It’s all about déjà vu for Dead Rising 2

I’ve started Dead Rising 2 over twice now and am currently playing through the opening story bits for a third time, wondering why I’m doing this to myself. Certainly not because I love the sound zombies make when you bop them on the head with a spiked bat. The problem is that I keep running into boss fights that are wiping the floor with me, and I’m unsure if it is due to my lackluster fighting skills or if Chuck Greene is not high enough in levels–which increases health, inventory slots, speed, damage, and so on–to deal with these psychopaths. The latest progression roadblock happens in Case 4 involving two sword-wielding women, if you’re curious.

Clearly, someone at Capcom loves starting over. This seemingly masochistic mechanic is also a key element in the company’s Breath of Fire: Dragon Quarter, an RPG from the PlayStation 2 era that more or less demands you die and begin again to better learn how to survive some fights. I will eventually go back and try to grok Dragon Quarter because, man…I need to know. Maybe that’ll be on my “Games to Beat in 2014” list. Unfortunately, at the rate I’m playing, a few from my 2013 list will most likely be there too. In case it’s not clear, I’m not talking about the main character dying and reviving at some checkpoint–you literally must start Dead Rising 2 over again, from the very beginning, cutscenes and all. The twist is that you retain Chuck’s level, money, upgrades, and a few key items, so you’re only growing stronger with each and every playthrough.

But some games are not fun to play over and over, especially when the playing part is fueled by frustration. A few I find I keep coming back to and enjoying include Borderlands 2, Fallout: New Vegas, and Saints Row: The Third. Those kinds of gaming experience offer you choices and variations on how to play. You can go down an evil path or focuses on heavy weapons or whatever.

I think Dead Rising 2 is a prime example of a game you should only play once, all the way through; just like the zombies you hack and slash out of your way, this game moves at a shambling, almost idiotic pace. You can skip the cutscenes, but still have to endure the loading screens, and the missions do not play out any differently a second and third time through. Sure, you can get through them faster now that you know what they entail and have a better grip on what makes an effective zombie-killing weapon, but it’s more or less mindless grinding for the sake of…what? Some designer’s guilty pleasure? Also, stick suck at saving survivors unless they are standing a few feet away from the safehouse. Every playthrough is an uphill climb, each less than the previous, but still–completely unnecessary.

I think the most fun I’ve had so far with Dead Rising 2 is when I hit a zombie with a painting, stuck a goofy mask on its head, attached an IED to its back, and shot it from a safe distance after it meandered over to some friends, racking up a sickeningly rewarding amount of PP in one heck of a zomplosion. That said, I really hope I don’t have to start the game over for a third time.

GAMES I REGRET PARTING WITH: SaGa Frontier

Much like the Nintendo DS, the original PlayStation played home to a swarm of strange and untraditional RPGS, such as The Legend of Dragoon and Brave Fencer Musashi. As well as SaGa Frontier, today’s topic for Grinding Down‘s games I regret parting with thing that I do from time to time. It was an era of chance and experimentation, and that’s something that I miss, because it’s notably missing from the industry today, seeing that Bravely Default: Flying Fairy has not yet been confirmed for U.S. shores (though, thankfully, Fantasy Life has).

One of the earliest posts on Grinding Down was about a PlayStation 2 game called Unlimited SaGa, which I’m positive I purchased more because it might have a connection, however slight, to SaGa Frontier than it being relatively inexpensive and a pretty looking JRPG. I tried several times to get into it, but it’s a beast of a game, snarling and growling and constantly chasing me away. I mean really–that combat wheel, the way you “navigate” through towns. Pffft. I’m sure I’ll pop it back in yet again some day, just as I will with Breath of Fire: Dragon Quarter, because there will always be a part of me that needs to understand why.

Thankfully, SaGa Frontier was a lot better than Unlimited SaGa, though it definitely had its own unique pitfalls. The aspect I remember the most about it is that you had seven different characters to pick to play, some with interweaving storylines, some all on their own. And you could pick and play them as you choose. Granted, I went with Red first each and every time, as he appeared to have the most action-driven plot of the bunch, given that he basically becomes a secret superhero within minutes of the opening cutscene. The other peeps–Emelia, Blue, Asellus, T260G, Riki, and Lute–could wait.

Coming out in the states a year or so after Final Fantasy VII, the sprites on pre-rendered backgrounds in SaGa Frontier did not look as sharp as polygonal Cloud did (at the time), but they made for interesting visuals. Especially when on the region ship “Cygnus” or in the magically dark and purple Facinaturu with Asellus. There are some really pretty vistas here, and that made exploring each character’s story a joy, as even though saw some overlapping spots, many were self-contained elsewhere. Many boss fights were your tiny sprite characters versus large suckers, which often had an insane number of Health Points.

Combat is probably the oddest part of SaGa Frontier, as a lot of it is based around randomness. Before I get to that, let’s begin with a staple of fantasy-based RPGs: Health Points (MP) and Magic Points (MP). These are bound found here, but instead of just straight MP, you now have three sub-classes of it: Waza Points (WP), which is magic points but only for weapon skills; Life Points (LP), used when a character is knocked unconscious; and Jutsu Points (JP), which is used for actual magic spells not tied to weapon skills. Whew. Got all that? Right, well, battles are turn-based, and many character skills are learned mid-battle, something I remember as being both exhilarating and confusing.

