How's your backlog?

All other video games not related to the main farming series - Pokemon, Stardew Valley, My Time at Portia, and other indie-developed games.
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RopeMaidenKirie
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Kikki wrote: The Backlog Blitz has certainly worked to keep me from buying stuff I don't REALLY want. Basically if I'm not wanting to play it as soon as I get it, I don't buy it, any more...because I don't want to see that backlog stacking up. So I'm always wondering if the game is worth that +1 I'm going to have to report. It's been a good thing :)
Glad to hear it! It's really curbed my unnecessary game purchases, and like you I try and and only buy games which I'll play immediately. It's also helped a lot with saving money, because by the time I get to a game after it's been out for awhile, I can usually get a pretty good deal on it for the most part. It's pretty nice!

I especially keep in mind not to buy a bunch of long RPGs one after another, because one always goes on the backburner forever lol

Bluie wrote:I got bored and made a backloggery. :P

https://backloggery.com/Bluie

It's pretty much only for my Switch. I didn't realize how many Switch games I wanted until I filled up the wishlist section. This year is STACKED for me, and it's not even E3 yet! What I mainly want from E3 is Fire Emblem. Anything else is just the icing on the cake. Pokemon would be cool, but I'm not gonna get too antsy about it. FE though, gimmie.

(I'd also take a port of Tokyo Mirage Sessions. I can dreaaaam).
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Ronin19
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I finished Ni No Kuni 2 yesterday! I've been working on the remaining side quests and I have one left! Once I'm done with it I'm heading back to Mass Effect 3 to finish up those files. I need Champion's Buttons for this quest; stupid RNG isn't giving them to me in this dungeon!
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Ronin19 wrote:I finished Ni No Kuni 2 yesterday! I've been working on the remaining side quests and I have one left! Once I'm done with it I'm heading back to Mass Effect 3 to finish up those files. I need Champion's Buttons for this quest; stupid RNG isn't giving them to me in this dungeon!
How did you like Ni No Kuni 2? I'm thinking of snagging it for PS4 but didn't play the first one. Do you need to play the first one to understand the second one?

Backlog currently is BoTW, Mario Odyssey, Digimon World: Next Order, Dragon Age Inquisition, Tales of the Abyss. I have a time of Steam games to finish but I'm having trouble getting past the mindset of 'ugh I have to learn new mechanics.' I want to try Pyre because it looks super interesting.

I picked up Tales of the Abyss again while on a work trip (3DS rpgs are great for flights). So far I like the story more than most of the characters, but I also understand from spoilers I'm not far enough yet for the interesting stuff to hit. The difficulty spike with boss fights is notttt funnnn though, ugh. I'm fighting Legretta now and she's wiping the floor with my team. Time to grind... :(
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You have absolutely no need to have played White Witch to play Revenant Kingdom...so go ahead with Ni No Kuni II with no worries :) (And I can't speak for Kirie or Ronin, the others in this thread who've been through the game so far, but in my books, it was great fun. The story and characters are not very unique, but they are charming, so it doesn't really matter much. Loved the kingdom-building.)

I liked Abyss in theory but could never get very far into it as the story just didn't pick up fast enough for me to get interested before I got bored with trying. I liked Luke's spoiled-boy whining...that kind of character entertains me as they're always in to be smacked around by life before the story is through :) Sadly, Abyss ended up on my 'Abandoned' list. :(
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Thanks, Rope! Added you back~

Man, I am adoring Atelier Lydie & Suelle. I haven't had this much fun with the series since Escha & Logy (there's three games between these two titles). I was hoping to have it finished before Tuesday, ready to give my full attention to Penny Punching Princess, but thaaaats not gonna happen, at all. I think i'm maybe halfway through? Wish I could check my playtime on the Switch but uh, the save screen says 80 hours, and I know that's totally wrong. It won't be for another 3 days or so until my user page tells me playtime.

