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HiddenX
The Elder Spy
Joined: 20 Jul 2001
Posts: 749
Location: NRW / Germany |
aj142:
I am playing rpgs for 20 years now 150/20 ...  this are only 7.5 rpgs/year.
Gorath:
Great deal - try Rage of Mages !
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=Member of The Nonflamers' Guild= |
Mon Jan 06, 2003 8:57 pm |
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corwin
On the Razorblade of Life
Joined: 10 Jun 2002
Posts: 8376
Location: Australia |
quote:
Originally posted by aj142
Holy @#$%..... I feel like the valet guy who wanders into the Ritz Carlton lobby and tries to mingle with the rich and famous... All the games I've ever owned don't add up to some of your RPG collections!! Nobody mentioned Xenogears, but that's still my favorite. Surely I'm not the only fan of that one, am I?
I'm afraid I've never heard of Xenogears and I thought I knew all the RPG's ever released. Could you give more details.
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If God said it, then that settles it!
I don't use Smileys, I use Emoticons!!
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Tue Jan 07, 2003 12:26 am |
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aj142
Village Dweller
Joined: 27 Oct 2002
Posts: 18
Location: LA |
Of those of you who have amassed RPG collections that number over 100, did you keep them all? And, if so, why didn't you sell them a long time ago - do you still play them? |
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Tue Jan 07, 2003 5:40 pm |
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HiddenX
The Elder Spy
Joined: 20 Jul 2001
Posts: 749
Location: NRW / Germany |
I am a collector - I resell or give away only the worst games (Arcatera, Dungeon Siege...). Sometimes I lend games to friends ... and have to wait several years to get them back.
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=Member of The Nonflamers' Guild= |
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Tue Jan 07, 2003 10:20 pm |
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corwin
On the Razorblade of Life
Joined: 10 Jun 2002
Posts: 8376
Location: Australia |
Who'd buy them??  Actually, I re-played UW2 last year and still loved it. My teenage daughter is actually replaying serpents Isle for the 3rd time. Unfortunately, some games no longer work properly on my XP system and most likely some of my old floppies have corrupted over time. However, all the boxes make a great display.
_________________
If God said it, then that settles it!
I don't use Smileys, I use Emoticons!!
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Wed Jan 08, 2003 12:22 am |
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Dhruin
Stranger In A Strange Land
Joined: 20 May 2002
Posts: 1825
Location: Sydney, Australia |
I agree. I can't say we've set up a neat and orderly display but I love having all the old boxes. |
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Wed Jan 08, 2003 12:34 am |
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Guybrush Threepwood
High Emperor
Joined: 19 Jun 2002
Posts: 500
Location: Oklahoma |
amazing...I didn't think anyone else besides me liked Betrayal in Antara... I however can't play it anymore because it won't work on win xp for me.
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"What are you gonna do? Release the dogs?! Or the bees?! Or dogs with bees in their mouth so that when they bark they shoot bees at you?" - Homer Simpson |
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Wed Jan 08, 2003 2:25 am |
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aj142
Village Dweller
Joined: 27 Oct 2002
Posts: 18
Location: LA |
quote:
Originally posted by corwin
I'm afraid I've never heard of Xenogears and I thought I knew all the RPG's ever released. Could you give more details.
Xenogears was an RPG by Square. It was considered one of the best RPGs for the PSX (and my personal favorite!). Here's a review I copied from Amazon fer ya that was originally from Gamespot:
Editorial Reviews
GameSpot Review
Square's latest RPG is weird in a lot of ways, especially for Square. Xenogears' reliance on story, subtlety, and mood make it Square's most anime-like RPG thus far, in many ways making the game one of its best.
Staged on a human colony far in the future, Xenogears' story centers around the war between the nations and their endless power struggle. With the nations constantly dueling for power and resources, warfare has escalated to new levels thanks to enormous humanoid robots called "Gears." Trapped by destiny in the middle of the crisis' latest escalation is the game's stereotypically-named Fei Fong Wong. Exiled from a peaceful burg on the brink of war, Fei scours the world with his allies for clues to his past and the unknown destructive power that dwells within him.
Like a number of anime features, Xenogears' story is hard to put a finger on. The game's beautiful introduction sequence explains nothing and, at first glance, bears no relevance to the game. This trend continues throughout the game - when questions are answered, a slew of others open up, leaving one in a constant state of cluelessness. As opposed to a Final Fantasy game's primary goal of defeating the villain and saving the world, the driving force behind Xenogears' is resolving the game's excellent story. While it has its humorous moments, Xenogears's story is serious - so serious that it was almost never released in the United States. Rife with religious overtones and criticism, Xenogears often asks us to question our very being. While a little preachy at times, this is used well to enhance the story and our understanding of the game's deep characterizations.
