Cassylvania's Miserable Little Pile of Platinums

[Rune_Crys]

9 hours ago, Rally-Vincent--- said:

Also, why catch monsters in D1? Just powerlevel in CoO 3 and reincarnate. Statistician farming is a bit annoying, but grinding is in Disgaea's DNA.

 

Uhm, I'm not even close to unlocking Cave of Ordeals yet. I'm still farming via Invincibility panels in Level 5-3, haven't even fought the boss of Chapter 5 yet.

[R25CCE]

Fantastic collection!

 

I really like the format you’ve done with the genres and the quotes made me chuckle

 

keep up the amazing work!

[James_Tonto]

19 hours ago, Spaz said:

I would just play every God of War game you haven't put on your profile @Cassylvania.

 

I still consider God of War 1 thru 3 to be some of the best and most memorable experiences of gaming I've had in my 27 years of playing video games. Chains of Olympus and Ghost of Sparta are obviously not as good, but considering that they were done on a lower budget and on a handheld initially, they are still decent.

 

Ascension is basically the 'black sheep' of the franchise. It has a forced online that you have to get a trophy for but thankfully there's no actual multiplayer involved. You originally had to get a pass to access the online, hopefully PlayStation Now has that part covered without you having to go through the hassle. Story wise Ascension is more cartoonish and lacks much of the epic cinematics that made God of War 3 awesome. While I consider it weak in several categories, it's still worth playing.

 

Just play and finish every game in the series. It looks good on your profile.

 

I don't know if you're going to touch Assassins Creed or not. I'm still waiting for you to play the series.

 

I wouldn't call Ascension cartoonish, it is a game where you slice open elephant monster skulls to expose their squishy brains, shishkebab enemies and engage in several large scale battles. Including the possessed/infected portions of the body of a Titan, with hundreds of arms. And a final battle against a kraken-esque boss monster. You also fight a set of conjoined twins, i.e, Castor and Pollux, inside a temple. Also this is a Kratos earlier in his career as the Ghost of Sparta, so logically the spectacles and grand scale of the battles would be a bit tamer.

[Cassylvania]

Sounds like everybody is in favor of the other God of War games, so I started Chains of Olympus last night...and another game that we'll get to eventually. I'm not sure how to deal with Ascension yet. If there's a MP trophy (why?), I'll have to see if we can get it through PS Now, and there's no point in subscribing to PS Now until I have about a month's worth of games that I want to play. I think I already used up my free trial. If the lockdown is extended until the end of May, that might be worth consideration. Otherwise, we'll wait until this summer.

 

On 4/13/2020 at 2:16 PM, Rally-Vincent--- said:

D5 takes significantly less time than D4. If D5 was too long for you, D4 probably isn't best right now, although you can cut down time with item duping. But why not try D1 complete? It's shorter because it is the first of the series, and it's one of my favorite games of all time. Laharl, Etna and Flonne are hilarious.

 

D1 could be fun. I think I'm going to treat the Disgaea series the same way I treat Resident Evil. That is, I'll play some games in the series and leave the rest alone. Speaking of that...

 

21 hours ago, Spaz said:

I don't know if you're going to touch Assassins Creed or not. I'm still waiting for you to play the series.

 

Ehhh... I'm not sure what the series has to offer me. I did the math at some point and it'd take hundreds of hours if I wanted to play all those games, let alone completing them. That's different than Kingdom Hearts, which I'm interested in because of Disney, or God of War, which I'm interested in because of mythology and are much shorter games. From what I understand, most Assassin's Creed games are open-world environments that take place in various historical periods of time, which isn't really something that draws my interest. I like history, but I'm not enough of a history buff to appreciate what those games probably have to offer.

 

I think if I'm going to do an AC game, it'd have to be one that's good (duh), relatively short, and/or takes place in a period of time that I'd find interesting. Not sure what that'd be. Probably the newest game, but I'm always open to suggestions.

 

11 hours ago, Langy900 said:

Fantastic collection!

 

I really like the format you’ve done with the genres and the quotes made me chuckle

 

keep up the amazing work!

