How was the plat to you overall? I'm still sticking to a 6-7.5 rating.
Eh, you have me on PSN anyway so you know where I'm at (I got everyone's 100 titles last night but I haven't finished Future Arc yet I beat the Rock Gagan since it's much easier with Accel Mode (though you can't spam Blast Calibers at it)).
I'll give it an 8 because of its grindy nature (I haven't played Xillia and Vesperia though and I'm expecting Vesperia to be a 9.5). The other trophies become easier to get when you're level 110++, plus you can do a 3/4 playthrough (that is if you defeat the final boss under 60 seconds on your first playthrough) on New Game+ to get the rest of the 60 second trophies.
Though, I find the platinum of this game harder than Catherine's because of its, like what I previously said, grindy nature.
Hubert's the hardest for me because I had to cast his ice spell thing 550+ times.
My small tip to get 100 titles quickly and assuming you don't have the Eleth Mod titles for everyone: Finish future arc to unlock
everyone's Narikiri dolls, so that's 6 not including your own narikiri doll, so you need to get the requirements to get at least one of each character's narakiri doll
. Get 93 titles for each character, go to Telos Astue and buy the titles 7 titles. Once the trophy unlocks, load the save file and buy for the next character, then load again.
For 9999 Eleth Pot, I used this setup:
Zhonecage, or any place that has battles longer than 30 seconds:
Borscht
Crab Omelette
Miso Stew
Book of Satiation
Book of Growth
Book of Potential
Book of Frugality
Lhant Hill (for strictly quicker Eleth Pot growth):
Grilled Chicken Cutlet
Crab Omelette
Miso Stew
Book of Satiation
Book of Growth
Book of Potential
Book of Frugality
Man, Vesperia just lacked something for me. I think it was part of how much of the combat system felt locked away for awhile and then just a lack of a really interesting character to control (as much as I loved using Judith, it just wasn't exciting). I really do need to revisit Vesperia though. Maybe even get all the achievements!
:/ I got all the grindy related ones done during the story. Viva la Chaos playthrough! Though the Mixer was basically a grind, but it also doesn't really need that much extra effort assuming you just always have food in it that's almost always activating. But if you didn't ... yeah, it basically sucks to get to max.
Of the ones I have played I think i personally enjoyed vesperia the most.
It had the best use of free run thus far combined with battle areas big enough to not feel claustrophobic. I prefer TP over CC which brings alot of the japan only releases down a notch for me and abyss had far to many issues for me to rank it even above graces F.
I would say my ranking for recent games would be Vesperia then Graces F and then Abyss i guess. Haven't played xillia yet as i'm holding out hope for a localization.
edit: I forgot to mention that i generally disliked the around step system as i thought it made already small battle areas feel even smaller as well as generally made everything extremely easy in the game.
I don't know why you'd like TP over CC, TP just encourages you to spam moves until your enemy is dead. The only problems I ever had in Vesperia are when enemies were immune to stagger, rarely did I ever need to block or sidestep.
I don't know why you'd like TP over CC, TP just encourages you to spam moves until your enemy is dead. The only problems I ever had in Vesperia are when enemies were immune to stagger, rarely did I ever need to block or sidestep.
Resource management is a big part of rpgs to me, and CC has terrible resource management. I would say CC actually encourages you to spam moves until the enemy is dead just as much if not more.
I had an easier time being underleveled on chaos for everything but boss fights in graces then i did being slightly over leveled for fights in vesperia, not to mention that vesperia had infinitely more interesting boss fights.
Who knows, CC and around step just completely broke any difficulty in graces for me, combined with never having to use items or manage tp in a long dungeon I just didn't feel it as much as vesperia.
Resource management is a big part of rpgs to me, and CC has terrible resource management. I would say CC actually encourages you to spam moves until the enemy is dead just as much if not more.
I had an easier time being underleveled on chaos for everything but boss fights in graces then i did being slightly over leveled for fights in vesperia, not to mention that vesperia had infinitely more interesting boss fights.
Who knows, CC and around step just completely broke any difficulty in graces for me, combined with never having to use items or manage tp in a long dungeon I just didn't feel it as much as vesperia.
How is it terrible? Rather than having TP and the limits of normal attacks before you have to stop, Graces just made it one resource. The game also rewards you for using different moves, weakness types, movement management, etc.