Annnnd I need to prep for the new Splatfest at the end of next week. I am gonna get ALL the seasnails I can. Holy heck, I need them so bad.
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Ronin19
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Kikki wrote:You have absolutely no need to have played White Witch to play Revenant Kingdom...so go ahead with Ni No Kuni II with no worries :) (And I can't speak for Kirie or Ronin, the others in this thread who've been through the game so far, but in my books, it was great fun. The story and characters are not very unique, but they are charming, so it doesn't really matter much. Loved the kingdom-building.
Kikki is correct; no need to play the first one to understand the second one. I had a ton of fun with it. Out of the four new games I've gotten this year, it's my GotY right now. It's only comparing to Digimon Hacker's Memory, Radiant Historia, and Detective Pikachu, but it's great fun. I definitely loved it more than the first one.
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Kikki wrote: I liked Abyss in theory but could never get very far into it as the story just didn't pick up fast enough for me to get interested before I got bored with trying. I liked Luke's spoiled-boy whining...that kind of character entertains me as they're always in to be smacked around by life before the story is through :) Sadly, Abyss ended up on my 'Abandoned' list. :(
Thanks Ronin and Kikki! Good to know, I'll definitely check Revenant Kingdom out!

I read spoilers because Luke was grating, and his story IS interesting, but I think I'm starting to be in the same boat you're in, Kikki: it's not picking up fast enough to be super interesting. Also every time I play I'm like 'man I miss the Tales of Symphonia' :lol: Even the characters I like in Abyss (which is like... Tear and that's it?) still feel way too anime to me. They don't feel like they're acting in line with their personalities, they just feel like a bunch of hams that hit on specific anime stereotypes ('ha ha, the female character can't cook!' :roll: ). I also reeaaaallly dislike how they handle Guy's phobia. I have a phobia and people sometimes act the way the other characters respond to Guy and let's just say I avoid folks who act like that at all costs. :mrgreen:

...yeaaaa I might abandon this game, haha. Too much grind, not enough pay off.
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RopeMaidenKirie
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Bluie wrote:
Man, I am adoring Atelier Lydie & Suelle. I haven't had this much fun with the series since Escha & Logy (there's three games between these two titles).
After my backlog is clear I'd like to try an Atelier game; would you recommend this one to a beginner? I know they usually go in trilogies, but I only have a Vita/Switch/PS4 so it might limit some of the older ones that were on the PS3.
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RopeMaidenKirie wrote:
Bluie wrote:
Man, I am adoring Atelier Lydie & Suelle. I haven't had this much fun with the series since Escha & Logy (there's three games between these two titles).
After my backlog is clear I'd like to try an Atelier game; would you recommend this one to a beginner? I know they usually go in trilogies, but I only have a Vita/Switch/PS4 so it might limit some of the older ones that were on the PS3.
I'd recommend Atelier Rorona Plus (Vita and PS3) or Atelier Ayesha (Regular version on PS3, Plus version on Vita) as they're kinda considered the entry points to the series. Rorona is very slice of life - you're trying to make your Atelier popular and you'll do so with your friends you already have and make. Ayesha is a little darker, you go on a journey to find your sister who's been kidnapped by some otherworldly being, and you'll be helped by those you meet on the way. Both are alchemy heavy and have time limits (iirc, it's 3-4 years to accomplish your goals).

With that being said, every game can be played without playing any of the previous entries (trilogies or not), with previous characters showing up as cameos, making references to previous game events, but they're not a super coherent story or anything. Just cute girls (and occasionally a boy) doing alchemy for various reasons/goals.

I'd say the two best games mechanics wise are Escha & Logy and Lydie and Suelle. E&L ironed out all the issues from the previous entry, has an awesome battle system (very similar to FFX where you can switch out at any time), and the narrative is probably the best in the series. L&S is the most recent game, and it's very lax, letting you do as you please for as long as you like, but also having a lot of fun with the cast and mechanics (new and old). I'd say the only downside is there's no english dub in L&S which is a deal breaker for some, but imo, only one of the JPN VA's is overdone, everyone else is fine. (I've also played all the games exclusively with JPN audio so I have a bias lol).