Xenogears plays differently than just about every RPG out there. This is most noticeable within the game's dual battle systems. When Gear-less, one has the standard RPG options at his disposal: attack, defend, magic, item, and run. Attacking is where the game differs most, as you are given a number of attack points for every turn. After opting to attack, the player can perform a series of moves, costing one, two, or three attack points each. Certain combinations of moves will result in more powerful attack combos, learned throughout the game. Additionally, leftover attack points can be stored up and used to string together massively destructive combinations of combos with a sixth battle option. When riding a Gear, one's attack options are similar but different enough to keep things interesting. Instead of using attack points for player combos, Gears come equipped with a large stash of fuel. Each move requires 10, 20, or 30 fuel points, and super-combos require more. As running out of fuel would be a problem, a "charge" move restores a small amount of fuel points but leaves the Gears open to attack. Finally, a "booster" option speeds the Gear up for more frequent attacks but sucks 30 fuel points away every turn it's active. A definite change from the Final Fantasy series, spells play a very small role in Xenogears, mostly serving defensive purposes, and are learned through the age-old "get a level, get a spell" system.
With its different style of game and story, Xenogears is accompanied by an art style vastly different from that seen in other Square games. Each town and dungeon is presented polygonally from an overhead view, where pressing the left or right shoulder buttons will smoothly rotate the scenery. All characters in these scenes are sprite-based. Battles are presented in a combination of 2D and 3D, with most characters in 2D and the Gears in 3D. Xenogears is Square's first game to use actual anime and voice acting, mostly found only in the game's awesome movies. Unfortunately, the concept isn't pulled off as well as similar executions, namely GameArts Japanese RPG hit, Grandia. The game's character sprites are poorly animated and suffer from terrible pixelation, no doubt due to the PlayStation's limited RAM. Xenogears' robot and town designs are full of detail and panache, but their textures constantly wiggle and distort when the camera pans about, giving the game's geometry a less-than-solid, gelatinous look. The game's color in general is bland and washed out. Finally, the game's spells use the PlayStation's more 2D effects well, much like Final Fantasy Tactics' elaborate spell animations. Xenogears doesn't look bad by any means, just substantially unpolished when placed next to Final Fantasy VII or Tactics. However, the beautiful anime sequences skillfully combine top-notch hand-drawn animation with rendered graphics a la Ghost In The Shell's cinematics.
Featuring music from Chrono Trigger's composer, Yasunori Mitsuda, Xenogears expertly uses audio to push the story along. Many tracks include voice or chanting and all are appropriately uppity or low with the game's mood. Much of the game, however, uses silence or ambient noises, making parts of the game's soundtrack a tad sparse. To go along with the anime cutscenes, Xenogears is also Square's first foray into including in-game voice-overs. With a few rare exceptions, the voice outside of the movies is limited to grunts and other attack-type noises and usually end up getting drowned out in the game's music. Unfortunately, just when you might have thought Square was ready for all-digital sound, the rest of the game's sound effects lamentably follow Square's standard, uninspiring synthesized formula.
Xenogears is an excellent, thought-provoking RPG with enough story and original gameplay to warrant a look, even if the gameplay could use a little graphical polish. --Peter Bartholow
Xenosaga will be out for PS2. This is also from Gamespot, a preview:
Namco's upcoming PlayStation 2 role-playing game, Xenosaga, has been the focus of much anticipation for RPG fans, thanks to its loose ties to the amazing PlayStation RPG Xenogears. The game is being developed by Monolith Software, a fledgling developer whose employees include former SquareSoft employees that worked on that underappreciated PlayStation gem. Although Xenosaga's story has elements that are reminiscent of Xenogears, the game tells an all-new epic story. Originally released in Japan earlier this year, the game is finally coming to the US. We got hold of a previewable copy of the game and had a chance to check it out.
If there were a competition for the most-detailed story, Xenosaga would surely win the day with its very intricate tale. The game's basic plot revolves around humankind's investigation of the Zohar, a mysterious and powerful artifact that has allegedly existed since the dawn of time. The game's prologue opens on modern-day Earth and chronicles the discovery of the Zohar, at which point the action shifts 4000 years into the future, when humankind has abandoned Earth and taken to outer space. However, in spite of all the newfangled technology lying about, no one has been able to crack the mystery of the Zohar. You'll start the game in the role of Shion Uzuki, an engineer charged with working on the Zohar project and testing a new battle android known as KOS-MOS. Battle droids are a vital piece of technology in the future due to the appearance of the Gnosis, an aggressive alien race that is a serious threat. However, the investigation of the Zohar, the threat of the Gnosis, and KOS-MOS's development are just some of the story elements you'll be dealing with. The game's broad story involves a plethora of characters and events that definitely qualify as epic.