I had an easier time being underleveled on chaos for everything but boss fights in graces then i did being slightly over leveled for fights in vesperia, not to mention that vesperia had infinitely more interesting boss fights.
Part of it is that level actually doesn't play a huge part in your overall stats in Graces. I'd say it's a bit of an unfair comparison. That and enemy level vs player level seems a bit wacky anyway.
Edit: And just to add my spiel on it, I always felt that TP enforced just using normal attacks a lot and that Artes are locked away for special moments. It makes the combat dreary to just regular combo over and over. You eventually get to the point where your post-fight recovery offsets it (or pools big enough to offset it / better return on gel use since it's percentage based) but it makes the combat boring for awhile.
How is it terrible? Rather than having TP and the limits of normal attacks before you have to stop, Graces just made it one resource. The game also rewards you for using different moves, weakness types, movement management, etc.
Because there's barely any management in the game at all, You don't need to manage item use cause you never have to use them. You don't need to manage CC cause it regens in half a second mid battle and you don't need to ever manage your overall HP levels cause your healers never run out of resources.
Some people might like the spammy michael bay explosion fest combo feel but i'm not among them and prefer having to pay attention to my resources.
Here's my overall thoughts about the game, abridged version:
+ Characters are interesting for me. They aren't annoying and they're funny... Especially Malik's troll moments and Pascal's "wut" moments.
+ Awesome awesome battle system (including the Eleth pot thing), kinda like Star Ocean 4's but juicier.
+ Despite its small scale, there's a decent amount of post-game content.
+ Awesome localization. Item descriptions are funny (ex. Moon Anklet: Suitable for a sailor-like outfit).
= Not too much nor too little stuff. It's straightforward and the scale isn't overwhelming me, but then again I like my RPGs medium to small scaled.
= The graphics aren't mindblowing because it's a Wii port but the colors of the game seem to hit the right notes, and there's anti-aliasing(!)
- The soundtrack was overall bland, only a few highligths.
- Generic and safe story, but hey, it's been long since we had that.
- Dungeons were terribly designed, especially Wallbridge, Amarcian Ruins, and the final dungeon in the future arc.
- No minimap, thus you can get lost easily if the dungeon is terribly designed.
The negatives are non-gamebreaking though, just annoying. Overall I thought it was a good game and I'd give it a 8.9/10. It's a little higher because it has been quite long I've played a console JRPG with a non-irritating story, but the dungeon design kinda pulls it down.
Platinum difficult will be 8/10. 10 being the highest.
Because there's barely any management in the game at all, You don't need to manage item use cause you never have to use them. You don't need to manage CC cause it regens in half a second mid battle and you don't need to ever manage your overall HP levels cause your healers never run out of resources.
Some people might like the spammy michael bay explosion fest combo feel but i'm not among them and prefer having to pay attention to my resources.
Before I make statements I'd like to ask what difficulty you're playing.
If you're playing on normal you're rarely going to use items, if ever. The same applies to all Tales games. Not just Graces.
Secondly, my healers get roflpwnt on harder difficulties.
Lastly, it's not spammy. Learning to dodge and stop your movements and quickly resume your combos replenishes CC and rewards you for playing smart and not exhausting all of your resources. Button mashing is a valid way of playing but the game offers much more than that and rewards you for doing so.
Here's my overall thoughts about the game, abridged version:
+ Characters are interesting for me. They aren't annoying and they're funny... Especially Malik's troll moments and Pascal's "wut" moments.
+ Awesome awesome battle system (including the Eleth pot thing), kinda like Star Ocean 4's but juicier.
+ Despite its small scale, there's a decent amount of post-game content.
+ Awesome localization. Item descriptions are funny (ex. Moon Anklet: Suitable for a sailor-like outfit).
= Not too much nor too little stuff. It's straightforward and the scale isn't overwhelming me, but then again I like my RPGs medium to small scaled.
= The graphics aren't mindblowing because it's a Wii port but the colors of the game seem to hit the right notes, and there's anti-aliasing(!)
- The soundtrack was overall bland, only a few highligths.
- Generic and safe story, but hey, it's been long since we had that.
- Dungeons were terribly designed, especially Wallbridge, Amarcian Ruins, and the final dungeon in the future arc.
