RPG Progress Report

[Ack]

Well, I am in the final dungeon of Anvil of Dawn. I have the source of the big bad's power locked away in a magic box I made, and I've been through every dungeon in the game, including both optional paths to enter the harder final areas. All that is left is to confront the main villain and destroy his power.

The final dungeon is one of the more puzzle-focused areas, and it had an invisible maze to navigate, but I've already knocked out a big chunk and have been dropping certain herbs to show the path on the map. I'm looking forward to wrapping this up.

[noiseredux]

I played about 3 hours of Shining Resonance Refrain yesterday. I'm pretty mixed so far, but I've barely even gotten into the game proper yet.

I'd say the first hour or so was basically just tutorial and... TALKING. Ugh so much talking. I was starting to get cold-sweat flashbacks to Final Fantasy Type-0 for a minute there. The story so far is your usual convoluted JRPG stuff. Our main character is a reluctant hero, but he can turn into a dragon. And there's these other kind of mechanical dragons or something. And your party contains a sort of dragon whisperer and a princess who kicks ass. It's all pretty weird, but whatever. The art is pretty nice.

The battle system is okay so far. It doesn't feel super deep. And actually I hate to compare it to FF Type-0 again, but that was the last JRPG that I played through so it's still fresh in my head. But it's got that same kind of actiony battle system that you'd find in many of recent JRPG's like the Tales games or whatever. It's fine, but not really all that exciting to me. What can I say? I'm a turn based dude at heart.

I'll say this: the difficulty is all over the place. I was running through encounters with no problem, just following the story and hitting up any enemies along the way to grind naturally. Then I get to the first boss of the game which is a (you guessed it) dragon and he DESTROYED me... for an hour. Literally an hour. I just kept replaying this same battle over and over again for an hour. It was a sharp spike in difficulty out of nowhere. And early in the game! I suspect some less patient folks (and I'm really not all that patient) would have just quit the game there. In fact, it's possible that I only found the patience because I was playing in handheld mode and could listen to the TV at the same time.

Anyway, I feel like everything I'm saying is negative but I don't mean it to come off that way. For one thing I'm pleased as punch that there's a new Shining game that's been localized. Even if it is four years later haha. Oh, and the steelbook with clear sleeve packaging looks lovely. (@Sega: I bought this Shining game... how about you bring Phantasy Star Online 2 to the west as well now?)

So since this game is reminding me of my early experience with Type-0, I'm hoping that a similar arc follows: because eventually I ended up really enjoying Type-0 despite its flaws. Hopefully the same will happen with Resonance. It's certainly possible as I'm really early into the game so far.

[noiseredux]

Okay, a little more time with Shining Resonance: Refrain, and am now enjoying it more than my initial impression. I'm actually glad I didn't play the demo, since the demo was really like the first 3 hours, and it may have soured me. It turns out that the game gets better JUST after that, haha. I'm now playing around with the various skills/perks for each character, and have a fourth party member (a redhead witch, FTW) and am working out the battle system a little better. Battles are y'know, hack-n-slash but at the same time there is a bunch of stuff that can sort of complicate it. The break system works fine, but then there's "BAND" mode which is sort of a group attack that has its own meter to fill and changes depending who initiates it. Also, there's the whole thing where Yuma (main character) can turn into a dragon but he has a rage meter that can make him become uncontrollable. It's all sort of clever, but also sort of too much, haha. But yeah, getting into it more.

[noiseredux]

Shining Resonance: Refrain continues to get better. I'm ~5 hrs in. First off, it's getting more bat-shit tropey. I can't tell if this is just a lot of JRPG cliches, or a parody of them, or both. But now I've got a dude whose weapon is an electric guitar. You guys! His weapon is an electric guitar! I mean! (You can't see me, but I'm shaking my head right now). Maybe it's just because it's still early, but I seem to be picking up new characters every hour or two, which does actually remind me of old school Shining games. And I quite like the score, and the bright sort of cell-shaded look of everything is easy on the eyes. One thing I'll say is that most encounters are really pretty easy and don't require much thought, but then boss battles are just huge spikes in difficulty. It's jarring. I just started the third chapter, or "Op. 3," which stands for what? "Opera," maybe? I don't know. Oh, this game, haha.

PS, I wish I knew an easy way to upload screen shots. Maybe once the online service rolls out in September there'll be some 'social' stuff like shared screenshots that'll make that easier?

[Michi]

PS, I wish I knew an easy way to upload screen shots. Maybe once the online service rolls out in September there'll be some 'social' stuff like shared screenshots that'll make that easier?

I've been posting them to Facebook and then downloading them from there so I can upload them elsewhere. It's more steps than I'd like, but at least it's fairly easy.

We'll see if they make it quicker when they implement their online stuff.

