Random Ramblings: Season 4 - Episode 17 - Once again, our king is terrible at names

Lord Dragelsnart wrote:Persona 4 though

Great for feels,  Press Turn is better than 1 More!.

TheCapsFan wrote:So many paragraphs, I'm too lazy to read them all. :U

tcfil;hdr:

Get turns for hitting weaknesses/getting criticals, lose turns for missing or having your attack nulled, lose your turn for having your attack reflected or drained. Maximum turns cannot exceed initial turns * 2.

LOOK AT THIS PARAGRAPH

That is a sentence, not a paragraph :p

Metaphorically speaking, that post had so many words in it, it was longer than a trip to the moon!

*sort of stumbles in*

Sup

I only just got out of bed.

Lief Katano wrote:

Jack Pschitt wrote:Pokemon is definitely one of my favorites for how accessible it is and how much it appeals to the imagination, which allowed me to build a huge nostalgic attachment to it. Lately I've been getting into Shin Megami Tensei, which honestly is sorta like a Pokemon for mature adults like me, in that there are resistances and weaknesses, and you can recruit most of the enemies you encounter in the game. I'm currently playing through the first game on my iPhone, and I'm astonished by how deep and involving the story is, while still taking into account the interactive nature of the video game form. I do have one HUGE complaint about a segment of the game I just got through which yanked me right out of the immersion and is going to take a while to get back into it, but the fact that I've taken so many twists and turns in the story up to this point, and there's so much symbolic meat on its bones, probably means that I'll be back into the swing of things in no time.

It's really great to hear that you're enjoying the first SMT!

Gravitas wrote:

Lief Katano wrote:That isn't really part of the battle system. It's just standard turn-based.

Now, if we're waxing on about great battle systems, then the Press Turn system from SMT Nocturne/IV/Digital Devil Saga is the best.

Good point, sorry about that mistake. I still think that Pokemon's multiplayer aspect is pretty cool.

What's Press Turn like?

Each side gets its own turn, Fire Emblem style. The side whose turn it currently is gets a number of Press Turns equal to the amount of currently alive party members. (This is obviously changed for boss-type enemies, who get more Press Turns.) An action typically costs one Press Turn, so, under normal circumstances, you'll get one action for each party member.

The non-normal circumstance is hitting an enemy's weakness or scoring a critical hit, which only consumes half of a turn icon - which really works the same way, it just can't be converted into a half turn icon. Missing an attack or using an attack on an enemy that nulls it costs two turn icons, while using an attack on an enemy that reflects or absorbs it costs all of your team's Press Turns.

This goes back and forth between both sides until one is dead.

I love it. It rewards being prepared, but doesn't make the bosses too easy (generally they'll carry at least two elemental attacks, and it's generally hard to carry more than one null/reflect/drain on a singular party member; there's also almighty attacks, which don't affect Press Turns at all besides the standard cost, and Phys attacks are generally hard to null/reflect/drain, especially early-game). It can make random encounters rather easy, because the enemy can not even get a single turn, but that's great if you need to grind (if, for nothing else, expanding your level to get the demons you need).

Oh, that seems like a good idea. I dunno if that'll be enough to sell me on the series, but it's a pretty neat concept. Thanks for the writeup.

Charles wrote:LOOK AT THIS PARAGRAPH

EVERY TIME I LOOK IT MAKES ME HURL

Truthseeker4449 wrote:*sort of stumbles in*

You been drinkin' or something?

Lief Katano wrote:

Jack Pschitt wrote:Pokemon is definitely one of my favorites for how accessible it is and how much it appeals to the imagination, which allowed me to build a huge nostalgic attachment to it. Lately I've been getting into Shin Megami Tensei, which honestly is sorta like a Pokemon for mature adults like me, in that there are resistances and weaknesses, and you can recruit most of the enemies you encounter in the game. I'm currently playing through the first game on my iPhone, and I'm astonished by how deep and involving the story is, while still taking into account the interactive nature of the video game form. I do have one HUGE complaint about a segment of the game I just got through which yanked me right out of the immersion and is going to take a while to get back into it, but the fact that I've taken so many twists and turns in the story up to this point, and there's so much symbolic meat on its bones, probably means that I'll be back into the swing of things in no time.

It's really great to hear that you're enjoying the first SMT!

I am! I'm going through a phase right now where I can't be bothered to play a video game without a really gripping story, and I wanted it to be a RPG because RPGs are my favorite type of game, and I also craved something with a fair challenge to it just cuz, and lo and behold, this entire, monolithic series that's older than I am was just waiting for me to discover, and it's pretty much exactly what I was searching for. I couldn't be more happy with how this worked out. I currently have IV and Devil Survivor Overclocked sitting around completely untouched because I want to finish the first game first. All of my complaints about the first game so far are pretty much just counter-intuitive design choices and inconveniences typical of games that are older than I am, but it's pretty completely overshadowed by how fascinating and ahead-of-its-time the game is in terms of both game-play, and especially the story. I mean, holy crap, this story is phenomenal. It's emotional, it's political, it's epic, it's intimate, and on top of all of this, it's post-apocalyptic, which is something I've had a teenage obsession with ever since, well, I became a teenager. I couldn't have asked for a better game to discover right under my nose this whole time.

