Grandia

[xS]

Originally posted by Tsubaki


But you know... looking at my favorite games for every system, they're all import only. Where's Sin & Punishment for N64?

It's very import friendly ....I have nothing against impports . I've imported for almost every other system I own. I mainly import action games and shooters though.

Where's... well, darn near everything(Chaos Seed, Langrissers, Sakura Taisen, Grandia, Grandia: Digital Museum which is a complete game, Shining Force 3s) for the Saturn? Where's Growlanser, Tales of Phantasia, Black/Matrix for PSX? Where's Culdcept 2 Exp. for the PS2? etc etc etc.

I'm pretty sure Tales of Phantasia has been romhacked , Sakura Taisen 1-3 patches are being worked on as far as I know.now what Grandia digital mueseum is I'm not really interested.

Black Matrix is easily playable with an FAQ(at least the GBA is) .

Sure there are many japanese games that are'nt coming stateside , but the Its a good enough amount to keep me satisfied.

And even if there were millions of excellent Japanese games that never came out , western games are good enough to keep me happy.
[/quote]

possibilities are endless if you step outside the world of gaming too..

The same go's for any other language. I can speak 3 , and hopefully I'll be able to go through french over the next few years.

[sggg]

Originally posted by xS
The same go's for any other language. I can speak 3 , and hopefully I'll be able to go through french over the next few years.

Which languages do you speak?

[xS]

urdu,hindi, english

[Korian]

thanx for the feedback

[Aurora]

Grandia is not as good as Toilet Kids.

[Diff-chan]

Tsubaki, you make me sick. "Why dont you just learn the language?" What the fuck is the matter with you? Thats such a blatantly arrogant statement its not even funny. Not everybody has the time or ability to do that. Let alone to play some crap RPG that's already available in English.

Im learning Japanese now, but I figure I might as well because Im in a top college and they have a great EALC department. However it's a hella long process, and learning to read Kanji is a huge time investment. I wanna do it because pretty much the last thing on my list is to be able to watch anime or play videogames (lots of other ones). Ill probably never import another game in my life. But its ridiculous to suggest putting in that time just to play Grandia or Super Happy Princess Creator VII.

Lets learn another language, probably the most complex written language in the world, to play garbage dating sims and games available in English! And then lets talk about these obscure pieces of crap on a message board where nobody cares about them! And then lets mention a bunch of assholes who voice-acted in a game I can't understand anyway!

And while we're at it, Grandia can go screw. I have it for PSX, in ENGLISH, and I think its okay but overrated. And the battle system's not that great.

[Tsubaki]

Originally posted by diffusionx
Tsubaki, you make me sick. "Why dont you just learn the language?" What the fuck is the matter with you? Thats such a blatantly arrogant statement its not even funny. Not everybody has the time or ability to do that. Let alone to play some crap RPG that's already available in English.

I personally love Grandia. It is my favorite game of all time, and maybe. Just maybe I would learn a language just for it. But I wouldn't ask anyone else to.

But maybe... just maybe... you missed every post in this thread where I've written, because I've certainly never said to go learn Japanese for Grandia.

Im learning Japanese now, but I figure I might as well because Im in a top college and they have a great EALC department. However it's a hella long process, and learning to read Kanji is a huge time investment.

Well good for you. Of course it's a long process, as is learning anything. If you need any assistance, I'm sure many people here including me would be happy to assist you.

I wanna do it because pretty much the last thing on my list is to be able to watch anime or play videogames (lots of other ones). Ill probably never import another game in my life. But its ridiculous to suggest putting in that time just to play Grandia or Super Happy Princess Creator VII.

Then that's your own priorities. My library of games for the last two generations have been largely Japanese imports. If you say one game isn't worth learning Japanese for, then I have no arguments about that. But if a gamer has like 100+ games in Japanese, wouldn't knowing the language be helpful?

My point in this diverged-portion of the thread was that no matter what, English-only speakers are limited by what Western companies decide to localize and what not to localize. Assuming you knew both languages fluently, that issue would be irrelevant. So would poor translations, dubbing, or release dates. Assuming you knew both languages, you would always have a choice, and that is a good thing.

It's that ideal, that I'm striving for, and suggest to others.

Lets learn another language, probably the most complex written language in the world, to play garbage dating sims and games available in English!

As much as you'd like to think Japanese is impossible, try Chinese where there's like 10-20x as many "kanji". Written Japanese is quite easy in comparison, largely in part that it has an "alphabet" system.

And yeah.... you can keep deluding yourself that all you're missing is garbage dating sims. Don't forget that many shooters, 2d fighters, 2d anything, RPGs(mostly SRPGs) tend to be left in Japan.

And then lets talk about these obscure pieces of crap on a message board where nobody cares about them!