- No minimap, thus you can get lost easily if the dungeon is terribly designed.
The negatives are non-gamebreaking though, just annoying. Overall I thought it was a good game and I'd give it a 8.9/10. It's a little higher because it has been quite long I've played a console JRPG with a non-irritating story, but the dungeon design kinda pulls it down.
Platinum difficult will be 8/10. 10 being the highest.
Great comments but wut at the score. Sorry Ultros, gotta disagree on that scoring a bit. rofl. What does each whole number range mean? Is 10 perfect? Is 8 Great? I'd like a bit more context.
Because there's barely any management in the game at all, You don't need to manage item use cause you never have to use them. You don't need to manage CC cause it regens in half a second mid battle and you don't need to ever manage your overall HP levels cause your healers never run out of resources.
Some people might like the spammy michael bay explosion fest combo feel but i'm not among them and prefer having to pay attention to my resources.
I don't get how occasionally using an item to restore TP is any more innovative or fun than CC. By that token, FFXIII's battle system must be the worst battle system ever because there is zero resource management.
Before I make statements I'd like to ask what difficulty you're playing.
If you're playing on normal you're rarely going to use items, if ever. The same applies to all Tales games. Not just Graces.
Secondly, my healers get roflpwnt on harder difficulties.
Lastly, it's not spammy. Learning to dodge and stop your movements and quickly resume your combos replenishes CC and rewards you for playing smart and not exhausting all of your resources. Button mashing is a valid way of playing but the game offers much more than that and rewards you for doing so.
I played on evil for the very start and chaos from there, It was still super easy for everything minus a couple of boss fights. I didn't use a single gel the entire game and the only items i used were life bottles which i never once ran out of. My healers would die on occasion but they would either get brought back by someone with a rez spell or i would life bottle and keep going.
And it IS spammy. The fact that i knew how to dodge is what made it so easy to spam and never run into trouble. I never run out of CC due to dodging attacks which leads to being able to do non stop combos which isn't fun. When every non boss battle consists of juggle juggle juggle dodge juggle juggle monster dead on CHAOS then there is a fundamental issue with the gameplay.
I don't get how occasionally using an item to restore TP is any more innovative or fun than CC. By that token, FFXIII's battle system must be the worst battle system ever because there is zero resource management.
Different strokes for different folks. I still think the saving grace of the XIII series is the battle system. If the difficulty was more fine tuned, I would actually enjoyed it a lot more, but it's still a very streamlined and enjoyable experience.
When every non boss battle consists of juggle juggle juggle dodge juggle juggle monster dead on CHAOS then there is a fundamental issue with the gameplay.
I don't get how occasionally using an item to restore TP is any more innovative or fun than CC. By that token, FFXIII's battle system must be the worst battle system ever because there is zero resource management.
Its not the actual use of the item that makes it fun, its having to pay attention to item stock and tp levels in dungeons. If you are halfway through a dungeon and have 3 tp gels left you need to actually think about the best way to move foward knowing there is likely a boss at the end.
Will you avoid random battles completely and try to save all 3 for the boss? Will you engage in fights with monsters you know to be easier in order to level up and replenish your tp that way while saving items? Do you just not bother saving them under the assumption you can beat the boss without them? These are what make rpgs fun for me and graces just simply had none of it.
I prefer TP over CC which brings alot of the japan only releases down a notch for me and abyss had far to many issues for me to rank it even above graces F.
Only one Japan-only Tales uses CC though, and its execution of the idea is noticeably different from Graces (and when simply breaking it down to which is more fun, I feel it used CC better than Graces).
The other games don't use TP or CC, use the classic-style TP, or use TP with an added layer of complexity.
But personally, I think neither classic TP nor CC is the best approach to take. I feel Rebirth and Destiny 2 have done the best job of combining resource management (micromanagement in general, really) with fluid and fast battle pacing, while avoiding the annoying flaws of classic TP and, to some extent, CC.
That's Judith's forte, but it's not representative of Vesperia's entire battle system.
With that said, you could still stun-lock almost every single enemy with every character if you really wanted to. And this was before the PS3 added in such things as 4 additional Overlimit bars and like 8 more arte shortcuts to abuse.
