SRPGS

[Anonymous No.1335301]

So /vr/ I want some recommends for some good Strategy RPGs. My favorite SRPGs are both FFT and Tactics Ogre, however, I really haven't found any other SRPG that really has kept my interest lately. I'd like some recommendations if you don't mind, I was thinking of playing one of the earlier Fire Emblems, but I don't know how good they are, however, I'm ears for anything.

[Anonymous No.1335320]

>>1335301
The numbered Front Mission games are my favorite Strategy/Tactical RPG's, even the two non-/vr/ games on the PS2.

[Anonymous No.1335334]

>>1335320
I've actually played Front Mission Gunhazard, but, I imagine the rest of the series is very different from that. If you had to recommend one which one would be the 'best' to start with.

[Anonymous No.1335353]

You should learn the difference between strategy and tactics.

[Anonymous No.1335356]

>>1335334
The DS remake of the Front Mission 1 would be a good introduction to the main series. While it's a bit lacking in character customization compared to the later games, it's a good backdrop to the rest of the series because the war in the game gets referenced throughout the rest of the series, and some of the other games have sections that take place at the same time as the first game.

The game will give the a choice at the beginning to play either OCU or USN. The OCU campaign is the original SNES version of the game that's of normal difficulty and you should probably play it first. The USN campaign was added to the PS1 remake and the DS retains it. It is a bit more difficult than the original campaign, but it gives you better customization options for your characters and mecha.

[Anonymous No.1335365]

>>1335353
Despite the technical dictionary difference between the words strategy and tactics, the terms "Strategy RPG" and "Tactical RPG" refer to the exact same video game genre.

[Anonymous No.1335368]

>>1335334
FM3 is everyone's favourite. I certainly find it lovable.

[Anonymous No.1335371]

>>1335368
While I liked 3, I find that it's the weakest of the main series. The main reason why people remember it is because it was the first Front Mission game released in English.

[Anonymous No.1335372]

>>1335356
Is there a difference between the PS1 and DS version that I should know about. I don't mind emulating either one.

>>1335368
>>1335371
What's up with FM3?

[Anonymous No.1335374]

>>1335365
No, it's a misunderstanding. The Japanese SRPG means Simulation RPG, not Strategy RPG.
Strategy RPG are games like Xcom or Jagged Alliance where you control the whole war effort instead of just fighting battles.

[Anonymous No.1335381]

>>1335372
The Playstation version is Japanese only. The DS version just has a few extras added on top of the PS1 version and is the only official English version of the game. The original SNES version does have a fan translation, though, if you'd rather play that instead.

Front Mission 3 is sort of an odd man out in a few ways compared to the rest of the series. The main characters, Kazuki and Ryogo, are civilian instead of military and I personally find both of them to be a little bit annoying at times unlike the more serious portrayal of main characters in the other games who are all military. The game limits you to only 4 mecha per battle, while every other game usually lets you have 6 or more. The game also has a weird eject system that no other game has that will either royally screw you over or make missions a cakewalk, depending on your luck. The game is certainly worth playing, though, because it has two different story paths your characters can take, depending on an early question in the game, that will have them side with different characters.

>>1335374
Those games usually all get lumped under the Tactical RPG umbrella. Speaking on Jagged Alliance 2, I would also recommend playing that game. And then playing it again with the 1.13 mod.

[Anonymous No.1335409]

>>1335381
Then the UC + 1.13 mod. God I love me some slavshit, commieblock room clearing, foldable stocks, and tac rail conversion systems.

[Anonymous No.1335432]

>>1335372
Oh, I should also mention a strange translation decision that Square Enix made in the later English translations of the games.

>The game will give the a choice at the beginning to play either OCU or USN
While the English version of Front Mission 3 uses the same name as as all the Japanese games do for the USN (United States of the New Continent), the English versions of Front Mission 1 ofr the DS and Front Mission 4 for PS2 refer to the USN as the UCS (Unified Continental States). Not really sure why they changed it. All the fan translations of Front Mission games stick with USN.

[Anonymous No.1335459]

Vandal Hearts.

[Anonymous No.1335471]

OP here, how is shining force? My friend described it as Fire Emblem except easier, can anyone verify that?

>>1335459
I feel like I've played this game or at least know it. I don't know why

[Anonymous No.1335482]

>>1335471
Your friend described it correctly. I've been playing Awakening and I keep reminding myself "This is what Shining Force should have turned into."

Shining Force 2 is still one of my favorite games of all time. Not sure if it can be described as "easier" though.

[Anonymous No.1335485]

>>1335409

How do you get other mods to work with UC? I installed UC into a 1.13 mod and it's all vanilla gear.

