t3m3st

I bought my DS in anticipation for this game, had the game preordered and everything, but when I read the reviews, I cancelled. I'm a long long time Lunar fan, but the new gameplay features, like the 2 combat systems and the whole "running wastes HP" thing, and blowing in the mic to run, seem, well, stupid.

Has anyone tried this game? What did you think? Were you a fan of the Sega CD games or the PSX remakes?

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El Pollo

I love the Lunar series, but not enough to buy a DS for this game. I hadn't heard about these stupid gimmicks till just now, but it makes me feel better to know I'm not missing out on a great game. It's a shame, though.

YaWhateva

whoa, those new "features" sound lame. I loved the old lunars.

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hulk

Screw Lunar, get Advance Wars, and forget your troubles

AW, man, it's such an ebodiment of the ultimate DS game. Touch-screen strategy!

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"'There's a tendency among the press to attribute the creation of a game to a single person,' says Warren Spector, creator of Thief and Deus Ex."
-- From an IGN game review.

t3m3st

I got the DS the day Advance Wars Dual Strike came out. It was my first Advance Wars and it blew my mind. Radness overload.

Just got Castlevania instead of Lunar. So worth it. I'm just upset that the new Lunar sucks. The Silver Star remake is my all time favorite game. It's sad to see a series fall like that... YaWhateva summed it up with " "features" "

hang on hulk, you actually play AW with the touch screen? I find it annoying as hell!

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I do it for the rare drops

Reese

I dislike the gimmicky gameplay of the DS, some games like Nintendogs and Warioware have pulled it off but other games that throw in stupid stuff like this just because they can ruins the game, in my opinion.

I still have the Eternal Blue Complete 5 disk collection with a Pendant, Ghaleon puppet, and and mini standees that I bought the day it was released Great games, it sucks to hear about the DS version.

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hulk

C'mon, name one title that gimmicks up the DS, and forces you to use the touch screen. As far as I know, there's none. Splinter Cell, perhaps, but that was arse full stop.

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"'There's a tendency among the press to attribute the creation of a game to a single person,' says Warren Spector, creator of Thief and Deus Ex."
-- From an IGN game review.

hulk

Gimmicky gameplay? Honestly, have you sat down and actually played with a decent game? I can't think of one title that really 'gimmicks' up the DS. Sure, it's different, but it works and is also optional in many games, that hardly makes it a gimmick.

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"'There's a tendency among the press to attribute the creation of a game to a single person,' says Warren Spector, creator of Thief and Deus Ex."
-- From an IGN game review.

t3m3st

Only gimmick is the mic thing. That's just so they can say they use the mic.
The use of the touch screen is actually really good from what I'm told. Uses a PC like point and click movement system as well as d pad. Makes it more friendly to PC gamers. The "running wastes HP" is just trying to add realism, but who dies because they ran across a field? 2 combat systems sounds annoying. One gives you Exp for winning, the other gives items/money.

No, there's alot of crap out there for the DS. Alot of the games are fleshed out tech demos (the Yoshi one, name escapes me right now). And WarioWare? Both new WarioWares are ALL gimmick!

They're just learning how to use the screen effectively still. Touch screen was a great idea, but what has really surprised me has been the effective use of the second screen. I thought 2 screens would be stupid, but after experiencing it, mind change. Games like Trace Memory are paving the way to more intuitive gaming.

This isn't fanboy talk. I bought a PSP first. Right now the good portables seem to be coming out for DS though.

Gotta say, I miss the the days when there was only one portable to buy for.

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I do it for the rare drops

hulk

Hmm, in response to that:

The mic use has been limited for most games, purely because of it's nature. With Nintendogs, though, it work well, and the ability to use it for voice chat online is awesome.

Yoshi's Touch and Go was an experiment, true, but so are most launch titles. Super Mario 64 was much the same on the N64. Kirby's new game for the DS expands on the same technique, and does it much better than YT&G. So, it served it's purpose.

Calling Warioware gimmicky, too, is just silly. Have you ever played WW? The entire premise is based around microgames. Four seconds at a time is hardly enough for any particular one to be gimmicky.