Its not the actual use of the item that makes it fun, its having to pay attention to item stock and tp levels in dungeons. If you are halfway through a dungeon and have 3 tp gels left you need to actually think about the best way to move foward knowing there is likely a boss at the end.
Will you avoid random battles completely and try to save all 3 for the boss? Will you engage in fights with monsters you know to be easier in order to level up and replenish your tp that way while saving items? Do you just not bother saving them under the assumption you can beat the boss without them? These are what make rpgs fun for me and graces just simply had none of it.
Imagining a scenario where Graces used a TP system, I would have managed resources the exact same. Stores were widespread throughout the world, and dungeon sizes were small enough that back-tracking was relatively straight forward. I usually back-tracked to fill my eleth mixer or buy more life bottles and by changing it to a TP system, I would have just bought more gels at the same time. There really would have been no difference, except that I would have needed to occasionally restore my TP mid-battle and post battle, resource management wise. I don't see how any extra layer of strategy would have been added from using a TP system.
Only one Japan-only Tales uses CC though, and its execution of the idea is noticeably different from Graces (and when simply breaking it down to which is more fun, I feel it used CC better than Graces).
The other games don't use TP or CC, use the classic-style TP, or use TP with an added layer of complexity.
But personally, I think neither classic TP nor CC is the best approach to take. I feel Rebirth and Destiny 2 have done the best job of combining resource management (micromanagement in general, really) with fluid and fast battle pacing, while avoiding the annoying flaws of classic TP and, to some extent, CC.
Yeah, having not played alot of the japan only tales of games to the extent i would like i'm sure ive missed out on stuff like that.
I agree with you though that neither is perfect, and having graces been my main exposure to CC i simply didn't like the way it was used in that particular game by getting rid of all management of resources. A middle ground would be perfectly fine with me and probably end up being my favorite if done well.
I don't dislike graces as a game, I actually really enjoyed it. I simply don't think it had as good of a combat system as people laud it with and wish they could of thought of some ways to not abandon some stuff i love about rpgs.
edit: The problem is you cant just shoehorn tp onto a game that was built from the ground up for CC, of course it wouldn't change the game as much as if it had been built with TP in mind. Dungeons would be optimized for optimal difficulty of resource management as well as shop placement. The eleth mixer would also need to be reworked as that mechanic is broken as it is with regards to making resource management completely null.
I'll give it an 8 because of its grindy nature (I haven't played Xillia and Vesperia though and I'm expecting Vesperia to be a 9.5). The other trophies become easier to get when you're level 110++, plus you can do a 3/4 playthrough (that is if you defeat the final boss under 60 seconds on your first playthrough) on New Game+ to get the rest of the 60 second trophies.
Though, I find the platinum of this game harder than Catherine's because of its, like what I previously said, grindy nature.
I can't do Catherine's platinum. I'm too impatient. :/
I'd say a 6-8 is reasonable for Graces, and I can definitely see where you're coming from with the 8. I'd give FFXIII's plat an 8.5 in comparison, maybe.
I'd give Vesperia a 9.7 with regards to trophy difficulty because I don't really like the requirements for some of the trophies in general. Xillia, I'd give a 4 just because it's grindy, but it's grindy without much thought being put into it and you can pretty much get it by playing through the game (ex: use this 150 times, collect 450 of these, play the game through twice but it's much easier the second time, exploit enemy elemental weaknesses 1350 times, get a 100 hit combo (which is a joke in Xillia compared to Graces; you can do it with Milla alone), etc).
As for your evaluation of the game, that seems pretty fair on your part. Though I'd personally rate this a 7.5-8 (good to great), myself. For comparison, I'd give FFXIII-2 a 6 (which is 'average' on my scale) and FFXIII a 6.5 (taking into account postgame and how postgame finally made the battle system enjoyable; without postgame, it's a 6 as well).
:/ I got all the grindy related ones done during the story. Viva la Chaos playthrough! Though the Mixer was basically a grind, but it also doesn't really need that much extra effort assuming you just always have food in it that's almost always activating. But if you didn't ... yeah, it basically sucks to get to max.