I wouldn't recommend Totori (my personal favourite, but hasn't aged well), Meruru (the characters and motivations are the worst in the series), and Shallie (very boring, feels rushed).

The Mysterious Trilogy (Sophie, Firis, Lydie & Suelle) are available on Steam, PS4, Vita and L&S have a Switch port instead of Vita. They're the easiest to acquire. You could start with Sophie and see how you like it, but I feel like they didn't get the feel they were going for until Lydie & Suelle.

If you have any questions about a specific Atelier, I could give you all the details you need. I'm pretty passionate about the games (LOL AS YOU CAN SEE) and GUST in general. I've played every localized entry except the PS2 titles. I never had a PS2... :p
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You know, I own Rorona Plus (got it about when it was released, I think) and I played the start and then just...never went on with it. Not because of something wrong, as far as I remember, the graphics were even pretty cute and none of the characters I met were irritating or anything like that. I just never really got a feel for what it was about and was quickly distracted by games that grabbed me faster. I more or less just didn't know what I was doing. I even looked at a walkthrough to see what it was all about but even the walkthrough confused me and left me unsure what I was actually supposed to do. Seems like you can get different endings based on things you make, how well you make them, how good of friends you are with people...I got too confused.

Plus I realized I was on a time limit of sorts and I cannot stand being on a time limit because it makes me feel like I can't afford to mistakes or go at my own pace. Even though for all I know, that time limit might be super generous. Just the fact that there IS one puts me on edge. (I couldn't play Majora's Mask, either, though I tried. It made me feel stressed out.) Add that to the fact that I couldn't get a feel for how to play and I got stress.

I still think the Atelier games look really cute but I think I have a better chance of playing through Lydie & Suelle if it doesn't have a time limit than I do of trying to pick Rorona back up even though I've already got that one. Feels like a waste to do that, though. I should at least boot it up once more just to see if I can figure it out better this time. I didn't like RF4 the first time I played it because I couldn't figure out what I was supposed to do (or what was possible or what I wanted to do, I guess) and when I tried it again it was suddenly one of the best games I had ever played, so I really ought to try it again. It's just that I'd be going on willpower to begin with, lol.
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^Sophie doesn't have a time limit either. I might have sounded a bit too harsh with Sophie in my previous post. It's a very character driven game, and I do still like it (it has my favourite opening in the whole series + my favourite character designs), but coming off of the gem that was Escha & Logy, it felt very lacking. Each time Gust starts an Atelier Trilogy, they try to make it different, more unique than the last three to both keep it fresh and draw a new audience.

If you're an Atelier nut like me, it felt like a downgrade, but to first timers (or those who only played an entry here or there) it was fine and they liked it for the most part. I am happy that my two favourite characters from Sophie are back in Lydie & Suelle, seemingly they're going to get their stories wrapped up (though i'm slightly bummed they aren't playable!).

Firis, however, does have a time limit. And I've been told that the very end of Lydie and Suelle has a small time limit, but if you've been playing like me, whatever is required in said time limit will probably be super easy to do, thus making it kinda useless. I think they're trying to please both the fans of the time limit and fans that don't care for it.
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It seems like a game I'd want a walkthrough for with different endings depending on crafting/assignments/friendship levels/triggering the right things at the right time...or something like that. But I've looked walkthroughs up and they really made me more confused, lol...they were so basic I didn't have enough to go on. And I'm not the type who wants to play a game ten times to get through all the endings unless it's my favourite game ever.

I even saw that certain characters become available at certain points or are no longer available at certain points so in some cases you have to hurry to make friends with them enough to get certain endings or something, and I just couldn't convince myself that I wasn't stressed out, figuring out how to play the game 'right'. Unless it is SUPER short, I'd most likely only want to play it once or twice, so I wouldn't want to play 'wrong' and not get the ending I like most the first time, if that makes any sense. I'm not sure if what I'm saying applies to all of the games but it seems like it did to Rorona Plus, at least going by the scanty and lacking-in-details walkthroughs I managed to find.