As for the days of the one portable, well, Sony certainly livened things up. Think about it, they add primitive colour to the GameBoy, and they're on top. The add some more processor power, a few more colours and shoulder buttons and they have the GBA. Make the GBA a new shape, they had the SP. Add a screen, microphone, wireless, true 3D, touch screen, and you have the DS. It's a major jump, and very much thanks to Sony's presence.

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"'There's a tendency among the press to attribute the creation of a game to a single person,' says Warren Spector, creator of Thief and Deus Ex."
-- From an IGN game review.

t3m3st

WarioWare is all about gimmicks. It's not that it's a bad thing. I'm really looking forward to a WarioWare Revolution. It'll all be little gimmicks, stupid things to do with the controller. I'm buying it. It'll be one of the most influential games on the system as well. Companies will grab ideas from those microgames.

Your Yoshi-to-Kirby point proves what I was saying. They're learning how to use the hardware. Whenever there's new hardware, alot of what I call "half games" are released. Companies are inexperienced with the new hardware, and have to learn how to use it effectively. Games will come out that inspire other developers, they will take that concept, develop it furthere, and better games swing around.

I heard Square Enix gave Nintendo a call telling them that one of their people had a good idea for controlling a Basketball game. Then Nintendo was like "Make it". And so we will have a Mario 3 on 3 basketball game from the makers of Final Fantasy. If we respond well to it, maybe developers will take that a step further.


When I got PS2, I was all excited for Bungie's Oni. Oni was an incredible experience for me. It was the first time I played a game that combined a third person shooter with martial arts moves, and let you fight seamlessly with both techniques. I don't know if it was the first, but it was certainly PS2's first. Later games like Enter the Matrix, or maybe even Devil May Cry, took that further.


You're right about competition though. I'd forgotten. I had a Neo Geo Pocket Color back in 2000. Also had a Gameboy color. The NeoGeo was ages ahead of the GBC. GBC wasn't even comparible to the NES really, in terms of hardware. I remember being pissed at Nintendo for not even trying. And more pissed when the better piece of hardware flopped. GBA came out though, and for the last 4 years, it was alone in the portable marketplace as far as I and many others were concerned.

Edit: Rereading your post, hulk, I thought I'd clarify my last one. The mic use in the new Lunar is gimmicky. I haven't played Nintendogs (yet) but I've heard good things about the mic use. I think it was really put there for use in online multiplayer. That would be great, if bandwidth supports it. Better yet, the DS could be used as a wireless Voice over IP device, if a game company could use that in a game. Easier than whipping out the stylus in an online gameroom.

Not my kinda thing (anymore) but a Pokemon game that accepts voice commands would be brilliant. "Pikachu, thunder shock!" The kids would go nuts.

Blowing into the mic to run is just stupid though

this is a big edit...

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I do it for the rare drops

Reese

I'll accept that they're still learning how to use the hardware effectively and maybe that is the reason I feel that the use of the touchpad and mic seem gimmicky in some games. I think games that embrace the gameplay style of the DS like warioware, nintendogs etc are good games, but when they try to adapt existing console/portable gameplay to use the features of the DS "because they can" it's just silly and out of place.

Lunar does this with the blowing in the mic, Castlevania does it to a much less annoying extent by using the touch screen to seal bosses and a few other things, while it may not "ruin" the game, it definitely feels gimmicky.

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t3m3st

Sealing bosses was a pretty cool idea, in retrospect. I was annoyed at first, but I liked it. Removing ice blocks by touching them was moronic. I never used the stylus in CV, just my finger to seal bosses. Worked great.

I'm glad to see the return of adventure games to the ds. Also, AOE2 is on the way, something previously not possible. Touching can be good.

I just got Riviera: The Promised Land for GBA. It's an RPG/Adventure game, I'm gonna say. You don't get to walk around the map, just inspect stuff in the current screen and react to things that happen. I assume the story will change depending on my actions. Riviera is pretty good so far, and I've heard alot of good things. Much like this new Lunar, it plays with and changes the conventional console RPG formula. Riviera seems a little Lunar inspired too, I think. I'm glad I got this instead. Riviera and Lunar tried to be different than every other RPG than has been produced since the SNES era (which I consider to be the era that really developed the genre). Lunar just got lost along the way. After so many years, it's probably not even the same dev team anyways.

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I do it for the rare drops