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Penny Arcade's On The Rain-Slick Precipice of Darkness 4
Winky
rRegistered User regular
rRegistered User regular
Quartet for the Dusk of Man wrote:"Four Gods wait on the windowsill
Where once eight Gods did war and will
And if the Gods themselves may die
What does that say for you and I?
Now, three Gods wait on the windowsill
Where one God's blood was lately spilled
While black tongues lap at the spreading pool
And build the strength they need to rule
When two Gods wait on the windowsill
The wick of the world is burning, still
But when one God in triumph shouts
The candle of the world goes out
And when that candle, bare and white
Sheds at last its dancing light
Then we will rouse, with raiséd rod
To pierce the very house of God"
Many of you may not be aware that the PA forum's own Zeboyd games has already released the final installment of the Rainslick series, available now on Steam, and it is awesome.
What is Rainslick 4?
Rainslick 4 is the last game in the Penny Arcade's On the Rain-Slick Precipice of Darkness series, a noir cosmic horror-comedy set in 1922 featuring alternate universe versions of the Penny Arcade characters we know and love. The first two games were 3d RPGs made by Hothead Games. The gameplay was nothing to write home about, but they did feature some fantastic writing by Tycho along with artwork and animations heavily directed by Gabe. They didn't, however, make a lot of money and so PA and Hothead went their separate ways. That's when Zeboyd games, an indie team known for their JRPGs Cthulhu Saves the World and Breath of Death VII stepped up to take the reigns. They made Rainslick 3, an incredibly different game from the first two: It much more closely followed the pedigree of 16-bit era JRPGs, complete with 16-bit graphics, while including a lot of fantastic twists on genre staples that eliminated many of the most frustrating aspects of JRPGs while still retaining a complex and challenging battle system. The highlight of the game was a quirky Final Fantasy V-esque job system that included such classes as Cardboard Tube Samurai, Crabomancer, Hobo, and Dinosaurceror. Rainslick 3 was well-beloved by a fair subset of fans around here, of which I am one.
What's new in Rainslick 4?
It picks up right at the end of Rainslick 3, but features an all-new class and leveling system and a big open world with towns, many optional dungeons, and even vehicles. The job system from 3 has been completely turned on its head. While the mechanics of the battle system are much the same as they were in Rainslick 3, including a four-character party, MP that grows each turn, interrupts, and reusable consumables, instead of fighting enemies directly your characters now use monsters found in the Underhell to battle for them Pokemon-style. You obtain new monsters each with their own unique set of abilities to fill out your party roster over the course of the game, which you can switch in and out of your party at will at the start of a battle.
The monsters are rad: I'm not very far into the game but already my collection includes, among others, a deep-crow chick, Dr. Blood's Leviathan, Twisp, Catsby, and a living vending machine.
You can "equip" your party members as trainers for your monsters. Doing so grants the monsters an additional set of abilities based on who their trainer is, as well as determines how the monster's stats grow when it levels up. For instance, setting Gabe as a trainer for a monster gives it his "Brute" abilities, and makes it so that the monster gains strength and defense when it levels up.
In addition to this, you can customize your monsters further by equipping different weapon types that your monster will have available to them based on whether they are a "Strength", "Magic", "Speed", or "Defense" type monster. Each of the different weapon types has passive abilities associated with it.
How is it?
It's a shame that more people aren't talking about this game. I'm about 3 hours into it right now and it's already high up the list of my favorite JRPGs of all time. It's a definite improvement over Rainslick 3 in every way, and I happened to love Rainslick 3 (there's a special spot in my heart for games with job systems). The combat system is consistently extremely engaging and with the constant influx of new monsters and abilities it remains varied and requires significant decision making every fight (my biggest problem with Rainslick 3, and most JRPGs, is that once you got a good strategy going there is little incentive to switch things up and not just repeat the same set of actions every fight). Despite retaining the same 16-bit style the art has improved dramatically, though much of that may be due to the change of setting that allowed the game to really stretch its wings. After three games of fighting in Hobo Alley the change of scenery is extremely appreciated.
Tycho's writing is just spectacular in this game and I think it's some of the best he's ever done. "Bizarre and humorous depictions of hell" is basically the ideal application of Jerry's talents; above all I think he excels as a cosmic horror-comedy writer. The more occult and fantastic you allow him to get, the better the product will be, as his imagination seems to work best at a grandiose scale. The biggest improvement by far, though, is the music. It sets some great emotional tones and gives the whole endeavor the epic feel that the entire rest of the series has been missing.
Winky on
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Steam Profile | Signature art by Alexandra 'Lexxy' Douglass
Do people playing on Xbox get framerate drops? Like, when the battle meter moves without anybody's turn going, the frames get janky. When battle ends, it often seems like I'm going to encounter a hard freeze, it's so abrupt. Still, I have NOT encountered any freezes yet, so credit where it's due.
