Let's Play Suikoden 2!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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Classic
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Re: Let's Play Suikoden 2!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Postby Classic » Mon Jul 28, 2014 9:17 pm

F, if there's any True Rune that can just magic new true runes into existence, it's probably the halves of the Rune of Beginning.

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Blossom
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Re: Let's Play Suikoden 2!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Postby Blossom » Mon Jul 28, 2014 9:38 pm

But the Rune of Beginning is incomplete. That would be a pretty dramatical situation, where they have to choose which of them gets shivved so the rune reassembles and they can fix Nanami.

I prefer to think that the three of them just jumped Luc in a public toilet and kicked him until he gave up his. Then Suikoden 3 doesn't happen.
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nosimpleway
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Re: Let's Play Suikoden 2!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Postby nosimpleway » Mon Jul 28, 2014 10:27 pm

Making another true rune would also fuck with the gameworld's numerology, as 27 multiplies evenly into 108.

Maybe that's what they're doing on their long journey, though, sneaking into Harmonia or something and swiping a rune for Nanami. That way they can be bffs forever or until Hikusaak finds them and kills them.

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Re: Let's Play Suikoden 2!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Postby Thad » Mon Jul 28, 2014 10:33 pm

nosimpleway wrote:Image
But here's the rest of the scene. Huan asks Shu to come into his office. This is the indication that you've done everything right, but I left it out of this LP so far because I wanted to leave some surprise for the end. I'll understand if you wish to punish me for disloyalty.


Yeah, just this once the game has a good excuse for telegraphing its punches -- it's there to tell you you did everything right BEFORE you play the last several hours of the game to get to the ending.

Which is good, because I fucked it up a bunch of times. Suikoden 1 taught me the nasty habit of stripping characters' equipment off right before they leave or die, and I didn't realize that Suikoden 2 uses Nanami's Defense score (in addition to whether you got all 108 stars by the deadline, and, at least according to some walkthroughs, what you shout right before she's hit -- haven't tested that last one empirically) to determine whether she survives.

On the one hand, the game's pretty horrible about burying a permadeath so close to the end and not documenting how to prevent it. On the other, it at least gives you a confirmation when you do it right.

Compared to Suikoden 1 it's probably a wash. 1 doesn't tell you you can save Gremio and doesn't give you a detective to tell you how to fill in your party, but on the other hand it's a relatively short game and you're probably going to wonder, after that first playthrough, if it's possible to win the Teo/Pahn fight. 2 helps you collect all the stars, and if you played the first game you've probably already got a hunch that you can save Nanami, but you're still unlikely to do it right on the first playthrough and it's a much longer damn game to go through a second time.

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Blossom
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Re: Let's Play Suikoden 2!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Postby Blossom » Mon Jul 28, 2014 10:35 pm

I seem to recall there being a menu option you have like two seconds to select during the attack, which I think mattered? Saving Nanami is very precise, in any case.
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nosimpleway
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Re: Let's Play Suikoden 2!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Postby nosimpleway » Mon Jul 28, 2014 10:42 pm

It doesn't matter what you shout, as long as you shout it quickly. That's why I don't have a screenshot of Muteiu's text box options during that scene.

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Blossom
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Re: Let's Play Suikoden 2!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Postby Blossom » Mon Jul 28, 2014 11:11 pm

Ahh. I remember seeing a window and having it close on me before I finished reading what was there.
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nosimpleway
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Re: Let's Play Suikoden 2!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Postby nosimpleway » Mon Jul 28, 2014 11:47 pm

The options are "Look out!!!" and "Nanami!!!!".

It's one of those games where t h e t e x t c r a w l s a c r o s s t h e s c r e e n and you can hit the confirm button to make it all appear at once. But input text boxes print all the text at once, and hitting confirm chooses the first option. So the timing isn't an issue, as long as you can read faster than the text prints.

It happened a couple of times on this very LP, often leading to a plaintext "so I agree to do that" or "so we go to <next destination>" instead of a screenshot or a line of dialog getting transcribed.

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Re: Let's Play Suikoden 2!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Postby Friday » Wed Jul 30, 2014 3:05 am

Hmm.

Well, Jowy and Delita DO resemble each other, but I think Jowy's happy ending here undermines his character in a way that is never done to Delita. Delita is stuck in a thankless job where, despite being regarded as a hero, everyone who knows him hates him or is fucking dead by his own hand. He has to come to terms with what he's done. All that killing only got him a bitter harvest and a hollow, empty feeling that despite everything, despite literally becoming the King of the World, he can't bring back his sister. Jowy lucks out and avoids his destiny and gets Nanami back. (which is fine, I mean, I don't think his ending sucks, but I just think Delita's is more true to life.)

