LET'S DISCUSS...SUIKODEN!

post=151664

post=151662
What are you guys talking about? 4 was awesome. It had some of the best costume designs I've seen.

this was sarcastic... right?

Yes

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On a more serious note. I honestly did find some of the mini games in 4 quite fun. That's about it though.

post=151674
Lol. Bizarro Superman.

De gustibus non est disputandum.

Dragons sound like Elephants in the first one. Ha.

post=151670
I'm not being sarcastic.

4 is the only game in the series that is really worth playing besides the original. 2 is pretty mediocre, 3 is shit, 5 is barely passable, Tactics is abysmal, and Tierkreis might be one of the worst video games ever made.

We are wildly different people, then. I find IV to be the worst out of the lot. What did you find great about IV? Sailing around on a fucking boat at a blazing 5 MPH fighting flying fish or whatever for about a third of the game isn't exactly riveting. Elenor is probably the most boring tactician out of the entire Silverberg line, Troy was more or less a waste of a character, the Rune of Punishment was a wasted concept, the battle system was about the most boring out of all of them (you thought Suikoden had no variation on its battle characters? TRY SUIKODEN IV FOR THE SURPRISE OF YOUR LIFE), going from 6 to 4 characters at a time was completely unnecessary, the ship on ship battles were about as interesting and challenging as watching paint dry, and Snowe was an alright character, for the entire 3 hours that you see of him in the game.

Yeah, unlike all those other Suikoden games with... silent protagonists....

Funny as it is to say this, the dude from V was a better silent hero than dude from IV. At least V guy had reactions to his surroundings and situations through his body language. McDohl even had touches such as when he kneeled down to grab Gremio's cape after the...spore incident. II guy (Riou) had a ton of animations. What did IV guy have to put on the table as far as human behavior besides 'CONSTIPATED STARE'?

And how did you find II mediocre? I'm interested! The scene where they ambush Luca Blight alone is more interesting than any single solitary segment of the game that IV had to offer.

EDIT: Someone breaks down (some of) the flaws of IV better than I can.

This game's main problem is two-fold. The plot is unfocused and the gameplay is way to simplified.

Where the plot is concerned you have a main antagonist that never interacts with protagonist. By the time you reach the Giant Tree and meet Cray for the first time (for Lazlo) the text prompt really should just be "And you are..?"

There's also the whole aspect of having a True Rune that embodies atonement and forgiveness, a pretty cool concept, and then doing absouletly nothing with. What the hell is Lazlo atoning for? Being in the wrong place at the wrong time? Wanting to help his friend and mentor?

If they had added some sort of plot point where he was perhaps accidently responsible for the destruction of Iluya maybe, it could have worked much better. He'd have done something he needed forgiveness for. Yeah, technically he helped transport the Rune Cannon shells that were used, but it's a very weak connection.

As it is, he's just granted forgiveness for nothing in particular when he forgives Snowe. But that isn't all that well done either, Snowe is an annoying brat, yes, but he's not particulary bad. If we killed people simply for being annoying we'd have to get rid of most of GameFAQs.

It's another missed oppertunity, if they had added a trial scene where he completely betrays you it would have made more sense, yes he is still responsible for your exile but only by virtue of being a complete coward that likes to point fingers.

And that whole exile thing... what, you're gonna cast me out to sea to die because a guy that's generally considered the least trust worthy person in the country says I did something? And I don't even get to defend myself? Nice. And strange thing, they don't make any big deal out of forgiving Razril in general or Katarina for that event either.

And just why in the hell did Lazlo go up that tower in the first place? Other than for plot advancement? He has standing orders not to go near it, yet for no reason at all he goes up there. Could at the very least have thrown in a cutscene of Snowe going inside and then go after him.