Yeah, if you do this game on chaos, you're going to have an easier time with the plat, I feel, since you're getting drops a lot, you're using the mixer to cook during battles, and you're getting shards, drops, and more shards for synthesis and inn requests. Plus you're forced to use all the artes in your arsenal to exploit weaknesses, so the 100 titles might come naturally (I know they did for Asbel, Cheria, Hubert, Sophie, and Malik on this playthrough; Pascal was one I had to do some grinding via turning off artes and turning on certain artes, but that seems like the case in general across my three playthroughs).
And if you learn to do the Arles Pot management early on and start dualizing early, then that trophy's much easier on you.
Pascal was my nightmare one. I don't even know why. Her Level 3 MA hits a decent number of times (like, 17?) and she has some multi-hit A-Artes and B-Artes ... but it was just so damn frustrating somehow. And then
Richard's was a nightmare mostly since he'd find a way to muck it up when I switched to him at ~80-ish hits. That and it was getting pretty hard to have enemies survive for 100 hits that didn't also troll my combos and drop at bizarre times (like, in the middle of an attack like Void Sword)
I don't feel like Pascal's artes chain very well, or if you try to stun an enemy with an A-Arte and try to step to it to cast your B-arte, sometimes it'll get out of the stun and ruin your combo. But then there were times when she was overpowered against enemies and killed them before 80 or so hits on Chaos, so that was unfortunate.
Yup. Chaos is rewarding since it walks a fine line between "whee, I did that right!" and "oh shit how did everything go so wrong." It's quite funny to see a random encounter that is basically a joke all the time just randomly goes south because I get sloppy and decide to just beat on whatever I see first or let some spells get off that juggles someone into oblivion (oddly, never Cheria; find it weird vs all the other complaints when my Cheria is like 99% of the time the lone survivor of disasters).
It's not even like fights are that much longer at the higher HP counts. Then again, I haven't tried Normal or anything in awhile so maybe 20s-30s fights is too long for end game random encounters.
If you exploit enemies' weaknesses properly and maintain combos, fights on higher difficulties shouldn't even be that long at all. But I do get into the situation where I completely screw up and shit happens because I screwed something up, or let an enemy spellcaster do whatever they wanted, etc. Chaos feels like a good difficulty setting for me, and even moreso when you become very familiar with the battle system.
Cheria is generally the party member who survives for me too. It's hilarious.
And I'm right-handed!
...okay, that probably doesn't change anything but still.
If I were in that position, I wouldn't mind... because I'm left-handed. Ahaha. There aren't many true rune bearers who hold runes on their left hands, anyway!
I can't imagine a normal situation where you'd have to stare at the back of your hand all day unless you look at the keyboard when you type or something.
True. Was just remembering everyone had aerial skills (useless as most may be) and I thought that "Aerial" was in the combat system name but oops, nope.
The problem is you cant just shoehorn tp onto a game that was built from the ground up for CC, of course it wouldn't change the game as much as if it had been built with TP in mind. Dungeons would be optimized for optimal difficulty of resource management as well as shop placement. The eleth mixer would also need to be reworked as that mechanic is broken as it is with regards to making resource management completely null.
I don't really think CC is the problem then, it's the Mixer itself. I mean, the end of the game is basically Miso Stew -> never care about HP again (94% restored). That's a bigger issue than CC, even if you fight battles to let them heal (which is basically the exact same thing as fighting battles for the post-fight recovery to kick in).
Plus you're forced to use all the artes in your arsenal to exploit weaknesses, so the 100 titles might come naturally (I know they did for Asbel, Cheria, Hubert, Sophie, and Malik on this playthrough; Pascal was one I had to do some grinding via turning off artes and turning on certain artes, but that seems like the case in general across my three playthroughs).
Yeah, the 100 Titles (and then the Mastery ones) came in like ... Chapter 5? for me. So many titles. Titles everywhere!
I don't feel like Pascal's artes chain very well, or if you try to stun an enemy with an A-Arte and try to step to it to cast your B-arte, sometimes it'll get out of the stun and ruin your combo. But then there were times when she was overpowered against enemies and killed them before 80 or so hits on Chaos, so that was unfortunate.
Basically. I just cheated and went Book of Enthusiasm and used my full party to build a combo to ~75-80 hits and switched to the character I needed and hit their combo count Mystic Arte. Made it easier to deal with since enemies would actually last long enough ... just had to build my combos right (though, easy as Hubert or Asbel).
