To Buy or Not to Buy-Rainbow Moon

[TristanBrown17]

Good morning/afternoon/evening everyone!

 

I typically wouldn't do a post like this, but with Rainbow Moon on sale at $2.99 I can't help but wonder if I should pick it up. I'm a fan of a wide variety of games, but have never really sat down and played a turn-based RPG. I know the trophies aren't too difficult and that it's a bit of a grind to the platinum, so those things aside, I was wondering people's impressions of the game and whether or not it's worth the buy? 

[IntroPhenom]

I picked it up during the sale, and I'm also interested to hear what others who've played it have to say.

[BeautifulTorment]

I absolutely loved the art and the gameplay. I can't describe why all that well but if you like RPGs and you like strategy rpg type combat then pick it up. 20 dollars is a great price, 3 is a steal. 

 

The plat isn't too tough and you can idle on a menu for the hours played trophy.

 

Yes yes yes!!!

[The Moose Knuckler]

I really enjoyed the game from an artistic point and the turn base style. It reminds me of FF Tactics but the story for it to me isn't that great. Not a bad game at all for $3.

[ElBolovo]

For 3 bucks it's really worth it.

[NaseemJohn]

I played it a bunch and its definitely worth the price and I think it's a really good game. The platinum isn't hard just very grindy. If you want to speed up that process there's some dlcs for very cheap that'll really help out if you want. I think the dlcs were 1-3$

[TristanBrown17]

I'm really appreciating all the replies! My big thing is that I've never played a true JRPG or whatever you want to consider it (I've played and loved Kingdom Hearts, that's about the closest), so it's a close decision!

[LucileRose]

I would definitely get it, even if you don't love it $2.99 is a good deal. I think I got mine for £10 I can't remember but I would recommend it on the vita if possible, it's a long game but you can save whenever so it's not a must. 

[Thoazol]

I think an isometric grid-based SRPG is the accurate way to describe the genre. That aside though; it's well worth trying for how cheap it is, even with the rough edges in the mechanics.

[Beyondthegrave07]

I got bored of the game pretty quickly, especially when there are 16 enemies on the board and you can't skip the enemy's turn. Though it's probably worth it at $3. I may come back to it sometime to see if it gets any better.

[MMDE]

Having written a guide for it, it's no secret that I very much enjoyed the game. It has it's glaring issues such as the story being rather bland and mediocre, but it has a tiny bit of humor to it. Where the game shines is in the gameplay department, where it does most things right. Sure, it's classical tactical RPG battle system, but it's fast paced compared to similar battlesystems. It's also just deep enough for it to be interesting and have a tactical layer. Random battles are optional, you select if you actually want to fight an enemy, and there's also enemies walking around on the map that you can decide to encounter or not. Leveling sounds like a grind, but it depends on how you do it. You really want to get further in the story as fast as possible, so you can face stronger enemies which gives much more XP. The thing that will stop you from progress too fast is the bosses, so you'll need to be able to beat them at lower levels to quickly level up. The alternative is to take a lot of time and level manually. Yes, I know, DLCs that looks like microtransaction to make up for grinding or whatever. Didn't use it, and what you get in them is useless late in the game.

 

The best part is probably the post-game portion. Sounds like a grind to get to level 500 when you barely beat the last boss on level 65-80? Nah, not really a big grind, because you get so much more XP from stronger enemies and the XP required to level up stops increasing at certain points, so you just level faster and faster. Hardest part of the game is the last boss.

 

Gameplay will remind you about SNES era FF games, at least in how you explore the world, but with a lot of fetch quests etc.

 

There's also no missable trophies!  Just enjoy.

 

2 hours ago, TristanBrown17 said:

I'm really appreciating all the replies! My big thing is that I've never played a true JRPG or whatever you want to consider it (I've played and loved Kingdom Hearts, that's about the closest), so it's a close decision!

 

It's not a JRPG though. It very much plays like an old-school late SNES JRPG though, but without the great story, but the gameplay very much makes up for it.

