Wednesday, September 16, 2015

Keep your money in your pockets

Remember when I said I was worried MD4 would turn out to basically be a fanservice-laden Gates to Infinity with all Pokémon and hunger? From what little we know so far, I wasn't too far off. The balance is still just as out of whack as MD3's was, and I know the first two games weren't perfect either, but the 3DS outings just insult your intelligence.

Traditional recruitment is completely gone, you now get all your Pokémon from Affinity Chart Connection Orb stuff. The good news is that you can do multiple missions in one go. The bad news is that the tutorial gets you a LEVEL 50 SALAMENCE. You're just a couple hours into the game and you get a LEVEL 50 SALAMENCE. What the fuck Trollfreak Chunsoft. Oh, but doing one particular mission allows you to do further missions that allow you to recruit... Team ACT from MD1. Well, we don't know if it's actually Team ACT, but they laid it out that way because FANSERVICE.

Oh, by the way, remember how MD3 just gave you friggin' Virizion early on just for the lulz? Well here you get Victini for free early on. I mean, come on. At least the first two games made you work for those legendaries - and I mean work really, really hard in some cases.

On a slightly related subject, I finally caved in and downloaded Pokémon Shuffle. Once you overlook the fact that your sessions will almost never go over 20 minutes unless you pay, it's actually quite a fun little game. I've done the first 50 regular stages, none of the expert stages even though I've unlocked a bunch, and I even managed to snag the event Emboar. (Note for anyone interested: every time you beat Emboar, but fail to catch it, its base catch rate will go up by 1%. So if you're having trouble, you can basically grind the catch rate on this thing - but start now, because there are only two days left! And yes, this is strictly an Emboar thing, no other battle, including events, does this.) Regirock really, REALLY seems off-limits with its 20k HP in 30 turns, though, and Diancie... well, I still have until the 28th to get ready for that.

Edit: Okay, so MD4 charges you for going from a continent to another. WHAT THE FUCKING FUCK. I'm sorry, but I'm just at a loss for words here. The first three games never did that! Nobody charged you a dime if you wanted to go to Blizzard Island, you went to Blizzard Island and that was it!

Oooh, but wait, it gets better. This is spoilerrific so I'll just mask it (highlight to read).

There's a boss fight where, about halfway through, you and your partner evolve to your final forms... AND THEN IT REVERTS AFTER THE FIGHT.

This is the most cruel I've ever seen a Pokémon game be.

7 comments:

  1. The only MD game I've played was EoT (this was before Sky came out), and that wasn't too bad. Interesting that most of the other games really weren't that good, and a shame that this one looks like it will be more broken than MD1 (and even Morrowind, for that matter) and generally not a fun game.

    On another subject, I was rewatching your OoT LP, and I had noticed that you frequently stated your dislike for Majora's Mask. I was wondering why, exactly, though it's also possible that things have changed with it being some five years in the future. I definitely can see why it wouldn't lend well to LPing though, since its mandatory content is quite short (enough that it was pretty easy to complete it within the first three days after you became human).

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    1. If I remember correctly, the biggest reason was because the time mechanic made the whole game tedious, repetitive and not fun.
      Which I agree with, although my own reasoning might be different than his. You fans of the game can repeat all you want that it was intended, but I don't play games to feel depressed, I want to have fun taking my time exploring every nook and cranny of the map, which you can only really do in Majora's Mask by planning out the days cycle beforehand with a guide.
      If I get distracted while exploring or get stuck on something, I just don't feel motivated to keep playing, I react by saying "goddammit, I just wasted my freaking time and might not finish everything I need before the end of the cycle, screw it, I'll play something actually fun"
      Although as much as the purists are complaining about it, I heard that the remake did fix that issue, so I dunno, maybe I should give it a second chance.
      It's nearly 3AM and I'm tired, so I'm sure I made a mistake here that will make me regret typing this comment once I wake up, but what the heck, I think I stayed respectful, so I'll just roll with it. Biggest mistake was to step in as someone who dislikes the game in the first place anyway, hopefully I won't get murdered in my sleep. (Just kidding)

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  2. At first I thought you meant you had to pay actual money to access another continent, but it's just in-game money. Doesn't exactly seem like something I'd want to have to pay for, regardless.

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    1. You know gaming's in a bad spot when it's never clear whether we're talking real or in-game money, even for expenditures that should never be covered with real cash.

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  3. I think they probably give you Salamence because there were early dungeons that were very difficult in previous games, especially for younger players. Sinister Woods from the first game will always give me hell. I'm not saying it's a good reason for giving us a level 50 Salamence, I just mean that is probably why they did it. It's been a little while since I played PMD3, but I don't remember Virizion being that overpowered. My biggest problem with her uhhh.. subplot (romantic subplots don't really belong in PMD).

    I never thought too much of the balancing in PMD games; it never seemed that great to me. There were starters that were just bad. The game's difficulty is inversely proportionate to how many reviver seeds you have, and you can cheese every boss with seeds. And in this new game I've already heard stories of people being two-shotted by a pokemon they can't even see, so I've no clue what to think of it's difficulty now.

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    1. PMD has never been this hugely balanced game, but MD2 is easily the closer it ever got. Then they threw all that away with the 3DS outings.

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    2. Another thing MD2 did right. Grovyle and Celebi have the hots for each other, but the game doesn't constantly hammer that fact home. (Now Arceus allowing them to live... that's something else entirely.)

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