Rift

[Eskay]

See, on the surface, Awakening seemed like a really good game. However, the 'convenience' of the pairing up system would quickly become a necessity to actually play the game, as they gave enemy units really ridiculous status to compensate. This resulted in a lot of characters becoming useless, particularly the dancer and healer type characters, as using them would have forced me to forego using someone who can actually cause damage. Which is a pity, because the dancers are among my favorite units to use in previous installments.

But all of the balance issues really don't matter once you discover that you can solo THE WHOLE GAME with the Tactician, the most unbalanced shitstorm in all of FE history. The only reason I even bothered with any of the other characters was because I was literally willing myself to go for all of the little kidlets (who, aside from Tacticians kids are all not worth the effort, as Tacticians kids are also broken little shitlets.)

I'm not saying that Awakening was terrible- in fact, I thought it was refreshing that the developers took the time to put all of the coolest features of the FE franchise into one nice little package. The balance issues, however, force you to exploit the few advantages that are granted to you to a degree that it makes the game laughably easy. If you don't, the game becomes impossible because the enemies are always going to be better than the rest of your units, unless you spend hours grinding them up to god mode status (which, frankly, is terrible game design IMHO.)

As you can tell, I haven't really touched the story lol. For one, every Fire Emblem story is basically the same and I really don't delve too deep into it (except Radiant Dawn, holy shit talk about needlessly complicated!) I'm also of the opinion that plot is always subservient to gameplay- how much fun I'm having playing the game will always come before my enjoyment of the story. I'm not reading a book or watching a movie; I'm playing a game.

And yes, it certainly is better than Shadow Dragon, but I wouldn't feel right comparing it as Shadow Dragon is essentially the first Fire Emblem in 'HD.' The years of evolution in both design theory and hardware options make that comparison totally unfair in my opinion.

[Flexar]

I didn't pair up units particularly often and didn't do much grinding (the only time I ever bothered to fight the extra risen was for money or because I wanted a reward from a merchant), and I didn't have a huge deal of difficulty with the game. I was also really impressed by Radiant Dawn's story, probably more so than any other game I've ever played. Still, different people look for different things in games. While the main focus in games for me is how enjoyable they are to play, I certainly like there to be a good story to go along with it.

[Eskay]

Did you play through it on normal? I only played the game once, and it was on Hard Mode, which might explain some of the discrepancies we're having.

[Flexar]

I played it through on both, and while I did have to pair up units more often on Hard Mode, it still wasn't all the time. However, I'd got to know the maps better after my first playthrough, which was on normal.

[Eskay]

Wait a minute.

I think I know what the deal is.

Perchance, how long do you take on maps? Do you make it a point to stick around and kill every enemy before finishing the objective?

[Talisman]

Yep, I'm still kicking around. I'll see what I can do about a post... Eventually. I haven't really had much of a drive lately.

[Flexar]

@Talisman: I'm glad to see you're still with us.

@Eskay: I usually do. However, there were a few maps on which I didn't, like the one where you fight Walhart for the first time. On that note, I'm going to have to disagree with you about the Tactician being the ultimate overpowered character. Walhart is by far the most overpowered character I've ever used in any game ever. He's already incredibly powerful once you get him, but once you put him back to level 1, he gains level ups as fast as the NSA records phone calls, all without having to sacrifice ANYTHING. I suppose you do get him right at the end of the game though, which rather limits his usefulness.

[Eskay]

See, getting him at the end is what inhibits him from being the most overpowered thing ever. You have Tactician from Chapter One and get to use him all the way to the end, relying on him to help you through everything. By the end of the game, most of your force is already set, so he isn't really necessary as he is nice lol.

[gafebear]

Did I really just miss out on a conversation about Fire Emblem?
/dead/
*goes work on post*

Sidenote: Should we decide on the number of villagers that are gunna make it? (I mean maybe not now, but maybe define it some posts later on?) I come from an absurdly hugely populated city, so it's hard for me to picture the amount of people that would populate a medievalish village, let alone survive such an invasion.

[Eskay]

Lol you didn't exactly miss it, feel free to jump on it! At this point, Flex and I are kinda just clashing against conflicting philosophies on adequate game design haha :p

[Flexar]

Let's say that Ley has about 100 citizens, including guards. There would probably be between 10 and 15 guards, and other than Iridian, they'll all die (maybe excluding Cole, I rather like him). Roughly 50 of the villagers will make it to the abbey and into the tunnels, including our characters.

I wouldn't say that getting Walhart at the end of the game stops him from being overpowered. He's still overpowered, he's just not all that useful.

[Eskay]

Lol do I need to respond to the IC again?

[Flexar]

That would be nice. Castella's 3-day trip seems to be considerably longer than 3 days; let's hope (s)he's not fallen to his/her doom. Once Flynn and Iridian are back at the abbey, I'll godmod Phile if need be so that we can get everyone into the tunnels.

Centi85 said he'd look at the roleplay and get back to me, but that was a while ago. If he doesn't give me any form of response by Monday, I'll see what I can do about finding someone else. The person I was going to ask, but then remembered had left the site, has recently returned, so I'll ask her should Centi85 not get back to me.

[Castella]

Hello there....sorry....

Ahaha, yea that trip was a day longer then 3 but then some things came up and, to put it simply, I've been struggling to pull myself up to the computer and get writing. But, a cup of strong coffee and a wedge of lemon should help so give me...oh 3 hours to work up something.

Again, sorry. =.=

[Eskay]

Gettin ready to make a post nowish.

And heya Castella! I hope that your trip was good?

EDIT: Ayo Flex, just talked to Centi, he says that he's interested in the role!

[Flexar]

@Castella: That's fine, but it would have been nice to have notified us. If that wasn't possible, I apologise.

@Eskay: I know, he's PM'ed me. He'll start posting once he's gone through all of our posts. Thanks for recommending him, I didn't want to see Jacia go any more than you did.

[Eskay]

No problem!

And in other news, Gateway had one of its famous crap-outs while I was in the middle of a post, so I basically ragequit the internet for the night. Once I simmer down, I'll re-do it :p

[Flexar]

I know how you feel. This site has made me paranoid, so I back up just about everything I write here even OOC posts. It's like the site staff gain sadistic pleasure from deleting the work of innocent roleplayers. This morning I sat down at my computer, only to be greeted by the infamous "502 Bad Gateway" error message (one I find particularly ironic).

[Eskay]

Post is finally up!

I feel like Cadbury's getting so shafted now in terms of usage lol, I'm hoping that getting out of Ley will give the old badger some better development :p

[Centi85]

Howdy everyone! Finally checking in officially to the OOC. Finished going over everything, and I believe I'm ready to throw myself into the fire!

Flexar - I'll submit the new Jacia profile before tonight and hopefully get a post in.

I thank you all for the opportunity, and hope this RP the best! Great potential, characters and writers to see that this story fulfills all hopes and expectations that I have for it!

That said, I have a few other things to attend to before I get started, so I shall see y'all later!