 

Thanks! And welcome to the pile, where Jones Soda still exists and we were practicing social distancing before it was cool. Grab a mug, have a seat, and oh hey you've played almost every Assassin's Creed game. Maybe you could tell us where to start.

[Grotz99]

I really liked the Assassins Creed 2 Trilogy (AC2, Brotherhood and Revelations), since it still had some of the original modern day story (why they were diving back into the past as assassins) mixed in and the story during the time period (Italy 1400s) was good from what I remember. I haven't played the first one since I started with AC2 and just haven't had a chance to go back and play it. Each one of these to platinum on PS4 should probably take around 25 hours. They removed the MP required trophies that were in the PS3 version.

 

I would not recommend AC3 or Unity. They were not as exciting and Unity was pretty buggy, unless they fixed it.

 

AC4 Black Flag was probably one of my favorites, mostly due to the pirate-like nature and naval battles. Beware though that it does have some of the most annoying MP trophies. I don't remember the main character being all that great, but honestly the main character for each of them after the AC2 Trilogy aren't that exciting. Syndicate was fun if you like 1860s London and the characters had a little more....character to them.

 

Although, you could play the newer ones (Origins and Odyssey) and the modern day story will barely be included or even relevant anymore, meaning you won't need much back story from the others to enjoy them. They are the longest with probably 100 hours each. Odyssey is still sitting on my shelf in shrink wrap, but since you like Mythology, you might like this one as it is in ancient Greece. Also no MP trophies :).

 

These of course are my thoughts about the games, I would be interested to hear which ones other people had for favorites.

Edited April 14, 2020 by Grotz99

[AJ_Radio]

2 hours ago, Cassylvania said:

Ehhh... I'm not sure what the series has to offer me. I did the math at some point and it'd take hundreds of hours if I wanted to play all those games, let alone completing them. That's different than Kingdom Hearts, which I'm interested in because of Disney, or God of War, which I'm interested in because of mythology and are much shorter games. From what I understand, most Assassin's Creed games are open-world environments that take place in various historical periods of time, which isn't really something that draws my interest. I like history, but I'm not enough of a history buff to appreciate what those games probably have to offer.

 

I think if I'm going to do an AC game, it'd have to be one that's good (duh), relatively short, and/or takes place in a period of time that I'd find interesting. Not sure what that'd be. Probably the newest game, but I'm always open to suggestions.

 

If you want my advice, purchase the Ezio trilogy on the PS4. Assassins Creed 2 is still one of the best but also one of the quickest platinum trophies in the series. It was the game that drew a lot of fans, myself included. Graphically the game is dated and the controls aren't as fine tuned as in the later games. Only thing you have to worry about are the cryptic puzzles from the glyphs, a couple of the Assassin Tombs and obviously the feathers. Nothing is hard, just watch some YouTube videos. You can easily get the platinum in under a week.

 

Or if you want to completely skip the old games, buy up Origins and Odyssey. Those games have gotten a lot of fans, but I can't say I don't like those games that much because frankly, I prefer the older games to an extent.

[James_Tonto]

I agree with Spaz on purchasing the Ezio Trilogy. You have no idea how much shorter/easier it is to platinum those games, without all the multiplayer trophies. I would also recommend Assassin's Creed Rogue, Assassin's Creed III and Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag. However these should be games you aren't racing to finish and those latter three got really out of hand with all the collectibles, especially Rogue. I had to spend hours picking up all those fragments and it honestly wasn't rewarding to do that. (The Naval boss battles are also a highlight of the last three games. Fighting legendary ships on the high seas.)

[Cassylvania]

Alright. You guys convinced me. I picked up AC Odyssey because it's currently on sale for $30, and that includes all the DLCs, AC3, and Liberation. I assume that's a good deal. I also bought the Ezio Trilogy from Best Buy, but they wanted me to spend $35 to get free shipping, so I grabbed Ni no Kuni Remastered too. And then I figured I might as well drop a Benjamin today, so I got one more game that I think I'll keep as a surprise for now. But I can safely say that I'm fully ready for this lockdown now.

