Thread 11974005

Was Vagrant Story ahead of its time? I feel like if a game with this plot and setting came out today it would sell like cocaine candy

I had no idea how to play this game when I played it years ago. vaguely remember standing around and menuing in some kinda RTwP system

>>11974017
Are you joking? Anon you might be sub 90 iq

>>11974017
I hope you were 8 years old or something because the combat system is really easy to get

>>11974024
>>11974027
well I guess I did get it, I just thought 'is it really this shit or am I missing something?'

>>11974005 (OP)
It was, it was. As was FFT.
Haven't played Crimson Shroud

>>11974017
It's kind of oblique, you have to make it bast the first couple of chapters to get the hang of it

>>11974005 (OP)
It's one of those late in the lifespan of a console games that shows all the tricks the devs have learned. It some respects it seems a generation ahead and in others it's very of it's time.

>>11974028
Were you doing 0 dmg per hit to a boss because your weapons weren't suited for that enemy? Even then you can brute force pretty much every encounter thanks to high drop rates for healing consumables and Ashley being able to perform three actions per one enemy action.

>>11974017
I beat the game buy dealing just 1hp of damage per attack. I'm not kidding. I played it back when nobody seemed to play this game so I had no idea who to talk to. I just got very good at timing so 1hp attacks were "enough".

>>11974005 (OP)
I don't think so. Certainly not when it comes to mechanics, which are mostly overwrought and not in a "misunderstood" sort of way since they're also mostly redundant and can be largely ignored.

The aesthetics and tone are very cool but also not really more so "today" than they were at the time. Though back then I mostly thought the devs had played MGS in the early stages of development and decided to give their game sort of a similar self-serious tone of intrigue and constant twists, and a similar implied complexity to the setting.

>calls himself risk breaker
>gets buck broken by RISK
pottery

it deserved an n64 release

yeah it could've easily fit in a cartridge

>>11974005 (OP)
>Was Vagrant Story ahead of its time?
I mean, kinda?
>So with many possible game developments lying in your future, where does that leave Vagrant Story?
>Matsuno: If asked, I don’t think there will be a sequel to Vagrant Story. I think I want to leave it concluded here, as-is. However, one of the goals for this project was to acquire skills and know-how for the next-generation of game development, and I think we accomplished that. For example, in the future we may be working on online (network) games, and those games often have a lot of characters on-screen at once. Even the PS2 would need to use very limited polygons for the characters to make it work. In that event, the skills we learned in Vagrant Story—how to make beautiful and attractive 3D graphics—would really pay off, I think. That’s why, even if we don’t make a sequel to Vagrant Story, I think its essence will live on and be seen in any future work we do.
https://shmuplations.com/vagrantstory/
VS was basically a PS2 title on PS1, which is why some functions were simplified (combat system, spell effects) or outright removed (initially the game supported 2-players gameplay and Merlose was supposed to be playable; also not gameplay-related but plot was also heavily cut and plotlines like Sidney and Duke's relationship and Rosencrantz's motivation were greatly shortened) to run on PS1.
>I feel like if a game with this plot and setting came out today it would sell like cocaine candy
Well, it's a cool setting (isolated dead city, perfect for horror games) and this time Matsuno's "No, John. You are the demons." magical mumbo-jumbo kicks in from the prologue and not in the second half or at the end of the game (Lucavi in FFT, Dorgalua / Diablo / Shaher in Ogre series, Occuria in FFXII) so the supernatural theme flows way better in VS.

>>11974005 (OP)
the presentation was solid
but the gameplay was utter shit and failed that's why it didn't become a franchise like Kingdom Sharts, hell even Parasite Eve had 2 sequels

>>11974005 (OP)
Played this game earlier this year for the very first time. Beat it twice in a row. Was considering beating it again but i stopped myself. Skyrocketed to my top 3 PS1 games of all times.
What the fuck /vr/? you always told me this game was good but you never said it was literally the best thing ever.

>>11975001
It has always been considered one of the best PS1 games

>>11975001
It was always good, it's just menuing and learning basic mechanics (casting buffs before fights, carrying 3 types of weapons, using correct gems to abuse elemental advantage, niche stuff for NG+ like crafting in workshop and training specific race advantage on dummies) that filters A LOT of people. But once you get used to both of these factors you are rewarded with great story and killing bosses in 4-5 hits.

