Suikoden IV

Developer: Konami Computer Entertainment Tokyo (KCET)

Release Date: August 19, 2004

Time Played: A little over two hours

Dubiosity: 2 out of 5

Random Encounter Rate: 108%

Would I play more? It might eventually happen for the podcast, but I’d be lying if I said I was relishing coming back to this one.

It’s once again totally coincidental that both games in this week’s write-up fit a specific theme, namely “disappointing installment in long-running JRPG franchise.” Gensou Suikoden is a series I’ve always wanted to get into, but haven’t yet found the time and/or willpower to do so. It’s beloved for its ensemble cast, surprisingly nuanced worldbuilding, and the general nostalgic desirability that comes from being a dead-as-hell cult franchise. Now that I am both on a podcast about playing RPGs and own every game in the series (big shout out to @sparky_buzzsaw for selling me his copy of Suikoden V) it seems more than likely that will happen in the relatively near future. Will I be a bad enough dude to stare at character recruitment guides so I don’t miss any of the 108 stars of destiny? You’d better believe your ass I will.

But that’s for the future. Now is Suikoden IV, which is generally considered the “black sheep” of the series. At least, by the people who don’t consider Suikoden III to be the black sheep of the series, but I played that game nine years ago and liked it so it’s not getting covered. It’s the naval one! With the boats! Also it takes place like 150 years before the rest of them, so it’s also a prequel? Anyway, as silent anime protag-kun (whose canon name is the impressively Suikoden-esque Lazlo En Kuldes) you start out your general anime career as a Boat Knight before getting saddled with The Rune of Punishment because your best friend was a cowardly weiner. That’s about as far as I got, but if it’s anything like the rest of the series I bet there’s probably intrigue and JRPG mechanics aplenty. This is definitely another case where the introductory hours might not be a great window into the game as a whole, and there’s absolutely a non-zero chance I might eventually come around on it if/when I give it a serious look.

So then, what’s the immediately dubious thing about this game anyway? Certainly, it doesn’t look especially amazing for a late-era PS2 title despite having progressive scan support, but I’ll chalk some of that up to the particular quirks of my capture setup. Instead, the clearest and most evident red flag is that the random encounter rate in Suikoden IV is… egregious. As someone who has liked some difficult, decidedly *crunchy* dungeon crawlers and RPGs in my day, there’s a balance to be maintained with games like this, and Suikoden IV does not do that. I sure did spend the majority of these first two hours hitting the “auto” button against packs of ravenous seaweed every three feet while on the open ocean. There are few ways to drain my patience faster, but for what it’s worth there doesn’t seem to be anything else especially concerning about Suikoden IV. I think this might be one that’ll get revisited at some point, so look forward to it.

Tales of Zestiria

Developer: Bandai-Namco

Release Date: January 22, 2015

Time Played: A little over two hours

Dubiosity: 3 out of 5

Borediosity: 5 out of 5

Would I play more? What if I played literally any of the other Tales games I owned instead? Like, any of them.

I’ve oft-described Namco’s Tales series as “Comfort Food JRPGs.” For better or worse, you have a pretty good idea of what you’re going to get with each installment, even if the nuances and particulars vary pretty wildly from game to game. Given that I own like nine of them now, I think I’m definitely coming up on playing through another one… or at least picking my 30 hour Tales of Xillia save from two years ago back up. I think we’re just about due for some more Linear Motion Battles, demon fangs, various air juggles, and speeches about the power of friendship sometime soon. Just… Just not this particular flavor. This Tales tastes like store-brand vanilla.

Tales is a lot like Final Fantasy in that most of the flagship titles have their adherents and defenders, but I don’t exactly see a ton of advocates for Zestiria. In fact, the game did poorly enough to warrant the quick turn-around of the far better-received Berseria only 18 months later. What’s the problem? To sum it up succinctly, Tales of Zestiria is the literal incarnation of what I thought Dragon Quest was before I played one*. Based on those introductory hours (and what people have told me about the rest of the game, tbh) it might just be the dullest and most trope-laden JRPG I’ve seen for a while. My tolerance for anime bullshit is pretty high these days, but this… this is one of the more boring introductions to a video game I’ve played for this feature. Not necessarily hot garbo, per se, but compared to how some of the other flagship Tales games have introduced themselves it was enough to almost make my sleep-deprived self doze off.

There’s some real, uh, quality English VA and localization, complete with a series of Proper Nouns that one of the commenters in my chat said sounded like they came out of a ProZD sketch. THE LORD OF CALAMITY gotta be defeated by THE SHEPARD who uses the power of ARMATIZATION with SERAPHIM. Listen, all you need to know is that Sorey is the super duper pure-of-heart protag-kun with the personality of a limp noodle even by Tales standards. The boy makes Jude from Xillia seem like a font of dynamism by comparison. He, along with his invisible water spirit boyfriend Mikleo and probably a similar group of ragtag invisible people are gonna perform fusion dances and save the world from demons or some shit. Like, you can already write half of it in your head just from my description, right? Admittedly a lot of Tales storytelling is held up by the quality of the supporting cast, who tend to start out fairly trope-y before being fleshed out into full characters. However, the point I’m trying to make is that if this introductory sequence was supposed to sell me on anything, be it the premise or the cast, then it failed miserably. Yuri Lowell is an immediately interesting character. Sorey (which is not pronounced like how Canadians say "sorry" but is instead given a bit of a flourish. Soar-Ay.) is not.

Probably also worth mentioning, that while I didn’t really get in-depth with it in my stream, everything I’ve read about the game’s equipment leveling system sounds like a *real fuckin mess.* It’s wordy and complex enough that I don’t feel like restating it here, but I highly suggest looking up the specifics if you’re interested. It’s one of the more baffling, ass-backwards implementations of a loot system I’ve seen in an RPG of any kind. The other big shift from previous Tales games concerns yet another revamp of the battle system, which I didn’t get far enough with to feel comfortable going on about, other than “hey it’s cool that basic attacks and special attacks are now considered separate artes and can be mixed and matched.” The one interesting thing that Zestiria has going for it is that Sorey (and Rose) are able to fuse with their elemental spirit buddies and go full SSGSS Vegeto (or Gogeta?) up in this business, but I imagine that won’t be for at least a couple more hours of me being bored out of my skull. Anyone who’s played a game in this series before knows that it’s going to be a few hours before you get enough attacks and abilities to do anything other than mashy-mash… and at that point why don’t I just play Berseria? Or hell, even Graces F, which I’ve heard has the best combat and the single dumbest story in a mainline Tales game! That sounds like a challenge to me. Just.... just please don't make me play this game for the podcast, @jeffrud. At least the opening song is a banger.

*: To be perfectly honest, I dunno if I'm gonna be any sort of long-term Dragon Quest stan in the way someone like Tim Rodgers is, but hot damn if DQ XI wasn't the most charming-as-fuck thing. It's just a little too straightforward and not degenerate or weird enough to have totally encapsulated my attention. I'll probably get back to it the next time I'm stuck with just my Switch.

SO that's it for me. At least for this week. Next week might be a little messy with prep for the GIANT BOMB COMMUNITY ENDURANCE RUN, which you can once again look forward to my participation in. More details soon. Wheels are involved.