 

I'm not sure if I'll start with Odyssey or AC2, or even when I'll begin. It kinda makes more sense to do Odyssey first since it's newer and, if I completely hate the series, I can always sell the Ezio Trilogy. If I start with AC2 and don't like it, I'll probably still want to finish the trilogy, and then I'll be stuck with Odyssey anyway. I don't care about AC3 or Liberation. Fun fact, though. I actually DID play Liberation on Vita. That's right -- I had a Vita at one point. I bought it, it came with Liberation, and I decided like three days later that I wanted my money back. On the Vita, that is. Not Liberation. So I packaged it up, brought it back to Walmart, and they gave me a full refund. Then I went home and realized I forgot to give them the Liberation cartridge. Being the honest person I am, I immediately went online, put it on eBay for $30, and...well, that's how I made a profit on the AC series. I guess we're even now.

 

First things first, though. I gotta finish up Langrisser II. Yeah, it's yet another twofer. It's basically the same as Langrisser I, but the story tree is a bit more confusing. I'm not sure what I need to do to get the other like eighteen endings. In the first game, you'd either kill a character or leave him alive to access the branching paths. Here, you gotta do more work. I don't like that.

 

And are my boys really about to grab Odell Beckham Jr. from the Browns? I didn't think they had the cap space for that.

[Rune_Crys]

On 4/14/2020 at 4:36 PM, Cassylvania said:

I think I'm going to treat the Disgaea series the same way I treat Resident Evil. That is, I'll play some games in the series and leave the rest alone.

 

Fine with me. To be honest, I don't think I could do Disgaea 3 for Vita. The Reverse Pirate trophies are so annoying. If they make a "Disgaea 3 Complete+" on PS4, I might consider it as that was my favorite game, storywise and characterwise, but I already bought the Disgaea 3 DLC on Disgaea 5 so I will probably just grab Almaz and Sapphire from there and try to use them instead. Been working on Disgaea 5 a while back and got a Maid to Level 725 just by having her spam sodas. Trying to train a Sage now but Land Decimator is so much worse than it was in Disgaea 4 Complete+.

 

I really need to get back to platinuming the LEGO Harry Potter games. I got the Vita version of Years 5-7 and the lag is horrible as I remember. Once I platinum Word Maze on both versions, I'll try to get back there.

 

Also put up the post for the event I promised to start up, you can find it on the event's page, and it's called "STAYHOME and #PLATINUMWITHME." I'd love to see if you are interested. You don't even have to start with 0% games.

[Cassylvania]

On 4/15/2020 at 10:00 PM, Rune_Crys said:

Also put up the post for the event I promised to start up, you can find it on the event's page, and it's called "STAYHOME and #PLATINUMWITHME." I'd love to see if you are interested. You don't even have to start with 0% games.

 

Looks good. I picked a decent variety of games, I think. Some short, some long, some that have been in my backlog for a while, and others that I don't know much about. As usual, I'm doing a theme within a theme, only this time the theme within the theme is the theme itself. (That made more sense in my head.) Basically, all the games have to do with diseases, masks, and/or isolation.

 

I know there's no official end date for the event, but I'm going to give myself an artificial deadline of end of the summer (whatever that means), just so I have something to work with. Plus, I'll obviously be wanting to jump back into horror games in the fall. I had to crunch some numbers, though. This event won't push me over the 10k milestone, but I will come close, depending on what other games I work on this month and during the event. If I shoot for 100% completion and no additional games, we're looking at being around 140 trophies short. I may end up working on one of those Assassin's Creed games during this time. I just didn't know what category they'd fit under.

 

The three big games are going to be Kingdom Hearts: Birth by Sleep, Surviving Mars, and probably Persona 5 Royal, even though I know that one is supposed to be easier and less time-consuming than the original. Spider-Man and Resident Evil 2 might also eat up a good deal of time. I'll probably start working on one of those this weekend, just so I can get a head start.

