[Breath of Fire] BoF 6: Capcom Destroys Another Beloved Franchise!

Shapeshifter

Tommatt wrote:

I loved the shit out of BoF3. Thought it was the best rpg on the system. Never played 4, as after 3 I found ways to play 1 and 2 and didn't like. Didn't 4 get bad reviews? Something turned me off from it

same, I loved bof3.

RainbowDespair

chocobolicious wrote:

Getting 100% D-meter erased your save file and you were SoL.

Pretty sure it didn't actually erase your save file. If I remember correctly, there are two kinds of saves in Dragon Quarter - temporary saves (can be created anywhere and are erased when you load them) and permanent saves (requires a save coin to create and can only be done at save spots). If you got 100% D-Meter, you got game over but you could load up your last save (which probably is in an unwinnable state if you were doing so badly as to get 100% D-Meter). Generally, the better option would be to start over since you get to keep some things with each replay.

Dragon Quarter can be completed without a single restart though if you know what you're doing. I think the real key is the XP system - you get an XP percentage bonus based on how many enemies are in a single fight so by trying to group strong enemies with hordes of weak enemies, you can gain a lot of XP which will keep your characters at a good LV to take on the various challenges of the game without having to use the dragon form much, if at all. Unfortunately, most people's first inclination is to try to break up monster groups into smaller groups since that's easier in the short run - unfortunately, you get much less XP this way and so you end up in trouble later on if you do this too much.

see317

chocobolicious wrote:

I just want to post two tidbits:

BoFIV: The dragon system required you played Minigames to unlock points to upgrade forms. This could be good or bad depending on how much you enjoy the minigames.

BoFV: "In Dragon Quarter you weren't necessarily dying over the course of the game

You had a percentage that went up every time that you used the dragon abilities, but it increased very slowly otherwise

Once that hits 100% you died (which is likely to happen the first time around)"

This is completely false. Getting 100% D-meter erased your save file and you were SoL. You died simply by dying. The dragon form was a get out of jail free card as it could literally 1hit even the last boss. The problem was it was very limited in how often you could use it and abuse of it would quickly see you hitting 100% and losing your save file. Same with the D-Dashing through enemy encounters and such. BoFV was very much the survival horror of RPGs wherein you spent a lot of your time deciding how far your current supplies could get you.

It was a fantastic game though and I may have to LP it now just to show off how damn great it is. (Or maybe I should LP all of them. I've been considering it, so this thread popping up is kind of motivational.)

I would love to see an epic LP of all the BoFs.
I remember really liking the gene system in IIIs. I had a couple sheets of paper filled with different gene combinations and what they did.
Never really got into Quarter though.

vagrant_winds

Didn't BoF IV suffer from Xeonsaga ep.III like horrible censorship on the English release?

Elimination

Dragon Quarter was literally the worst RPG I ever played. Storyline was nonsense compared to previous BoF's, and the length of the game was a joke. It was extended only by the absolutely horrid death system that sees you restarting the game from the beginning over and over and over with some kind of "New game+" type deal when you die. Re-watching the beginning scenes for the 5th plus time grates on your nerves about as much as you can imagine it does. Absolutely horrid design decisions to artificially extend a half-finished product that equals to about 7 or 10 hours of actual story, but extends to about 50 as the game forces you to constantly restart from the very beginning for no good reason. The game is actually too hard to beat the first few times as well, your character just will not be strong enough to handle specific fights, it is frustrating and intentional. Gave up after spending a few hours with it a few years back. This game is the reason we dont see new BoF games anymore, I am certain.

RainbowDespair

Elimination wrote:

The game is actually too hard to beat the first few times as well, your character just will not be strong enough to handle specific fights, it is frustrating and intentional.

That's not true. Last time I replayed the game, I started over with a completely clean slate and was able to beat the game without a single restart and with a very low D-meter going into the final boss. It's more difficult than most RPGs because enemies don't respawn so you can't just stick in one area and grind for hours, but if you understand the game systems and play intelligently, it's very doable. It's quite similar to your typical roguelike in that respect - knowledge and skill is more important than stats.

And let's be fair - most RPGs are 7-10 hours of actual story that is artificially extended by a lot of grinding. I'd much rather have games done Dragon Quarter's way where if you're a skilled player, the game has a minimum amount of filler than force the filler on everyone.

chocobolicious

RainbowDespair wrote:

chocobolicious wrote:

Getting 100% D-meter erased your save file and you were SoL.

