning a THIRD SP pool lol I'm waiting to see how's the Qanta, but Zabanya is a monster... And it still lacks its final battle equipement lol
2 that comes to mind is in Z2-2 when the Guren Mk2 is an S size unit with really high mobility but Kallen has the Guard ability and a super robot pilot's seishin list (Iron Wall and Fortitude). The other is Lacus as the main pilot of the Eternal. She has freaking SEED. The Eternal will never ever dodge anything. There was no point.
The show did it so the game has to do it too. As for Gurren it is an S unit and with high mobility so it can dodge most of attacks on it's own without any spirit commands, and Kallen's stats do focus on evade and not guard.
I blame the shows they decided to build the plot around. Not that the OG plot isn't the weakest part of the whole thing.
On a totally different note I finally finished Zengar's route in Alpha 2. The whole thing is just a straight sequel to Alpha Gaiden. Some of the series carry over into 3 but there is almost no other connection to the main plot of 1 or 3. The whole thing feels like more side story.
The show did it so the game has to do it too. As for Gurren it is an S unit and with high mobility so it can dodge most of attacks on it's own without any spirit commands, and Kallen's stats do focus on evade and not guard.
Yeah, but my point was from a mechanics point of view, Kallen's starting abilities (she even has Potential L5) is pretty weird. She's basically a super robot pilot inside a real robot. In fact, now that I think about it, even the Guren's barrier is pretty useless since the Guren has tin can for armor.
As for Lacus, I know the series gave her SEED so she needs to have it in the game too but its pretty useless mechanics wise as well.
Style is far more important for SRW than mechanics and speaking of mechanics, Alpha 3 is terrible. The early game is so painfully slow and tedious, having to deal with the hand holding and all limitations and deficiencies of the early units is really annoying. Maybe it gets better later on, or maybe it's just that I use super robots too much and haven't noticed how bad real ones are.
You seemed quite enthusiastic a while ago? What changed? I'm not asking to start an argument: I still have plans to buy a jap 3ds because of this game, so I'd be glad to hear some opinion about it.
I think the game started off strong for the first 5-10 hours introducing all the series, but then the story started going nowhere, the partner system was introduced and doubled up grunts made the maps drag on and on and bosses started being HP tanks and taking 20-30 attacks to kill. It's just really padded out in the middle and makes it hard to care about advancing in it.
I really think I prefer single unit SRW like how Z2 did it. Speeds up the gameplay a lot.
Every single unit being overpowered and broken and pilots having hilarious amount of abilities is what speeds up the gameplay. I would say that UX is probably faster than Z2 because the stages are so much smaller in comparison. You can get a single unit from one edge of the map to another in two moves. Although looking at my save files I managed to beat both games in around 300 turns and Z2 is 8 stages longer.
I wouldn't call UX a slow game in comparison to say something like 2nd Alpha or 2nd OGs which both recently took me at least 470 turns to beat. It all depends on how you decide to play the game really.
UX is so easy. I'm stocking up on really useful Skill Parts like Continuous Movement and Dash because I don't see the need to give them to any of my main pilots, and end up not knowing what to do with all of this shit ahah.
UX is so easy. I'm stocking up on really useful Skill Parts like Continuous Movement and Dash because I don't see the need to give them to any of my main pilots, and end up not knowing what to do with all of this shit ahah.
I guess I am. But then again, I just finished stage 30 and my heavy hitters are already completely DESTROYING the opposition, despite the fact I'm taking my sweet time to hit some killcount requirements (mainly Fafner related).
Main culprits: Mark Sein, Linebarrels, Black Lion, Nanajin and for some reason Destiny. This little team is all I need, but the rest is just as overpowered, just less upgraded.
OH MY GOD. I rarely if ever fully upgrade units (only the things important to each unit) and thus rarely go for the FUB, so I didn't notice until now... But upgrading a unit to level 5 everywhere gives you a crazy bonus
I had 400000 to spare when I realized that so I used it all on the 5-6 units that only needed a few bars to get the bonus.
The funny part about this is that in the case of UX there is no FUB bonus unlike other games. The same bonus is unlocked when pilots get Ace and Double Ace.
I'm at 35 now, the prison escape from Sayonara no Tsubasa. Graham's reaction to Alto is just priceless ahah.
If there's something I like about UX it's the crossover aspects. Both Z2 games have been playing it safe to a terribly boring extent IMO. It looks to me like they took more liberties here and it's just more fun/interesting as a result.
