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Professor Layton & the Mystery Town - Care of Level 5 • Page 3
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MadMirko 2,974 posts
Seen 2 years ago
Registered 17 years ago -
ilmaestro 32,932 posts
Seen 10 months ago
Registered 18 years agoI just fired off what will hopefully be the last of three e-mails to yesasia to get them to resend my order. Only ever happened once before (with Okami nearly a year ago) and they did send a replacement for that pretty quickly once I month had passed from my order being shipped, so I'll have it soon, hopefully.
Hopefully. -
CosmicFuzz 32,632 posts
Seen 56 minutes ago
Registered 15 years agoDamn... I'm reeeeeally looking forward to this game, it's totally right up my street. Hope you get it soon ilmaestro, mostly to hear your impressions, but maybe a little for yourself .gif)
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ilmaestro 32,932 posts
Seen 10 months ago
Registered 18 years agoHeh, thanks.
They are now sending me a fresh copy of this (and Bleach DS 2nd), so hopefully I'll have it by the end of next week.
Hopefully. -
MadMirko 2,974 posts
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Registered 17 years agoGood luck, mate. I'm really looking forward to your take on the game (although it doing well in Japan means something, too). -
ilmaestro 32,932 posts
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Registered 18 years agoI'm impressed (to some extent) at its sustained sales, the graphical style alone made me think it wouldn't have much penetration past 'proper' gamers and into the hands of the *spit* typical DS owner. -
MadMirko 2,974 posts
Seen 2 years ago
Registered 17 years agoCould be the Ghibli-like presentation lured the casual gamer in. On the other hand, there are "gamer's games" million sellers on the DS in Japan, so it might not be past the "proper" crowd. -
ilmaestro 32,932 posts
Seen 10 months ago
Registered 18 years agoHmm, no way am I having Mario and Animal Crossing as 'proper' gamer's games. 
But seriously, I was trying to say 'hardcore' without using the actual word. It just doesn't look like the type of game that would sell week after week to housewives and salarymen, but then again there's not really any telling what will happen with DS software these days. -
MadMirko 2,974 posts
Seen 2 years ago
Registered 17 years agoI was more looking the way of Dragon Quest Monsters: Joker or Final Fantasy III for the millions, or the also well doing Super Robot Taisen W (fantastic, BTW) and the like.
The DS is owned by the hardcore AND the casuals / new gamers, that's the beauty of the system. Imagine what games we are bound to see if even only a fraction of all those newbies turn into the hardcore of tomorrow.
If nothing else, gaming is finally for grown ups in the eye of the public and that as well should create games beyond what we have today.
Still, I get your point and I also think that Layton might appeal to casuals because of the "puzzles connected by story" structure. Logic games are mainstream, see Brain Training etc. -
ilmaestro 32,932 posts
Seen 10 months ago
Registered 18 years agoI know this may seem like I'm bending the rules to suit myself, but I'm not letting you have anything DQ or FF related either, as they sell in droves to gamers and non-gamers (as such) alike.
The reason logic games are mainstream is because they don't look like video games, they look like regular puzzle games that are already super popular in Japan. People are buying two things in bulk on DS 1) non-games and 2) outrageously high profile 'brand name' games. Nothing else sells to out of the ordinary levels, and anime stylings are no guarantee of huge sales, again without the attachment of a huge 'brand name' franchise to go with it. -
MadMirko 2,974 posts
Seen 2 years ago
Registered 17 years agoYou need to consider that "in bulk" on the DS means something along the lines of 5 million units sold in Japan alone, which alters the scale we have in mind. The fact that other titles do not do as well as Pokemon does not indicate they are selling poorly.
Look at the PSP for example. The "outrageously high profile 'brand name'" (sorry) Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops did not even sell 1/10th of the biggest DS seller.
Heck, even the biggest PS2 hits did not do as well as Pokemon on the DS, so holding it against the ordinary DS titles is actually bending the rules to suit your argument, yes.
Especially because the biggest hits on all other platforms are also fitting your category of high profile games (FF, DQ, Monster Hunter), and Sony in particular is trying hard to ape the success of logic- and non-games, see Brain Trainer Portable or Talkman which all did better than Valkyrie Profile Lenneth, Metal Gear Acid or Tekken Dark Resurrection on the PSP. Which is to say, both of your categories are always likely to do well, regardless of platform, simply because the market for them is larger.
