RPGCast – Episode 506: “Luigi Tries His Hardest”
We’re back from our mini-vacation and #JRPGJuly is in full swing. Now playing includes praise for Persona Q2, FF14, and Atelier Lulua. We’re also impressed with how everyone agrees in the feedback section. Now I must go find Chris and comfort him as he laments Marle.
Question of the Week
Which Direct Sequel did the worst to the characters from the previous game?
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I’m not sure about overall sales, but EarthBound Beginnings was at number 1 on the Wii U Virtual Console charts shortly after its release:
https://earthboundcentral.com/2015/06/earthbound-beginnings-rules-multiple-wii-u-sales-charts/
My answer for the Question of the Week is going to sound strange coming from me because of how much I love the game, and have defended from detractors in the past. However, I haven’t played very many games that have direct sequels now that I really think about it. Mostly I feeling nuetrally towards depictions of returning characters, or preferred them in a direct sequel. I much prefer how Tiz is treated and characterized in Bravely Second compared to Default, for instance.
But anyway, the game I least like what they did to the characters is Tales of Symphonia: Dawn of the New World. It’s more so because of how little they apparently changed in the two years between the games. They get no real development in DotNW, can’t level up, though they’re levels will increase at certain points in the story, and rely too much on old gags from the first game. I give the game a lot of slack for this and really don’t mind it. Dawn of the New World is Emil and Marta’s story, not the old cast of characters’ story. I absolutely adore those two as well. I do realize, though, that I would have been just as happy if they took Emil, Marta, and the other new characters in DotNW and placed it in a new setting, especially if the main duo’s romantic subplot is just as good. It didn’t need to be a sequel.
I wasn’t too crushed by the Utawarerumono news. You always have to prepared for that from JRPG series if platforms aren’t specified from the outset. Plus the Robotics;Notes news more than made up for it and there’s still Prelude to the Fallen to look forward to :3
And to clarify, Mages Inc/5pb. (Steins;Gate et al.) has nothing to do with Idea Factory/Compile Heart.
Since it was asked, Earthbound Beginnings never came out on the 3DS.
QotW: Strawberry Eggs took the most obvious answer, but I was a little perturbed about the handling of Lusamine in the Pokémon Ultra games compared to her Sun and Moon self. In Sun and Moon she was genuinely creepy and one of the few unredeemed villains in the series, while Ultra… not so much.
QOTW: My answer would be Metroid: Other M. While I enjoyed the gameplay, at some point I started to check out when the cutscenes would start playing as I hated the portrayal of Samus. Locking away her own suit upgrades just to satisfy Adam’s ego was one thing, but when she got sudden onset PTSD and broke down and cried like a baby as a newly reborn Ridley was about to attack her instead of just laying the 6th or 7th smackdown on him was my breaking point. And if I had to hear “the baby” one more time or watch another flashback cutscene of young Samus and Adam staring intensely at each other I was gonna puke.
I bought my Wii U to play two exclusive Wii U games: Paper Mario Color Splash and Earthbound Beginnings. I can’t recommend either game as a system seller to anyone else.
QoTW: Do book sequels to video games count? “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy” sci-fi book was adapted to a video game (among other media). The book “Mostly Harmless” is a sequel/finale that treats the original “Hitchhiker’s Guide” story and characters in the absolute worst possible way. Yes, even worse than Chrono Cross treats the story and characters of Chrono Trigger.
When author Douglas Adams was asked in an interview why “Mostly Harmless” trashes “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy” so thoroughly, he response was, “I just had a really terrible year.”
I finished the Dragon Quest XI postgame and platinum trophy for JRPG July! For the second half of JRPG July, I’m playing The Legend of Dragoon, and so far it’s good enough that I think it sat in my backlog a little too long.