 

The other number I wanted to crunch was the amount of time it'd take me to do everything, if I give myself from now until the end of August. That's about 4-5 hours of gaming every day, which is a little much...but not really uncommon for me. I usually try to make sure I can do everything in under 3 hours a day.

 

I'm not sure about a drawing for this one. There are a couple issues I see right now. The first is that a lot of the games are in first person or don't have a definitive "main" character. The second is that there are 14 games. That's a lot to squeeze into one drawing. I know what I'd want the premise to be, but I'd have to think about how I'm going to get a fair representation of every game. I told myself if I was going to do another drawing, I'd limit myself to five characters, so maybe there's another way I can get them all in there.

 

Anyway, that's my Friday update. I have no clue when I'll be going back to work. But it's snowing outside, which is...yeah, about what I'd expect from 2020.

Edited April 17, 2020 by Cassylvania

[EdgeOfPortal]

2 hours ago, Cassylvania said:

 

Looks good. I picked a decent variety of games, I think. Some short, some long, some that have been in my backlog for a while, and others that I don't know much about. As usual, I'm doing a theme within a theme, only this time the theme within the theme is the theme itself. (That made more sense in my head.) Basically, all the games have to do with diseases, masks, and/or isolation.

 

I know there's no official end date for the event, but I'm going to give myself an artificial deadline of end of the summer (whatever that means), just so I have something to work with. Plus, I'll obviously be wanting to jump back into horror games in the fall. I had to crunch some numbers, though. This event won't push me over the 10k milestone, but I will come close, depending on what other games I work on this month and during the event. If I shoot for 100% completion and no additional games, we're looking at being around 140 trophies short. I may end up working on one of those Assassin's Creed games during this time. I just didn't know what category they'd fit under.

 

The three big games are going to be Kingdom Hearts: Birth by Sleep, Surviving Mars, and probably Persona 5 Royal, even though I know that one is supposed to be easier and less time-consuming than the original. Spider-Man and Resident Evil 2 might also eat up a good deal of time. I'll probably start working on one of those this weekend, just so I can get a head start.

 

The other number I wanted to crunch was the amount of time it'd take me to do everything, if I give myself from now until the end of August. That's about 4-5 hours of gaming every day, which is a little much...but not really uncommon for me. I usually try to make sure I can do everything in under 3 hours a day.

 

I'm not sure about a drawing for this one. There are a couple issues I see right now. The first is that a lot of the games are in first person or don't have a definitive "main" character. The second is that there are 14 games. That's a lot to squeeze into one drawing. I know what I'd want the premise to be, but I'd have to think about how I'm going to get a fair representation of every game. I told myself if I was going to do another drawing, I'd limit myself to five characters, so maybe there's another way I can get them all in there.

 

Anyway, that's my Friday update. I have no clue when I'll be going back to work. But it's snowing outside, which is...yeah, about what I'd expect from 2020.

Nice. Will be interested in seeing how Surviving Mars goes, I actually own that game, but never played it. Also, I was looking at your profile, is there a reason why you haven’t completed Shovel Knight: Treasure Trove?

[AJ_Radio]

I need to get back to Shovel Knight myself. I find those coins that Plague Knight has to collect too annoying, because I've gone through some levels multiple times and I couldn't find them all.

 

Plus with King Knight now out I have to do three sets of challenges for all three characters. Probably going to be a 20 - 40 hour endeavor, depending on how quickly I can get them done.

[Cassylvania]

19 hours ago, EdgeOfPortal said:

Nice. Will be interested in seeing how Surviving Mars goes, I actually own that game, but never played it. Also, I was looking at your profile, is there a reason why you haven’t completed Shovel Knight: Treasure Trove?

 

Got distracted by games with "Kingdom" in the title. I wanted to do it for the most recent community event, but I was told it didn't count because I already had the platinum. I'll probably get to it soon. Haven't heard any reviews, but I hope it's more like Specter Knight than Plague Knight.

 

We'll see about Surviving Mars. I was debating between that and Aven Colony. I was leaning towards the latter because it's shorter (and doesn't have two DLC packs that practically double the length of the main game), but the idea of having to relocate to a new planet seems more in line with what's going on in the world today. It's also an UR plat, which is kinda cool, since I am trying to get 10 of those this year.