The DS has the most success with those, because it is the most successful platform.
For gamer's games, I'm again sticking with the PSP comparison. Here are three random examples:
Phoenix Wright DS did better than Tales of Eternia PSP
Legend of Starfi 4 DS did better than Loco Roco PS
Romance of the Three Kingdoms Wars DS did better than Metal Gear Acid 2 PSP
There are only few really comparable games on both platforms, but there are those that compare favourably for the DS:
Super Robot Wars DS: 220000 sold after 3 weeks
Super Robot Wars PSP: 88000 sold after 20 weeks
Considering how really great games do on PSP, say Jeanne D'Arc with 90000 copies sold one could very well assume they would have done better on DS. DS titles that have sold better than that include low profile games like Egg Monster Hero and Megaman ZX.
The really interesting DS times are just beginning as developers shift their focus from other platforms to the DS, which most have (I think) written off at the start of this generations battle due to the assumption that the Playstation name alone would draw gamers.
As game development takes a lot of time, we are only just beginning to see the effect of them discovering that they were wrong. We'll see RPGs, strategy games, software from western and eastern developers alike, high-prestige hardcore games like DQ IX.
What you said was true a year ago, there is some truth in it now, but it will be wrong next year. -
ilmaestro 32,932 posts
Seen 10 months ago
Registered 18 years agoThat's a really great post (I mean that, don't let it be taken sarcastically), but I think the relative lack of third party million sellers (despite the fact that DS software sales are easily comparable to software sales at any stage of the PS2's lifespan) speaks to my 'your regular DS owner isn't branching out too much' viewpoint. So by 'in bulk' I'm talking a quarter of the sales of the really high profile stuff.
Comparing software sales with the PSP is hardly fair - if DS games weren't selling much, much better (what is the user base ratio? 5 to 1? 6 to 1?) then there'd be some serious issues to be discussed.
I'm not saying it can't change, but the number of third party games not attached to an overwhelmingly popular franchise that have troubled the sales charts is very few, and in that context I was pleasantly surprised by how Layton has continued to sell well. -
MadMirko 2,974 posts
Seen 2 years ago
Registered 17 years agoThank you.
My figures were all taken from Japanese-only sales data (not because I chose so, it's just about the only place for which reliable data is even available to the public), and the DS vs. PSP ratio there seems to be about 3:1.
I chose DS vs. PSP because they have been around for a similar length of time and are both handhelds, but it doesn't change much if it is compared to the PS2 instead.
Your criteria of "more than 1 million sold by a 3rd party title that is not part of a big series" is not fullfilled by any PS2 title at all. Every single game is part of a high profile series:
Dragon Quest VIII PS2 Enix 3,609,000
Final Fantasy X PS2 Square 2,736,750
Final Fantasy XII PS2 Square 2,370,750
Final Fantasy X-2 PS2 Square 2,112,250
Gran Turismo 3 PS2 Sony 1,874,750
Dragon Quest V (Remake) PS2 Enix 1,647,250
Everybodys Golf 3 PS2 Sony 1,384,000
Kingdom Hearts II PS2 Square 1,178,000
World Soccer Winning Eleven 6 PS2 Konami 1,157,250
Dynasty Warriors 4 PS2 Koei 1,132,750
World Soccer Winning Eleven 7 PS2 Konami 1,128,750
World Soccer Winning Eleven 8 PS2 Konami 1,115,750
Gran Turismo 4 PS2 Sony 1,097,250
Onimusha PS2 Capcom 1,087,250
Until very recently there has not been a million seller on the PSP, 3rd party or not, the first is the Monster Hunter sequel which is quite high profile, too.
I'm not quite sure this is a useful criteria.
Comparing software sales with the PSP is hardly fair - if DS games weren't selling much, much better (what is the user base ratio? 5 to 1? 6 to 1?) then there'd be some serious issues to be discussed.
But why? The PS2 has a larger user base than the DS, but sales have not been much better, not even in its prime. In fact, the system with the smaller base sells software much better in this case. But anyhow, developers asking themselves for which platform to develop certainly won't be concerned with fairness but with where they can sell the most copies of their game.