The biggest flaw might be the length of the series they choose. Destiny, Dunbine, Dancouga Nova and Brave Warriors simply don't count (their plot is over when the game starts) which leaves Fafner, Linebarrels and Tobikage as the only series with a decent length. Heroman too, but its plot is completely melted into the shorter Demonbane one, which itself is often confined to route splits... After that, all there's left are Mazinkaser with 3 episodes and the Gundam and Macross movies lol.
As much as I like Fafner and Linebarrels, it's a bit boring to have them monopolizing the plot all the time. At least I got to discover Tobikage I guess.
But, hey, for all it's flaws I'm not getting the usual mid-game fatigue (yet), so I'm definitely happy with how this turned out.
Hit the weirdest stage in Alpha 3 now, it is at least in my opinion. For some reason Macross Plus needs to happen all over again but I have no idea why. I had to stop playing just because of how odd all of it was, well that and the language barrier.
They didn't do the full Macross Plus plot in either Alpha or Alpha Gaiden. Alpha had Isamu and Guld introduction, Gaiden had their brawl and reconciliation in Macross City while fighting againt Ghosts. But the whole Sharon Apple didn't happen yet.
Hit the weirdest stage in Alpha 3 now, it is at least in my opinion. For some reason Macross Plus needs to happen all over again but I have no idea why. I had to stop playing just because of how odd all of it was, well that and the language barrier.
but late 30s stages were kind of funny with all those badass moments they got
only to die or be assimilated because something goes terribly wrong out of nowhere. Mamoru's death scene was BRUTAL, I didn't expect them to make it that way.
I'm becoming extremely cautious whenever I hear that abridged version of the Mark Sein theme now, I know that despite the initial EPIC something is going to happen lol
Fafner secrets are pretty much the only ones I managed to get. I raised a lot of flags for other secrets, but since most of them require you to go through every route the concerned series appears, I missed one or two flags for most of the non-Fafner related things...
The secret system in the game is pretty good for people who do multiple playthroughs, but for those like me who play each entry only once, it's definitely worse. Oh well.
Eh... I'm partially interested. I still prefer 2d animations over 3d. I did play the Wii SRW game (which this looks like it uses updated assets from), so I'm a little wary... didn't like the Wii SRW too much.
I am curious, at the end of the trailer, when it lists all the series, at the end of the list it says "And More..."
Makes me think, because of the episodic nature of this game, they haven't locked down the final series list yet?
That would be nice actually, since it would keep us guessing as to what direction the story might take, since what series is in, would more or less help up predict the story direction.
I actually kind of like the 3D once and awhile. Plus, it's easier to do nowadays which allows for some series that you'd normally not see with the 2D titles. Ryu Knight, for example, wouldn't make it in a 2D title most of the time, Aside from not meshing with the title of most of the main titles anyway, lol.
Looks alright, kind of been there, done that. Guessing almost all the voice clips will be recycled from Z2 or other games.
What's the chance the game will have story like a normal SRW and cover the plots of the series in it? Probably would be the only reason I'd pick it up.
Looks alright, kind of been there, done that. Guessing almost all the voice clips will be recycled from Z2 or other games.
What's the chance the game will have story like a normal SRW and cover the plots of the series in it? Probably would be the only reason I'd pick it up.
At the very least, any series that was in the SRW Wii game, those animations and voice clips are probably gonna be recycled (with the animations being cleaned up and upscaled a bit, obviously)
But now there's a new SRW for the PS3 and Vita, so I don't care as much anymore for this game. Woohoo, Masou Kishin! (bit surprised they even announced a new game so soon, they usually wait until the previously announced game is actually released first)
At the very least, any series that was in the SRW Wii game, those animations and voice clips are probably gonna be recycled (with the animations being cleaned up and upscaled a bit, obviously)
But now there's a new SRW for the PS3 and Vita, so I don't care as much anymore for this game. Woohoo, Masou Kishin! (bit surprised they even announced a new game so soon, they usually wait until the previously announced game is actually released first)
Yeah so I have been on a bit of a SRW kick recently.
I couldn't turn down the super hot UX 3DS so I bought that bundle before leaving for GDC.
I spent a ton of time on the game while traveling but it got old pretty fast.
My biggest pet peeve is that the attack animations are pretty goddamn unimaginative in my opinion. Considering how many cool ways the 3D could have been used it is disappointing.
And yeah overall the featured series are of no interest to me.