Gravitas wrote:

Lief Katano wrote:That isn't really part of the battle system. It's just standard turn-based.

Now, if we're waxing on about great battle systems, then the Press Turn system from SMT Nocturne/IV/Digital Devil Saga is the best.

Good point, sorry about that mistake. I still think that Pokemon's multiplayer aspect is pretty cool.

What's Press Turn like?

Each side gets its own turn, Fire Emblem style. The side whose turn it currently is gets a number of Press Turns equal to the amount of currently alive party members. (This is obviously changed for boss-type enemies, who get more Press Turns.) An action typically costs one Press Turn, so, under normal circumstances, you'll get one action for each party member.

The non-normal circumstance is hitting an enemy's weakness or scoring a critical hit, which only consumes half of a turn icon - which really works the same way, it just can't be converted into a half turn icon. Missing an attack or using an attack on an enemy that nulls it costs two turn icons, while using an attack on an enemy that reflects or absorbs it costs all of your team's Press Turns.

This goes back and forth between both sides until one is dead.

I love it. It rewards being prepared, but doesn't make the bosses too easy (generally they'll carry at least two elemental attacks, and it's generally hard to carry more than one null/reflect/drain on a singular party member; there's also almighty attacks, which don't affect Press Turns at all besides the standard cost, and Phys attacks are generally hard to null/reflect/drain, especially early-game). It can make random encounters rather easy, because the enemy can not even get a single turn, but that's great if you need to grind (if, for nothing else, expanding your level to get the demons you need).[/quote]

I still don't know if I fully understand all of that. You get another move if you hit a weakness? Doesn't that mean you can hit their weakness for massive damage perpetually? Surely that's not how it works, but whatever it is, it doesn't sound very game-changing to me. But like I said, I've already bought SMT IV so I'll find out for myself one way or another.

Lord Dragelsnart wrote:Persona 4 though

More like SMT 4 BABBIES GIT GUD CASUALRY

Seriously though, I've never played a Persona game but they do seem very interesting to me, with their focus on characters overcoming their personality flaws in order to unlock their Personas and become more powerful or however it works. Could you explain to me the lengths that the story will go to, to that end, if you don't mind? That's what interests me about Persona the most, more than fighting monsters or developing the Social Links or however it works. From what I understand Persona is generally stereotyped as the trendy teenybopper Shin Megami Tensei that's lost its meaning in the deluge of merchandise and memes and waifus, so I was hesitant. The main-line series (i.e. the first game, on my iPhone) immediately grabbed me with the use of the Law-Neutral-Chaos alignment system, so it was a safer bet than Persona for me.

Persona has a bit of a unwarranted bad reputation for being care free and stupid. Persona 3 has a much different (and darker) story. The story of P4 is about a bunch of teenagers trying to solve a murder mystery, but every character has their own arc which goes into acceptance of one's self. This is probably why the game resonated with me like it did. Persona is actually pretty dark, though nowhere as dark as the main SMT series. Persona 3 on the other hand, deals with the acceptance of death itself, if I went into any more detail I would be spoiling quite a bit. P3 and P4 are both amazing games that shouldn't have the kawaii desu reputation that it does have. If you do choose to play the games, I'd start with Persona 3 as it'll make you appreciate the fixes made in 4 so much more. (P3's battle system is kinda shit)

Lord Dragelsnart wrote:Persona has a bit of a unwarranted bad reputation for being care free and stupid. Persona 3 has a much different (and darker) story. The story of P4 is about a bunch of teenagers trying to solve a murder mystery, but every character has their own arc which goes into acceptance of one's self. This is probably why the game resonated with me like it did. Persona is actually pretty dark, though nowhere as dark as the main SMT series. Persona 3 on the other hand, deals with the acceptance of death itself, if I went into any more detail I would be spoiling quite a bit. P3 and P4 are both amazing games that shouldn't have the kawaii desu reputation that it does have. If you do choose to play the games, I'd start with Persona 3 as it'll make you appreciate the fixes made in 4 so much more. (P3's battle system is kinda shit)

Awesome, this is just the type of response I was looking for. Consider me sold, I'll definitely keep my eye out for Persona in the future. The only kink in this plan, though, is that I don't own a PSP or a PS Vita, so I can't play what I've heard are the best versions of any of the Persona games. Anyway, there's just something so universally alluring about the premise of "psychic teenagers fight monsters with their feelings and the power of friendship".

Persona is just bootleg Jojo, right?

MUDAMUDAMUDAMUDAMUDAMUDA