As I said, you are not wrong (yet *g*) but IMO there is a noticeable shift in the DS' future, and sales look quite healthy for every party involved. More so for Nintendo titles, but they have been around longer than anyone else in the business, so I'd expect as much. -
ilmaestro 32,932 posts
Seen 10 months ago
Registered 18 years agoHeh, I honestly didn't see your last post in this thread until now, although I concede that I have nothing even remotely resembling your amount of evidence or concrete arguments to back up my slight anti-DS bias.
And anyway, Layton turned up in the post this morning, more than a month after launch! \o/
So my bias may be turned down a little after today, if it's as excellent as it could be. Hopefully it will be very quiet in the shop later and I'll be able to give it a go in a few hours' time. -
CosmicFuzz 32,632 posts
Seen 56 minutes ago
Registered 15 years agoWow, MadMirko and ilmaestro, very nice reading from your posts guys, some really interesting points raised.
And am glad to hear Layton finally arrived! It took long enough! Looking forward to hearing your thought on it
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MadMirko 2,974 posts
Seen 2 years ago
Registered 17 years agoOkay, we'll call it a draw.
Looking forward to your impressions on Layton. I almost hope you don't like it, so I won't have to wait ages for an English version.
Almost. -
SirScratchalot 7,921 posts
Seen 1 year ago
Registered 16 years agoYou know lads, threads like this are why I like this forum. -
ilmaestro 32,932 posts
Seen 10 months ago
Registered 18 years agoMadMirko wrote:
Heh, I'll almost be doing my best not to like it. Almost.
Looking forward to your impressions on Layton. I almost hope you don't like it, so I won't have to wait ages for an English version.
Almost. -
Tonka 31,979 posts
Seen 7 hours ago
Registered 18 years agoWell after MadMirkos posts I think it would be hard for anyone to say otherwise. Good read. Although it doesn't look much as a draw from where I'm sitting. -
ChimneyBug 216 posts
Seen 12 years ago
Registered 15 years agoI also got Layton when it came out in Japan (the second week, first week it was sold out) and finished it a while ago (sold it second hand for 3/4 the price )
one of the reasons it got popular is because its made from a book written by a real professor who made all these brain teaser puzzles.
its basically a collection of puzzles stuck together with a point and click (well just tap all over the screen until you find another puzzle, which when you pass moves on the story) interface to stick them together. The animation is nice when it comes, the story isn't really up to much. Layton goes back to this town to try find the family secret, which other people are trying to find, which only has the hint of it being something to do with a golden apple. static screens with arrows in each direction to change place on the map.
Thats not to knock the game, it's really all about the puzzles, of which there are a fair amount and then more difficult versions of each puzzle. You can do things like build a jigsaw picture by collecting the pieces, put furnature in layton and his boy assistants rooms to make them happy, but it doesnt really have much effect on anything else. Music is nice and fitting with the style of the game.
It's all really just a means to trickle you puzzles and those are the good part, some will twist your brain and when the game is done its the type of one you never go back to, kind of like doing the same crossword puzzle a second time really.
edit: sorry for the long post
Edited by ChimneyBug at 15:38:52 02-04-2007 -
Tiger_Walts 16,674 posts
Seen 4 years ago
Registered 19 years agoSo it's more of a Fool's Errand than an adventure game. Good, because Hotel Dusk had far too few puzzles. -
ChimneyBug 216 posts
Seen 12 years ago
Registered 15 years agoI've never played Fool's Errand but it seems the same kind of thing, yea. The Japanese response (well, amazon comments and such read before buying the game) also seems to be if you're expecting an adventure get hotel dusk but if you want a game of puzzles Layton is what you want -
ilmaestro 32,932 posts
Seen 10 months ago
Registered 18 years agoTonka wrote:
Yeah, I'm arguing far more from passion and feeling, whereas Mirko actually has, you know, a real fully-formed argument.
Although it doesn't look much as a draw from where I'm sitting. I'm fighting the good fight for the honest, traditional games fan, he's on the side of the evil faceless money grabbing corporation masquerading as the saviour of videogames. 