Basically, this game has a lot of nifty ideas but ultimately they don't do anything with them.

post=151691
We are wildly different people, then. I find IV to be the worst out of the lot. What did you find great about IV? Sailing around on a fucking boat at a blazing 5 MPH fighting flying fish or whatever for about a third of the game isn't exactly riveting. Elenor is probably the most boring tactician out of the entire Silverberg line, Troy was more or less a waste of a character, the Rune of Punishment was a wasted concept, the battle system was about the most boring out of all of them (you thought Suikoden had no variation on its battle characters? TRY SUIKODEN IV FOR THE SURPRISE OF YOUR LIFE), going from 6 to 4 characters at a time was completely unnecessary, the ship on ship battles were about as interesting and challenging as watching paint dry, and Snowe was an alright character, for the entire 3 hours that you see of him in the game.

Suikoden 4 is great because it takes the Suikoden staples and really turns them on its head.

Snowe is the betrayal character. You're not supposed to like Snowe. Snowe's a dipshit and a twit, and he's got every personality trait imaginable to make you hate him. Subsequently, that's why he's a great. You're not supposed to like people, let alone friends, who betray you. Unlike the two games before that where we're supposed to somehow like or at least empathize with the Judas character (Jowy and Luc), Snowe is completely unlikable.

And yet, when you sit in final judgment of Snowe, it becomes an amazing immersion point. You, the player, get to genuinely decide if he lives or dies (I guess some sort of actual representation of why the hero has The Rune of Punishment). Of course, by that point, if you're hunting for Snowe, you've already made up your mind anyway.

I am unsure how people can complain about Hero 4's lack of expression/action, when Hero 2 is much more of a criminal in that regard. Whereas McDohl and Hero5 at least give the impression that they're reacting to their environment, Hero2 amounts to little more than a punching bag. From Nanami, to Jowy, to Shu, to even Viktor, Hero2 is, quite literally in some instances, dragged along for the ride. He's used and manipulated constantly by whoever wants to use him.

This is, of course, the deadly pitfall of using a silent protagonist. Rather than using the hero as its intended purpose -- that is, to draw out the qualities of the other characters with dialogue, backgrounds, and such -- he becomes an empty, shallow husk of nothing. A player fills in the blanks with what they think.

To wit: Hero 2 is rarely found without his overbearing sister. Of course, we learn how overbearing (and obnoxious) she is in her own right. Nanami being tethered to Hero 2 serves absolutely no purpose whatsoever, and contributes absolutely nothing to the character of Hero 2.

Whereas when Hero 4 gets exiled, Tal, Paula, Kenneth, or Jewel stow away on his boat for the ride. Regardless of who actually comes along, you learn, right from the getgo, that these are Hero 4's most loyal friends; that they'd be willing to exile themselves with complete uncertainty.

This is why McDohl, Hero4 and Hero5 work as protagonists, and Hero2 doesn't. The 3 bring out the character in others; whereas Hero2 doesn't.

Graham Cray made sense to me, even if his motivations are simplistic. He wants the Rune of Punishment to remember his child, and will do anything to get it; even manipulating an entire empire. The empire wants to be an imperial power and desires to expands its borders conquering small island nations even though Troy is not on board with the whole idea. Got it. Actually beats out whatever excuse fans can come up with Luc's randomly wanting to destroy the world.

Elenor is a tactician with, by far, the most character, even if her plans don't amount to more than "Fire a rune cannon at that." Her past is quite complicated (as most tacticians seem to be), but she never resolves herself to being sober. Unlike every other tactician (except maybe Caesar, I'm not quite sure, he's amazingly forgettable) who somehow resolves overcoming their past and their hangups with being the best tactician ever, Elenor wallows in her sorrows, even through to the end of the game.

Yeah, the most common complaints I hear are "Sailing is too slow" and "zomg 4 characters instead of 6 in battle wtf!", to which I reply: Use Viki if you hate it that much (or push R2 to sail faster), and complaining about the reduction of usable characters in party means that you actually want to use more characters than allotted, which in turn means that you like a decent number of characters. I find neither of these to be valid arguments.

My personal assumption is that, fans hate Suikoden 4 because it really mocks what they love about the other games. Suikoden 4 is hardly a serious story even with subject matter like war and revolution, and all of its characters are very easily definable and likable, right down to the silly Hawaiian shirt king Lino en Kuldes. Lines are drawn, war breaks out, allies are made, and at the end of the day, the good guys win. Simplicity is hardly a vice.