It's a game I'd like to play if I could figure out how to do it properly (I'm not the type who has fun 'just playing', I have to play PROPERLY, lol). I might give Lydie and Suelle a go though and mess about since there's no time limit (or at least not for the bulk of the game).
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Kikki wrote:It seems like a game I'd want a walkthrough for with different endings depending on crafting/assignments/friendship levels/triggering the right things at the right time...or something like that. But I've looked walkthroughs up and they really made me more confused, lol...they were so basic I didn't have enough to go on. And I'm not the type who wants to play a game ten times to get through all the endings unless it's my favourite game ever.

I even saw that certain characters become available at certain points or are no longer available at certain points so in some cases you have to hurry to make friends with them enough to get certain endings or something, and I just couldn't convince myself that I wasn't stressed out, figuring out how to play the game 'right'. Unless it is SUPER short, I'd most likely only want to play it once or twice, so I wouldn't want to play 'wrong' and not get the ending I like most the first time, if that makes any sense. I'm not sure if what I'm saying applies to all of the games but it seems like it did to Rorona Plus, at least going by the scanty and lacking-in-details walkthroughs I managed to find.

It's a game I'd like to play if I could figure out how to do it properly (I'm not the type who has fun 'just playing', I have to play PROPERLY, lol). I might give Lydie and Suelle a go though and mess about since there's no time limit (or at least not for the bulk of the game).
IIRC, The only character who has big availability issues in Rorona is Gio (and he's the only one who's ending I never got LOL). The easiest ending to shoot for in Rorona is Liona's or Tantal's as they're readily available as soon as you unlock them + their ending requirements are just seeing all their events, and that's pretty easy.

In the Arland and Dusk trilogies, to get character endings (or the normal ending) you just stick people in your party and travel a lot with them - doing so raises their friendship. Their events will naturally pop once you reach a certain friendship % (as seen on their party stats) or as the story progresses. If you manage to achieve the requirements for a normal ending (ie: play the game and do all the goals given to you), then you'll either get the option of a character ending, or you'll be locked into whoever has the highest friendship with the protag.

The Mysterious trilogy is kinda mixed bag. Sophie only has one ending, Firis has 10 (Character endings + Normal and True), and Lydie & Suelle has 4 (Normal, True, and two misc endings).

You usually can't get the True Ending in the first playthrough. Your NG+ lets you keep your equipment, money and other misc things to make the next playthrough quick and painless so you can get a better ending or work towards a really hard one (like Rorona's millionaire ending, oof). I played through Totori four seperate times, getting better endings with each playthrough, and each playthrough shorter than the last.

It's really up to your playstyle. If you're just wanting to do one playthrough, then it's best not to stress and focus on one character you like in Rorona if you get back to it.
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I suppose that's true...that should be a simple way to go about it. Pick one appealing character, find out what their ending requirements are, and go for just that. It seems that you can have a Bad, Normal, Good or True ending, (not to mention weird things like 'Pie' endings and 'Adventure' endings...I won't pretend to know what those are, or if they tie in with the other endings or stand alone) and that each of those has one or two character endings possible with them, which I don't totally understand, but I could at least just keep one character's requirements in mind and aim for them. :)

Though honestly, if any game can ever end in pie, what other ending could possibly be acceptable? I want today to have a Pie Ending.
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LOL.

Rorona's character quirk is she loves to make and eat pies. There's a ton of them to make (and you have to make all of them to get the pie ending). The Plus version of the opening even ends with her making a pie for all the girls. IIRC, she even has a special animation for using pies in battle, scarfing them down while everyone else just gets the heal animation.

Be warned though, that pie ending isn't very easy! Some of the ingredients for the late game pies are really hard to come by.


(PS - I'm sorry I derailed the backlog thread into an Atelier gush session.)
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