Cheria is generally the party member who survives for me too. It's hilarious.
Richard, is this really a spoiler actually? Feels awkward tagging just his name hence this filler text! Anyway, Richard
dies like every fight somehow. I don't even know how he manages to do this.
I can't imagine a normal situation where you'd have to stare at the back of your hand all day unless you look at the keyboard when you type or something.
Yeah its entirely possible that it's not really CC at fault or a mix of many things or whatever, graces is just my first major exposure to a CC based system that i put alot of time into and came away with a lot of personal gripes.
Either way it was still enjoyable, I guess i just don't agree with the majority opinion of the combat being the best in the series.
Pascal for me. She dies 99% of the time and on Chaos, having a full party is sometimes a necessity. Cheria dies like... 10% of the time (spamming Revitalize or Nurse every 10 seconds helps a lot )
Well, I can't give Tales of Graces ƒ an 8 in terms of the overall game because I gave Star Ocean 4 a 7.9. That's like saying Graces ƒ is on par with Star Ocean 4.
Ill give Tales of Graces ƒ an 8.6 at least if I don't include generic, ol' stories as part of the nostalgic experience. The characters are hilarious though so that's a plus.
My scoring system is kinda weird. Anything above 8 is playable and fun for me, the story does its job/serviceable (I thought XIII's story was "ok", but eh whatever). 9 and above is godlike meaning the story, characters, and pacing is good and the game is also fun/unique. Basically Chrono Trigger, Xenogears (more like the story is top-notch), Persona 4. Star Ocean 4 is borderline playable because what totally brings it down is the story.
In regards to platinum, here's more comparisons for me:
Graces ƒ - 8
Final Fantasy XIII - 7.5 (compared to Graces, the turtle grinding is terrible, but the rest of the trophies are breeze)
Final Fantasy XIII-2 - 4
Not in-depth yet, sorry. But I still stand by what I said with regards to trying to facilitate the LMBS in a more open environment. It's probably going to be difficult to do that, and I'm not sure if it's possible to construct the LMBS in a way that doesn't feel limiting in a more open environment (because obviously, you'd want to free run since you have the space to do so, right?). You might have to throw the LMBS out of the window entirely for a fluid experience. I kinda see where you're getting the idea that the LMBS can work in a free environment (with regards to around-step, right?), but given that the LMBS has characters on lines in general, you might feel more inclined to just run around the enemy because you have the space for it, and because it just feels better that way. Perhaps a stamina system could be put into place for penalizing the player from free-running too much, but that seems unfair given the theoretical larger environment you have to deal with.
Battles transition pretty quickly in Tales too, so I don't think there's any issues there.
Plus given how Xillia's environments worked (aka: narrow or spacious and boring), I don't think Bamco would be completely willing to make environments in a Tales game bigger. I think they tried to compensate the travel areas being bigger by putting sparklies (and in Xillia, duffel bags) everywhere. I dunno.
As for the economy system, I don't think it's really necessary, and I don't think most people would want to be hindered from buying/selling stuff in a game since they just want their consumables and that's it. Suikoden kind of had this thing where you could trade items (not consumables, weapons, and armours; just items in terms of collectables or stuff you put in your bath) in different towns to get a bunch of money, so maybe Tales could try something like that, which separates itself from the regular item purchasing. I don't know how they could integrate that into the game, though. I think people just want to buy stuff and get out without any sort of cumbersome mechanic attached to it.
Agreed with what you said with regards to aliases and titles. What they did in Xillia was dumb, dumb, dumb. What did for Graces was very smart and integrating it with shopping, synthesis, battles, etc. made it fun to try to acquire many titles for all of the characters. I didn't feel like it was a chore, really.
Tales definitely needs better quests in general, I agree. A lot of it is just fetch quests with little extension on characters' personalities. And they need to quit with the stuff that you might not know about at all and end up skipping over it because you aren't following a FAQ. It kills the completionist in me.
I think skits are fine the way they are, but I kinda see your point about modifying the skits a little with regards to what you think the protagonist should say. But Tales strikes me as the player following the adventure of this particular group as opposed to you putting yourself in the protagonist's shoes and carrying out decisions for him or her. Of course, this could change if Tales ever changes up its narrative structure, but I honestly think skits are fine the way they are.
