Vagrant Story coming to Euro PSN
Square's classic RPG re-released.
Square Enix is releasing its PlayStation RPG Vagrant Story on PSN in Europe, so both PS3 and PSP owners can play it.
The news comes via the European Square Enix newsletter, as reported by Kotaku. The newsletter initially gave a release date of 12th November, but the company has retracted that and now says it's simply "coming soon".
Vagrant Story was released on the Japanese PSN back in August. There's no concrete word on a North American release yet.
The game's debut back in 2000 was met by a perfect score from Famitsu magazine and almost immediate cult status. It was produced and directed by troubled genius Yasumi Matsuno, who also made Final Fantasy Tactics and Final Fantasy XII, and shares the setting of Ivalice with those games.
Unlike them, however, it's a solo dungeon crawl with no shops or interaction with other characters, and a focus on crafting, strategy, puzzle-solving and even platforming, with a rhythmic chain system to battles: a brilliant, and to this day unique, blend. The fine story follows Ashley Riot who travels to a ruined city to unravel a conspiracy involving a cult and a murdered political leader.
It's a must-have.
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Comments (38) Latest comment 2 years ago
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Would perhaps be an ideal subject for a retrospective...
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Is it even possible to wear a disk out?
/falls asleep
EDIT: @Stoatboy: yeah the maze... /shudder
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One of the best things actually imo is the replay value it has... Not many games have that nowadays.
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I am now too excited to do any work today.
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Perhaps I had completely missed the crafting system? Either way, I suspect that it's not going to appeal to modern gamers.
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Use a specific weapon on a specific enemy type consistently and it'll get better against them. Use the same weapon against everything and it'll become crap against them all.
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Not sure how good it's going to look nowadays, but it's the gameplay that matters to me, but would be nice if it got a minor lick of paint.
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The last couple of games I played on the PSP: Silent HIll, Resident Evil, now Wild Arms 2 and apparently Vagrant Story next. Top class entertainment.
I'm catching up on the years I was a PC-only gamer
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@ZuluHero:
I played a copy of Phantasy Star Universe so much that the disc cracked. Lasted about eighteen months of hard labour, sometimes being used for over twenty four hours on some weekends and usually several hours most nights.
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I still have the old game too, and also struggled with it for reasons mentioned above. But I'm happy to try again whilst waiting for FF8.
@Toothball: My old copy of PSU also has a crack in the middle from play, what a odd coincidence
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With that said, I think this game could benefit enormously if it was remade. With current-gen graphics and effects, Ashley could effectively, visibly wear the armour he collects along the way, which would make the game even more of a blast to play. The story could then also be told in full, because I have the distinct impression and suspicion that the final parts of the story were "rushed", that they were supposed to be more elaborate but weren't due to time pressure.
Anyway. Even the original game still is a gem: full 3D, beautifully crafted to look as good as the concept art. Best graphics on PSX hardware, period. The music, top notch, fits the game like a glove. Story, while rushed near the end, is well written and is a delight to see develop. Game system is lovely, and you will sink in quite a few hours until you've got the ultimate weapons and armour. Anyone up for making an ultimate silver Brandestoc?
Oh, and Zuluhero, I wore out several Resident Evil CDs. Those things scratched easily in the PSX for some reason. That, and I played them day after day for months on end.
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The trick is: chain attacking and taking damage, quite simply. Use the Scimitar and set Heavy Shot and Raging Ache as your chain abilities as soon as they come available (use Temper until Raging Ache is go). This combo is incredibly easy to chain with a sword, so you won't have any trouble getting Combos of 15 and up. Hence, combos of 8 are easier still, and it's combos of 8 you want (if your combo goes 9 or higher, RISK skyrockets which makes you incredibly vulnerable against attacks, therefore don't go past 8).
Okay, now play the game. You'll invariably get hit and suffer damage. Don't heal yourself, because being low on health will boost Raging Ache, which is exactly what you need.
Right, so after a while, you're deeper into the game and your Scimitar will become "'useless" and only does 0 or 1 damage. Boohoo. However, Raging Ache's effect doesn't care about this, so it will become your main source of damage. Simply run up to your enemy with 0 RISK and 9 HP or less, and (if Ashley has 250HP) with a Heavy Shot/Raging Ache Chain of 8, you may do something like 0+24+1+26+3+28+5+30 = 117HP damage. Not too shabby, considering basic enemies have only 100-400HP. Hence, with three to four 8 combos, you'll get past all enemies except the bosses (which require a few extra Chains, but nothing overly dramatic). Once the room is clear of enemies, you'll have high RISK, so allow it to cool down to 0 before entering the next room. Lather, rinse, repeat. (of course, at some point during this process, enemies might be allowed to hit Ashley. Heal before this happens)
At some point, you'll have cleared Snowfly Forest - hurrah, Magic Ward becomes available. Cast it immediately and cast it again whenever the Ward is broken, because you absolutely need the protection. Beyond Snowfly Forest , magic-using enemies frequently appear and they will crush you with instant KO or 250+HP elemental damage attacks. That's where Magic Ward kicks in and saves Ashley's butt cheeks, time and again.
With the above strategy, I was able to finish the game in about 4 hours using the default "crappy" Scimitar and default "papier mache" armour. In the second walkthrough, I kept using the same tactics (and weapons/armour) and was able to easily get 100% map coverage. You don't have to use it (or finish the game in a hurry), of course, but it's nice to fall back on and an interesting play method, as it "solves" the game and is entirely weapon/armour/magic independent.
Better stop now, as "tl;dr" alarm bells are going off.
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But I'd rather wait and buy them from the US store to get the full speed versions.
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I guess i've just been lucky then.
I used to leave games on pause overnight on many occasion (thanks to infrequent saving and harder difficulty settings) and never cracked a disk. I wonder if taking games on and off the spindle in the dreamcast and PS1 a lot weakened the disks at all?
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@ QUANTUM SHEEP "I *AM* THE REINFORCEMENTS" that made me properly lol
the game has one of the most wonderful intros ive ever played, i fell in love with this game straight away, even though it was difficult to damage enemies to start with it was clear that it was so well made i had to carry on and work out how the heck you were supposed to do damage.
i got the two best swords after hours of trying lol.. what were they called.. rude something.. and the really ong single handed sword... bah1
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Ah yes, the Damascus Holy Win and the Damascus Rhompaia. Great weapons (awesome design), but if you're really looking for something broken (the "Infinite Rocket Launcher" of Vagrant Story), you should get 4 Hagane Hand of Light weapons from the Minotaur Lord in the room where you obtain the Silver Key (about 8% drop chance), and turn it into one ultimate Hand of Light blade with an Elephant grip.
The above process takes about 4-5 hours but then you get a weapon which has an enormous range, chains very fast, chains very easily and deals 200+ damage to any enemy you encounter. Beware: this makes the game ridiculously easy (hence "Infinite Rocket Launcher"
Finally, the Hand of Light takes the cake in my book as it's available in the first walkthrough, whereas the Holy Wins and Rhompaias can only be unlocked in the second round (and up). I have two saves, one of the first walkthrough and one of the second, and in each of them I'm trying to create the best gear possible (armour+weapons+maxing Ashley's stats). The results you get are quite different for each of the saves.
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Similar to Dark Chronicle / Dark Cloud 2.
Can anyone who has played it confirm?
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