Ushi No Tane Forum

Oh, yeah. Preorders. I still haven't put mine in yet, I'm waiting for a confirmed release date. I don't think XSEED has announced one formally yet, but it shouldn't be much longer. Amazon says February 16th, which I believe is a placeholder/ideal target date.

I'm going to be super sad when this and FE:Fates both hit in the same timeframe, aren't I?

^Ahahaha.... yeah, we're doomed.

If its anything to go by Xseed's Trails of Cold Steel had a placeholder in November and it came out December instead. Tom hasn't mentioned any major setbacks or anything to hinder the game's release (that I can recall anyways) but as they were originally aiming for December 2015, its pretty sure to say January-March are all fair game for it's release window.

Confirmed for EU/AUS, dual audio absolutely confirmed, but digital only for PAL.

Digital only and only in english apparently. It's sad that the better games from the Bokujou Monogatari series, the spinoffs such as Rune Factory and this game, only get limited releases and usually only in english in Europe, hindering their chances of widescale success in that area. And instead, localization efforts are only made on the now mediocre main line games.

Ugh. The main Bokujou Monogatari line of games has lost all appeal to me, having dropped down into mediocrity with artificially-swollen gameplay lengths in the form of uninteresting and unending game chores and tasks. It's sad to see the much better looking spinoffs get second class treatment when they are leagues above the main Monogatari games.

BrokenHearted wrote:Digital only and only in english apparently. It's sad that the better games from the Bokujou Monogatari series, the spinoffs such as Rune Factory and this game, only get limited releases and usually only in english in Europe, hindering their chances of widescale success in that area. And instead, localization efforts are only made on the now mediocre main line games.

Ugh. The main Bokujou Monogatari line of games has lost all appeal to me, having dropped down into mediocrity with artificially-swollen gameplay lengths in the form of uninteresting and unending game chores and tasks. It's sad to see the much better looking spinoffs get second class treatment when they are leagues above the main Monogatari games.

Assuming you're talking about Rune Factory 4, the extra delay and digital only format had everything to do with Neverland declaring bankruptcy before the localization rights were sold to a company that has distribution rights in the PAL region. The fact that Marvelous EU does apparently have those distribution rights, and is owned by the same parent company as XSEED (who did the English localization), got it onto the eShop through some tricky loopholes, but otherwise there was zero way it was going to happen. They went out of their way, above and beyond the call of duty to make it happen, including getting programmers to touch another company's game.

It is fine if you no longer like Bokujō Monogatari as it is now, and you're certainly not alone in that opinion, but this is a PoPoLoCrois game, not a BokuMono spin-off. (Sorry, Bluie! You're a saint for reading this for the millionth time despite this info being in the OP!) The "Story of Seasons" stuff is somewhere between 95% to 100% optional from what I've been lead to believe from Tom's (lead translator) posts on the Marvelous/XSEED forums and from other importers. Yes, the story of Return to PoPoLoCrois is thematically appropriate for a crossover, and yes, you can get neat bonuses from doing the side quests (aka farming and socializing), but you can play through the game's story without touching it. (If there is a required farming or socializing tutorial, I haven't heard of it, but that's providing the margin of error.)

I do not know, nor claim to know, what the Marvelous EU situation now is, but I know for a fact that the Japanese parent company (now just called Marvelous or Marvelous AQL iirc) has been trying to keep all their in-house stuff actually in-house whenever possible. There are a million articles on the Internet that mention this, because it was the reason they gave for taking BokuMono back from Natsume/Rising Star and rebranding it as Story of Seasons to localize it and publish it overseas through Marvelous USA, also known by the name XSEED Games. Because of this, and maybe the fact of limited operations/partner companies in EU at the moment, they may not be able to provide multiple language translations or physical games from time to time? Or perhaps this game didn't sell well enough in Japan to warrant a heavier investment? (I see 46k for opening week, 9.2k increase in the second week, almost 5k on the third, and so on, on Media Create, so it did okay, but nowhere near Story of Seasons numbers...) That's just my speculation, and I'd be happy to hear an official reason (though mostly companies won't give one for various PR or legal reasons).

The reason(s) that SoS got a physical release in PAL regions was probably a combination of giving it to NoE to publish, and the fact the game has sold well in Japan and NA.

The pro of this self-publishing move is that EU/AUS are going to be getting either a simultaneous or near simultaneous release with NA, instead of having to wait longer, which is a frequent complaint I see from EU and AUS fans. The cons are digital-only, and apparently English-only, although there is a dual-audio track of English and Japanese. I've watched a bit of the game on a Let's Play channel (enough to get a sneak peek without ruining the game for myself, I hope), and there is a surprising amount of voice work.

(its cool Arcy, i'm getting desensitized to those not reading.)

Another thing to note on the no physical, it is expensive for any company to manufacture physical copies of a niche game, and its common in NA just as well in EU. PoPoLoCrois is super niche over here in general with only one of the game being localized before this upcoming title.

The mainline series has gained a huge following over the years and it makes sense to manufacture physical copies because they're going to sell. But this? Its a gamble, a huge, huge gamble. In Japan, where PoPoLoCrois is well known, not so much.

So, it (mostly) boils down to regional preferences and whether theres money to be made. Xseed are saints as they are niche publishers and always endeavour to get physical releases out if they can despite how niche the game is.

Ive just come to accept that a lot of my favorite series on my favorite consoles are going to be digital only outside of Japan or have tiny overpriced limited edition runs. Thats just how it is. I'd much rather get to play the game in my region then see my favorite publishers lose money for over compensating a game they know isn't going to sell millions of copies.

