A Blog About RPGs

I am not the smartest man ever born, let's just say that. Last night, I recorded a lengthy video blog on this very subject, but in my infinite wisdom, forgot to set the microphone settings on the camera so you all could actually HEAR what I was saying, as opposed to simply seeing my facial inflections, hand gestures and breath-taking good looks.

So, in honor of my now borked laptop (the only place I can do video blogs off of, unless I get a new camera, and that's not happening), I suppose a written summary of the events of the ill-fated video blog is in order.

Eternal Sonata

This game is the JRPG for players that want to love JRPGs, but hate the grinding that sometimes comes with the territory. With many JRPGs, at least in my experience, you can kill every enemy, look for every nook and cranny, etc., but at some point, you will reach a boss that will completely flatten you and your party straight the hell out, forcing you to do monotonous grinding. Monotonous grinding is for MMOs, thank you. With Eternal Sonata, I never experienced at boss characters that were tough enough to make me feel like I had to turn back and grind. In fact, I died only once during the entire game, and that was due to me not healing my party members properly, and the second try was much easier after I learned that valuable lesson.

I believe that I did end up grinding during some of the time I played, because there are certain "puzzle" (I use quotes because they're very, very light) elements to Eternal Sonata, sending you back and forth into rooms you've already visited, filling each room back up with monsters in the process. If you so choose, you can simply walk by most of the monsters and not even bother with leveling your party. But for me, I found it rewarding enough to continue to clear out rooms multiple times on many occassions, simply on the strength of the combat as well as the high experience rewards for defeating each set of monsters.

I'm glad I finally decided to take Eternal Sonata off my shelf and slide it in to my 360. I've had the game sitting for a number of months after I purchased it at a local Meijers along side Thrillville: Off the Rails, (for a grand total of $24 for both) but I suppose I wasn't really ready to start it at the time of the purchase. Either way, if you have not purchased this game yet--please do. Tremendous combat system that's fun and rewarding, graphics that still hold up 18 months after the game has been released, superb music, and a worthwhile story. (Moreso for the characters than the plot)

Because of Eternal Sonata, I've gone on somewhat of a JRPG kick, acquiring the following games:

Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII
The World Ends With You
Blue Dragon

I have only played Crisis Core so far, but I have been enjoying it. Apparently it does have its "boss fight that knocks you on your ass" moments, but hopefully I'll learn the battle system well enough that it won't be a problem. Storyline is interesting enough. (I suppose it should be, for all the splurging I hear about FFVII, which I have not played.)

Don't have a whole lot to say about either The World Ends With You or Blue Dragon, other than I believe I'll be picking up a DSi either today or tomorrow, trading in my old DS to GameStop, which is giving a $50 credit towards the purchase of a DSi. Decent deal and is about as much as I could hope to get selling it on eBay, Amazon or Craiglist, so we'll see how that goes.

I am not the smartest man ever born, let's just say that. Last night, I recorded a lengthy video blog on this very subject, but in my infinite wisdom, forgot to set the microphone settings on the camera so you all could actually HEAR what I was saying, as opposed to simply seeing my facial inflections, hand gestures and breath-taking good looks.

So, in honor of my now borked laptop (the only place I can do video blogs off of, unless I get a new camera, and that's not happening), I suppose a written summary of the events of the ill-fated video blog is in order.

Eternal Sonata

This game is the JRPG for players that want to love JRPGs, but hate the grinding that sometimes comes with the territory. With many JRPGs, at least in my experience, you can kill every enemy, look for every nook and cranny, etc., but at some point, you will reach a boss that will completely flatten you and your party straight the hell out, forcing you to do monotonous grinding. Monotonous grinding is for MMOs, thank you. With Eternal Sonata, I never experienced at boss characters that were tough enough to make me feel like I had to turn back and grind. In fact, I died only once during the entire game, and that was due to me not healing my party members properly, and the second try was much easier after I learned that valuable lesson.

