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The Last Story (US) |OT| One of Wii's epic last breaths.

massoluk

Banned
Final boss in this game is such a bitch. Always the same patterns, get him down to 3/4-1/2 HP, get a bit of hope up, then dude one shot my entire party.

Didn't want to grind, but guess I'll have to.
 

Doorman

Member
And the love story between him and Calista was pretty great. It was understated and felt "real." I think my biggest problem, story wise, is the twist that comes at the very end. You know what I'm talking about. That felt very false and rushed.

Really? I have to disagree with the love story angle of it. The setup for it felt like something we've all seen tons of times before, and it felt to me like it progressed far too quickly to feel at all realistic. We're to believe that they basically fall so deeply in love in the course of, what, half a day spent running around town together? I guess it doesn't help that the passage of time feels very unclear at points, so to me it seems as though
the two of them go from meeting for the first time to their wedding day within, like, a month.
It works for the sake of the storyline, but the love story part of the plot has felt pretty cheesy and kind of forced from the beginning onward.

Fortunately there are other parts to the storyline that make up for it. I like that mercenaries in this setting are actually viewed like, well, mercenaries, as well as what knighthood means and the bit of conflict around what a "real" knight is.

And Jirall.
 
Oh my god, XSEED. It's beautiful. SO BEAUTIFUL!!! *____*

I never would have expected even the reverse to have an embossed logo, it's incredible.

And the art book is absolutely lovely.
Ah, you finally got your copy, huh? Cool.

And yes, Xseed should be commended for a fantastic set.
 

Plinko

Wildcard berths that can't beat teams without a winning record should have homefield advantage
My copy that I ordered for $29.99 from Deepdiscount a few weeks ago finally shipped. I was confident it would be canceled.
 

Credo

Member
Has anyone began playing a New Game + what all carries over???

Taken from a FAQ since I wasn't sure: "Now you can start a New Game Plus with all your levels, equipment and items. Normally occurring monsters will be a breeze considering this. The only catch
is that certain monsters, as well as the bosses will have leveled up something ridiculous and will proceed in wrecking your face, so it's not going to be that easy. Also replayable levels and Summon Circles will have powered up enemies to match your character levels."
 
Got mine last night as well, damn Canada delay.

The package is awesome though. I am thoroughly impressed. It's so much better than the crap that other publishers release as "limited editions" and charge $80ish for.
 

Terra_Ex

Member
Really? I have to disagree with the love story angle of it. The setup for it felt like something we've all seen tons of times before, and it felt to me like it progressed far too quickly to feel at all realistic. We're to believe that they basically fall so deeply in love in the course of, what, half a day spent running around town together? I guess it doesn't help that the passage of time feels very unclear at points, so to me it seems as though
the two of them go from meeting for the first time to their wedding day within, like, a month.
It works for the sake of the storyline, but the love story part of the plot has felt pretty cheesy and kind of forced from the beginning onward.

Fortunately there are other parts to the storyline that make up for it. I like that mercenaries in this setting are actually viewed like, well, mercenaries, as well as what knighthood means and the bit of conflict around what a "real" knight is.

And Jirall.
I think a more interesting twist on it would be if
Zael were actually able to take the Duke up on his offer to work for him and marry Calista (been a while since I played, it was something along those lines iirc),
would have been intriguing to see how the romance angle played out from that point, but instead Zael was locked into a classic cookie-cutter "but thou must" choice loop until you picked the "right" choice. Probably my main gripe with the game really, the protagonist is a touch too virtuous and the rest of the cast becomes more intriguing by default, a similar thing happened with Valkyria Chronicles for me too. Still, the game overall was better than most home console jrpg efforts and I enjoyed the battle system.
 

CorvoSol

Member
Final boss in this game is such a bitch. Always the same patterns, get him down to 3/4-1/2 HP, get a bit of hope up, then dude one shot my entire party.

Didn't want to grind, but guess I'll have to.

My feelings exactly. How is a mortal man expected to win this fight? UGH. The wall jumping thing is so not working, either. So I have to do it the old fashioned way, which is bunk. Think I'll use Gathering and run around the arena while my mages slooooooooooowly chip away at him.
 

Credo

Member
My feelings exactly. How is a mortal man expected to win this fight? UGH. The wall jumping thing is so not working, either. So I have to do it the old fashioned way, which is bunk. Think I'll use Gathering and run around the arena while my mages slooooooooooowly chip away at him.

I gave up on the wall jump method and just duked it out with him inside a heal circle. He destroyed me when I was trying the wall jump thing, and I only dropped his HP to about 3/4 while losing 2 of my own lives. But I think I only lost 1 life while I was fighting inside the circle.
 

