Famitsu White Knight Chronicle score (29/40)

[Euphoria14]

mrstickball said:

Euphoria14 said:

@Mr. Stickball

If you truly appreciate what the SaGa team brings to the table in terms of combat style and just like me enjoy the fact that they at least always try something new, do yourself a favor and try some of their older titles like SaGa Frontier 1 & 2 and the Romancing SaGa series.

All games that have recieved very harsh reviews yet offer more than enough enjoyment, regardless of their technical issues.

It just pains me to see games ignored for the wrong reasons. I myself am still waiting for my copy of TLR to come in from Gamefly. I am glad some people here appreciate this team like I do and ignore what reviewers think, because their opinions are just that, their opinions.

I'll have to try the SaGa series if I get access to a decent PS2.

And I agree, it sucks to see games missed for the wrong reasons. Back when I started playing JRPGs, I was one of the few people to bother owning them. Look back in VGC data to the SNES years, and see how largely the 'golden age of JRPGS' was missed out on by the masses.

How many people bought Chrono Trigger? FFVI? SMRPG? Ogre Battle: MotB? Go look at E-Bay to see the insane prices that the games fetch. Why? Because few people bought those JRPGs, and once FFVII came out, JRPGs became 'cool' to like, and began to become popular in the West.

I play JRPGs because I enjoy them. That's why I own copies w/ boxes of most every great SNES JRPG - FFIII (US name), Chrono Trigger, Secret of Mana, Secret of Evermore, Lufia, Breath of Fire series, RoboTrek, and a few others. I also played virtually every decent JRPG ever made in the US. I think the only one I didn't play when it was out was Brain Lord.

So when a game like TLR comes along that does so much 'right' but has a few things glaringly 'wrong' such as technical issues (mainly pertaining to loading)...What am I to say about it? Technical issues don't stop be from enjoying a game - I'm not that much of an elitist. I grew up on JRPGs, so it's difficult to complain about loading issues, or frame rate drops because they rarely have an effect on gameplay.

So what do I do? I have to be honest about the game - if I like it or not. And I really like TLR. It's strategic, deep, fun, long, and certainly involved - with a helping of frame drops, technical glitches and a by-the-books storyline. I'm enjoying it more than 70% of the JRPGs I've played on the X360 - so how am I to score it?

I think, if you review something, enjoyment has to be a top priority. Why? So many games this generation are being awarded high scores for being technical masterpieces, but lack 'fun' - Grand Theft Auto IV is a great example of this. It's the most well-reviewed game in the X360 library, but after playing it for 10-15hrs...I haven't played it since (and I own it). So what am I supposed to do if I was to review GTAIV, which wasn't fun? Give it a 10 based on how large the game world was? How well it worked on the X360? Or base it on the fact that it's polished, but nowhere near as fun as Saints Row 2?

And DMJ, I won't base the quality of a game if it's a X360 game or not. I base it on looking through my back cataloge of 200+ video games and seeing where it matches up in the 'fun' factor. I'd rather take a game that is tons of fun like EDF2017 on Co-Op over Gears of War SP because single player was (for me) pretty boring. Is that a perfect review? No, but I'd tend to think that if your gonna pay $30+ for a new game, it better be enjoyable.

 

 

 You pretty sum up how I feel about JRPG's in a nutshell.

If you can grab hold of a PS2, or even a PS1 in this case (should be extremely cheap) I highly suggest picking up SaGa Frontier 1 & 2. Pick up 1 for the great battle system (Never had so much fun just running around getting into battles to absorb monster skills and Robo skills) and 7 different characters or 2 for an updated version of this system (1 is still better IMO) and an insane difficulty level. The strategic war styled battles you come across a couple times in SF2 really cause you to need to think, not to mention feel the need to rip your hair out. If you can complete this game in it's entirety you rightfully deserve to make a thread to boast in.

The art style in SF2 is gorgeous as well, especially for a PS1 title.

I would suggest avoiding Unlimited SaGa though, I try to act as if that game does not exist.