And with regards to narrative structure, I agree. Ever since Tales of Destiny, there's always gotta be (series spoilers, but I'm trying to be vague, here)
one character who betrays you, and you can usually tell who it is
. The thing about Tales narratives--but perhaps I'm the last person who should be talking about this since there aren't a lot of narratives in games which I like outside of certain ones or cases--is that they aren't outstanding or they don't seem to take risks. They generally follow a same basic formula with similar character archetypes (there's the idealistic leader, the heroine/leading lady, the old cranky/snarky guy, the kid, the genius, etc.), and while I get that the comfort might be the draw of the series, I guess some may not appreciate that as much.
Though again, I might be the last person who should talk about this since I don't come to Tales games for the narrative.
I think that's all I can think of right now... if I think of anything else, I'll post it or amend this post.
True. Was just remembering everyone had aerial skills (useless as most may be) and I thought that "Aerial" was in the combat system name but oops, nope.
Nope. It's just EFR-LMBS. The evolved flex-range comes from being able to normal attack while free running, and cancelling free run as you normal attack and then starting a combo.
The Aerial thing you're getting at is Judith's ability to naturally fight in mid-air, but you can also use artes in mid-air with other characters if you master them.
Basically. I just cheated and went Book of Enthusiasm and used my full party to build a combo to ~75-80 hits and switched to the character I needed and hit their combo count Mystic Arte. Made it easier to deal with since enemies would actually last long enough ... just had to build my combos right (though, easy as Hubert or Asbel).
I felt like Cheria's combos were easy to pull off as well since she recovers from attacking quickly. But I did have to have some people build them up prior to, or time her hits after the others finished attacking the enemy to recover.
But the blast caliber is the way to go if you want to get the 100 hit titles easy, imo.
Richard, is this really a spoiler actually? Feels awkward tagging just his name hence this filler text! Anyway, Richard
dies like every fight somehow. I don't even know how he manages to do this.
In regards to platinum, here's more comparisons for me:
Graces ƒ - 8
Final Fantasy XIII - 7.5 (compared to Graces, the turtle grinding is terrible, but the rest of the trophies are breeze)
Final Fantasy XIII-2 - 4
...because Lucky Coin is a pain in the butt. Also, I used slots for the Serendipity trophy and I complained about it a lot in the OT after hours of putting a rubber band on my controller. :lol If it weren't for Lucky Coin or that Serendipity trophy, I would have given it lower.
I'd give FFXIII's plat a higher one than Graces because turtle grinding is terrible and I had more luck farming Dark Matters and Gold Nuggets from Guis than the Traps and Ingots from Adamantoises. So bad. :/
The terrible trophies of XIII were the Treasure Hunter and the maxing-the-crystarium.
... Yeah I'll redact my 7.5 score to an 8.0. Same score but different reasons. Graces was less grindy than XIII but requires you to do more stuff (and encourages you to repeat the game). XIII gave you less stuff to do but requires you to grind a lot.
As for the economy system, I don't think it's really necessary, and I don't think most people would want to be hindered from buying/selling stuff in a game since they just want their consumables and that's it. Suikoden kind of had this thing where you could trade items (not consumables, weapons, and armours; just items in terms of collectables or stuff you put in your bath) in different towns to get a bunch of money, so maybe Tales could try something like that, which separates itself from the regular item purchasing. I don't know how they could integrate that into the game, though. I think people just want to buy stuff and get out without any sort of cumbersome mechanic attached to it.
Well, Tales of Abyss did have some sort of economy system where the prices of items bought and sold were affected by things like story events and how well liked you were by the town. It changed the prices to the point of
you could hoard all your equipment and sell them off during the war to make more money than selling them normally.
It isn't anything amazing and pretty much besides that one example, most people wouldn't have noticed anything really different with it.
Well, Tales of Abyss did have some sort of economy system where the prices of items bought and sold were affected by things like story events and how well liked you were by the town. It changed the prices to the point of
you could hoard all your equipment and sell them off during the war to make more money than selling them normally.
It isn't anything amazing and pretty much besides that one example, most people wouldn't have noticed anything really different with it.
I was just thinking of that just now. It's easy to overlook that system, but Abyss's way of doing it was kind of clever. It's just too bad that it wasn't very emphasized outside of NPC talk or when you go to buy stuff at shops.