Pretty sure it didn't actually erase your save file. If I remember correctly, there are two kinds of saves in Dragon Quarter - temporary saves (can be created anywhere and are erased when you load them) and permanent saves (requires a save coin to create and can only be done at save spots). If you got 100% D-Meter, you got game over but you could load up your last save (which probably is in an unwinnable state if you were doing so badly as to get 100% D-Meter). Generally, the better option would be to start over since you get to keep some things with each replay.

Dragon Quarter can be completed without a single restart though if you know what you're doing. I think the real key is the XP system - you get an XP percentage bonus based on how many enemies are in a single fight so by trying to group strong enemies with hordes of weak enemies, you can gain a lot of XP which will keep your characters at a good LV to take on the various challenges of the game without having to use the dragon form much, if at all. Unfortunately, most people's first inclination is to try to break up monster groups into smaller groups since that's easier in the short run - unfortunately, you get much less XP this way and so you end up in trouble later on if you do this too much.

Ah, right, right. I forgot about the token saves. Using them lowered your overall score though so I tended to avoid them due to that. Getting 1/4th was actually pretty tough. Love this game.

My first playthrough I died about 10 minutes in while getting used to the system and after that I never had to SoL again. So no, I'll say that there is never any need to die. I had a couple of close scrapes, but it was always possible to win.

Edit: Also the story made perfect sense. You just didn't see the whole thing without getting a low enough ratio to unlock all the SoL scenes. Which yes, meant you had to replay it once or twice. On the other hand, you could breeze through it in a couple of hours the second time with all your party XP and knowing how to use Lin+Nina to wreck the game like a hurricane.

CorporateLogo

The luring system seemed to encourage taking enemies on one group at a time, though I haven't played in years

Dragkonias

vagrant_winds wrote:

Didn't BoF IV suffer from Xeonsaga ep.III like horrible censorship on the English release?

Naw. Only three or four scenes were really edited and you could tell what was happening for the most part.

If you really want to see the scenes, just youtube 'em.

chocobolicious

Hmm.. A video LP would probably be too damn long and most wouldn't watch it. So that'd pretty much leave a screencap LP with important conversations being either capped or typed out. Maybe occasional videos for important bits? Thats the only sad part about LPing RPGs, so long.

Lovely

Dragkonias wrote:

vagrant_winds wrote:

Didn't BoF IV suffer from Xeonsaga ep.III like horrible censorship on the English release?

Naw. Only three or four scenes were really edited and you could tell what was happening for the most part.

If you really want to see the scenes, just youtube 'em.

Or click on this site here http://www.kotowari.org/censorship-in-breath-of-fire-iv/ ~ ! Nothing quite as obvious as the Xenosaga 3 edits ("I have to put it back!") , but still kind of a shame.

Dragkonias

I don't know if I could call it too big of a deal.

The

beheading scene

could have been left alone...but the context is there already.

The rest was your usual pervy stuff, which...while good for a quick chuckle, isn't anything worth crying over.

Elimination

RainbowDespair wrote:

Elimination wrote:

The game is actually too hard to beat the first few times as well, your character just will not be strong enough to handle specific fights, it is frustrating and intentional.

That's not true. Last time I replayed the game, I started over with a completely clean slate and was able to beat the game without a single restart and with a very low D-meter going into the final boss. It's more difficult than most RPGs because enemies don't respawn so you can't just stick in one area and grind for hours, but if you understand the game systems and play intelligently, it's very doable. It's quite similar to your typical roguelike in that respect - knowledge and skill is more important than stats.

And let's be fair - most RPGs are 7-10 hours of actual story that is artificially extended by a lot of grinding. I'd much rather have games done Dragon Quarter's way where if you're a skilled player, the game has a minimum amount of filler than force the filler on everyone.

There is always that chance that I was just really bad at the game and doing it wrong. But regardless, personally i had negative 10 fun levels with the game.

Daris

I think the great thing about four is what it brought to the table in terms of the type of story it told and the style of it's animation and combat. I certainly felt at the time it was a bit unique and it has remained so since. Putting story aside though, I also enjoyed it's combat engine. So many aspects of rpgs are shared from one title to another, but the more unique quirks always seem to be one-title affairs.

Creating skill and spell combinations was a lot of fun, and it would be nice to see something similar in other games. Not just for the novelty, but for the utility. One example I could give, is when you had an enemy who absorbed wind but was weak to fire. Now, just about everything Nina casts for offense was wind, so in a traditional system she would be a crapshoot against this thing. However, you could have Ryu cast a fire spell that would combine with her wind to make a towering inferno of a fire spell. Thus, you would still be able to use Nina to good effect in such a fight.