 

You seem to really like sim games too. How's Tropico 6? I want to pick it up, but I know they'll probably release a ton of DLC down the line, so I might be better off waiting for a complete edition.

 

13 hours ago, Spaz said:

Plus with King Knight now out I have to do three sets of challenges for all three characters. Probably going to be a 20 - 40 hour endeavor, depending on how quickly I can get them done.

 

Shovel Knight is DLC done right. You're practically getting four trophy lists for the price of one. I actually picked up the standalone Specter of Torment because I want to support the devs and I don't mind playing through it a second time. I hope they do the same for King Knight (assuming it's as good as the other two -- I didn't want to imply I didn't like Plague Knight's campaign above).

 

I started Marvel's Spider-Man last night. First impressions are pretty good. Swinging through NYC looks and feels natural and cinematic. Combat is much clunkier than the Arkham games, but that's probably because you're playing a wiry web-slinger instead of a tricked-up powerhouse. But what I REALLY like (so far anyway) is that it's not another damn origin story. That is such a breath of fresh air for a franchise that keeps re-inventing itself. (And this is coming from someone who absolutely adored Into the Spider-Verse.) We'll see where the plot goes, but I'm very happy that we didn't have to see a spider bite Peter or Uncle Ben die for the four thousandth time. Although I'm sure we'll get that in a flashback...

 

I'm hearing all sorts of good things about FFVIIR, but I just can't bring myself to buy ANOTHER game. I don't have to play everything. I just don't.

 

...but maybe one more won't hurt...

[EdgeOfPortal]

1 hour ago, Cassylvania said:

 

You seem to really like sim games too. How's Tropico 6? I want to pick it up, but I know they'll probably release a ton of DLC down the line, so I might be better off waiting for a complete edition.

Yes, it’s my favorite genre. I’m actually waiting for the DLC to cool down a bit with Cities: Skylines so that I can start it on my profile.

 

 Tropico 6 is excellent in my opinion. There’s people who say it’s not worth the price, but I really don’t agree with them. The additions of multiple islands and bridges is really interesting, and makes for a more varied experience. They also added a lot of buildings. 
 

There’s this one mission though, called the referendum, that is incredibly difficult, even on easy mode (at least it was for me and a lot of other people, maybe you’ll have a different experience). They should’ve either not added it, or made it the final mission. Be prepared to spend many hours on that.
 

I thought about the whole dlc thing as well. The thing is, they actually have already released a dlc pack I think called “The great llama of Wall Street”, and that dlc didn’t add any trophies. I still think they have some more trophies up their sleeves, but I’m not that worried.

If you do decide to start it, I made a trophy guide for it you can use.

[Rune_Crys]

19 hours ago, Cassylvania said:

Got distracted by games with "Kingdom" in the title.

Know how you feel. I actually purchased the Kingdom Hearts All In One package. I know I have physical copies of some of the stuff that I will have tons of trouble selling as Gamestop is now closed indefinitely, but All In One was on sale for $29.99! That's seventy bucks off! Clearly Square-Enix is trying to get as many people to buy for the upcoming KH4 that will hopefully come out in 2022 barring the Cow Virus.

(Yes, I am calling COVID-19 the Cow Virus as that is how ugly it is.)

Edited April 19, 2020 by Rune_Crys

[Arcesius]

@Cassylvania I was wondering, have you played the original Persona 5 at some point, or one of the older Persona games? (Not the dancing game ?)

 

Just curious to know if you are aware of what you are getting yourself into... ? 

[Cassylvania]

22 hours ago, EdgeOfPortal said:

If you do decide to start it, I made a trophy guide for it you can use.

 

Hey, I didn't even notice you wrote the guide! Thanks for that. Maybe we'll get to it after CJ's event, if no DLC trophies are released by then. I just didn't want to fall into the Cities: Skylines trap, where I buy the full game and the "season pass," thinking it would include all existing and future DLC. Silly me.