Thats just my two cents.

Arcy wrote:

dandy420 wrote:It looks really cute but lack of gender options and lack of marriage really dampens my excitement for it. I might pick it up but probably won't be any time soon.

I'm curious why people expect this in a PoPoLoCrois game, so let me ask you a couple of questions... Have you played a game in the series (PoPoLoCrois) before? Are you familiar with the manga or anime?

PoPoLoCrois isn't exactly a well known title in the West. I know nothing about the franchise. All I saw was "Story of Seasons" and just assumed it'd followed the basic structure with aesthetic changes mostly.

I didn't even know about this series until now, I wasn't aware it was a crossover when I first heard about the game.

I just finished watching the E3 gameplay demo, the EU trailer, some journal entries in miiverse community, and the latest localization blog posted at XSeed tumblr. The characters look cute and the battle looks interesting! Though I never good at grid & position stuffs, it looks neat & quite easy to pick up The farming aspect look interesting too, I do wonder if the synthesized items include some interesting effects or not.

This year has many anticipated games, hopefully I can get this game on the release or after a few weeks :D

New Localization blog by Tom:
http://xseedgames.tumblr.com/post/13692 ... of-seasons
That first gif... And the dialogue of White Knight slays me.

It's good to hear Tom talk about his experiences with the series. It's good to hear really. He seems so enthusiastic about this game. Although there is one thing that caught my eye...

Next time, I’ll fill you in on what you can expect from it feature-wise, as we have quite a few exciting things left to reveal. Some of them have been mentioned elsewhere, but at least one has never been publicly unveiled, and it’s something rather unconventional that I’m super-duper psyched for, so I’m looking forward to sharing it with you all soon. (And yes, a firm release date will be announced in the near future too; we’re just getting all our ducks in a row first, so that when we finally do give you guys a date, you can trust in that date, without having to worry about it getting delayed or anything!)

I wonder... Is it that "tri-audio" thing? Or does XSeed have something else up their sleeve...? Huh, things to ponder.

Of course the man waits until I fall asleep to release this awesome hype nugget, there's an EU version of the standard trailer attached to that blog, too, which is so cute to see again.

His enthusiasm for the series is contagious!

Gah, Tom's enthusiasm for PoPoLoCrois is so adorable. Its like he's fulfilling his life long childhood dream and he wants to tell the world!

his all may not sound like much, but what I’m trying to get at here is that Return to PopoloCrois has what a lot of other modern RPGs sorely lack: true, honest-to-goodness heart. So many games these days rely upon convoluted meta-narratives to drive the plot forward, along with edgy protagonists and – if there’s real romance at all (which there sadly isn’t much of the time) – over-the-top sexual innuendo or tension. This can result in a good story, sure, but it often feels a bit “paint-by-numbers,” utilizing media trends to appeal to a wider audience even when they’re not really appropriate to the story. Rarely do modern games have “Awwww!” moments anymore, or bring tears to your eyes, or make your heart skip a beat.

AINT THIS THE FREAKING TRUTH, HOLY « Puppy Doodoo ». I can literally only think of maybe two games in the past 5 years (because I can only remember so far back haha) that have literally given me "Awww!" moments and brought me to tears. Sure, plenty of games have given me the feels or have given me a few laughs, but rarely does one have heart that keeps me coming back and gets me excited at the mere mention.

Theres a huge difference between "Oh you're playing <gamename>? I liked that game." and "HOLY « Puppy Doodoo », DID YOU JUST SAY <gamename>!? ARE YOU PLAYING IT? I LOVE IT AND I HOPE YOU LOVE IT TOO!"

And the fact that I can latter to two games, maybe three, is really kinda sad.


ANYWAYS, I'M EVEN MORE EXCITED NOW. ADD MORE COAL TO MY HYPE TRAIN. CHOO CHOO!

I was so convinced not to get it, cos I usually stay far away from games with random encounters, but somehow I keep coming to this thread and the hype gets me

*LaI* wrote:I was so convinced not to get it, cos I usually stay far away from games with random encounters, but somehow I keep coming to this thread and the hype gets me

I'm not 100% sure, as it has been a while since I watched the Let's Play, but I think there may be options to change the encounter rate and/or difficulty level, so hopefully you can set it at a more welcoming level.

Arcy wrote:

*LaI* wrote:I was so convinced not to get it, cos I usually stay far away from games with random encounters, but somehow I keep coming to this thread and the hype gets me

I'm not 100% sure, as it has been a while since I watched the Let's Play, but I think there may be options to change the encounter rate and/or difficulty level, so hopefully you can set it at a more welcoming level.

There is an encounter rate slider! Here's an interview with Tom about that...
Interview here
And then here's a bit more on the subject...

It's also a random encounter system, but a lot of Japanese players felt that the encounter rate was a little too high in the original version, so there's actually a slider in place now, where you can choose to play with 100%, 50%, or 25% of the normal encounter rate. There's also an additional 'King mode' for harder difficulty, which definitely adds to it a lot.

They're really giving us all the options... On top of the "tri-audio" thing, the encounter slider, the skip-able battle animations, it makes me wonder what Tom was alluding to in his newest blog. There's already so much!

He never "confirmed" dual or tri audio (and Marvelous Europe only confirmed dual, not triple), just said they were going to try to do it, but my money is on either a preorder feelie or a LE for NA. Or a release date that is sooner than expected.