What does the time do in the mines right after the forest? Also how do I get out without running out the clock?

>>11976926
Running out of time warps you back to the room with the save point at the start of that dungeon. Just explore the dungeon and open all the chests in your initial run(s) and after that rush to the end. Alternatively there is another dungeon you can access from the town

>>11977071
Good to know. I thought it gave you a game over or something like that. I have to get back to VS. It's been literal years and I loved the game so far up until that point.

Thanks mate.

>>11977874
IIRC, the only way to get a game over is to outright die. And falling into chasms just deducts 20 HP before spitting you back at the entrance of that room, so not even that can kill you unless you already have ridiculously low health. That being said, some rooms give you different enemy spawns if you have low health. Iron Maiden B2 in particular is full of dullahan type enemies that can drop their rare swords if you walk around that place with less than 150 HP; final room before Iron Maiden B3 has a mini boss with the final boss' sword.

>>11974005 (OP)
The gameplay was the thing that turned audiences off.

>>11974362
>I mostly thought the devs had played MGS in the early stages of development and decided to give their game sort of a similar self-serious tone of intrigue and constant twists, and a similar implied complexity to the setting.
Not Tactics Ogre?

>>11978017
You mean they got stuck doing 1HP damage to a dragon boss and didn't beat it before they had to return it to Blockbuster, like me.

>>11974005 (OP)
more like out of time because no game since has done what it did

>>11975001
This is why it's so important to play games for yourself rather than asking for reccs

>>11974017
lmao what? I finished it when I was 5.

Game is plain ugly. Fucking blocky as hell with a terrible shit brown aesthetic. The comic book speech bubbles clash with the look as well. I was interested in the combat systems but couldn’t get over just how ugly it was when I tried it a few years ago. Makes mgs1 look like a ps3 game.

>>11975001
If you look up what to do or someone told you it's easy.
If you go in blind it's very easy to turn the game into a slog, especially if you prioritize the wrong mechanics.

>>11980449
i played it completely blind when it was new
my strat with weapons was to have 6 different weapons, one for each enemy type
starting sword for humans, that first axe you get for beasts etc.
it mostly worked out, handful of bosses i still had trouble hurting them even with buffs and every weapon i had did 1 damage to the final boss but i just used break arts

>>11980601
Carrying one weapon per enemy type was the standard advice for many years, but you're actually better off carrying one of each blade type (blunt/edged/piercing), along with a grip that powers up that blade type, then using gems and enchanter spells to further boost your damage against tougher enemies.

>>11974005 (OP)
What are the antennae for? Do they engage them during sex to enhance the orgasm?

>>11980734
I've done it both ways and having three enemy type focused weapons is less annoying than three damage type weapons. Why? Because you can tell what type an enemy is just by looking, while blunt/pierce/slash damage effectiveness is annoyingly very random and often you need to change your weapon multiple times per room against enemies that are all the same type. For example against crimson knight rooms with 3-4 human enemies that would all be vulnerable to your anti-human weapon one might be nearly immune to blunt, one is immune to slash, and one is immune to pierce, and you don't initially know which is which. So that's way more menushitting.

>>11981176
*that's still only three weapons needed though. the six type affinities all have a compatible pair although I forget which pairs with which.

>>11981187
Human-Phantom
Beast-Dragon
Undead-Evil
Because raising one enemy type affinity also had a chance of reducing the next two on the list, so you picked the two that were three spaces apart.
And yeah, the downside of focusing on blade type is that you have to cast Analyze on every enemy, or constantly go in and out of the menu to swap weapons and see what had the best damage estimate. If they ever remaster VS, one of the first balance changes they should make is that Analyze is a buff you cast on yourself to allow you to see full enemies stats, like Libra in FF12. Truthfully, when I first played VS, I just brute forced every encounter with the same 1H sword that I upgraded over time, swapping out gems for bosses.

You're better off by literally never switching weapons and just using the buff spells.

>>11982717
i have an extreme tolerance for menuing so messing around with different weapons in the workshop and switching them around in battle is one of my favorite things in VS
it really needed some kind of quickswap tho

>>11974005 (OP)
Tinted glasses nostalgia it was just ok