A lot of game, a whole heaping pile of them, emphasize using the best tool for the job at all times. The problem with this, is there is always a tool that isn't a great fit for the fight, and the people with those tools are left by the wayside. MMORPGs are notorious for this, and have compensated the last few years by giving everyone as many tools as possable. Maybe what they should do, is take a page from this title and find a way to make a hammer deal slashing damage.

Beezel

Out of the BoF games I've played I like IV's the best. The goofy and weird bits aside I thought it had a fairly thought provoking story.

Jephery

I do like how at the end of every Breath of Fire, you're given a choice to just give up and see what happens if you fail.

Beezel

I wish I had an artbook for IV. I loved the dragon designs for that game

chocobolicious

BoF3 had the spell combos, too, and most of them were really good.

I rather liked the random support you could get from off screen characters though. So good. Yep. Think its time to replay this series!

so, starting from one. Screenshot or video?

Daris

Screenshots. No doubt about it.

Kai_San

Personally, I was OBSESSED with the BOF series for awhile. Back in the SNES days I wanted something more artsy than Final Fantasy and latched on to BOF1. I waited for that game to come out all damn summer and ever labeled it the summer of breath of fire. That being said BOF1 was kind of bad for the point in time it came out. Almost no character development to speak of. The main story barely got interesting at the end. Otherwise it was literally trot to this evil dudes lair. The battles were ok with the only interesting thing being you keep your entire party with you and can switch fighters any time out of battle easilly (the way the Tales games handled it, which I like).

BOF2 took BOF1 though and fixed EVERYTHING. Longer game, better plot, character development, more involved combat. It even had its own continuity. I felt with that game they had a universe going.

PErsonally I didn't like BOF3 as much. I know personally it bothered me that

The game led me on thinking it was a continuity but ended up not having anything to do with 1 and 2 at all. It was more of a redo with the whole godess thing

The gameplay was great, but the story just didn't entertain me. But again the art was superb.

I ended up getting a friend of mine who had always played PC games into console RPGS with BOF3 and gave him my copy for his Bday. I never played through 4, but I saw him playing it a lot. Easilly way better than 3 IMO.

As for dragon quarter, the only thing I like about it was the combat. It was a great departure, but the game itself and the rare albiet slightly entertaining plot was a failure. Its sad but its the reason the series is simply in rerelease status.

chocobolicious

Kai_San wrote:

As for dragon quarter, the only thing I like about it was the combat. It was a great departure, but the game itself and the rare albiet slightly entertaining plot was a failure. Its sad but its the reason the series is simply in rerelease status.

Or, more factually, one could take into account the fact that each sequel sold less than the game before it. III selling about 450k, IV selling 300k, V selling 150k. Thus the series was obviously becoming less marketable and a failed attempt to bring new interest to the series with a departure in the obviously unsuccesfull formula led them to shelf it. There is no real way to blame V, it even reviewed the same or better than III or IV in many game mags and such.

The series was just never really that popular.

Gaming-Freak

Hooray! I love the BoF series!

Syphyre

Yeah I'm a big fan of screenshots for RPG LPs, they just seem to work better. That being said. You're getting into a really freaking big project if you do! (and I remember BoF1 being pretty boring too.)

chocobolicious

BoF the original had some really interesting ideas for its time. Such as the Karn fusions and such. That being said it wasn't the most complex story or anything.

El Fantastico

The absolute worst thing about BoF1 was the lack of XP to next level indicator. I was obsessed with trying to get characters to level 99, and I think at one point, I just ground away for hours on the enemies near the floating fortress (better XP per hour than trying to farm the giant gold Goos that gave 9999XP) and then finally seeing some characters gain a level. Bleu took FOREVER to go up 1 level in the upper 30s range. She was a broken character, sure, what with all the spells, but still. You didn't even need her if you had the Star Mallet.

I also never got Gobi's or Karn's best weapons from the Fish Trade Market.

Best thing about BoF1 though was Mrbl3. Guaranteed no encounters? Hell yes.

chocobolicious

Which then reminds me of Sten and his awesome fire fusion/switch. Oh my, was that so very very good.

Delzhand

BoFV is one of those games that I absolutely love, but I can't commit to playing anymore, because of the save system. But it has, bar none, the coolest ending sequence I've ever played through.

The first time you get to the end and use D-Breath, and you get your meter up to around 95%+ and stop for fear of ruining your game at the last moment, and it doesn't stop. You think your controller is stuck, and you watch it climb towards 100%... and punch through 100%. Every second it climbs, and you wonder exactly where it will top out.

Edit: Huh, YouTube shows it different than I remember...