Edited August 11, 2017 by MMDE

[Elvick_]

I personally wasn't a huge fan of it, the animation and art are kind of crappy in my opinion. And that bothers me. The gameplay is serviceable though.

[MMDE]

 

28 minutes ago, Beyondthegrave07 said:

I got bored of the game pretty quickly, especially when there are 16 enemies on the board and you can't skip the enemy's turn. Though it's probably worth it at $3. I may come back to it sometime to see if it gets any better.

 

Hehe, so I guess TRPG isn't your thing then, because this is super fast paced version of how those games usually work.  Take this game for example:

https://psnprofiles.com/trophies/583-vandal-hearts-flames-of-judgment/MMDE

That game consist of like 14 or something TRPG battles, there's a short cutscene between each battle, but that's it. The rest of the game is just those battles, and those battles will likely last for about 45+ minutes. Final Fantasy Tactics is an apt comparison too, and there too the battles last for 15-45 mins.

 

Anyway, as you get stronger in Rainbow Moon, you learn attacks where you can take out several enemies from a distance at the same time as you make a move, which makes it a lot faster. These ability cutscenes are also skippable by holding some should button after you've used the ability enough times. It seems connected to how long the animation is. This massively speeds up the game as well.

[TehCro]

Pass. This game is so boring. Everything about it is so bland you'd swear you're playing somebody's RPG maker tutorial game. No story and all you do is grind until you get strong enough to go to the next area. It's just something you play so you can do something with your hands while listening to a podcast or something. Play Tactics Ogre or War of the lions on PSP or something else instead.

Edited August 11, 2017 by TehCro

[Beyondthegrave07]

59 minutes ago, MMDE said:

 

 

Hehe, so I guess TRPG isn't your thing then, because this is super fast paced version of how those games usually work.  Take this game for example:

https://psnprofiles.com/trophies/583-vandal-hearts-flames-of-judgment/MMDE

That game consist of like 14 or something TRPG battles, there's a short cutscene between each battle, but that's it. The rest of the game is just those battles, and those battles will likely last for about 45+ minutes. Final Fantasy Tactics is an apt comparison too, and there too the battles last for 15-45 mins.

 

Anyway, as you get stronger in Rainbow Moon, you learn attacks where you can take out several enemies from a distance at the same time as you make a move, which makes it a lot faster. These ability cutscenes are also skippable by holding some should button after you've used the ability enough times. It seems connected to how long the animation is. This massively speeds up the game as well.

Well, I love FF tactics advance and all the fire emblems, but at least you can speed the animations up. I spent 25 minutes on a fight just to lose and have to do it over again!

[MMDE]

13 minutes ago, Beyondthegrave07 said:

Well, I love FF tactics advance and all the fire emblems, but at least you can speed the animations up. I spent 25 minutes on a fight just to lose and have to do it over again!

 

What battle lasts 25 minutes?  They usually last like 30 secs to 3 mins. Must have been a boss? Looking at your trophies, you seem to have gotten to the more difficult part of the game. If you progress a bit further the game will open up quite a lot for the last story line quest, and then post-game the world is totally open. Those parts are honestly the best in the game IMO.

[Aelaer]

This game is not fun, to anyone considering buying this, be warned.

The story is not engaging.  The combat is a slog. And poison will do 20+% damage to you every turn, and the enemies in the beginning of the game love to spam it.

You also get multiple actions per turn, but your last action will need to be defend to avoid INSANE damage, even when wearing the best armor available...

Edited March 25, 2018 by Aelaer

[Livingstone7728]

Loved it... alot of fun... not much storywise.. but overall worth 3 bucks

[theshywaterguy]

I really enjoyed this game, but I also enjoy most TRPGs. I almost bought it again and would have if it had a separate trophy list. Also, judging from their website they are in QA on most versions of the sequel so that should be coming out very soon.