On the up side I found a cheap copy of SRW Z during Golden Week.
Was disappointed to find out it doesn't work with UMD passport so I am stuck playing on the PSP instead of Vita.
Once I finish it on PSP I may buy Z-2 for the Vita but goddamn at that price for the DL version....
Watching the Operation Extend trailer, it actually bugs the shit out of me that they're re-using the cut-ins from Z2. Like they just feel out of place here and it seems so lazy and cheap to re-use the same ones :\
Watching the Operation Extend trailer, it actually bugs the shit out of me that they're re-using the cut-ins from Z2. Like they just feel out of place here and it seems so lazy and cheap to re-use the same ones :\
I actually want to play Alpha 3 really bad too, since I played 2 last summer. But I left my PS2 back in France and absolutely can't find anyone with a PS2 willing to lend it to me
I just finished UX and put up my impressions in the game thread:
I finished the game this morning! Overall, I had a lot of fun with it. I went through the full cycle from the "cast list announced: not buying" > "everyone talks about it: mildly interested" > "launch period: hyped to death, buying it in the end".
Do I regret that last part? Nope, not one bit.
Animation wasn't that good, especially after Z2 and OG2nd, but nothing egregious IMO. The (over)use of cut-ins was probably a good thing. I was initially not impressed by the 3D after checking the eshop trailer, but I found myself liking it quite a bit, and had it on for most of the later stages battle scenes. Music selection was alright, and despite some arrangements being pretty bad, I think I liked most of them and also the fact it was more varied than that violin overload we got in Z2.
I already told you guys what I thought about the series selection in the community thread. This didn't really changed and Bebpo illustrated the problem pretty well with his complain about how late the Macross and Gundam plots kicked in.
However, I think the crossover aspects where pretty cool, especially if you went for secrets. I got all the Fafner ones, which got me things like
Shoko being sent to Rean's Byston Well and becoming a Holy Warrior, Michio being saved by Irbola from Tobikage etc
; plus the usual seiyuu jokes, the whole thing about Three Kingdoms Gundams being "human gundams", the (IMO) nice integration of Shinn with the Fafner cast (better than doing absolutely nothing like Dancouga people)... I'm pretty happy with what I got.
Also, I thought the game had pretty strong moments at its climax. Shit started going down with the death of
Richard
, then you get the Fafner meltdowns, Rean's finale, Linebarrels final two stages (especially the death of
Ishigami
). They nailed most of these moments really well IMO, my favourite ones being the end of the 00 movie (I really didn't expect them to put that BGM in the game just for that!) - because, yes, I actually like that movie - and the final Tobikage + Zerokage scene in 50.
The OG story didn't do a whole lot for me. It wasn't bad or anything, but nothing amazing, and I felt the way Arnie's actor forced himself REALLY HARD to sound badass in the third act was terribly silly. Kinda like the character and Saya, but they really didn't do a whole lot.
On the gameplay front, it was okay. I hadn't played K or L and am way more used to the way Alpha/OG/Z handle character progression, so I had to adjust a bit, but I think I like the skill part system better. One could argue the differences are ultimately pointless though, since UX is so fucking easy. It doesn't have skill points too, which usually bring a little bit of variation to Z or OG games, so the stages were definitely a bit repetitive. But for some reason, this is the first game I didn't got the usual SRW fatigue with, where I usually stop playing half or 2/3rds in, and wait a few weeks before finishing. Played one or two stages religiously every day and bam, it was over before I knew it.
To summarize, UX was definitely not the best game I played in the franchise, but I liked it quite a bit and think people initially cautious about should definitely give it a try.
Yeah, I'm gonna double post this here because it's more about the direction the franchise has been going over the last 4 years that bums me out:
UX is getting a little better as the story gets more serious and more events happening with actual value. Also more Demonbane is good. Demonbane is awesome and I only wish there was even more of it in UX.
I think the story and game overall would have been much better if they actually did the Dunbine and Tobikage full plots. Or the SD Gundam. There's so many series in UX that are basically mid/post-series and a waste. I mean when you have so many short OAVs/movies (Rean, SKL, OO Movie) it makes no sense to also have so many post-series shows. The lineup is not bad! It's quirky and weird and fun (could've used Geass or Gurren though), but the lineup is fake when they don't actually use any of the plots! The entire game is simply: Linebarrels, Fafner, Mac F and that's it. Occasionally you get a map from the OAV series of Rean, SKL, OO Movie, Heroman (yeah, Heroman's not OAV but it's treated like one with only a few maps) and OG plot.