 

But since you mentioned Cities... Be aware that I've put over 500 hours in the game and still don't have 100%. (The 500 hours primarily because of What the...? and the 100% because of two glitched trophies that they'll hopefully fix soon.)

 

4 hours ago, Rune_Crys said:

Know how you feel. I actually purchased the Kingdom Hearts All In One package. I know I have physical copies of some of the stuff that I will have tons of trouble selling as Gamestop is now closed indefinitely, but All In One was on sale for $29.99! That's seventy bucks off! Clearly Square-Enix is trying to get as many people to buy for the upcoming KH4 that will hopefully come out in 2022 barring the Cow Virus.

 

Are they really aiming for 2022? That seems awfully fast for a KH game. I figure they'd milk a few more spin-offs, like Prime Numbers Up To 431 Eons or Pudding Pop Panic. But I may put BBS on hold for now or at least accept it'll take me a long time to finish. I'm just looking ahead at my games for this event and I'm not sure I want more than one pushing 100+ hours.

 

4 hours ago, Arcesius said:

@Cassylvania I was wondering, have you played the original Persona 5 at some point, or one of the older Persona games? (Not the dancing game )

 

Just curious to know if you are aware of what you are getting yourself into...  

 

Nope. No clue. I just know it got remarkably high reviews and the guys on PlayStation Access have been pushing it.

 

Sometimes I like to go in blind.

 

That's what she said.

[EdgeOfPortal]

48 minutes ago, Cassylvania said:

But since you mentioned Cities... Be aware that I've put over 500 hours in the game and still don't have 100%. (The 500 hours primarily because of What the...? and the 100% because of two glitched trophies that they'll hopefully fix soon.)

Yeah, I’m well aware. I don’t really mind extremely long games as long as they’re a genre I like. Usually I can put on a TV Show or something to watch while I play them. Yep, the two glitched trophies are a real pain. It’s one of the reasons I haven’t started the game. It seems like most of the time when they release a dlc pack there’s some glitched trophies along with it.

[Arcesius]

1 hour ago, Cassylvania said:

Nope. No clue. I just know it got remarkably high reviews and the guys on PlayStation Access have been pushing it.

 

Sometimes I like to go in blind.

 

Aight, aight... Those are exactly the reasons I got the game as well (well, I don't necessarily trust Rob's opinion on everything, though)... One of the highest rated games on Metacritic, and a turn-based RPG at that! 

 

We'll leave this spoiler-free then ? But I'm looking forward to hearing your thoughts on the game! And I mean this in a genuine way, not in a "mwa-ha-ha malicious joy" way ? (And I mean your thoughts on the game, regardless of trophies). 

 

As for Royal being easier... Definitely less grindy. Like WAAAAAAAY less time-consuming, in that you won't have to follow a spreadsheet of what to do when if you want to have a chance at getting the plat in around 100 hours (took me 110 hours), but easier? I mean, the original Persona 5 is as easy as they come, especially since there was no difficulty-related trophy. 

 

Keep us posted! ?

Edited April 19, 2020 by Arcesius

[Rally-Vincent---]

I'm interested to play P5 Royal as well. I liked the social interaction in P5, the extended bonding sounds nice. But since it's only an extension of the original, I don't want to pay full price on that. Hopefully, there'll be a good price for a physical edition some day.

[Mori]

What exactly is P5R? Just a polished version with new content or an entirely new game? 

[Intoner_Zero]

3 hours ago, Mori said:

What exactly is P5R? Just a polished version with new content or an entirely new game? 

It's a polished version. New events and characters are woven throughout the game, and there's additional traits that have been added to the battle system too. I'm not too far in P5R, but I think(?) there's an extra dungeon or two when going for True Route.

Atlus has done this previously with Persona 4 to its polished form Persona 4 Golden, Persona 3 with it's FES addition and Persona 3 Portable entry.

 

I wholeheartedly recommended newcomers to play the polished versions, it's just extra fun and you get a fuller experience!