CorvoSol

Member
I gave up on the wall jump method and just duked it out with him inside a heal circle. He destroyed me when I was trying the wall jump thing, but I think I only lost 1 life while I was fighting inside the circle.

What about that ridiculous knock-back attack of his?

Or like, did you use Gathering then stand in the circle? I might try that.
 

Cedric

Member
Just finished the game, I'm going to move on to those endgame chapters sometime tonight and probably wrap it all up. I've never played a mistwalker game before (I own BD and LO, I only watched my father play from time to time), I kept hoping Sakaguchi would come back to FF and make everything right again. But this game man, it reminded me of Final Fantasy IX a lot, which is my favourite game of all time.

I enjoyed the story, but the strong point was really the characters. Although Xenoblade remains my favorite jrpg this generation, Last Story has it beat in terms of the characters. My favourite was Syrenne, Lowell and Dagran were great too. Everybody has nice character development and play off each other really well. One thing I'd like to point out is that even though I find most main characters in jrpgs to be boring, I came to really like Zael (and his relationship with Callista). I guess it reminded me a bit of Zidane and Garnet.

The soundtrack was nice, but it's not what I was expecting from Nobuo. Most areas don't have music, but the battle themes were good (I particularily like the one where you're fighting
Jirall
, sounded like some old school Final Fantasy).

Anyway, this was an incredibly fun game. In term of exclusives, Last Story and Xenoblade solidify the Wii to me as #1 home console for jrpgs.

edit: oh and also, am I the only one who thought Asthar and Therius would be bad guys? best npcs in the game!
 

Dark Schala

Eloquent Princess
Man, I wanted to get this game done today, but my eyes are kinda feeling tired after my eye appt and I don't wanna push it especially with this game, lol.

But I have to say that this was my first Mistwalker console game (I'd previously played all of the DS games they had a hand in, including ASH and Away), and I have to agree with people saying that the game is kind of evocative of FFIX. That's how I feel in some parts.

I also stick to my feelings about how I probably shouldn't compare it to Xenoblade at all and look at it on its own; they're completely different games in terms of structure. I like Xenoblade a lot, but I've ended up liking The Last Story a lot too (and in terms of structure, considering it progresses at breakneck speed sometimes, it... sort of reminds me of pre-Chapter 9 FF13 with regards to mere story pacing, but it doesn't feel restrictive).

Don't get me wrong; the game has issues, but I've enjoyed it so far despite its flaws.
 

Dragon

Banned
Man, I wanted to get this game done today, but my eyes are kinda feeling tired after my eye appt and I don't wanna push it especially with this game, lol.

But I have to say that this was my first Mistwalker console game (I'd previously played all of the DS games they had a hand in, including ASH and Away), and I have to agree with people saying that the game is kind of evocative of FFIX. That's how I feel in some parts.

I also stick to my feelings about how I probably shouldn't compare it to Xenoblade at all and look at it on its own; they're completely different games in terms of structure. I like Xenoblade a lot, but I've ended up liking The Last Story a lot too (and in terms of structure, considering it progresses at breakneck speed sometimes, it... sort of reminds me of pre-Chapter 9 FF13 with regards to mere story pacing, but it doesn't feel restrictive).

Don't get me wrong; the game has issues, but I've enjoyed it so far despite its flaws.

And I'm sold!
 

CorvoSol

Member
Major FF4 moment there with Ganondorf toward the end
ripping off his arm and sending it ahead while the heroes do literally nothing about that.
 

Doorman

Member
FFIX comparisons? Huh...I guess it's mostly for the aesthetic and character design, but I've had more of a Vagrant Story vibe coming from this game over anything else.

Does anybody know if there's possibly a multiple-ending scenario for this game? I'm near the end and the game seems to give you a pretty significant option (
The fight against the swordsman gurak--Zepha, I think?--when everybody's urging you to go on ahead but you can still whittle down his lifebar and fight him. You can just exit the fight, but I get the feeling that I'm probably better off by beating him, annoying of a prospect as that is.
) but I'm not sure if it makes any difference for either storyline or gameplay-wise. I made a new save file after that spot so that I can redo it if necessary, even though the fights leading up to it were really irritating for me.
 

Credo

Member
What about that ridiculous knock-back attack of his?

Or like, did you use Gathering then stand in the circle? I might try that.

That's what I did. Thankfully, almost everyone else was hiding behind columns. Also, I put accelerate up as often as I could and kept 2 heal circles going just in case something went bad.
 