Care to share what these obscure pieces of crap are? If this is targetting me directly, care to share how Sakura Taisen 4, Space Channel 5 Part 2, Lunar Legend, Grandia Xtreme, and Tales of the World Narikiri Dungeon 2 are "obscure"? Those are the games I've had extensive write-ups about and all of them are from pretty well known and established series.

And then lets mention a bunch of assholes who voice-acted in a game I can't understand anyway!

Just because YOU don't know who I'm talking about doesn't mean that no one else does. If you watch anime, you know the names I mention, or the works they've been a part of. They're darn famous.

If you're going to make this post a personal attack against me, then please provide some backup for your statements. I never said go learn Japanese for Grandia. My argument is that if you can only speak English, then you're at a disadvantage because the English companies decide what and what you can not play. The only issue is whether those other games are worth playing, but if you don't import (you said yourself that you never will again) then how will you ever know what's out there? Sure you can claim they're all garbage dating games, and admittedly there's a lot of them. But that's utter crap if you believe that's all Japan has that doesn't come here.

And while we're at it, Grandia can go screw. I have it for PSX, in ENGLISH, and I think its okay but overrated. And the battle system's not that great.

<nonpersonal>
I feel the battle system is the best in any traditional console RPG. It combines a lot of ideas in one sweet package that is just executed perfectly. It has you consider the position of your party. Not only in absolute position, to where you want to keep your characters out of harm's way (area of effect attacks), but also relative positioning to enemy. If an enemy is too far away, you may not be able to attack them that turn and spend it just walking closer to it. If an enemy is right next to you, your attack will hit instantaneously which is important because... the system also allows you to consider timing.

Every attack you make will have some effect on the enemy, big or small. Normal attacks will pause them for that one .5 second where you hit them. A slower, weaker critical hit has the chance of delaying an enemy's attack or cancel them outright... it depends on the timing. But the enemy can do the same to you. All the while, your special attacks and spells all have their own individual levels of expertise. A cure spell, when you first acquire, may take 3 seconds to cast, leaving you open for getting your spell cancelled by an enemy hit. Upon using the cure spell more and more and more, eventually you'll master it and casting it will be almost instantaneous.

The entire battle system working together means, every thing you do has a huge effect on how battles occur. You have the strategy to coordinate all your attacks on all enemies, deciding to do more damage with minimal effects on the enemy's timing, or less damage but a chance of bumping the enemies back or cancelling their attack altogether. All the while, they're doing the same to you. So positioning and timing all have a role.

I have not found any other RPG battle system to be in its class, personally. Most RPGs do not have any factors to consider period (FF, DQ, WA, Suikoden for instance). I love the Panzer Dragoon Saga system, where that also takes into account positioning and timing in a different way. The Lunar system is a bit more basic with just positioning to worry about, but it's still a step up from most. Valkyrie Profile's system is interesting, however it is extremely limited in that once you find your combo, you don't do anything else until you get a new weapon/party member. So you end up doing repetitive button presses for 50+ battles in execution. The Tales series on manual is like a side-scrolling beat 'em up/hack 'n slash with lousy AI controlling your other chars. It's sorta fun in a mindless sort of way, but in the end is pretty repetitive too. On semi-auto, it's a lot more strategic.. but it's also frustrating because you have such limited control.

So if you have any suggestions on RPGs to try, I'm open. But at least in my experience, I haven't found another RPG I've liked nearly as much as Grandia.</non-personal>

[BonusKun]

Originally posted by burgundy
Because any game is better in a language you can't understand.

Burg,
I played the PS version but I also played the Saturn version 1st.
The translation was spot on for the PS but the game wasn't made or written to be run on the PlayStation. It was a sloppy piece of shit port.

Bad load, choppy 3D and overall just was like walking in mud. That game should have just stayed overseas if it never came out with an English release on the console it was meant to be programmed for.

I've seen shit ports of games from other consoel systems as well but Grandia on PS was one of the worst. Hell I'll even go a step further. The 'Official' U.S. Strat Guide for Grandia was a joke.

All it was littered with was small screen and words saying go here, do this, go there, get that.

They didn't even bother to tell you where the hidden stages of the game was in this "official' guide.

Grandia in the U.S. got shat on....hard...

[Freeter]

Didn't Grandia 2 on the PS2 get shat on hard also?

[BonusKun]

Originally posted by Freeter
Didn't Grandia 2 on the PS2 get shat on hard also?

Ow a Point is made indeed but then we could go into that line of how the game reached more of the solbbering masses to appease the tready thing it is to own RPGs now.

Nevermind the fact Grandia II was so awesome on the PlayStation that they were offering it in a buy 2 get one free bargin awhile back.