This is excellent so far, the puzzles come thick and fast and whilst there're an awful lot of easy ones (admittedly I'd already solved upwards of 20 of the game's puzzles on a bit of paper after seeing screenshots in previews ^_^) there have been a couple of real teasers in there. Only two so far that rely on a bit of Japanese knowledge for the solution, although you'd probably be struggling to know what the game wanted you to do with a lot of them, so definitely not import friendly. Probably not impossible to work around, but hard to recommend.
What I like most is the ease with which I can play it in work and just put the DS down at a moment's notice without any chance of missing anything (unless you were unlucky enough to be in the middle of one of the short animated sequences) - very relaxed game, no time limits, and no text disappears from the screen unless you touch it.
I'm sure there's a chance the story might not be great, but the characters sure are, very memorable visuals all around really. The animation is stylish, but technically limited to a greater extent than I expected, in frame rate and in terms of how much of the bottom screen it takes up.
Like ChimneyBug says I've found it to be very linear - although there are puzzles you can miss by not checking everything. It doesn't feel like it's quite going to convince me that the DS has any actual 'games' of any substance and quality (bar the Treasure made Bleach fighters), but it's so well packaged and presented that it's a far worthier purchase than any of the more standard puzzle/quiz/'brain training' games you get.
One thing that I can't decide whether it's a nice touch or not is the addition of unlockables in the 'secret mode' that are accessed via passwords to be gleaned from the sequel ('... and Pandora's Box') - either it will be stuff that ties the two games together, in which case it's a nice touch, or it's a bit of a cheeky way to get you to pay for content that should have been available to you anyway. -
JinTypeNoir 4,368 posts
Seen 7 years ago
Registered 16 years agoTo back up what MadMirko is saying, I present you with this:
Harvest Moon: The Island I Grew Up (English title) 250,085
This is what it has sold thus far, which means it is by far, the best selling Harvest Moon game ever in Japan. In fact, in its first week it surpassed the lifetime sales of the last three games in the series. This one relies much more on the touch screen elements than the past games. Marvelous announced they would be supporting the DS more lately. It may not seem like much to you, but to a small company like Marvelous, such growth is huge and invaluable. UPDATE: The game has now outsold the last three games put together and was able to allow Marvelous to go on a funding spree and get small games as diverse and important as No More Heroes, King Story and Vanillaware's new title.
Digimon Story 217,986
None of us may be into a game like this, but it's a notable RPG of the Pokemon ilk for children and the series has fallen off the map years and years ago. In the first place, it had never been all that popular. This game did far better ever expected and the sequel recently went on sale and is outpacing the original. For a game and series that was never all that popular and often HORRIBLY, that's a lot of growth.
Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney 340,000+
Not only did this outsell the original, it outsold the best-selling game in the series. Again, this is isn't stars and stripes million seller territory, but it's growth for the developer in a game that is economically profitable for them. UPDATE: I put the + there because I still see this game pop into the Top 50 every once in a while, so it's clearly still selling. The Phoenix Wright 3 re-release this August has sold about 140,000 thus far and of course the brand new Gyakuten Saiban pretty much hit half a million. It and Professor Layton are completely responsible for 100% reviving the adventure genre in Japan, which has more new games coming out this year and the next than it has over the last six or seven.
Chocobo and the Magic Picture Book 139,944
UPDATE: Has sold a bit more since last time, further confirming the slow burn of DS sales.
Square Enix expected 80,000 from this, but it did much more and its still selling bit by bit. It did this by selling for a long time. You can see this in many DS games. The myth that Japanese games sell a lot of the beginning and then taper is just that, a myth.
However, due to the problems of the used market, publishers used to have introduce reduced price versions of their games in order to get the most of the market. You can see this with the original Monster Hunter Portable, which has about 35% of its sales on the budget version and which will be debuting another budget version shortly, which they hope will propel the original into the million seller realm. Other examples include Tales of Destiny II for the PS2, which was a high seller at around 800,000, but it took three different budget versions and about 3 years to propel into its current status of around 1.3 million.