[noiseredux]

well the problem is I don't have FB. I never have, and I rather enjoy saying "I don't have FB, and never have." So I don't want to sign up for an acct even for such functionality.

I do technically have a Twitter acct, though I've never posted anything on it. I mean I guess I could technically just use it as a screenshot dump, but I also kind of like not using social media at all.

I wish there was an option to just upload to Google Drive or to email or something other than social media. I'd probably just prefer to manually move pics from the Switch/SD card to a computer than bother with social media.

[noiseredux]

I didn't get to play much the past couple of nights, but I managed an hour or so before bed last night. Shining Resonance: Refrain remains a mixed bag for me. I'm about six hours in now I believe, and it's constantly playing a sort of tug-o-war with itself. Sometimes I find it doing something unique, and then it plummets into all the usual tropes. I'm kind of going back and forth between "oh good, I can't wait to play this game after dinner" and "eh, this is getting kind of monotonous." But the good still far outweighs the poor. It's a nice looking game and the battle system is pretty fun and you can mix things up with various party members. I wish there was WAY less talking though. Between chapters it can border on VN territory. And guess what? I mostly don't care about the plot. I mean some of the dragon stuff is interesting and all, but there's just way too much talking. Like, I'll read chunks of dialogue and think "that could have been written in one sentence!" Bah. Oh, and I find the overworld map kind of confusing. Partly because you can't choose to let the mini-map move itself depending which way you're facing.

Anyway, where am I? I don't even know. Somewhere still in Op. 3, and I have no idea how many "Ops" there are. My last quest involved killing some giant with a club, but my party took him down pretty handily. I've been grinding a bit, mostly by accident because like I said the map's confusing so I'll end up backtracking. We took down a Griffin which was pretty cool.

[noiseredux]

Shining Resonance: Refrain
2018, Sega


This week, the gaming world is abuzz with talk of Octopath Traveler, a new JRPG published by Square Enix. I admit that it looked fantastic to me but there was a snag: a new Shining game was published in the west this week as well. There's no hiding my love of Sega. And I adore the Shining games on Genesis and Saturn. Shining Resonance: Refrain would be the first new Shining game to reach this continent in well over a decade. It's kind of a big deal. So as awesome as Octopath Traveler looks, my allegiance is with Sega and the Shining series. I HAD to play this first.

The first couple of hours were rough. And you have to put this into perspective: I'm a dude who is thrilled that a new Sega published JPRG exists. I'm a dude who is ecstatic to even be saying that I'm playing a new Shining game. So I feel like I'm probably more forgiving to Shining Resonance than say, just a JRPG fan who is casually interested in playing this one. But then again, there's a flip to all this - I'm not the biggest JRPG fan in the world. I like them. I love some of them. I've been playing them since Dragon Warrior/Quest and Final Fantasy on the NES. I have lots of favorites. But it's not my top tier genre of choice. So then again, maybe I'm possibly LESS patient that JRPG fanatics. Maybe.

That said, I did play through Final Fantasy Type-0 earlier this year. I hurled a laundry list of complaints and criticisms at that game, but I still found it enjoyable enough to see it through to the end. I'm ten hours into Shining Resonance right now and I'm already feeling like I'm ready to put it on the backburner and get started with Octopath Traveler. Maybe it's just unfair timing.

But stop! I don't want you to think I hate this game. I don't hate this game. At all. There's actually lots of stuff that I'm enjoying about it. It's just that the story and dialogue is blah. There's some interesting stuff, mind. The main character is Yuma who can turn into the Shining Dragon. And all of this plays out as sort of an Incredible Hulk type trope. Like, Yuma wants to suppress the dragon, but sometimes it's needed in battle. The problem is that the more time he spends as the dragon, the more he seems to lose himself; the harder it becomes to control it. So yeah, there's that. It's pretty cool. And I'd probably enjoy this story more if there wasn't so MUCH of it. But, O-M-G there's just so so so much TALKING in this game. Between quests you're subjected to this never-ending visual novel type sections that just drive me nuts. I've gotten to the point where I don't care and I'm just spamming the A-button to get on with it already. I'm sorry but I just don't need this much story.

The game structure also suffers from that Final Fantasy XIII thing where you're often just following what are effectively hallways. There's not a lot of exploring to be done outside of the central hub. Often sections of map are blocked off. And the overworld map is confusing to begin with. After a while it just starts to feel like you're so limited; it's so linear, and that feels detrimental.