[Cassylvania]

14 hours ago, Arcesius said:

We'll leave this spoiler-free then  But I'm looking forward to hearing your thoughts on the game! And I mean this in a genuine way, not in a "mwa-ha-ha malicious joy" way  (And I mean your thoughts on the game, regardless of trophies). 

 

As for Royal being easier... Definitely less grindy. Like WAAAAAAAY less time-consuming, in that you won't have to follow a spreadsheet of what to do when if you want to have a chance at getting the plat in around 100 hours (took me 110 hours), but easier? I mean, the original Persona 5 is as easy as they come, especially since there was no difficulty-related trophy. 

 

Keep us posted! 

 

I'm always debating whether it's better to post updates as I play through a game or wait until I have the platinum. On one hand, I want to play a game long enough that I can provide some fair criticisms, but I also don't want to wait for so long that I forget my early impressions or have a sour taste in my mouth from the end-game grinding. For Persona 5, I'll probably hold off until the end. If they made the platinum a lot less time-consuming, then I probably won't be taking week-long breaks in between play sessions.

 

12 hours ago, Rally-Vincent--- said:

I'm interested to play P5 Royal as well. I liked the social interaction in P5, the extended bonding sounds nice. But since it's only an extension of the original, I don't want to pay full price on that. Hopefully, there'll be a good price for a physical edition some day.

 

I wanted the Phantom Thieves edition, but I settled for the steelbook.

 

Well, guys. Smoke 'em if you got 'em, because we got ourselves a 4/20 plat.

 

Platinum #212 - Langrisser I & II

 

I'd like to take you back to the past. No, not to 1987, when the first Langrisser game was released. Just a couple of months ago, when I mentioned that I had my eye on this remaster. Do you remember what I said? "I hope it's not too easy." Well, guess what? This game basically plays itself.

 

"But C-dawg," I hear you say. "It looks just like Fire Emblem. Don't your units have permadeath? Isn't there a weapon triangle? Aren't you commanding an army of misfits against an immeasurable amount of enemies? Is shipping a 3,000 year old half-dragon who looks like a 6 year old girl even legal?" To which I would respond, "No," "Not really," "Sorta, but you don't get to choose who is on your team and your numbers are basically equal to that of your opponent," and "Uh, what is wrong with you?"

 

You see, guys, the problem begins with the gameplay. Instead of having a ragtag team of heroes that you're desperately trying to protect, you have a team of heroes...and a bunch of grunts who follow them around on the map. They're not strong, but they can help you chip away at an enemy's health and you can sometimes strategically place them to prevent your heroes from getting attacked. It costs money, but I never had any problem in hiring the maximum number of mercenaries per map. In fact, you pretty have to use them, as the enemy AI is equipped the same way: a team of super soldiers who each have four or five grunts of their own. This leads to every battle being essentially the same, where you have grunts taking on grunts until your heroes can fight their heroes. Who you don't kill. And they don't kill you. Yeah, see, Langrisser I and II have a cast of about twenty characters between them, and you just keep fighting the same characters over and over. Sometimes they're your friends, and other times they're against you. If you defeat one of them, they usually just retreat from battle. Same thing if they defeat one of your units. The only exception to that is the protagonist, who must stay alive, and sometimes you're required to protect a hapless villager or two.

 

Sound redundant? I'm not done. Let's talk story. The story is bland. Just look at the cover. No, you don't even need to look at the cover. Look at the platinum image. It's the same thing. If you've played ANY video game before in your life, you can probably tell everything this game has to offer from that single picture. There's a guy, a girl he wants to bang, a legendary sword with a name nobody can pronounce, and an ancient evil you're trying to destroy. That's basically everything you need to know about the plot.

 

So, what did the writers decide to put in place of a story? A dozen stories. Yes -- we have a game that struggles to tell a single narrative with branching story paths. Get ready to have that minuscule amount of characterization vaporized instantly every time you return to a previous timeline to make a slightly different decision. This time, give the ancestral pudding to the guy with the ugly scar across his face and watch your friends betray you and turn into dickheads. But don't worry. Every unit you use maintains its level across playthroughs, even though the levels of the enemies remain static. That means the game will become easier and easier as you replay through the same maps upwards of 50 times. (And yes, they do reuse maps across games.)

