I’ve been keeping an eye on King’s Bounty. It’s supposed to be turn-based and is certainly polished graphically in a cartoony, very WoW-influenced sort of way. OTOH, it’ll be translated from Sputnik and it only has “RPG elements”…whatever that means, so it could go either way.
Obsidian is working on a Aliens RPG but no idea when or for what platform.
And then there’s Alpha Protocol, their espionage action-rpg.
Hmm… it does seem though that outside of Fallout 3 there’s not much on the immediate horizon.
What’s wrong with it?
it plays like something they throw together at last moment, as if they wrote the story, plan out all reveal and plot, and at very end, they suddenly realize “oh we are making a game!!”, and throw the generic combat from Dragon Quest that’s consider boring and old even 10 years ago.
Yeah, all I can find so far is a job listing on Obsidian’s site for a creative game designer to help with the game, and all it says is “console RPG.”
There’s Age of Decadence, which looks amazing in an old-school Falloutish way. That’s if they manage to pull off what they talk about in the interviews of course, but I’m optimistic.
What were you hoping for? What’s the best combat in a JRPG to your reckoning? The combat is mostly traditional, but if you dislike this combat, I’d expect you to hate all JRPG combat. The game uses Shadow-Hearts-like timing for melee attacks, except better, because missing the timing doesn’t mean botching an attack; it just means the lack of extra damage. There’s an FFX-like turn order bar. You can change your accessories while in battle, as well as your formation. Battles probably take too long, but a lot of JRPGs have had this problem since the move to 3D. At some point, I probably walked around up to a minute without a random battle.
I can’t think of anything really wrong with the combat, though it wasn’t revolutionary. I never had a feeling like I was being punished by random battles, because at least enemies would drop items for accessory synthesis. Games like Dragon Quest VIII, I felt like I was being punished.
I don’t know why you keep thinking JRPG = shitty combat??
Star ocean have fun combat as well as awesome customization. FF12’s combat was great as well, same for Grandia. For Shadow Heart the ring system can be set to automatic, also shadow heart’s combat is deeper than Lost Odyssey, multiple character can chain their attack together.
When Lost odyssey was released, they took a HUGE step back.
JRPG combat is like playing chess with half the pieces missing from the box and a whole line, out the door and down the block, of opponents that only have a tenuous grasp of the rules and cheat at every turn (and there isn’t shit you can do about it).
But they don’t get stuck going through doors! ;)
Don’t make me Disintegrate your ass.
A lot more information will be available on Dragon Age shortly. It’s well along.
Desslock, do you think it will still release this Fall, then?
Mmmmmm Dragon Age
Goddammit, man, you are a fuckin’ tease.
More please.
Bio’s waiting on the last of the ME push to be over (MEPC release at the end of May). Shortly after that, I’d expect it’s a pretty safe bet that the focus will shift to DA and you’ll see that ramp up in terms of public information.
As to other RPGs, is Sacred 2 on anyone’s watch list? Not a party/turn-based game, but it’s a huge world and the first Sacred was a pretty enjoyable game to play, and repeatedly. It’s probably more along the line of a Diablo-clone than you’d care for, though. All the same, I thought I’d mention it; it’s on my definite list for the fall (along with FO3).
When is Sacred 2? I couldn’t get into the first one, but I saw the potential in it. I’ve been looking forward to the sequel. I think the problem for the first one was Divine Divinity, which I played first. I loved DD, and Sacred just couldn’t compare, so I was disappointed.
Star Ocean 2 and 3 both have very little customization, and the party AI is so bad that I was often, or usually, forced to be the healer. The battles are still fun and fast, but it’s not like, a hallmark or anything.
FF12’s combat was great as well, same for Grandia.
Agreed, except for Grandia’s frequency. And you know how divisive FFXII is, though I loved it. It’s not really fun until a ways in to the game.
For Shadow Heart the ring system can be set to automatic, also shadow heart’s combat is deeper than Lost Odyssey, multiple character can chain their attack together.
That’s nonsense. There’s nothing deep about Shadow Hearts. In Lost Odyssey, at least you can customize your four immortals.
It’s only a couple of months away.