So when I say, "Suikoden 4 almost captures the magic of the original", that's what I mean. Characters and motivations are very clearly defined and consistent. The original game wasn't complicated, and neither was 4.

Suikoden 2 expands on the core principles from the original in terms of gameplay, and it really does work to the game's advantage. Nonetheless, outside of Luca Blight, the game completely flops.

All three of the protagonists are completely and utterly unlikable; I illustrated why earlier, and the entire game is dominated by these three people. This completely ruins the the entire game in of itself. Jowy in particular is one of the most inconsistent, ridiculous, and flimsy characters in videogamedom, further adding insult to injury. Moreover, I don't like being forced to feel a certain way about a character. I'm supposed to like Jowy, Nanami, and the hero, because the game tells me to? Fuck that shit.

The story tries to be much more in depth than its predecessor, and it winds up failing miserably. While I empathized with the rebellion army, I have no idea what the fuck Viktor and Flik are doing in Jowston or why they even care. North Window is empty and Warrior's Village is in the Toran Republic.

It's not all bad though, as Luca Blight is still one of the best villains I've ever encountered in a video game, and the battle versus Luca Blight is an amazing apex. The problem is, the game doesn't know what to do after Luca's death. Both sides conspired against him to bring him down, but continuing that would resolve conflict and thus end the game. Instead, the game continues to be drawn out with a flimsy Jowy at the head of Highland, with motivations that still elude me to this day.

So, tl;dr, S4 is great, S2 is not.

Yeah, the most common complaints I hear are "Sailing is too slow" and "zomg 4 characters instead of 6 in battle wtf!", to which I reply: Use Viki if you hate it that much (or push R2 to sail faster), and complaining about the reduction of usable characters in party means that you actually want to use more characters than allotted, which in turn means that you like a decent number of characters. I find neither of these to be valid arguments.

'Your ship is way too freaking slow' is definitely a valid argument. Being pigeonholed to use a certain gameplay feature to get around an especially shitty one is a valid blow to the game. I more or less taped my finger to the R2 button and it still felt like rolling through molasses. If nothing else, I thought they would have either made the ocean smaller, the islands bigger, or made the entire Island Nations in general be more like an El Nido setup rather than 'a few dots on the map'.

My personal assumption is that, fans hate Suikoden 4 because it really mocks what they love about the other games.

I dislike Suikoden IV because there's nothing about the game that compels me to like it over the others. The graphics and the environments? Nope, Suikoden III beats it in that category. The main villain? Nope, Luca Blight is more interesting than Troy and Graham put together. Great gameplay? Nope, the Skill System in III, and III's battle system in general, is actually the most in depth in all of Suikoden and I'm surprised they dumped it. II's and V's War System was leagues more interesting than IVs. The 'spore incident' with Gremio in I was probably one of the most emotional scenes in the whole series. What does IV have again?

It's just not...interesting. The machinations of an internal rebellion in the Scarlet Moon Empire was interesting. Nobility plotting against each other in the Falena Queendom was interesting. Seeing an alliance of several countries crumble and bicker, and eventually destroy themselves in the face of an invading kingdom was interesting (Suikoden II). So on and so forth.

However, watching the Kooluk Empire, a bunch of faceless, unexplored, unelaborated, uninteresting goons fumble over the equally uninteresting Island Nations with the force of a limp dick was not interesting. I can recall a bunch of memorable scenes from every Suikoden except IV. Even Suikoden III, which is really a bunch of STUFF MASHED INTO ONE NARRATIVE, has more interesting concepts than IV.

As a matter of fact, I think that's the perfect way to describe Suikoden IV; a limp dick. It just sort of meanders about, with nothing really striking about it.

Are... you seriously defending the fucking buddy system?!

Besides the stupid buddy system, yeah, Suikoden III's battle system was more interesting and meaty than any of the others.

Also if the internal strife of Kooluk in Tactics was worked into the plot of IV as opposed to Kooluk being some 'place I was supposed to give a shit about/who are these guys anyway', it would have been WAY more interesting. It's like the storyline of Tactics was a way of them going "oh wait my bad we're actually supposed to characterize our antagonists whoops"