 

"OK," you say. "So, the game is less challenging once you become a powerhouse. That's true in most games. I'm sure it's tougher in the beginning." Well, that's kinda true. You know what map gave me the most trouble? The first. And that's because you're SUPPOSED to lose. And even then, I came pretty close to winning. (To be fair, I did struggle with one of the final maps in Langrisser I, but that's only because you're limited to two units and the game keeps throwing mega bosses at you.)

 

"But you still have to play the maps," you argue. "It's not like the game plays its--" I'M NOT FINISHED. Remember how I said you can hire mercenaries? Well, you don't have to manually control them. I mean, you could. You probably even will in the beginning, because you're so used to doing it in every other turn-based strategy game. But if each of your heroes has six mercenaries, and you have ten heroes at your disposal, do you really want to take 60 moves every turn? No, so what you do is move your ten heroes and then "command" your mercenaries to defend or attack. I didn't even bother to change the defaults. If you don't move a mercenary, they'll automatically take their turn when you're done, and I usually found that was sufficient to help me win the map. Sometimes I had to force their hand when I knew there was a chance they'd do something stupid, but not often.

 

And that's basically this game, guys. You turn off the battle animations and skip through the dialogue because it isn't worth reading. If it wasn't for the fact that you need to "press any button" every time one of your units kills somebody (yes, they get experience even if a mercenary is the one to get the kill), you could essentially take your turn and then grab a sandwich. I'd say I was only actively playing about 10% of my total playtime, which is pathetic for a strategy game. The only time I really had to think was when I was trying to come up with the quickest way to finish each map.

 

That...was a bit of a harsh review. I know this is an older game. The first few Fire Emblem games to come to North America (yeah, I played them before they were cool) were primitive too. I like the art style in this, and you can switch between the classic and remastered versions, which is always a nice feature. I also like how you can be an asshole. I'll be honest with you here, guys, in that I didn't pay much attention to the story outside of my initial playthrough. I ended up on the Route C path for both games, which was a decent enough ending for my tastes, but I enjoyed the missions where you were clearly siding with the bad guys and beating the shit out of your friends. That's not really something that existed much back in the 80's. In fact, I don't remember duality being much of a thing in video games until the early 2000's, with stuff like Fable and Mass Effect.

 

But what you're really here for is my pick for favorite character. So, which cardboard cutout do I like the most? Well, speed is the name of the game, and the units that can fly can cover the most ground in the shortest amount of turns, so I'm going to go with Cherie from Langrisser II (and maybe I, but I don't remember). She's cute, but it sucks when you end up in one of those timelines where she goes all crazy ex-girlfriend on you and wants you dead.

 

I mean, would you want to upset someone who has a dragon for a pet?

 

Edited April 20, 2020 by Cassylvania

[Rune_Crys]

1 hour ago, Cassylvania said:

Get ready to have that minuscule amount of characterization vaporized instantly every time you return to a previous timeline to make a slightly different decision. This time, give the ancestral pudding to the guy with the ugly scar across his face and watch your friends betray you and turn into dickheads. But don't worry. Every unit you use maintains its level across playthroughs, even though the levels of the enemies remain static. That means the game will become easier and easier as you replay through the same maps upwards of 50 times.

 

I am very tempted to platinum this collection just because I could curbstomp the story by the time I get to my final branching path because my characters are max level. It's like Disgaea but with easier ways to grind.

 

Also, there is a platforming game called "Stories: Tales of Destiny" that does the same thing - you play through the several levels, beat the big bad in five minutes, then restart and do the whole thing over but make a different decision. And you have to go through ALL 50 branching paths to get all of the trophies. Ouch. ?

 

Glad you got that out of the way, Cass. I'm sure you'll find the Kingdom Hearts series much more palatable.

[Rally-Vincent---]

12 hours ago, Cassylvania said:

"But C-dawg," I hear you say.

 

Hah. I have to remember that.