So they take this interesting lineup of series and make it a SRW about three plots and occasionally 1-2 map short arcs of guest series. Not only this but they make it a large/long SRW almost on par with the console/Z2 ones. But those have TONs of plots going on constantly, usually like 6 full length series running and then 4 OAVs/movies/OG + non-plot series. It just makes it feel repetitive and padded as hell. I don't know what they were thinking. It's not like it's any cheaper to license since they still have the series. I guess it's cheaper in that they don't have to make sprites for the main characters in those shows, but I dunno, that seems super lazy. I actually like Linebarrels/Fafner (especially Fafner), but if I didn't I would hate this game. Not even one classic series plotline. For shame (tobikage starts in the middle and has very little plot; dunbine is post-series).
I keep thinking back to K and W and how they covered the entire plots of all these great shows from Gainer, to GunxSword, to that show with the boobs that Shouta loves, to Seed Astray mangas, to GOLION mothafucka! to Gaogaigar ENTIRE SHOW + FINAL, to Tekkaman Blade, to Seed Destiny, to ZOIDS, to Dancouga Nova, to FMP, there were so many full plotlines of interesting series done and those games were limited to 30-35 stages total!! Yet here with are with UX and it's 52 stages and we get Fafner, Linebarrels, Mac F. Just a huge waste, kind of boring, and feels cheap/lazy/uninspired.
And next up is a SRW with a great lineup (Operation Extend) but almost entirely recycled series, cutins, voices in episodic form. Which also screams lazy and cheap.
I get that you can't expect a high quality SRW like 2nd OGs or Z series more than once every 3 years, but you can also make cheaper, shorter, smaller SRW games in between that don't come off as lazy cheap cash-ins. I guess this should be no surprise as while last gen started strong with W & K along with balls hard A remake and Neo, it ended lazy with L and that Gakuen game. /qq
UX story got pretty boring I fast forwarded all conversation, even missed some of the main story.
So anyone wanna tell me what happened in a gist? I am on the last stage the last boss means nothing to me (I only read story for the first 24 stages though)
And it's way too easy
edit
O i think i remember, it's the doctor who gave mc and jin the suit to start from? lol confused,
UX story got pretty boring I fast forwarded all conversation, even missed some of the main story.
So anyone wanna tell me what happened in a gist? I am on the last stage the last boss means nothing to me (I only read story for the first 24 stages though)
And it's way too easy
edit
O i think i remember, it's the doctor who gave mc and jin the suit to start from? lol confused,
the UX universe has been going through countless cycles of destruction, but the real end of the universe is nigh (it's not possible to cycle any more). The prof is the only one who remember all the cycles, through Richard was her buddy. Actually I think Richard remembers some of it, but maybe not all. Not sure anymore.
Saya and Ayul are both creations of the prof, "made" for the purpose of stabilizing the particule accelerator engine used by the Odysseus & co. She stands against the heroes as the last test before they meet (and fight) the reason for the never-ending universe-cycling: Kali Yuga (final boss). After you kick Kali Yuga's ass, the universe is saved and gets free of the cycle.
One thing I didn't get however, was the whole thing about the other worlds some of the series comes from. When the big reveal came, I thought they clearly said
there was no "future", "past" or "other dimension" involved and that the people not from the current cycle simply came from another one, summoned by the prof call ("Gather at the beginning"). But in the ending you see all these guys going "back to the future"
and it confused the shit out of me. I must have missed or misunderstood something. The whole Linebarrels thing made it even more complicated.
the UX universe has been going through countless cycles of destruction, but the real end of the universe is nigh (it's not possible to cycle any more). The prof is the only one who remember all the cycles, through Richard was her buddy. Actually I think Richard remembers some of it, but maybe not all. Not sure anymore.
Saya and Ayul are both creations of the prof, "made" for the purpose of stabilizing the particule accelerator engine used by the Odysseus & co. She stands against the heroes as the last test before they meet (and fight) the reason for the never-ending universe-cycling: Kali Yuga (final boss). After you kick Kali Yuga's ass, the universe is saved and gets free of the cycle.
One thing I didn't get however, was the whole thing about the other worlds some of the series comes from. When the big reveal came, I thought they clearly said
there was no "future", "past" or "other dimension" involved and that the people not from the current cycle simply came from another one, summoned by the prof call ("Gather at the beginning"). But in the ending you see all these guys going "back to the future"
and it confused the shit out of me. I must have missed or misunderstood something. The whole Linebarrels thing made it even more complicated.