Zython

Tommatt wrote:

I loved the shit out of BoF3. Thought it was the best rpg on the system. Never played 4, as after 3 I found ways to play 1 and 2 and didn't like. Didn't 4 get bad reviews? Something turned me off from it

You thought that because it's true.

The only thing I can say that BoF IV did wrong was the dragon system. It didn't have the balance issues that 1 & 2's systems had, but it wasn't anywhere near as good as the gene system.

Daris

I don't think you could really knock BoF for sales. I loved four, but couldn't get a copy at the time anywhere. I had to rent it, and ended up playing all kind of late fees because had I returned it, I wouldn't see it on the shelf for a month. Even back on the snes it was hard getting a copy of one or two compared to say, Final Fantasy 3 (6) or Chrono Trigger.

If a new title came out, it would be in the game case at the local Wal-mart, available for online purchase, and you could get it off Amazon as well. I think if a new entry came out that looked good it would sell well.

Edit: In case it wasn't implied enough, I will flat out state I have never purchased a BoF game. I have played the first two titles, and the fourth to no end though. I never even knew three was localized.

Kai_San

El Fantastico wrote:

The absolute worst thing about BoF1 was the lack of XP to next level indicator. I was obsessed with trying to get characters to level 99, and I think at one point, I just ground away for hours on the enemies near the floating fortress (better XP per hour than trying to farm the giant gold Goos that gave 9999XP) and then finally seeing some characters gain a level. Bleu took FOREVER to go up 1 level in the upper 30s range. She was a broken character, sure, what with all the spells, but still. You didn't even need her if you had the Star Mallet.

I also never got Gobi's or Karn's best weapons from the Fish Trade Market.

Best thing about BoF1 though was Mrbl3. Guaranteed no encounters? Hell yes.

Yeah I forgot to mention this in my post. I went apeshit over leveling and stats (another problem with BOF1 and mostly BOF2, a lot of stats that actually do nothing) that I actually had all my characters to level 85. And yes, that is as rediculous as it sounds. I think they were in the 8 millions of exp. For a judge of how nuts this is, the average fight near the fort mentioned is about 5k exp, and they are divded by 8. At one point I tried to even out everyones levels then see who went up faster (I liked in BOF how different characters had different leveling speeds, an odd quick I tend to obsess over in the older RPGS that did it) then I finally evened out thier exp to see who was just a higher level. IIRC the main character just blows everyone else away.
I also was taking all the money I was making, which maxes VERY quickly, and buying Gold Bars. Max money you can have is 1 shy of a million, I think I had like 7 million (each gold bar is 65k)

I didnt get as far in BOF2 doing the same. But both games were absurd with thier later levels.

Undead Scottsman

For a second there I thought "Wow, I can't believe they're getting their game on PSN too" then I realized the thread was "Breath of Fire" not "Breath of Death"

Zython

So wait, BoF III never came to the PSN? What the fuck?

RainbowDespair

Zython wrote:

So wait, BoF III never came to the PSN? What the fuck?

One of the Capcom Community Managers said that 3 didn't get approved. I'm guessing it's because there's already a UMD of 3 (though not in the US).

chocobolicious

I figure that'd be the perfect reason to release it on PSN. The UMD version did have the awesome fishing minigame from the main menu (Let me tell you, after a while I could just fish for hours.)

Stolls

Ah, this takes me back... BoF was never really a major series, but I loved every game in its own way. Even when it was retreading familiar RPG territory, it usually had enough crazy extras - hunting for secret gear, town building, fishing - to make it worth the effort.

One thing I really liked about BoF3 is it wasn't about saving the world so much as understanding what was going on; the world isn't really in imminent danger and killing Physical God X to save it isn't technically on the to-do list. Just getting from A to B was an adventure in itself, especially since it meant going somewhere nobody has been before, only to find yet another seemingly impassible barrier to try and cross. It definitely had its problems, but it's one of my favorite games of the generation and I still poke at it from time to time.

It was also a nice touch that young Ryu stops blindly flailing his sword like an idiot the very fight that Nina shows up. Kid knows what's what.

Renzo

I'm reading that this is now up on PSN.

$6, 256mb

Syphyre

Man, I forgot how fantastic this game looks for a PS1 game.

Vi Monks

Renzo wrote:

I'm reading that this is now up on PSN.

$6, 256mb

Is that a typo, or is this really six dollars? If so,

Gilder

It's up and it's $6. I'm downloading it now. You need to search for it though. I'm glad I didn't buy anything last week now, because I have 27 cents left over after this.

blaze_zero

Guess I'm buying this.