Cedric

Member
FFIX comparisons? Huh...I guess it's mostly for the aesthetic and character design, but I've had more of a Vagrant Story vibe coming from this game over anything else.

Does anybody know if there's possibly a multiple-ending scenario for this game? I'm near the end and the game seems to give you a pretty significant option (
The fight against the swordsman gurak--Zepha, I think?--when everybody's urging you to go on ahead but you can still whittle down his lifebar and fight him. You can just exit the fight, but I get the feeling that I'm probably better off by beating him, annoying of a prospect as that is.
) but I'm not sure if it makes any difference for either storyline or gameplay-wise. I made a new save file after that spot so that I can redo it if necessary, even though the fights leading up to it were really irritating for me.

Nope, no multiple endings. That fight doesn't change anything, you just get experience.
 

Dark Schala

Eloquent Princess
I just got to Ch 4. Are the sidequests worth devoting time to? Seems like most are just fetch quests.
You'll get stat upgrades and stuff if you do some.

Agility+ rewards are good. (ie: the frog sidequest, which will allow you to swim after you find three frogs). Higher agility allows you to cast magic faster, move a little faster, and increase phys. attack speeds.
 

CorvoSol

Member
Finished the game just now.

All in all, definitely worth my money. While I feel like the game certainly is derivative of many other games (it has major shades of FF9 and Twilight Princess going on) its cast is endearing and its play is fun and in the end, that's all I cared to have. That third stage of the final boss is a PAIN. Finished him at level 63 but MAN how does one compete with his constant OHKOs? Had to spend most of the fight running and praying that Mirania and Yurick's Limit Breaks would come back.

Also
screw this nonsense about "we never stopped to ask Dagran how he felt." That's not a good excuse for what he did. Which is why Zael's "I know him as I know myself!" line was ridiculous, because that whole scene was illustrating how little any of them really knew Dagran. Even though the player could see it coming from a mile away.
Really, if the game had been subtler about its villains, and if Zael and Calista's romance had been more, I dunno, explored, it would've been a great story. As it was, Zangurak was a compelling foe, and I confess that I found Zael's
semi-awkward hug at the end to be almost as cute as Link holding Zelda's hand at the end of Spirit Tracks.

My favorite boss fights, though? Zangurak and
Jirall
. The final boss would've been fine, if the last form hadn't been given mother effing OHKO ROFLSTOMP power.
 

massoluk

Banned
Finally finished the game. Beat the final boss after grinding level up from 59 to 65, just straight out melee and keep healing circles up for diffusing.

Thought. Good game, but never felt epic. No quest tracking was disappointing, Xenoblade's cities felt more alive despite obvious effort by the devs here. Hate the fact that some quests are missable. Plot was so utterly predictable, I correctly predicted every single one of the plot twists before it happened.
What's with the tiger. The blue dude appear what? 4 times? Thought he'd played a bigger roles or something
. Sounds negatives, but really like the game overall.
 

Credo

Member
For those near the end of the game, use the summon circles that you come across until it takes you about 5 fights to level up each time. My party members were between level 72 and 75 for the final boss fight, and I didn't have that much trouble after I abandoned the "run up the wall" method.
 

Chris R

Member
Man you guys were not kidding about the packaging being great. Only played about an hour last night but it was pretty cool... I need to try the different control scheme though, because pushing the stick towards the enemy is just kinda strange (and not being able to move and shoot sucks :( )
 
best graphic on Wii

One of the best at least, yeah. But also definitely the worst frame-rate I've yet encountered on Wii (or even any other console game I remember at the moment). That and the low level of difficulty were the biggest letdowns for me in an otherwise good game.
 
One of the best at least, yeah. But also definitely the worst frame-rate I've yet encountered on Wii (or even any other console game I remember at the moment). That and the low level of difficulty were the biggest letdowns for me in an otherwise good game.

Yes, for the framerate I have the same feeling but in the market there are several games with a worse framerate than Last Story.

I want a sequel on the WiiU
 

Eusis

Member
Yes, for the framerate I have the same feeling but in the market there are several games with a worse framerate than Last Story.

I want a sequel on the WiiU
Yeah, though it's probably one of the better games with a bad framerate, and one of the only ones that jumps to mind on Wii. Usually it's either badly made games (Two Worlds) or over ambitious ones visually (Crysis 2) that chug like this.
 
V

Vilix

Unconfirmed Member
How do you communicate with other players when in multiplayer mode? Is there a headset?
 

Dark Oni

Member
love the story and characters has some tech issues but overall a great game it's now became one of my favorite rpgs :)
 

Y2Kev

TLG Fan Caretaker Est. 2009
I love when games run at like 4 fps. I was raised on n64. It means you are getting supercharged games!!!
 

