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"More RPG goodness"

Lover of all things RPG that i am (apart from anything with Final Fantasy X or X-2 in the title) i thought i'd bring to your attention a couple of more great RPG titles in the wings that will hopefully reach the shores of Europe (if not ah well i'll have them anyway :-D)

First on the list is Radiata Stories done by the folks at Tri-Ace who did the great Star Ocean 3. It keeps the same battle system from SO3 and you can see the enemies before they attack so you can decide whether to charge in or save your energy and give them a miss.

It apparantly has a playable cast of characters of around 150 characters although whether it'll be like Suikoden 3 where quite a few of them were only support characters and not actually fighters remains to be seen.

Speaking of which it does seem to have quite a similar graphical feel to Suikoden so should be quite impressive visually if that sort of stuff determines whether you buy a game or not.

Release date is January in Japan so probably be waiting a while for that one :-D



and next to bring your attention to is the successor to the great Shining Force series on the Megadrive - Shining Tears.

First off graphics zealots (damn censors) may as well go now as you won't be getting ultra realistic 3D graphics with this one, instead you get the far better cartoony style graphics which are very crisp and smooth (i prefer this and sprites to the FFX style graphics anyway)

Big selling point i think of this is the co-op 2 player mode, so if you and a mate have about 40-50 free hours you can give it a blast :-D

One thing putting me off slightly is that they've done away with the strategy elements of the previous games and gone for a more action orientated style of fighting, but then i liked it in SO3 so maybe i'll like it in this.

Release date is March 2005 for America so at least there'll be a english version sooner then Radiata


and lastly the grand daddy - Dragon Quest VIII (Dragon Warrior in the west)

again using cartoony, cel shaded graphics my favourite RPG series finally comes onto the little black box. Still has pretty much the same battle system as old so basically it's good old turn based combat with random encounters although larger more powerful enemies appear on the screen (kind of like Ruby weapon in FF7 in a way) follows the traditional RPG mantra of head into town, talk to people and buy stuff, leave town, beat up monsters until you get to another town. Lovely :-D

big improvement though over the old games which may seem small and quite a weird thing to mention in this day and age is the fact you can now speak to characters with a press of a button instead of having to go to the menu and selecting 'Talk' very glad they've added that in, it was the only thing i hated in the previous games.

January/Feb American release date for this me thinks. Again can't wait.

Hedfix wrote:
> ah,
>
> You could have just said 'not the same game as FF tactics' and I'd
> have got the point.


Felt like a moan though :-D

Final Fantasy Tactics for the PS1 was never released in Europe...only in Japan and America.

Actually quite a lot of good rpgs (mostly from squaresoft) never got released over in Europe like:

Chrono Cross
Xenogears
Parasite Eve 1
Legend of Mana

That's the reason I decided to get a US PS1 :)

ah,

You could have just said 'not the same game as FF tactics' and I'd have got the point.

Damn, I have a PAL PSone coming through the post at the mo.

I guess I'll get Tactics in a bit after I've played 7 & 8 and a few others. I really want to play it though as it's been compared to Gladius.

Too kiddy for me
Poor story
Poor characters
Far too easy
Didn't have that addictiveness that FF Tactics had
Combat seemed to be lacking something as well

Kawada wrote:
> Hedfix wrote:
> Sorry but i found the GBA version to be horrible

Why?

Kawada wrote:
> here's another great RPG coming out called Atelier Iris: Eternal Mana

I thought the cover had Sarah Michelle Gellar on it :

* No sex, no drugs, no wine, no women, no fun, no sin, no you, no wonder it's dark *

Hedfix wrote:
> What I do is go to IGN remove all field in their search and just type
> RPG for the genre to get all RPG's on all systems (obviously you can
> put a specific system in aswell) and then you know you haven't missed
> any gems (assuming IGN have had their grubby little paws near them).


I usually don't bother with IGN (can't spell ignorance without an IGN as one guy's signature on gamefaqs says) i just check on the release date listing on Gamefaqs then have a closer look at any RPG's coming out.

> I haven't played Final Fantasy Tactics yet but I'm going to get the
> GBA version and my old GB player back for my impending Cube.

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!! Do not get the GBA version it is a damn disgrace to the FF Tactics name. Get the PSX original or nothing at all. Sorry but i found the GBA version to be horrible

IGN reckoned it's like Final Fantasy Tactics, which I believe you're currently playing. :)

What I do is go to IGN remove all field in their search and just type RPG for the genre to get all RPG's on all systems (obviously you can put a specific system in aswell) and then you know you haven't missed any gems (assuming IGN have had their grubby little paws near them).

I haven't played Final Fantasy Tactics yet but I'm going to get the GBA version and my old GB player back for my impending Cube.

If you do everything in Gladius it'll take you about 80 hours (my first time through) or just under 40 only doing the battles you have to do to progress (my second time through).

I thought when i first looked at it Gladius was one of those hack and slash games so quickly ditched the idea of getting it.

What sort of battle system does it have?

For those who have yet to get it:

GLADIUS.