I think you're supposed to start with positives before delving into the criticisms, but whatever. There ARE positives for sure. Even though the battle system is action oriented, there's some fun nuances here. There's the break system which allows you to disrupt enemy attacks if done properly, but your break attacks deplete so you need to switch to main attacks to let the gauge refill. In a way the battle system feels like a bit of a rhythm game when done properly. It's kind of cool. There's also the switching Yuma into a dragon thing, which feels like a game of chance as the lower is MP gets, the higher the chance of him going into an uncontrollable rage. When that happens, the Shining Dragon is just as likely to attack your own party as the enemy. So you're gambling. It seems to me like the more Yuma levels up, the easier it is to keep the dragon in check. Though maybe that just comes from higher MP? Also there's (ugh) B-A-N-D mode which synchronizes attacks and buffs between a group of party members and has its own gauge to determine how long it lasts. All of these things - along with the "Tuning" system which lets you tweak attacks as well as loadouts of buffs and skills can lead to some interesting and strategic gameplay. So I dig all that.

Honestly, I think if there was way more action and way less talking then I'd probably be much more jazzed about this game. It does a fairly good job of juggling all of these different systems even if doesn't always do a great job of explaining them to you. Certainly it has the edge of Final Fantasy Type-0 in that department. But I wish I hadn't played that game so recently because I'm getting flashbacks. The big thing is just how little this game seems to care about the player's time. I don't want to backtrack to the inn or castle after every quest to discuss our feelings. I don't need long-winded exposition between enemies. It's frustrating to get through a boss fight and start to feel some momentum and then just FEEL it all come crashing to a halt so that you can press A over and over again while silhouettes talk about what's going on. Where I am right now in the story? I had to guide Yuma around with his Diva Magica (seriously... this is what she's called) as they go on a date in the main town. I mean, ugh. Just going from one point marked on the map to the next to then tap A through their conversation which was super awkward. Ugh.

If it's not clear, my frustrations are not because the game is bad. Not at all. My frustrations are because the things I don't like about this game are starting to disrupt the things I do like about it. I just want to get out there and play and make some progress, but GAME, You are slowing me down! It just starts to come off as bloated. There's so much fat I'd have preferred trimmed. And speaking of, what is with RPG fans and the need for overly long games these days? Why are so many fans upset if a game lasts less than a season of a TV show? But I'm going off on a tangent here, and I know I'm often in the minority on this. And it doesn't even matter because my complaint is exactly that Shining Resonance is too long. My complaint is that the pacing is bad. There's a lot of good stuff but the pacing just makes you feel exhausted especially when you're ten hours in and realize that you're not out of the fourth chapter yet - and there are apparently EIGHT chapters. Or rather "Ops." It says "Op. 4" which I don't get. Is it short for Opera? I don't know.

I think that I'm being slightly unfair though. I think that if there were a drought of new games right now I'd be loving this and not complaining. If this had dropped in January I'd been just as likely to play this in a binge rather than Type-0. But we are not in a drought, and Octopath Traveler is showing up in my mailbox tomorrow. So here I am saying that after ten hours I'm ecstatic that a new Shining game exists in 2018 in the west. I just don't particularly feel like continuing to play it right now. Maybe I'll get back to it during the next drought.

[pierrot]

The main character is Yuma who can turn into the Shining Dragon. And all of this plays out as sort of an Incredible Hulk type trope. Like, Yuma wants to suppress the dragon, but sometimes it's needed in battle. The problem is that the more time he spends as the dragon, the more he seems to lose himself; the harder it becomes to control it.

That sounds fairly cool. Your description reminds me a bit of the D-Counter in Breath of Fire: Dragon Quarter, and I loved that mechanic, even if most people hated it.

I think it's cool that you were so excited for this new Shining game, Noise. Personally, if I were picking it up, and decided to play it, I probably wouldn't be expecting much. Part of that might be that I'm not even the biggest fan of the Shining Force games, but I also tend to view series that change out most or all of the high level designers and directors as having a break in the series. For instance, everything after Ys III, in my mind, essentially begins a new series that may as well not even be called "Ys." Same with Fire Emblem; Once Fire Emblem loses its driving force in Kaga Shouzo, after Thracia 776, there's sort of a dichotomy between Fire Emblem proper, and games that emulate Fire Emblem proper. So, without Camelot, I kind of look at any subsequent entry in the Shining series as needing to stand on its own merit. I won't give it any inherent credibility based on the capital established by the Shining games that Camelot made. All that said, your thoughts on this new Shining game make it sound a bit interesting. It's technically on the PS3, so I could actually play it. At some point I really need to play the Shining games by Nextech, just because I love Nextech, but it looks like Amusement.Vision took over for the last handful of Shining games. That could be good or bad, I haven't played enough Wild Arms to say much about them, personally. I didn't care much for Wild Arms 3, though.

[PartridgeSenpai]

I got to a little past where I got last time in Tales of Destiny Director's Cut (rather, a little past where I got in just the normal remake) at about 6 hours in. I'm at the underwater palace thing to try and find the 4th Swordian. This game is still good fun! I'd say the hardest part so far would be how it's the CC-combat system, like Graces uses, but it's in 2D as opposed to 3D. Stahn is a bit relentlessly naive so far, but he has some good qualities as well I'm sure