Indeed. Aside from a few hardcore Unix MuD types and D&D usenetters, games like FFT precede the era of the Pandora’s Box of gaming forums, with instant in-depth strat dissemination, and all the ensuing spoilers and quick-fire judgements that entails.
Anyhow, here’s my copy of the game, currently sitting underneath this awesome moth I captured the other night (lol Buffalo Bill):
That’s creepy.
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Last time I read this thread I was working on implementing the game engine from FFT based on the very detailed Systems FAQ. This thread popping up may be reason to continue that.
Did anyone play D&D Tactics?
FFT 1.3 Easytype deals with the main balance issues without adding incentive to look for the next most broken thing.
That said, the next most broken thing in 1.3 typically ekes out a marginal advantage over the AI (the end game being a whole different beast, of course). Something like a max MA female draw out build is a pretty significant step down from a math skill build or max brave min faith blade grasp build, either of which can easily win the game by themselves with proper status resists.
I don’t know if this has been done yet, i haven’t checked in a while
But i wish somebody would hack FFT to make it 2 players with netplay, I’ve always wanted to play against another person in FFT, I think it would be really interesting.
I guess I’ll have to do it if nobody else does
You don’t really need to have read the battle mechanics faq to do well in FFT 1.3. I got to the end of chapter 3 without knowing most of the in depth stuff about the system. I didn’t start reading it until I started my solo chemist run. The problem with FFT is that the broken stuff was hugely broken while the enemy didn’t use them at all. 1.3 at least made skill gap more even and the broken stuff far less easy to abuse. Pretty much any game can be boiled down to “find the most broken tactic and abuse it like a mofo”.
I actually started playing tactics ogre over the weekend. The wait system isn’t quit as complex as FFT’s is but I still like it. I’ll probably give vanguard bandits a try over this weekend too. For some reason I want to try it. Must be the giant robots.
you can do this with the PSP release of the title.
ok thanks i forgot about the re-release, i’ll look into it, i hope a decent amount of people play it
Did anyone played or finished Valkyrie Profile: Covenant of the Plume for DS? Game was really good, but HARD as hell if you decided not to use the plume.
Totally random moth is awesome.
Nice wings, big too!
I actually had to edit this post before I noticed how goddamned large it is in comparison to the FFT cover.
When you feed it honey and water soaked off a tissue, a really long tongue shoots out of it’s head 
Wish there was like a well drawn sort of gothic cell-shaded insect RPG made by the Japanese. There might be something that ‘crept’ out on PS2, who knows. Lot of obscurities on that system over a decade. Looking back, certainly the guys who played sports when I was at school didn’t play games like FFT, but then most of them didn’t even have PlayStations. How times have changed.
I need to play this game. I’ll track it down when I have money again. Where does it fit in the timeline? Does it take place after VP1 and before VP2?
I’ve heard the game was tough but I suspect it’s like that to try and see if you can resist using the plume. I remember the plume playing some role in the story, and if you use it, bad things happen.
I just bought Front Mission 3 off PSN. Enjoyed a fan translation of Front Mission 1 for SNES and Front Mission 4 for PS2 as well. Only problem with FM is the story is extremely bland and political. Whatever, cause giant robots right?
Optimus Cack: I played D&D Tactics briefly and may actually dig it up again sometime in the near future. I’m a sucker for the 3.5/PF rules sets, I guess. Just wish more people I met who had a similar interest in them weren’t completely out of their damn minds.
Subjective, regarding Front Mission: That’s subjec-- Red Rick Dias is shot for trying too hard to be witty
Ow. Uh, let’s try that again. What you say is true for some installments, but I found FM3 and 4 were a little better on personalizing things. I found the South American cast of FM4 to be very likable and interesting, and the Durandal team was okay. Actually, I think a lot of people in this thread would enjoy FM3 and 4 if you get a chance.
I remember the FM1 fan translations. Actually, I remember the earliest ones, one of which was done by a guy who spoke English as his third or fourth language and it showed. It had such gems of lines like Ryuji Sakata warning the main character, “Roid! LOOK PLANT!” before a factory exploded. This later became an in-joke between friends and I, as we would ‘warn’ one another of nonexistent dangers with that phrase.
On Fire Emblem in general: Fun series, I own either all or nearly all of the US releases and plan to look into FE 4 and 5 sometime. I’m often surprised by the hate Pegasus Knights get in these games; some players seem to expect they should be able to slam headlong into heavily armored knights, when their job is to use their incredible speed and flight to pick favorable fights against other kinds of targets. I always found adding one or two to a team was an acceptable way to play. Perhaps not optimal, but it worked fine for me.
Other suggestions: I believe there are a few games in this genre on XBLA/PSN. Vandal Hearts: Flames of Judgment is one of them. It is not the best game around by any means, but it is decent and I really liked some of the later battles. One of them is a series of escort missions that are fun because the AI will usually cooperate with your attempts to set up defensive zones around the character you have to protect. I think it’s $10 or $15, and that’s not a bad price for a passable entry in the genre. The demo just shoots the game in the foot because it gives you the two weakest fights to play, the worst designed ones by far.
I should really catch up on the Advance Wars games sometime. Definitely liked what I saw, just got interrupted by other work when they were new releases and forgot to come back. That said, I’ve always been fond of the animated .gif you see posted regarding “pay to win” games, invoking the CO ability “Power Of Money”.
I don’t have a ton of experience with 3.5, but I liked how some of the old D&D rules played out, and I’m wondering how well they translated to the Ogre Battle format.
I’d say they’re pretty related. Both use square-based maps for movement, both use a ‘you can take up to X actions, and only Y may be these kind of actions, per turn’ system. Skills in one directly carry over to the other.
Dont remember the timeline, but the game is HARD. It forces you to play really smart, because you must overkill your enemies to please Hel ( the goddess of the dead world ) to whom the main character has sold his… soul, for the plume help. If you play smart, she rewards you with a lot of stuff… if you dont, then you are going to die, unless you use the plume.
Using the plume, basically gives one of your allies a broken ability or mechanic for the rest of the fight, allowing you to crush the AI, but that character must die when the battle is over. I think they leave some stat or item for you, or something? The game has 3 endings, depending on how many times you do use the plume. If you use it more than 3 times, is also game over: Valkirye comes to kick your ass for being an asshole and servant of the dead goddess.
I think im going to replay the game, i remember it being really good (but hard as fuck).
Because most peoples’ first experience with Fire Emblem is with the GBA games, which were fond of placing reinforcement assholes in places where you’d park your Peg Knight thinking she’d be completely safe. That, and ballista maps.
Once Path of Radiance rolls around, lo and behold, weaker archers, no ballistas, less bullshit reinforements, and Marcia becomes one of the most popular and highly-ranked characters in the game.
There’s also Shadow Dragon, where Caeda is easily the best character for the first half of the game (or whenever you get Wolf/Sedgar leveled up).
“Reinforcement assholes” is… something I’m all to used to by now. I play every TacRPG expecting them, and am even pretty good at figuring out where they’re likely to be. It’s an annoying mechanic though, especially if the story doesn’t even suggest it might happen on any given mission/map. Some Gundam-themed games are particularly bad about this, sometimes flinging 4-5 reinforcement waves at you per stage. One would think this could be dramatic and interesting, but it often ends up just being tedious. “Yeah yeah, okay. Next pack of guys to get mowed down by my squad, come on over.”