After all the whining, I need to state the things I like about the game. The plot is probably the most interesting in a serious way, usually I just proceeded through the games for more jokes, this time I'm legitimately curious as to what the endgame is. The monster designs are very creative as before, and some of the random throwaway battle gags are great (a certain special battle condition in the zoo had me rolling). The music is EASILY the best in the series and deserves serious props. The voiced song came out of nowhere and I dragged the battle out to hear more of it. Finally, despite my complaints about the battle system earlier, it's not like anything that was good in 3 was outright lost, more like reorganized. It's possible this system is more balanced (the widely reduced amount of zero MP abilities suggests this).
Also, I like that the abilities are less scattershot in 4. In 3 I loved the design of the classes, but all of them had a few abilities that made me scratch my head and ask "Why is this even here?" due to redundancy or not fitting the overall flavor of the class.
What is your party set up?
Without being able to see how you are playing the game, my guess would be perhaps you are not using buffs enough (they are really good in this game) or you are not using interrupts enough (which are also really good)?
In 3 I found that what commonly caused me to lose battles was just letting them go on for too long. It helps to try to kill off enemies as quickly as possible and just get the battle over with, rather than playing too defensively. Focus-firing down enemies with low HP first is usually a good strategy, as the quicker you can have fewer guys attacking you each turn the better off you'll be.
I did truly enjoy the game, and I agree that the music is the best in the series, and one of the best soundtracks, even among modern games. I only wish that I could do a NG+
Steam: TheArcadeBear
I made myself push through, but I wish the later fights were faster while still being a challenge. It was also frustrating to switch parties right when I was getting comfortable with my battle circuit. I also wish any item besides the Potion were useful on Normal. Buffz and Interrupters aren't ever necessary, Molotovs are waaaaay underpowered outside of a narrow level band, and Switch doesn't have much utility.
At least early on in 4 I'm finding them extremely useful, but I could see that changing when I get more 0 abilities.
Also, does anyone know if Mr. Beaks' dive bomb ability is affected by strength? I assume it is because it says "wind attack" rather than "wind magic", yeah?
Having some of the item descriptions be only jokes was also a mistake, I think. The one off the top of my head is that yes, I can remember that the get up pin gives you a MP when you revive, but I worry I will forget.
I want to emphasize that I still like the game, I am just picking some nits.
Probably. I stomped through the game on the hardest setting with little to no difficulty
I don't keep up with this series at all, I just remember the first one being all in 3D and stuff.
I did think it was hilarious how both Gabe and Tycho bitched about any negative reception they had towards their first game, like they're invulnerable to any criticism even though they're basically part-time game critics as a job haha
Gotta disagree with this. I think Vendorr is among the strongest of party members for his ability to spam Molotovs ridiculously. First turn, (free) Molotov. Turn 2, use the ability to lob a free Molotov. Turn 3, throw a third one... which is actually the first one you've used. AND if you're having a certain character
When it says the "costs" go up, what does it mean? More MP required for his other abilities? Honestly at this point I don't run out of Molotov's in any battle unless the enemy is resistant to them, in which case who cares, they aren't helping much anyway.
3DS: 1607-3034-6970
Steam Profile | Signature art by Alexandra 'Lexxy' Douglass
The studio that made 1 and 2 didn't want to do them anymore.
You playing on Veteran or Insane or something? I can't offer an opinion on that. On Normal you're straight up wrong though.
They had to move on to do bigger and better things.
....
But it's just as well, Zeboyd picking up the next two games were clearly net gains for the series.
They were net gains for my happiness, at the very least.
Steam: TheArcadeBear
Need a soundtrack maybe just for the Fish Force song alone. And the ending guitar. And the rest of it, I guess.
http://www.loudr.fm/release/penny-arcade-s-on-the-rain-slick-precipice-of-darkness-episode-4/VskW2
Zeboyd Games Development Blog
Steam ID : rwb36, Twitter : Werezompire, Facebook : Zeboyd Games
I am so incredibly glad to have this, you have no idea.
@RainbowDespair, I'm not gonna lie: I would absolutely love to see you guys take an honest-to-goodness-homerun-swing at making a seriously-written full-on full-fledged full-length RPG in this style. I haven't seen anything that would indicate you guys wouldn't knock the spit out of that particular ball and make something up there with the classics of yesteryear but with a modern take.
Gonna start my own Kickstarter to ask for people to give me money so I can give more money towards your Kickstarter when it comes out.
Also thanks for that soundtrack link, @RainbowDespair !
Also the Fish Force theme. I was at SGC this past weekend and people would come up to just to tell me that they love that song and have it stuck in their head all the time, haha :P
Steam ID: slashx000______Twitter: @bill_at_zeboyd______ Facebook: Zeboyd Games
WiiU: jooncole (Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate)
3DS: 2122-5983-8919
Rainslick 3 picks up immediately after Rainslick 2, but it does do at least a little bit of explaining what went on in the first two.
You almost have to play Rainslick 3 to understand Rainslick 4, though.
WiiU: jooncole (Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate)
3DS: 2122-5983-8919
I'm really excited to see a new Zeboyd game after these two, but I will miss the PA tie-in. Not for the characters per se (although I do like them) but for the sense of humor and style. If the team wanted to go more serious, they absolutely have the right to do that, but I wonder how that would clash with my perhaps unfair expectations now...