I believe that I did end up grinding during some of the time I played, because there are certain "puzzle" (I use quotes because they're very, very light) elements to Eternal Sonata, sending you back and forth into rooms you've already visited, filling each room back up with monsters in the process. If you so choose, you can simply walk by most of the monsters and not even bother with leveling your party. But for me, I found it rewarding enough to continue to clear out rooms multiple times on many occassions, simply on the strength of the combat as well as the high experience rewards for defeating each set of monsters.

I'm glad I finally decided to take Eternal Sonata off my shelf and slide it in to my 360. I've had the game sitting for a number of months after I purchased it at a local Meijers along side Thrillville: Off the Rails, (for a grand total of $24 for both) but I suppose I wasn't really ready to start it at the time of the purchase. Either way, if you have not purchased this game yet--please do. Tremendous combat system that's fun and rewarding, graphics that still hold up 18 months after the game has been released, superb music, and a worthwhile story. (Moreso for the characters than the plot)

Because of Eternal Sonata, I've gone on somewhat of a JRPG kick, acquiring the following games:

Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII
The World Ends With You
Blue Dragon

I have only played Crisis Core so far, but I have been enjoying it. Apparently it does have its "boss fight that knocks you on your ass" moments, but hopefully I'll learn the battle system well enough that it won't be a problem. Storyline is interesting enough. (I suppose it should be, for all the splurging I hear about FFVII, which I have not played.)

Don't have a whole lot to say about either The World Ends With You or Blue Dragon, other than I believe I'll be picking up a DSi either today or tomorrow, trading in my old DS to GameStop, which is giving a $50 credit towards the purchase of a DSi. Decent deal and is about as much as I could hope to get selling it on eBay, Amazon or Craiglist, so we'll see how that goes.

You'll have to tell me how The World Ends With You ends up - Was interested in that one when it was released.

I liked the video beter, haaaaa thanks ultima

Interesting.  Yeah, I haven't gotten around to TWEWY yet.

People seem to love TWEWY, I just did not get it at all. To emo for me, and I grew up on Final Fantasy!

I loved Crisis Core at first, but after 20 hours I realized that all I had been doing was press X and stopped playing. Seriously, the only gameplay element in Crisis Core is battling, and the battles consist of pressing X until all enemies are dead. Sure, there's magic and crap, but why would I bother to use that when it's completely unnecessary? The basic melee attack has been than enough to deal with pretty much all enemies I've encountered so far. Also, the story was shit and character development was, in the rare moments where it occured, extremely stiff.

It's now official, you've gone and lost your damn mind.  :-p

I played some of it. I think I was on the 4th day. The main dude's personality was just really bleh to me. Perhaps I'll give it another try, I did like the pin system. I even advanced the DS's internal clock to get experience bonuses :p

The first smart thing you have done all year.  Now you are okay in my books after playing and liking Eternal Sonata.  I have played all 3 games you acquired and finished two of them.  I really enjoyed Crisis Core even though what Icemael said is kind of true (the combat part not the story and that).  Blue Dragon you shouldn't have a hard time with since the game is one of the easiest RPGs I've ever played because if you level up your skills and that, you can oblierate everything including the final boss (beat him without it getting a single turn).  TWEWY I find difficult because of the whole dual-screen aspect and usually get awful ratings after the end of each battle, its not a bad game though just hard to get into.

You should have got Lost Odyssey but I believe you may have that already.

I hated The World Ends With You to be honest.

All I am going to say is that your going to cry at the end of Crisis Core...

"All I am going to say is that your going to cry at the end of Crisis Core..."

Games...? RPGs?! BAHHHHHHHHHhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhaaaaaaaaaa common Greeno

"cc23574 said:

"All I am going to say is that your going to cry at the end of Crisis Core..."

I have to agree there, it's the only ending to a game to make me cry."

How is Blue Dragon?The 360 needs to shape up and get some good rpg's going >_>

RPG's make big explosions whats there not to like

Get Lost Odyssey.

I have it Tyler. On the 2nd disc but I blew it and stopped playing.

I'm glad you liked Eternal Sonata. I really enjoyed it as well. The gameplay, story, and artistic graphics were really enjoyable. Hopefully you will like the other games as well.

Im looking forward to play blue dragon too, good writing man.

Man, I thought this was going to be about rocket-propelled grenades :(