[Anonymous No.1335692]

>>1335485
http://www.bears-pit.com/board/ubbthreads.php/topics/236264/Urban_Chaos_1_13_Deidranna_Liv.html#Post236264

[Anonymous No.1335706]

Bahamut Lagoon is always a good choice for snes/super famicom. It's turnbased, 2dgrid but with the sweet feature of being able to feed your dragons items,weapons,armor and such to evolve them into several forms. Never had an official NA release but DeJap translations finished a great translation for it in 2002.

[Anonymous No.1335712]

>>1335706

BL is sweet, I'll second this

>>1335482

SF2 is also sweet, and a must-play if you are into this genre.

[Anonymous No.1335713]

>>1335706
I hate srpgs but this game was massively fun and addictive, it was fun just raising an army of dragons and playing a random map and just obliterating it

[Anonymous No.1335717]

>>1335301
fire emblems are nice.

[Anonymous No.1335718]

This beast right here. Probably my favorite Super Famicom tactical rpg of all time. Like Bahamut Lagoon above you have to dload a translation patch for it but it well worth it. The first Langrisser game was actually brought over under the name "Warsong" for the Genesis, but is not nearly as great as Der Langrisser.

[Anonymous No.1336210]

>>1335718
Seconding Der Langrisser, if it wasn't for FFTactics that would be my fave.

[Anonymous No.1336215]

The Wars series from Nintendo. They are better known for the Advance Wars games, but they were previously released in GB, famicom and SNES.

[Anonymous No.1336220]

Langrisser II, without a doubt, is my favorite 16bit tactical RPG. The SNES remake is called Der Langrisser.

Play on the Genesis if you want: Awesome FM synth music, SD-style graphics

Play on the SNES if you want: To join the bad guys and play an alternate campaign (hey, they are sympathetic)

[Anonymous No.1336231]

>>1336220
Plus that got tier Satoshi Urushihara character design....

[Anonymous No.1336239]

Not /vr/ but Fire Emblem: Awakening is a great entry point for the series. The FF Tactics Advance games are also great, if you can let go of your expectations and accept that they're not Tactics.

Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Survivor is okay too, if kinda clunky.

[Anonymous No.1336257]

regarding retro Fire Emblem:
FE3 has its definite form in the DS remakes titles Shadow Dragon (11) and Heroes of Light and Shadow (12). 11 is not that bad despite a couple bad design choices. 12 fixes those and has a translation patch by now.

FE4 is sublime. Absolutely essential.
FE5 is good if you like more complexity in your SRPGs.

Everything afterward is not retro, but highly recommended.

[Anonymous No.1336262]

>>1336231

[Anonymous No.1336275]

>>1336239

>FF Tactics Advance

Not even once. Seriously.

[Anonymous No.1336291]

>>1335471
Shining Force is one of the progenitors of the genre, play it just so you know.

[Anonymous No.1336306]

>>1336220
>Play on the SNES if you want: To join the bad guys and play an alternate campaign
It's not just AN alternate campaign, it's 3 really.
Independent is the best.

[Anonymous No.1336314]

>>1336257
I thought Shadow Dragon was a remake of FE1?

[Anonymous No.1336342]

As far as I'm concerned FE is the only consistently good strategy-RPG, disregarding Sacred Stones and Awakening.

[Anonymous No.1336745]

>>1336314
Yes, but FE3 was composed of both a remake of the original and a sequel to it, called books 1/2 respectively. FE11 is another remake of FE1/book 1 and FE12 is a remake of book 2.

[Anonymous No.1337037]

>>1335471
>>1335482
Shining Force is pretty bad. It's a very simple game, with not much room for strategy, bland maps, terrible AI, an uninteresting story, and flat characters. The worst part about it is that the battles are very slow-paced, as the camera has to jump across the map for every character. The second game is even worse, since it adds a bunch of filler where you wander from place to place based on extremely vague directions. But the worst part is the lack of interesting gameplay (or even balanced gameplay); I definitely would not recommend it to SRPG fans who like the genre for the tactical play. However, I hear Shining Force III is a big improvement.

Similarly, FE: Awakening was a huge disappointment as a SRPG (in terms of tactical gameplay), though it seems to have achieved a large fanbase of people who like it for other reasons.

[Anonymous No.1337048]

>>1335718
>>1336210
>>1336220
Agreed, Langrisser II is fantastic. I slightly prefer the Genesis version, due to the slightly more complex gameplay and better soundtrack, though the story and branching paths make the SNES version equally excellent. Yeah, independent is best. Langrisser IV is also enjoyable but the game mechanics have some faults and the story is super cheesy.

[Anonymous No.1337540]

Thank you for all the suggestions everyone, I really appreciate it. I'm going to put all the games suggested down on a RNG list and use this to update my progress through the game of choice if you guys don't mind. I'll leave the thread open for SRPG discussion, and I'm still more than willing to take suggestions. Thank you all agian.

