Games you are playing

[Vapour Trail]

[Maxine MagicFox]

The mature themes, really.

Also some comments made that the storyline starts to get slow.

I'm also afraid of it becoming a little too "complex" - I heard that you "make" your items (aka Alchemy). In Class of Heroes it's rapidly becoming my most-hated aspect of the game, but in CoH, you aren't really under that much pressure to deal with it. That game is just fun and light.

And seriously...



The only character I can see myself attracted to/liking is MAYBE the girl on the left. Everyone else is like -_- ugly men in their thirties. And, I dunno, every time I look at the MC's face I keep thinking "God that character looks like an NPC stripped out of Halo."

[negzee]

I've been increasingly interested in this game, but your mention of alchemy-type stuff is worrying.... :/

[Vapour Trail]

Ah, I see. What you heard about the story is true, actually. It starts off amazing but loses steam later in the game. It's not that the quality of the story gets worse, so much as the pacing gets all wonky. As the dungeons get longer you'll spend more time exploring between cutscenes, so that's why.

The mature themes mostly relate to the usual religious content that has been central to the series. There's nothing particularly offensive outside of that and the nudity, which there's plenty of.

As an aside, I like the way the characters look. They're not particularly attractive, but they don't really need to be. They're soldiers and scientists, not models. I think the semi-realism is a welcome change, personally. My only complaint regarding the characters is that they didn't add a female portrait for the MC. Since he is just a blank slate with no personality or dialogue, they should have given the player a choice of being either a male or female character.

Edit: The item creation system is really simple, actually. The items you need to make stuff drops off enemies and are also scattered throughout dungeons (they show up on your map, so you won't have any trouble finding them). The items are plentiful, so you'll have enough to make consumables at least. The forma you need for equipment is less common, but you'll still get enough to upgrade regularly.

It's like a variation of the system that Etrian Odyssey uses, so it shouldn't be that intimidating.

[negzee]

Ah, thanks for the note regarding item creation, VT.

[Liferake]

[Kimiko]

You find alchemy intimidating? But it's so much fun to put stuff together in a big cauldron, stir up the fire, and watch what happens. Will it go kablooey, or will something magical come out?

[Maxine MagicFox]

[Vapour Trail]

Each time you encounter a forma point in a dungeon (and there are several on each floor) they'll yield multiples of whatever forma they contain. Enemies also drop several each battle usually, so you'll end up with a surplus of the common ones. I ended up selling a bunch for macca since I had so many.

I should also add that enemies also drop healing items (maseki and hogyoku, the MegaTen staples), so you'll get consumables that way too.

There isn't really an item creation system, either. You just go to the laboratory on Red Sprite (your base), and if you have the forma needed for an item, then you can purchase the item in exchange for the materials and a monetary fee. You know, like Etrian Odyssey. Except you have to have materials whenever you buy anything, not just rare items (unlike Etrian Odyssey).

One helpful thing is that the laboratory guy (I can't recall his name at the moment, but his assistant is Chen for what that's worth...) will tell you where you can get the forma needed to buy items or equipment, as long as it's a forma you've already encountered. Like which demon drops it and which dungeon it's located in).

The nudity in the game is not sexual. Atlus used a lot of art from Soul Hackers, so you can look that up to get an idea of how it's presented. The only realistic depiction of nudity is that Tenshi Angel only has a cloth wrapped over her breasts and has nothing on from the waist down. Her legs are positioned in such a way that you don't see anything graphic, though. But most of the time the nudity is presented in a more surreal way. There are demons with parts that are blatantly phallic (one demon has the tip of a penis for a head). The strangest one is Tiamat, who has six breasts running down her chest with a vagina in her stomach. It's not sexual in any way, it's just odd.

[Kimiko]

Maxine - In CoH you can buy most recipes from the store, you don't need to discover them yourself.

[Maxine MagicFox]

I'm only just now starting to get "wealthy" enough to think about these purchases in CoH.

I dunno. I guess we'll see on Wednesday what I decide to do.

[negzee]

[noodles]

[scy]

I can't recall too many Alchemy-esque creations with a flat out "random" system for Item Creation. For the most part, they tend to tell you what you need.

Edit: Or, you know, break down and just use an Item Creation guide somewhere on the interwebz to save you the heartache if it is that big of a deal breaker.

As for SMT "nudity" it is probably no worse than what P3/P4 had. Except smaller sprites.

[spoiler]Go Penischariot![/spoiler]

[theo]