As far as its gameplay goes, Xenosaga is broken up into the RPG standard of exploration and combat. The exploration segments in the game will send you walking around areas and interacting with nonplayer characters. Combat, which definitely owes a tip of the hat to Xenogears, will be turn-based but somewhat more dynamic than similar combat systems seen in other RPGs. Your ability to fight will revolve around "action" points that you'll gain after every turn. You'll have the option to use all of them to perform various attacks or save some that will be added to your total in the next turn. You'll be able to perform several different types of attacks by combining the two main attack buttons. You'll use the square button to initiate a short-range physical attack and the triangle button to perform long-range attacks that use "ether," the game's form of magic. You'll also be able to perform "tech attacks" by stringing together button combos. The only catch to the battle system is that you're limited by the number of action points you have, which ultimately forces you to plan some form of strategy.
In addition to attacking with a party, you'll be able to throw an AGWS (anti-Gnosis weapon system), which is essentially a giant mech, into the mix for a bit of added firepower. Anyone familiar with the mech system in Xenogears should be pleased with Xenosaga's system and its streamlined approach to battling. Xenosaga lets you do a solid amount of customizing and lets you focus on fighting rather than obsess about the various meters you had to keep track of in Xenogears...
That oughtta be enough info for now! |
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Wed Jan 08, 2003 5:21 pm |
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Gorath
Mostly Harmless
Joined: 03 Sep 2001
Posts: 6327
Location: NRW, Germany |
quote:
Originally posted by HiddenX
Gorath:
Great deal - try Rage of Mages !
Hehe, the deal got even better. The guy also had most Ultimas since 6 and M&M 3 + 4. 
What´s Rage of Mages? I wouldn´t have considered it one of the highlights of this collection.
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Webmaster GothicDot |
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Wed Jan 08, 2003 7:07 pm |
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HiddenX
The Elder Spy
Joined: 20 Jul 2001
Posts: 749
Location: NRW / Germany |
Rage of Mages is a real time strategy rpg - very challenging - a predecessor of Rage of Mages 2 and Evil Islands. An underdog, but very good.
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=Member of The Nonflamers' Guild= |
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Wed Jan 08, 2003 10:55 pm |
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ArcturusXIV
City Guard
Joined: 03 Dec 2002
Posts: 142
Location: Oz |
I didn't like Rage of Mages--to much simplistic strategy and too little in the way of RPG elements. And frankly, I don't see how anyone would want to play that game unless they used a mage or archer. Ranged attacks ruled everything. The warriors sucked in comparison.
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"Madness is the first step towards unselfishness. Be mad and tell us what is behind the veil of 'sanity'. The purpose of life is to bring us closer to those secrets, and madness is the only means." --Kahlil Gibran |
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Thu Jan 09, 2003 8:03 pm |
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HiddenX
The Elder Spy
Joined: 20 Jul 2001
Posts: 749
Location: NRW / Germany |
I played Rage of Mages with the heroes only - without hired soldiers 'til the end the hard way, and I had a lot of fun
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=Member of The Nonflamers' Guild= |
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Thu Jan 09, 2003 9:06 pm |
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svencha
Village Dweller
Joined: 06 Jul 2002
Posts: 15
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I'm actually selling a lot of 12 rpg's on ebay at the moment as well.
arx fatalis
gothic
dungeon siege
heroes of m&m 3
bg1
bg2
icewind dale
ja2 plus unfinished business
diablo
myth 1
myth 3
wizardy 8
I just don't have the room to store heaps of games!
sv |
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Sun Jan 12, 2003 11:49 am |
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Hagatha
King of the Realms
Joined: 10 Feb 2002
Posts: 456
Location: Burnaby, B.C. |
I've probably played about 30 of them, but have given some away (Darkstone, eg). Favourites are BG2, Torment, Gothic, Morrowind.
I also include Deus Ex in this category; although it is an action/adventure, it also has a lot of elements of RPG in it (ie character development) and it is one of my favourite games of all time. I am so looking forward to DE2. |
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Mon Jan 13, 2003 4:36 am |
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lancaster6
Head Merchant
Joined: 06 Jan 2002
Posts: 59
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favs include:
ultima9, underworld 1&2
gothic
arx fatalis
baldur's gate , entire series
anachronox
summoner
wizardry 1 2 and 3 on nintendo lmao( which got me started on this genre, and ultima underworld which got me hooked)
divine divinity
and lets not forget dungeons and dragons (pencil and paper , imagination, and time were the system specs) |
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Wed Jan 22, 2003 1:01 am |
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