It still blows me away that they added that stinger scene in after the credits where Delita kills Ovelia. It's the last scene you see before the game cycles back over to the title screen, and it isn't a happy picture of friends standing under a tree. You were given that earlier with Ramza riding Chocobos with Alma, but that's not the scene the game goes out on, the ultimate summation of the theme. It's like the fucking ending to Chinatown, almost.

In any case, Suikoden 2 is an outstanding game and this was an outstanding LP. Thanks.
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nosimpleway
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Re: Let's Play Suikoden 2!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Postby nosimpleway » Wed Jul 30, 2014 8:32 am

The Suikoden series is a bit more optimistic than the Ogre series that spawned FFT.

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François
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Re: Let's Play Suikoden 2!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Postby François » Wed Jul 30, 2014 9:39 am

I can't say this LP exactly made me want to play the game (not that this has to be a goal of it), but I can certainly see what all the acclaim was about and that it deserves essentially every bit of it nonetheless. Smashing work, good chap.

In a way I'm not surprised that the sequels aren't so great. In part it's because following up on this is a hell of a tall order, but in the end it feels like some of its elements don't have any business working as well as they do even here, like so many of its systems are just this close to being a horrible mess. It's almost inevitable that follow-ups would drop the ball. That's what a series gets for taking chances, I suppose. Or for not taking enough afterwards, maybe. I mean, I don't know much about 3 and onwards but it would seem to me like it would be pretty typical of a big game company to try and replicate mechanics of 2 without making sure the heart that is the engine of the story is also present.

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Re: Let's Play Suikoden 2!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Postby Thad » Wed Jul 30, 2014 11:33 am

3 experiments too much -- it starts you off with a character select screen and gives you three heroes to choose from; you select one, play for a couple hours, then have to switch to one of the others. It goes on like this for the first 30 hours of the game.

It's not a bad mechanic (FF6 used it pretty well -- though it bears noting that FF6 introduced you to Terra, Locke, Edgar, and Sabin BEFORE splitting them up and making you choose which order you wanted to play their scenarios in) but the problem is that the first 30 hours are boring as fuck. The game doesn't get interesting until the three leads finally join up and declare common cause.

After that the game is really solid -- great new mechanics, compelling villain, good story with some nice twists -- but there's pretty much no way you're going to slog through 30 hours of crap waiting for it to get good unless you've got a tremendous amount of goodwill left over from the earlier games.

Which is just as well, really, because from a plot perspective Suikoden 3 is the only main-series game that doesn't stand on its own. Better to weed out all the people who didn't play the first two games, because otherwise they'd reach the biggest plot development in the game and find it had no meaning or emotional resonance for them.

There's also the problem that it's an early PS2 RPG, which means there are a whole lot of dull browns everywhere.

4...4 has some interesting ideas (prequel; you have a giant seafaring ship instead of a castle) but it never even remotely begins to gel. The characters are boring (though I quite like Eleanor, the Bitter Alcoholic Silverberg Great-Grandma), the combat is lousy and far too frequent, and the overworld is a big empty ocean like Wind Waker.

5 benefits from being less experimental than 3 or 4 and returns to similar story and mechanics of the first two games, but the downside is that it all feels so rote and perfunctory. And there are mechanical issues that drag it down from being an enjoyable, if not particularly groundbreaking, game: combat is way too frequent while simultaneously being really, really easy and boring.

(I sure am using the word "boring" a lot to describe 3-5. I could probably use a thesaurus, but you get the point.)

5's constant random encounters never felt challenging, only tedious. (Tedious! There's a synonym.) I've said before that I only ever saw a Game Over screen twice: once due to a Luca Blight-style multi-party battle where I was forced to use characters outside the core group I'd kept leveled up, and once in an Ogre Battle-style army battle where the game design fucked me and my defeat of an enemy unit caused it to "retreat" forward directly on to the Instant Win square.

I think I got up near the end in both 4 and 5 and just gave up. I think that in both cases the encounter rate just wore me down.

And then there are some side games that aren't part of the main series; a couple got US releases and of the ones that didn't, all but one have fan translations. I haven't played any of those, just the 5 numbered games.

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nosimpleway
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Re: Let's Play Suikoden 2!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Postby nosimpleway » Wed Jul 30, 2014 7:46 pm

I like 1 when it was new and 2 remains, despite its numerous flaws and apparent age, one of my favorite games. 3 was so dull and 4 so actively terrible that I never played 5. That... really should tell you something about 3 and 4.

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Re: Let's Play Suikoden 2!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Postby Thad » Wed Jul 30, 2014 8:30 pm

5 was okay. It might be worth playing, if there's a cheat out there that'll reduce the encounter rate.

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