According to this lengthy GameFAQ, the SaGa series uses a rather unique leveling up system, similar to that of Final Fantasy II (Japan) in that you’ll gain what you use during combat instead of a certain amount of experience points. In SaGa Frontier, experience points are in the form of stat boosts and can either gain you a direct stat boost, such as an increase in strength, or a proficiency level. You might gain stats after every fight, but you might gain hardly anything at all. Basically, you just had to try different skills from different characters, and hope that something clicked.

To me, this was genre-shattering, and certainly nothing I had experienced so far in a roleplaying game. It’s certainly not a game for everyone, but it was more than unique, unafraid to try new ideas. Plus, with the freedom to see the game through in a number of ways, with who you wanted and at your own pace, it really felt like your own version of the plot, especially if you started with Riki or T260G. And for all that, SaGa Frontier is a game I deeply regret trading in as a young, dumb teenager.

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GAMES I REGRET PARTING WITH is a regular feature here at Grinding Down where I reminisce about videogames I either sold or traded in when I was young and dumb. To read up on other games I parted with, follow the tag.

GAMES I REGRET PARTING WITH: Breath of Fire III

I have a strange, uneven relationship with the already pretty strange and uneven Capcom RPG franchise known as Breath of Fire.

First, for the introductory title and its sequel in the series, games found originally on the SNES, I only got to play them much later in life when I learned all about emulating ROMs on the computer, and even then I never got far with either. They were just something I tried out to see if the tech could actually work. During my PlayStation 1 heydays, I picked up a copy of Breath of Fire III, played a decent bit of it, and then traded it in like an idiot, which should be obvious considering the name of this post. Missed out on Breath of Fire IV completely, and later picked up Breath of Fire: Dragon Quarter for the PS2, which for all intents and purposes in basically the fifth game in the series. That one probably deserves its own post, but let me just say that it is a confusing game, one that encourages death and replaying the same areas over and over again, and one that I’ve tried a good number of times to figure out without much luck.

Nonetheless, each game in the series is sort of the same interchangeable story: a boy named Ryu can turn into a dragon and goes on adventures. A girl named Nina also appears frequently, as well as characters from other games in the franchise. Battles are turn-based, and fusing into different kinds of dragons is often the key to victory. Fishing and bright colors, too.

Well, how dragon Ryu (before becoming a boy) enters the world in Breath of Fire III is probably my favorite part of the game, and a really strong contender to a classic first hour. Here’s an animated GIF, but I’ll use words below it, too:

(EDIT: Okay, I guess I can’t host animated gifs on Grinding Down. Boo. So go here instead to see.)

That open sequence and probably the hour or so after it are probably the reasons why I like this game the most from the whole franchise. It’s endearing and nicely paced, as well as quite colorful. As you can see above, the graphics for the first Breath of Fire on the PlayStation 1 were a mix of hand-drawn sprites and polygons–and dang it, I love the mixture.

Anyways, it all starts with a pair of miners–Gary and Mogu–as they search through a mine, pontificating on the nature of the magical creatures and the valuable ore called chrysm. The two miners find a giant chrysm with a preserved baby dragon locked inside it. They plan to blow the crystal apart with TNT, and when they do, the preserved dragon, to no one’s surprise but the miners’, turns out to be alive, and it attacks them. Just like that, we’re thrown into the game’s first battle, and we’re totally in control of the dragon, not the humans. With ease and shock, we turn the miners to ash. Farewell, Gary and Mogu–we hardly knew ya. The young dragon is not a ruthless monster though, attacking back against miners only when they strike first. It is, in actuality, an innocent boy, and this is conveyed strongly as miners beg for their lives and are let go.

Eventually, a bunch of miners knock the dragon out with a crane, cage it, and put it on a train headed for a bad place. Luckily, Ryu the dragon wakes up during the journey and is able to knock its cage off the train and down a ravine. We then cut to a scene involving a cat-like man stalking a wild boar in the woods. The falling cage ruins his plans, and the man is somewhat surprised to see a naked little boy inside the cave. So is whoever is playing the game, as we last saw a fire-breathing dragon in there. Despite living in complete hunger, the cat-like man decides to bring the boy home, meaning another mouth to feed, and welcomes him into his surrogate family. What follows after that is that Rei, the cat-like man, and another orphan named Teepo teach Ryu how to be a thief as a means of surviving. This character-building and -bonding is important, as the trio eventually gets separated, and a large part of the game involves finding friends and rebuilding homes and generally growing up.

And that’s all I can recall. There’s a big white space after the intro and whatever happened next. Though I do remember getting far enough into Breath of Fire III to unlock the Faerie Village, which allows the player to rebuild an entire village for magical flying critters. Doing so unlocks special benefits like rare weapons for sale, mini-games, and a sound test mode. Can’t really recall how far into this element I got, but it stands out as a charming way to spend time. Another aspect that stands out as pretty neat and something that was also later found in The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion was being able to study under a Master, earning different skills and benefits this way.

I dunno. Games like this and other PS1 classics now long gone do have me seriously considering picking up a VITA–it just recently got announced that the Sony handheld would be receiving PS1 compatibility—one day. Well, them and that updated version of Persona 4. Yeah, I know; I’m losing my mind.

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GAMES I REGRET PARTING WITH is a regular feature here at Grinding Down where I reminisce about videogames I either sold or traded in when I was young and dumb. To read up on other games I parted with, follow the tag.