If something like that could be replicated, I don't it'd be a bad thing. But the world has to be more dynamic as opposed to what Abyss did (ie: only have the economy dictated by narrative elements).
The terrible trophies of XIII were the Treasure Hunter and the maxing-the-crystarium.
... Yeah I'll redact my 7.5 score to an 8.0. Same score but different reasons. Graces ƒ was less grindy than XIII but requires you to do more stuff (and encourages you to repeat the game). XIII gave you less stuff to do but requires you to grind a lot.
Yup, I agree with that. And if you sold off an accessory in FFXIII (name escapes me, but I remember being warned about it), you'd be locked out of Treasure Hunter... which would probably suck when you're preparing to go through with the trophy and then notice you don't have one item for it.
I think my party was around the same level and I also did it on Easy and it was... well, easy.
The whole party barely took any damage, really, couldn't even die from his mystic arte in eleth burst. Maybe the difference is everyone in my party has armor and weapons dualized more than 10 times.
He does have a lot of HP, though, I think it was about a 5 minute fight.
With EXP food you can get close to 1 million exp in every fight on floor 10 in moderate difficulty, my whole party was leveling up every fight.
EDIT: Not sure why people would have issues with the 100 titles trophies. I have controlled Asbel only for the entire game and most of my party has well over 100 titles. Hubert is the only one who doesn't (because I don't like him and I don't let him participate in battle much).
One thing that really helped was switching people who would normally only use B artes (like Cheria, Malik, Pascal) to "A Heavy" or even "A only" in the strategy menu so that they grind out their artes without me actually having to grind it for them.
I think the only reason Hubert is behind is because whenever I let Hubert in the party he either dies instantly or he spends the entire battle spamming healing wind
Well, Tales of Abyss did have some sort of economy system where the prices of items bought and sold were affected by things like story events and how well liked you were by the town. It changed the prices to the point of
you could hoard all your equipment and sell them off during the war to make more money than selling them normally.
It isn't anything amazing and pretty much besides that one example, most people wouldn't have noticed anything really different with it.
that system was really godly , especially when you realising that helping this merchant at one point can really tip things in your favor
or reparing the bridge lessen the burden on merchants so the prices would be low really an amazing system because all items prices reacts to whatever you do at a personal level or at a nationnal level ..
I think the only reason Hubert is behind is because whenever I let Hubert in the party he either dies instantly or he spends the entire battle spamming healing wind
I just turn them to <25% HP and leave Cheria at <75%. Has basically given me no trouble all game on Chaos. Sophie is <50% I think when I do use her but I typically play as her when she's in the group since I think I combo into her heals better than the AI.
problems with hubert healing is it's super easy to sidestep out of it, and when two people are trying to heal, you have the problem where letting an enemy free cast spells basically negate any healing done and you get stuck into this feedback loop where of constant damage and healing. Much easier just to tell everyone to go all out and let Cheria spam nurse
I JUST got my Gentleman trophy. So glad to be done with the shard farming. If you didn't know about it before, I went to this very helpful post. He listed all of the locations on where to find the specific qualities.
My brother got one again recently so I can see myself replaying that game again. Wish I had the PS3 version but oh well. I also never played Blue Dragon so better late than never. \
And thanks for the shard link! Definitely will use that to finish up the inn requests.
I JUST got my Gentleman trophy. So glad to be done with the shard farming. If you didn't know about it before, I went to this very helpful post. He listed all of the locations on where to find the specific qualities.
To add to that, the Google Doc shows the quality synthesis in easy-to-understand graphs.
cpp_is_king's Excel sheet for shard drop locations (sheet 1; Sheet 3 is a graphical take on it) is taken from the Japanese wiki, and it's pretty accurate.
But if you really wanted to, and if you could read kana at least, I found during my JP playthrough that the mmo-station wiki helped out a ton with regards what you needed for inn requests, where you could go for the items, and which ones to synthesize to give you the items. Far more helpful than the atwiki was.
The ending was ok. Well at least that part about the two bosses. I do want to say that Lamada's voice is probably too deep, too supervillain-y.
But besides that, I still love the credits and the movie that happens afterwards. Totally makes up for the somewhat dull where are they now thing that occurs.