[Kittet3]

If you never played a tactical RPG or whatever genre Rainbow Moon is, I wouldn't recommend it. I was hyped when I got this for plus as my first "real" RPG and I couldn't get through the first stage. I think you have to ease yourself into the genre with more hybrid gameplay options. 

[starcrunch061]

How did I miss this thread? Blame MMDE for my rediscovery of it.

 

As an RPG fan and aficionado, I was super stoked for this game on release. It sucks. 

Edited September 17, 2018 by starcrunch061

[starcrunch061]

I posted here last year, and should have just left well enough alone. But with a new community event, I thought I would make one last effort to beat and plat this game. I will succeed, but man, does this game suck. Here's my rant...err, reasons.

 

First, the game is far too long for what it is. The campaign, if you can call it that, is about 5 hours of story. That's not a joke, BTW - you get stuck on a world, and need to get home. You get a series of unrelated fetch quests, and then one very big fetch quest to get home. Then, you fight the final boss and get home.

 

HOWEVER, you are looking at 60-70 hours to get through this slog! And I don't mean a meaningful 60-70 hours. I mean sitting around, beating up random, useless enemies in the hopes of getting leveled up to beat random, difficult bosses. By "difficult", of course I mean "poorly balanced tank cannons who move twice as fast as your characters". And even when you manage to get powerful enough to tangle with these enemies, battles are inexorably long, because every monster has its own attack animation. Given that each enemy attacks multiple times (some as often as 6 times in the main game), this takes forever.

 

By the way, what genius thought it was a good idea in a "strategy" RPG not to allow you to turn off attack animations in the Options menu? You have to hold down R1 (or R2, I forget which) to skip the animation. However, you can only do this after doing the attack a certain number of times. Or having the attack reach a certain level. To be honest, I have no idea. I only just now got Baldren's Shield Bash to allow me to skip animations. I think it was around level 35, and was cast hundreds of times.

 

The "localization" (if you can even call it that) is a complete joke. Characters spew out random nonsense. Plus, they emit these atrocious voice clips. The same is true of your characters, but happily, this only happens during battle animations, which you will be skipping as much as you can. There are plenty of towns on the map, but good luck finding them! The in-game map that you can access is arguably the single worst map I've seen in any game, ever. It doesn't even make sense. Someone in the game gives you a map of the world, but apparently, it's a globe, which is fashioned in that odd 3/4 perspective used often in the PS1 days. You'll need to dig up a map online.

 

The denizens of the town often have quests for you, Good luck figuring out what they're talking about. The final main quest is interminable, and made worse due to the fact that the items required (and there are DOZENS of items required) have locations which are completely unknown to you. For example, you'll need to find "Dirty Fingernails". Where are they? Well, they are dropped by a random enemy appearing in a few locations on the map. This enemy is likely well above your level when you reach him, by the way. How do you know this? Because one girl, in one town, far away from the original quest given, tells you in a random conversation (though I think you have to complete a quest for her before she tells you).

 

Occasionally, the merchants upgrade their stock. These upgrades are VITAL to your success in the game, though you never get notified when it happens. Further, merchants don't appear in every settlement, and the game has a pointless day/night system, and merchants often close their doors at night (well, "doors" is metaphorical - they just disappear off the screen). You can further upgrade your weapons and armor with materials found in the game. This is completely useless...right until it's vital. For the vast majority of the game, you'll have so few upgrade slots in your armor, and the materials are so poor, that upgrading is worthless. BUT, at the end of the game, you'll pretty much be required to upgrade the best weapons and armor you have to beat the (ABSURD) final boss.

 

Oh, and you need food in the game. Yeah - just to further turn up the crap dial on this one, you have to eat food to stay alive. This is a drag, because you have to travel so much on the world map. Better have that spell that makes food rain from the sky! Oh, and that spell? You can only cast it so often. Thankfully, you will be able to buy a passive skill so that you no longer need to eat (yeah - that makes a lot of sense). But this happens very late in the game, and money isn't exactly free flowing in this one.