Another factor helping out developers on the DS is that the games usually resist falling victim to the used market much more than they do so elsewhere. For instance, Sengoku Musou 2 which sold around 500,000 copies to be the least selling Musou game in ages had a noticeable fall. However, that wasn't the case for its popularity. The game sold well over 500,000 additional used copies, which is far more than past Musou games, which always only got around 200,000 more in sales from the used market. Thus, developers had to figure out a way to make their games "hot" and keep them "hot" for a while so that they wouldn't succumb to the used market.
DS games get "hot" primarily because lots of DEVELOPERS and TRACKERS, you know the people, who actually have access to much more detailed stats than these, have noticed that DS buyers buy games at full price for longer and interest stays high in a game. Many, many, many third party games have much, much longer sales potential than what has usually been the case.
Moji Pittan DS 140,000+ -> current sales: 308,786
This is a "serious" puzzle game like Puyo Puyo or Tetris Attack that gets a lot of hardcore notice. It took the game over a year and a half to sell 130,000 copies in the PS2. It took a budget re-release and a year for it sell around 120,000 on the PSP. It's done this in two weeks on the DS and I put the plus and estimate, because its still selling like crazy. Who knows where it will end up, but either way its far, far, far above any of its predecessors. UPDATE: This is a rather huge leap, so I thought I'd leave the original in, just to show how much DS titles can sell over the long term.
Speaking of Puyo Puyo:
Puyo Puyo 15th Anniversary 209,000+
Again, blown away? No, but the series imploded almost completely at number 4 and its one of the things that killed Compile. Since then Puyo sold in the dumps. Now this game comes along and has the highest single sales for the series since the mid 90s. How did the other versions? A below 2000 debut on the PS2 for instance. The DS is actually the version that had the least sales potential going for it, if circumstances count because A) every copy of the game had to be recalled because of an awful bug and B) it went back on sales months after its original release, where it promptly darted back into the charts, C) it was both released and re-released during a period of heavy competition for gamer dollars, even in the puzzle game category. And it still sold way better than its competitors and it still continues to sell better than its competitiors and will probably be around 200,000 when all is said and done. As Puyo Puyo stands with Panel de Pon as one of the most hardcore puzzlers in Japan, this is quite a triumph. UPDATE: Ha, look at how good my prediction was! In any case, I put the plus again, because once more this another one that pops back into the charts again and again.
Yggdrasil Labyrinth (Etrian Odyssey) 74,000 -> 119,584
UPDATE: I left the original there, to again show how DS supports small developers with consistent sales over a long period of time. Because of the persistent sales, the game is now getting a sequel. Etrian Odyssey 2 can continue to fill a very dry niche that hasn't been watered in years.
The acclaimed the dungeon crawler that bears a resemblance to Wizardry. Why am I crowing about a game that "only" sold 74,000 copies (thus far, it's still selling)? Because, Wizardry-alike a rather active hardcore niche. They have a very loyal and interested fanbase and there are many games that cater to them, including the 3 billion Japanese-only Wizardry games they release (okay, so only about four or five last year). Despite this, they all tend to sell around 10,000 or less, lifetime. As Wiz-alike, Yggdrasil is the first to outpace that in...well, years and years. Its developer, Atlus, only expected a maximum sales of around 30,000. They sold that in the first week and were left scrambling to catch up to demand. So as you can see, the game has sold about two and a half times better than their expectations. Now with a small team, small budget and small expectations when a title does that well, the published can only be delighted.
There are other signs of course. Hotel Dusk sold around UPDATE: 206,000 thus far, which is an improvement of about UPDATE: 100,000 over Another Code, which shows growth there. And of course, it's still selling. Mario Kart DS is the second best selling in the series in Japan and that title used to belong to the N64 version. Love & Berry (which is a rhythm game, with some dating sim elements to it, so why it gets passed off as a "non-game" is beyond me, just because I'm not a girl doesn't I can't see that it is very much in the vain of Dance Dance Revolution, Guitar Hero and PaRappa) is Sega's second best selling arcade port ever. EVER.
