Radiata Stories.

[RedCoKid]

Like the characters say themselves, several times (and in the instruction booklet), take a nap if you can't do anything else. I don't see how you got lost, RedCoKid. You gotta give it more of a chance.

Yeah, I read that. Square-Enix wouldn't have answered such a hypothetical question if RS weren't flawed. Too late anyway, I sold it back.

Also, I'm only about 3-4 hours in, but I have no idea where RedCoKid is getting lost at, either. But then again, isn't RedCo the guy that couldn't beat fucking Prince of Persia?

Oh, God.

[Finch]

I guess the "good rpg's" are all confined to Japan. Nigeronpa and Kaze no Densetsu Xanadu must be the two best frickin' jrpg's ever, and shit, i missed 'em. Hey blueskied! I think that YOU haven't played any good rpg's in your lifetime! How about THAT, ya jerk!? Who's sad now?
Seriously, i'm a freakin' whore when it comes to jrpg's. I just doubt that Summon Night EX and Sakura Taisen V are good enough to make me hate everything i already love.
i'm sure you've played some great stuff, buddy. I just fell in love with this one, kay?



Radiata isn't THAT flawed. Compared to Atelier Iris, it's a diamond. It'd need a whale of a budget to be any cleaner.
Using the sleeping thing to pass time isn't what i'd call a flaw since the event is triggered by time of day. At least you have the option to advance time. Hell, you COULD wait for each event to play itself out, and it probably will happen a few times later on when more opens up and you find yourself exploring and finding new people. You know, if you give the game more than five minutes.

The only thing i'm not loving is the lack of sleep i'm getting from holding 2 jobs and trying to play this in my free time. It feels like my senior year of high school all over again.

[RedCoKid]

Radiata isn't THAT flawed. Compared to Atelier Iris, it's a diamond. It'd need a whale of a budget to be any cleaner.

Come on. If the people who wrote the instruction manual had not forseen their customers being confused, they wouldn't have tried to head off the question by answering it beforehand. It's like in politics where one party accuses the other of being at fault before anyone says a word. In this circumstance, it belittles the customer because the game wasn't written clearly.

For example, Ridley gets injured and takes a nap. The group splits up, but your "captain" Ganz doesn't give you orders. You're left to wander the castle... No events... Finally, you go to sleep. Cutscene. Then nothing... Visit everywhere, can't leave the castle because "There's no reason to leave if we don't have another mission." Go to sleep AGAIN. Finally another cutscene. How the hell is the player supposed to automatically know that he should put Jack to sleep TWICE CONSECUTIVELY!? Ridiculous. The game was built around the expectation that you're playing with a walkthrough by your side (see full page ad in instruction manual--right after the Q&A section where they accuse you, the gamer, of "not using your head" ), but goddamn Bradygames hasn't gotten off their butt to release it.

[Finch]

Alright, so they tell you what to do if you get stuck. Why is is a crime for an instruction manual to tell you how to play a game? That's what it's supposed to do, right? It's as basic as telling me to talk to other characters for hints or to try to find objects that they might like.
Even the charas in the game say, "if you can't think of anything else to do, take a nap!" or something like that. So the instruction booklet isn't even neccessary. It's just a bit of entertaining help, just in case i play rpg's without reading the text. It also tells me how to insert the game into my Playstation2™. Now that's not in the game. What other clever schemes will they come up with to make me buy a strategy guide? A whole page ad!? Gadzooks! No one else has ever done that before! Obviously i need one to enjoy this game!

You know, i figured that whole part out rather easily. I didn't even have to sleep twice. You know why? Cuz i was enjoying myself talking to Radiata Castle's inhabitants, maybe like they thought i would've wanted to. I passed the time, and even ran away from a monster in the basement that kicked my ass. When i was done, i found poor old Ganz. I didn't have a strategy guide or a walkthrough, and hell if i haven't used them before.

Since the whole progression by time thing is shown and explained a bit by the time you get to that part, it should be obvious to the player. I don't see how that's a flaw or a clever way to get me to buy a strategy guide.

And come on, this is nothing like politics. It's more like finding out that you have to put gas in your car to keep it going, and it's not really like that either.