GlassBox

Banned
I love when games run at like 4 fps. I was raised on n64. It means you are getting supercharged games!!!
Here here. Growing up with N64 automatically makes you immune to most framerate issues.

That said, this game definitely is one of the most unpolished Wii titles I've played. Almost seems like it was rushed.
 

jb1234

Member
I don't remember Xenoblade having any framerate issues.

I guess it's just how each game/engine is built/handled.

Xenoblade was generally okay but I found a major boss battle
Lorithia
to be practically unplayable because it was a slideshow.
 

Adam Prime

hates soccer, is Mexican
Xenoblade was generally okay but I found a major boss battle
Lorithia
to be practically unplayable because it was a slideshow.

Maybe because I played the game off a HDD but I never noticed slow down once playing through it...
 

chaosblade

Unconfirmed Member
Problem with the framerate is the majority of the time it's slowed down for me has been just running around. Nothing epic or awesome about that. The ships were especially bad.

And is there any way to command your allies? Like have them move to a certain spot? Had trouble with that
at the Gurak base when you had to take out the snipers, my mages were both in stupid positions and couldn't hit either of the enemies. Ended up having to take them out with the crossbow.


Anyway I'm around chapter 19 or 20 or something. Finally sort of have a feel for the combat, but I don't think have had a boss battle go smoothly yet. At least I'm not struggling with normal battles anymore, early on either the AI kept getting themselves killed because I didn't use gathering or I kept dying constantly because I did use gathering, and there wasn't really any in-between.
 

aceface

Member
Xenoblade had some slowdown for me in big fights with lots of enemies. Also that one boss fight mentioned above was made a lot more challenging because of slowdown (the boss summons about 10 cloud nebula things and it starts chugging).
 

Pikma

Banned
You guys surely enjoy reminding me how crowded is my backlog, to play this I need to finish Xenoblade first, and I have only played the intro as of today. :( too much Dark Souls.
 

Penguin

Member
Can I say the vertical slash is a great idea.. that is just poorly executed.. since it doesn't always want to register...

And makes for some... really annoying boss battles! >.<
 
Can I say the vertical slash is a great idea.. that is just poorly executed.. since it doesn't always want to register...

And makes for some... really annoying boss battles! >.<

They should of made time freeze like it does with Gale Slash.

Seriously, half the time I used it I was taking damage or lost a life because I was fighting the the slow cursor to turn around to where I can actually hit the enemy.

You also need to run at the wall straight on, if you curve just a bit it won't register. :/
 

Doorman

Member
Can I say the vertical slash is a great idea.. that is just poorly executed.. since it doesn't always want to register...

And makes for some... really annoying boss battles! >.<

They probably could have implemented it better, I'm just glad that it's unnecessary for the most part. Even spending the two to three seconds it takes to run at a wall before the game realizes you're trying to do that move can be critical, and there've been several occasions where I was knocked out of it while trying to place the cursor.

Oh well, not much point in worrying about it anymore, I think I've done just about everything there is in a normal playthrough and I don't feel like starting a NG+ right now. Not a bad game, but some boss fights were frustrating and it would have been nice if the major twist/s of the story weren't easily foreseen halfway through the game. Overall, I get the feeling like Sakaguchi had this really grand vision and a great concept for a game, but they wound up limited by budget and system specs. I wouldn't mind seeing a sequel to this (and there are plenty of possibilities to open up here, storyline wise, if they really wanted to) on the next generation of hardware, with a similar real time quasi-tactical approach to combat and grant them the ability to put in all of the detail they want without it murdering framerate.

I also wish there were more well-populated areas that had orange bushels to tip over, but that's a digression.
 

Dark Schala

Eloquent Princess
Can I say the vertical slash is a great idea.. that is just poorly executed.. since it doesn't always want to register...

And makes for some... really annoying boss battles! >.<
Yes. It's a great idea, but making time continue for you to place your AoE circle is ridiculous at times. Once the AoE circle becomes visible to the player, like PoorFate said, time should stop so you can get your positioning right, and that way, the attack will be more effective. It's a shame, really.
 

CorvoSol

Member
Yes. It's a great idea, but making time continue for you to place your AoE circle is ridiculous at times. Once the AoE circle becomes visible to the player, like PoorFate said, time should stop so you can get your positioning right, and that way, the attack will be more effective. It's a shame, really.

Especially since time stops for you to cast Gale. The other downside is the camera and limited range. And the crappy detection. I'll be running into a wall for like, half a minute and the thing is still not letting me run up. Strategy is completely not viable against the final boss.
 
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