There is a ton of evidence out there, if you actually look at how the DS market affects the people who make the games. In fact, weirdly enough, there is also some evidence that all attention and hype the DS gets is affecting the PSP's success positively in certain areas as well. There was a rather fascinating article six months ago which traced the buying habits of a couple of people who bought Brain Training and of course it's a diverse group. One of the verdicts was that some of them get attracted to challenging more "cerebral" games, i.e. strategy, sim or RPG and that some of these people were responsible for the rather surprising sales, which are inexplicable given the circumstances, of some of these smaller games on the PSP. As well, there's the example of the "Monster Hunter" effect. That is, one of the reasons Monster Hunter has become so popular on the PSP is because of a backlash towards the DS by middle school students, where it is considered much cooler to own a PSP and be in a Monster Hunter group.
I am of course, somewhat dismayed that people still look down on games like Brain Training and Kanji Quiz; I've really enjoyed this new trend of chiiku ("knowledge growth") games. And really, it's not like the market wasn't prepared for them. The earliest non-game explosion was way back in the SFC era. Back then it was megahits like the sound novels Otogirisou and Kamaitachi no Yoru, where all you did was select choices from a multiple choice list like a choose-your-own-adventure that made gamers claim that "real" games would go out and be replaced by these. The original Tokimeki Memorial was another one of those, but after that fad broke and it become a market for only certain very obsessed people did gamers realize they were worrying for nothing. Additional hysteria came from the popularity of Mario Paint and a game called The Psychological Game, which was a long-running serie that revolved mostly around analyzing the player's personality based on multiple choice questions in different situations.
It hit again in the PlayStation era Tamagotchi and Doko Demo Issho came alive as humongous hits. Even Famitsu wondered if they should even consider Doko Demo a game. And then Sony punched out Xi, Intelligent Cube, PaRappa, My Summer Vacation and Morikawa-Kun 2nd Pet in a short two-year period. All of these games were either simple, easily understand hits that made gamey gamers claim that gaming was going to the dogs for simon says, simple puzzle games and virtual gardens.
Heck, it doesn't even have to be about the idea of games becoming so simple that they somehow cease to be a game or not being what people expect. Back in the late 80s, people cried long and hard over the death of the hobbyist computer developer in Japan who thrived on the MSX and other Japanese computers, with ports to the console systems, when PC RPGs were actually quite popular in Japan. They said it was the end of Japanese creativity and innovation. When the PC Engine RPGs debuted like Tengai Makyo and were more linear, with movies and voice-acting replacing the hardcore elements RPGs had clinged to before, they claimed that it would kill off the appeal of RPGs and that no more meaty gameplay would be developed, that from then they would all be shallow ciphers of what they used to be. (Basically, the Final Fantasy VII argument years earlier.) We ran into this again with Pokemon, but in somewhat the opposite direction.
In all those previous periods, the new games helped new people into gaming and get interested into other types of games. If I had to quote all the Japanese blogs, company reports, sales data and articles I've read, or tell you all the anecdotes I've seen lately of people asking about or playing games, the evidence would be overwhelming: more and more the DS's success is translating into success in the more traditional genres that came before, there is simply not a shred of doubt. It's making every type of game more successful, from the niche to the already popular. To say it isn't is about as absurd as claiming that since you can't actually prove every single person who was thought to have died in the blast of Hiroshima isn't simply on a massively popular vacation to Guam.
But I'm not as concerned with that as I am with the growing market, which I'm tickled about. As far as I see it, I'm very glad the idea that the hardcore spazotron overwhelming desire for complexity is waning is a fantastic thing. Some games are just getting tiring and downright cheeky in how much they expect you to invest just to understand them. It's great to see games like Layton, Chocobo Tales, the new Harvest Moon, Kanji Quiz and so on actually look for ways to simplify in order to make an extremely compelling experience.
BTW, I think Layton's simply a billion times better than most of the underwhelming ho-hum PC adventures we've had lately (well, the "official" ones, a lot of the amateur ones, like Adventures in the Galaxy of Fantabulous Wonderment, are really cool). It's story might as be as much of a draw as Level 5 games (which is to say, not much) but its puzzles and atmosphere are great. And I wouldn't knock it too much for the sequel tie-in. After all, there's over a 100 puzzles in the main game proper and the weekly downloadable puzzles as well, and it's not like the game is short or shoddy anyway.