[RedCoKid]

Ok, so I arrive back at the guild in the late hours before midnight. Want to check in with Thanatos because I just finished a mission. The split second I press O, he says he needs to take a break, walks over to the men's room, and I don't see him for about 0:30-1:00 min. I wonder, "What the heck is taking him so long?" Then I see this:

[ssbomberman]

LOL. I ended up reviewing the game for got-next. I give it a 7/10, my review should be up shortly. All the faults redco addresses are the reason it misses out on being among the best RPGs PS2 has to offer. Graphics are amazing, expansiveness is nice, but the battle system is a weak version of Tales of Symphonia (I mean 100+ friends are nice, but I can't customize them? Come on!) and the lack of direction ruins the experience.

I will keep playing the game through. It is probably the slowest RPG to get going in history as it is 16-20 hours before you hit the real part of the game and the story branch. I have already recruited a bunch of magic users, who I prefer and that part of the game is really fun, so are the sidequests.

But yeah, I mean, I should not have to sleep in order to know what to do next and eve with the special walkthrough provided by Square, it clearly points out that you should basically use this tactic to learn what to do next. Weak! A little bit more planning in that department and all would be well. Also, I do not appreciate being in the middle of doing something and then being sucked away from it because time has caused me to move on in the story. Arghhh.

Alteast they added markers on the L1 map telling you your destination, without those, this game would be completely unplayable.

Anyway, play this at some point when it is on sale. It is not the best, but it is fun. Plus the aspect of kicking is quite humorous. I keep getting my butt beaten by people I should not be kicking lol. Another issue I don't like is that for a big part of the game, you end up have two parties, one for your job and the other for when you are dismissed from it. I prefer one continuous, expanding party.

ssb

[RedCoKid]

Last week, I ordered the guide online direct from the publisher & got overnight shipping for $8. It was worth it. If I could've bought it at the same time as the game, I wouldn't have complained.

I've finished the human side of the storyline & will replay to see the other ending. I have to say, winning friendships & building a posse of 2 dozen hotties wasn't too bad.

[ssbomberman]

Last week, I ordered the guide online direct from the publisher & got overnight shipping for $8. It was worth it. If I could've bought it at the same time as the game, I wouldn't have complained.

I've finished the human side of the storyline & will replay to see the other ending. I have to say, winning friendships & building a posse of 2 dozen hotties wasn't too bad.

Question, when you replay, do your items and any bonuses carry over? I know friends do, but what else can I look forward too?

ssb

[RedCoKid]

Question, when you replay, do your items and any bonuses carry over? I know friends do, but what else can I look forward too?

ssb

I was planning to start over again tonight. From what I've read, you can keep certain items (feather, maybe EXP doubler), all skills, the friends list (but you must refulfill reqs to get them in your party), and your gold.

[Finch]

:D RedCoKid... <3<3<3<3<3<3

Also, a new dungeon opens up with extra hard bosses, including Jack's dad, some re-occuring Tri-Ace big boss, and a certain Valkyrie as recruitable a team member.


I wouldn't have liked it as much if there was more direction as to what to do. I enjoyed just wandering around. Once i got the hang of the world map, i was fine with anything the game threw at me. Even the lack of solid story somehow makes it more appealing. You pay more attention to the little things going on with a lot of characters instead of everything happening with just a few. It would've been nice if more characters played into the story but then we probably would've gotten another Chrono Cross situation. I got around 90 characters my first time through. I only cheated after i beat the game. Some of the recruitment requirements like having certain races or characters or character classes in your party are kind of obscure, but it's interesting figuring out some of them. :D The "blue suit", for example.

After beating the fairy story branch, it's pretty obvious they just ran out of time. It seems like the development team was only half-way done. The story just kind of trails off and the ending sucks bad. There are also quite a few unrecruitale characters and there's a ton of space on the map that remains covered by fog. All the same, Radiata's my favorite PS2 rpg and there have been quite a few greats. I rarely play rpg's much after i beat them, but i'm still going.

And... The sleeping thing could've used some work. It's a good idea and it works when you want to hurry things up, but there should've been something else to speed time up. It's really awkward when it's the only way to progress the story.