[Anonymous No.1337764]

>>1337540
OP here again, this game was blessed by the RNG gods, so I suppose I'm doing it first. Like I said I'm willing to take suggestions, so don't be afraid to ask, they'll just be added to the list.

[Anonymous No.1337816]

>>1337764
Can't go wrong with that one. Its just the SNES version of 2.

[Anonymous No.1337819]

>>1337816
Yeah I read as much. I picked it since apparently it has more content than the genesis version.

[Anonymous No.1337854]

>>1337819
It does. The only reason you'll see both recommended is because the graphics are entirely different, and there are some gameplay differences too (can't mix squads). So its not just the exact same game but with more stuff.

[Anonymous No.1338131]

So, I've only gotten down to play it and I feel like I'm taking the game really slowly. I'm on scenario 2, and realized that the guy at the bottom is a complete joke so I'm just wiping away the units as they come in. Hopefully I won't get fucked for doing so. Almost planning on dropping the guy down there with magic since all he seems to want to do is jerk off with the king's knights, but, as a hawk knight I've just cast protect on them and they're pretty safe.

[Anonymous No.1338146]

>>1338131
Kill minions whenever you can, and spread your XP out between chars. Its easy early, but if you buff one guy early on, you'll really regret it later. You cannot grind in Langrisser.

[Anonymous No.1338149]

>>1338146
ah, and what about the guy at the south of the map, he looks like an important character despite being an enemy, should I just wreck his face with magic till he's dead?

[Anonymous No.1338159]

>>1338149
I don't remember specifics. But if he's not the mission objective, use standard procedure: kill as many of his minions as you can for xp, then kill him. Note: in Der Langrisser you get more bonuses for not losing minions than you do in 2. So don't throw your men away.

Never rush for the exit unless there is a time limit. And even in those, make sure you get your xp.

[Anonymous No.1338171]

>>1338159
His name is Laird, he's been dueling the lord and they've gotten into a cycle of healing every other turn.

[Anonymous No.1338541]

Update, on stage 3, and this happened. Debating what I want to do since I've gone in blind, but I hate fucking myself.

[Anonymous No.1338620]

>>1338541
I usually go the swordsman path, and end up as either King or Hero.

[Anonymous No.1338926]

I a lot of fun playing through Treasure Hunter G for the SNES. I liked the main characters and the soundtrack is one of my favorites. There's a fan translation out.

[Anonymous No.1339185]

>>1338620
I went with Lord which I imagine is the swordsman path, however, I have to ask are there truly any completely useless lines or paths I shouldn't take?

[Anonymous No.1339187]

>>1339185
Langrisser is about rock paper scissors in a way. You can make bad decisions but a bad decision during combat will fuck you over ten times harder than a bad class choice

[Anonymous No.1339197]

>>1339187
Alright, that's what I figured. I'm sure the game gets a bit more difficult from here, but, I've not really run into anything that has pushed me to be quite frank. Enemies seem fairly reluctant to attack my units most of the time for whatever reason.

[Anonymous No.1339208]

>>1339197
Enemies won't attack if they have a bad chance of winning the engagement. Its the opposite in Langrisser 1, where they throw themselves at you suicidally, which can either lead to their massacre, or actually wear you down.

It does get harder though. Once you get later in the story, the enemy gets stronger units than you can field.

[Anonymous No.1339574]

>>1338926
Ah neat, is there anything like it out there, don't spoil the whole game for me, but it sounds interesting.

>>1339208
Makes sense, I've just been playing extremely defensive up to this point so it makes matches slow since everything seems eerily too quiet.

[Anonymous No.1340705]

>>1339208
I got the impression that Der Langrisser was way easier than Langrisser II. Is that true?

[Anonymous No.1340865]

>>1339574
Its been a few years since I've played the game, but I'll try my best to describe without giving away too much.

There's not a massive army to raise, but you have four characters with set rolls. So there's not much in the way of customization. Your Characters are two brothers, a monkey, and a girl. No character feels completely useless. There is no real grinding that I can remember, but I wouldn't call the game easy by any means. There is emphasis on positioning and using the battle environment as well as spell/ item management.

There is a lot of exploration and secrets for a strategy game. You can interact with much of the environment in battle and outside of battle.

the story has a more light-harted, adventury tone. I sound the characters generally likable.

[Anonymous No.1342126]

>>1340865
Sounds pretty neato.

I'm back to continue my adventure through Der Langrisser.

Something I really wish I could do was prevent my units from moving automatically, while it hasn't fucked me completely yet it's annoying when they do things against my will at the end of the turn.

[Anonymous No.1342298]

>>1342126
>Something I really wish I could do was prevent my units from moving automatically
Can't you do that? Select a unit, change their "orders" to guard/manual/whatever.