Edited by JinTypeNoir at 05:03:50 03-04-2007
And also sometime in October, when the whim came on him -
JinTypeNoir 4,368 posts
Seen 7 years ago
Registered 16 years agodisc wrote:
Can I play it even though I have pretty much 0 knowledge of kanji and katakana?
I don't think that's a good idea. There are more than a couple of puzzles that require Japanese language knowledge. The consistency of which you are expected to solve these puzzles is erratic. One person might bar your way to a certain location until you do, whereas another puzzle might just be one of the many you can choose from in the area and when you solve a certain amount, you're allowed to progress, kind of like the stars in Mario 64.
Even if you could find a translation of the puzzles and their hints, you'll have to wander around clicking everywhere to find puzzles and do things because you'll have no idea what you have to do next.
I don't think you have to worry though. There hasn't been one single Level 5 game yet that hasn't been translated. This is a company who has shown quite an interest in supporting foreign markets. As their first self-published game, it just might mean that they need to forge a publishing agreement to get it out in other countries first or create an outlet with which to publish it in other countries. I'd wait if I were you. If you do understand the game, though the story is no great shakes, the atmosphere that comes from complete understanding is delightful. Think of it like making Yoshi and Mario into a hoverbike and a bald space marine in alternate history World War II with aliens, but keeping the mechanics the same. Sure, the gameplay is still there, but it's not as good as it could be if it had the benefit of appealing to all your gamer senses at once. -
MadMirko 2,974 posts
Seen 2 years ago
Registered 17 years agoilmaestro wrote:
Tonka wrote:
Yeah, I'm arguing far more from passion and feeling, whereas Mirko actually has, you know, a real fully-formed argument.
Although it doesn't look much as a draw from where I'm sitting. I'm fighting the good fight for the honest, traditional games fan, he's on the side of the evil faceless money grabbing corporation masquerading as the saviour of videogames.
Ouch! In that case I meant "draw" in the "Monthy Python and the Holy Grail" sense.
This is excellent so far, the puzzles come thick and fast and whilst there're an awful lot of easy ones (admittedly I'd already solved upwards of 20 of the game's puzzles on a bit of paper after seeing screenshots in previews ^_^) there have been a couple of real teasers in there.
That sounds very promising. In my mind this shapes up to be a little like Puzzle Quest, where the puzzle genre is embedded into a story-driven frame. A role playing puzzle game in PQ and more of an adventure puzzle game in Layton. I wonder if such games (combining a genre that's mainstream with one that isn't) will be a bridge for the casual game into the respective "hardcore" genre.
Now to wait a few months for a Western release... -
MadMirko 2,974 posts
Seen 2 years ago
Registered 17 years agoJinTypeNoir, thanks for that post it was a great read, and it should be saved for future generations. I'm only half joking, BTW, I can't count the discussions I had, time and again, about happenings in the video game world that had clear precedents in gaming history. It's only that the subject matter seems to be not researched properly, at least I didn't run across any works to which one could point. -
ilmaestro 32,932 posts
Seen 10 months ago
Registered 18 years agoJTN, great post, and it is indeed awesome that the DS is allowing for greater sales of niche series, but I still find myself wondering why I should be surprised at seeing better-than-previous sales on a console which is pretty much amazing everyone all the time with its sales and has game RRPs cheaper than, for instance, the PS2 which would be its only recent rival in the sales charts.
edit: to clarify, I'm not sure exactly what I'm looking for from the machine, but it's not some super-niche Wizardry-alike, and it's not Brain Training.
Edited by ilmaestro at 12:42:52 03-04-2007 -
JinTypeNoir wrote:
Are there many people who do? I certainly don't, I look down on the plaudits that have been heaped on Nintendo for saving the industry from becoming some kind of incestuous, head-in-the-sand industry coming towards the end of its natural growth if we don't tap into the market of 'people who don't like games' by releasing games like Brain Training. And I look down on the people who insist that they are actually video games. You couldn't call Scrabble (for instance) a video game just because you're playing it via a computer, it doesn't change the game at all from if you were playing it normally. OMG! Shit loads of people solve crosswords every day - video games confirmed as acceptable entertainment by Joe Public.
I am of course, somewhat dismayed that people still look down on games like Brain Training and Kanji Quiz
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