So this has been bothering me for a while now: why don't super robots get map attacks? Even if they had map attacks in the show, or used an attack to wipe out hundreds of enemies at once. Those attacks either are not in the game or are just removed entirely. The only time I remember them having any is in Alpha 1 where Mazinkaiser had a secret/hidden map version of Fireblaster.
Edit: Oh and Goldion Crusher I guess. Except you can use it once per map, that use is shared with the single target version and you can't use it in space even though it has A rating for that terrain. A game that spends most of the time in space, you can't use that attack in space. Makes perfect sense.
So this has been bothering me for a while now: why don't super robots get map attacks? Even if they had map attacks in the show, or used an attack to wipe out hundreds of enemies at once. Those attacks either are not in the game or are just removed entirely. The only time I remember them having any is in Alpha 1 where Mazinkaiser had a secret/hidden map version of Fireblaster.
Edit: Oh and Goldion Crusher I guess. Except you can use it once per map, that use is shared with the single target version and you can't use it in space even though it has A rating for that terrain. A game that spends most of the time in space, you can't use that attack in space. Makes perfect sense.
I take it if you're mentioning a GaoGaiGar attack you're not specific one given game - in that case there are a few more examples of MAP attacks, Ideon comes to mind.
The gurren lagann map attack (the drill one) also required earth terrain I think.
The problem I have with super units are not the hero units, are the support/zako units you use. they are pretty useless a lot of the times because they don't have the super hero unit's defence nor do they have real unit's dodge.
Since Z2.2, I haven't felt any SRW game as epic as the good old ps1/ps2 era alpha3/z1 type grand final.
The problem I have with super units are not the hero units, are the support/zako units you use. they are pretty useless a lot of the times because they don't have the super hero unit's defence nor do they have real unit's dodge.
That really depends on what unit you are talking about. King Kittan has more armor than Mazinger. However its attacks suck and it uses up more energy than several super robots put together.
In general, some of these games have a severe lack of useful map attacks (cough*cough*UX)
I think it's part of the whole new "not give characters hot blood until the last 1/3rd of the game" nerfing mantra SRW is doing right now. Hope they drop it and go back to crazy overpowered mechs destroying everything with giant map attacks and hot blood boss finishers.
I can see why some people would say that SRW Z is one of the harder games. The SP pools are tiny compared to other games and the squad system is incredibly fiddly and obtuse. That combined with non stop event scripts and squads being constantly jumbled around kind of makes it difficult to figure out whats going on. I am sure I'll spend most of the game just coming to terms with the mechanics.
The most difficult SRWs (without doing challenge conditions) are SRW Z Ex-Hard w/ SR points, SRW A Portable, SRW F/FF, OG2 Ex-Hard w/ SR points and SRW Alpha Gaiden w/ SR points.
I've been itching to replay the PSP games I own on UMD on my Vita, even if it meant buying another Vita MC card and rebuying these games. So I went on the JP PSN market. Jesus, are these guys still charging ¥7.000-8.000 for these games for real?
Yeah, I remember being shocked last year when Saisei-hen launched. They used that opportunity to put Hakai-hen on the PSN too (it wasn't before) at FULL RRP. I also wouldn't be against playing Saisei-hen again on Vita, but I sure ain't paying 8000 yens for it.
On the opposite of the spectrum, I might have been even more surprised when Square-Enix dropped (permanently) the price of PSN FF Type-0 to 2100 yen late last year, I really got used to the Japanese way of pricing and not knowing the first thing about sales and prices drops ahah.
Suppose to be out for Vita and PS3. If it really is SRW-style, there's something both vaguely wrong, and quite awesome, if the series list includes both Di Gi Charat and Higurashi.
I put this in another thread, but thanks to the user distantmantra for helping me find this thread. The petition and twitter account are not mine. I am helping spread the word and hopefully get more SRW content localized.
"Operation Hot Blood of facebook and my own, Operation Original Generations, are petitioning for the localization of the Original Generation series of mech RPG games. Its been a few years since Atlus localized the original OG games for the Gameboy Advance. We aren't looking to maliciously demand that these games be localized by Namco Bandai, instead we simply wish to show Namco Bandai that there is a market for these types of games in North America and Europe.
So far, we've posted the petition to Facebook, Twitter, smaller forums (Atlus USA's forum, the-magicbox, and Xseed's forums).