 

And speaking of traveling the world, what a drag. This game has one of the worst travel I've ever seen in a game, with its lousy map, its slow-as-molasses overworld travel, and its sucky teleport system. The post-game is particularly bad for this.

 

The absolute worst, most cynical part of this game, though, is the character upgrade. Each time you level up, you get the requisite stat boosts (HP, MP, STR, DEF, SPD and LUK). However, these boosts are nowhere NEAR good enough to keep you in line with the monsters. To make up the difference, you must visit a "savant" character, which will further raise stats...for a price. You see, as you level, you ALSO raise up your ability to level stats more with a currency called Rainbow Pearls. Of course, you need to pick which stats to level, as Rainbow Pearls are at a premium. This could have been a cool idea. Maybe your fighter wants more STR, or needs a slight boost in SPD. Maybe your archer needs some more LUK, but could do with a little DEF boost as well. Or maybe a few HP and MP would help.

 

The problem is that the HP and MP costs are through the roof. You can pretty much raise your other stats efficiently, but HP and MP are locked from you until the post-game (and even then, they take time before they are viable). Of course, if you had HP, you could survive attacks better, and wouldn't need to grind endlessly to face bosses. And with more MP, you could raise the level of your special attacks, and do more damage. But then, that would probably pull back the curtain too much on this sham game (showing, e.g., its likely freemium origins). This further slows the already glacially paced battles, as you will need to defend every single turn with your characters, even against weaker enemies.

 

There is a lottery in the game. The prizes, until deep into the postgame, are among the worst I've ever seen. And the chances for winning a high-level prize are very small. Thankfully, you can game the lottery, but outside of trophies, it really is pointless. 

 

Oh, and for some real nonsense, sometimes, characters simply lie about rewards and whatnot. One character told me that if I completed a quest for him, he would give me his Lion's Wrath + armor. This was very useful, as that was the best stuff I could buy for the final boss, and this would be an even better version. The quest was a real pain at this point, too, but I finished it nonetheless. And...nothing. He gave me a key which led to armor that was actually worse than what I was wearing.

 

Stay far away from this pile of poo.

[JNSpradlin]

@starcrunch061  I would say this is not the game for you.  I rather enjoyed it.  Most of the stuff you gripe about are such minor things.  Those are the mechanics of the game. You didnt have to play it.  You really need to read up on RPGs before you play them, if the mechanics of the game are what you are complaining about.

[starcrunch061]

1 minute ago, JNSpradlin said:

@starcrunch061  I would say this is not the game for you.  I rather enjoyed it.  Most of the stuff you gripe about are such minor things.  Those are the mechanics of the game. You didnt have to play it.  You really need to read up on RPGs before you play them, if the mechanics of the game are what you are complaining about.

 

What the hell are you on about? I would put my RPG bona fides up against yours any day, dude. Expecting an SRPG to be Disgaea or Final Fantasy Tactics would be wrong. Expecting an SRPG to have QoL aspects that have been in place since Ogre Battle on the SNES is not wrong.

 

I'm glad you found the issues here minor, and "rather enjoyed" the game. Apparently, you didn't enjoy it enough to tolerate contrary reviews by others.

 

[JNSpradlin]

1 hour ago, starcrunch061 said:

 

What the hell are you on about? I would put my RPG bona fides up against yours any day, dude. Expecting an SRPG to be Disgaea or Final Fantasy Tactics would be wrong. Expecting an SRPG to have QoL aspects that have been in place since Ogre Battle on the SNES is not wrong.

 

I'm glad you found the issues here minor, and "rather enjoyed" the game. Apparently, you didn't enjoy it enough to tolerate contrary reviews by others.

 

A few QoL things aside, you go off on a book of a reply about things that are just technical. I dont think this game was a AAA game when it came out, but a AA game.  It wasnt meant to compete against larger, grander RPGs. 

 

The game is fine for what it is, IMO. Its not everyone's cup of tea.