Tactical Insights. Turn based tactics/strategy and tactical/strategy RPG news and reviews.

Feb 2012 News #2

2012-02-22T10:41:00.001-05:00

04/19 [3DS] [JP] [P] [1] [2] Fire Emblem: Kakusei / Fire Emblem: Awakening
TBA 2012 [3DS] [EU] [P] [1] Fire Emblem: Awakening

New official Fire Emblem: Awakening JP website.

Fire Emblem: Awakening announced for Europe in 2012. Rev up your rage engines, Fire Emblem is coming to Europe, while nothing has been announced for NA. Look forward to some very unhappy NA gamers in the near future.

The first set of Fire Emblem: Awakening DLC will be free. DLC will take the form of new maps, episodes, and ~~Rainbow Potions~~.

New trailer:

Other Feb 2012 News:

MechWarrior Tactics announced. It's a microtransaction based tactics game with a focus on competitive PvP and leaderboards. No platform announced, but PC or browser based is a pretty sure bet.

Want Disgaea 4 DLC release information? Check this chart.

Imageepoch, developer of Luminous Arc, recently registered a Japanese trademark for "Romance of the Three Kingdoms Tactics".

SD Gundam G Generation Mobile Next Universe for Android announced. This might be a port of the iPhone G Gen game.

Exclusive interview with Skulls of the Shogun lead developer Jake Kazdal

2012-02-21T16:50:00.000-05:00

Skulls of the Shogun, the turn based tactics game with a focus on fast paced, arcade style competitive play, is due for release on Xbox Live Arcade sometime in 2012. Haunted Temple Studios lead developer Jake Kazdal was nice enough to answer a few in-depth questions about Skulls of the Shogun for the tactics game fanatics here at Tactical Insights.

TI: What tactics games inspired you while creating Skulls of the Shogun?

Jake: Advance Wars is one of my favorite franchises ever, so that's an easy one. I also love the first two Shining Force games, and parts of Fire Emblem as well. But there were a lot of influences out side of tactics games as well, I wanted the combat to flow faster and smoother, actually played a lot of attention to football and even some of the tactics I would have employed if it had been a real time strategy. The game has been called a turn-based version of a real-time strategy game, which is a funny concept but it holds pretty true!

TI: Did you run into any issues while designing the relatively unique, menu-less user interface?

Jake: Only basically everyday, throughout the entire life of the project. :) Yes it was a Pandora's Box, a very exciting but dangerous place that was I think one of our hugest challenges, but also one of the greatest things about the game. Very glad we were determined to make something fresh, it was a highly rewarding experience, a very addictive, all-consuming type of game development!

TI: What steps have you taken to ensure that Skulls of the Shogun is a balanced and fast paced game?

Jake: For the pace, we're really trying to see just how much 90's era fighting game inspiration we can possibly pack into a turn-based strategy game. Its a nutty combination for sure, but its really been our focus for the entire project. Quick, brutal strikes, with a fast back and forth, as each team can only use 5 units per turn. For balancing, we have a QA specialist in-house, Isaac Dudley, that is a Tournament Smash Brothers player, his feedback has been invaluable.

TI: What features will Skulls of the Shogun have to appeal to a long term competitive online community?

Jake: Like I said, Isaac is very involved in the competitive gaming community, and he brings a lot of balancing and tuning to the title. I think each map is so dynamic and can go so many ways, the replayability is very extensive. Each fight is a new battle, even MP testing in-house we never have any two battles that are too much like another.

TI: How does Skulls of the Shogun's relatively low amount of classes and abilities affect the overall style of gameplay?

Jake: There are up to 7 classes in any given fight, I feel they are very balanced and differentiated, I can't think how the core of the game would be made any stronger or better with more unit types. Each unit has a certain strength and weakness, and the strategy comes in using them together effectively. I think that by focusing on fewer units, players can become better players sooner, and really appreciate the fine balancing between unit types much faster than if we had 50 unit types. This is meant to be an arcade like experience, like a fighting game, as much as possible.

TI: What made you want to create Skulls of the Shogun as a tactics game with no growth system in between missions, instead of a more RPG-like experience?

Jake: Well a large part of that is simply for the bulk of development we were a 3 man operation. We were moving missions around, constantly tuning and balancing, and feel the ramp up is overall balanced and engaging now for the player. To have to test and tune every possible outcome by different paths of leveling up was quite simply not a realistic goal for us, and would have required quite a bit more effort and time. If we were a traditional team size we could probably afford to have a few people working on something like that, but our whole team was that size! And we are very happy with the final outcome, and think players will be too.

Thanks to Jake for your time!

X-Com Dev Interview Rant

2012-02-15T06:45:00.003-05:00

In developer interviews, the X-Com developers reference Dark Souls and Dwarf Fortress as examples of difficult games and as a comparison to X-Com's difficulty.

Dark Souls is a trial and error action game where mistakes are punished with grinding to make up lost souls or backtracking. It's in no way difficult in that it significantly tests typical action game skills as found in series such as DMC, NG, or Bayonetta, or even God of War and Vindictus, most of which have extremely fast enemies that require millisecond timing, coordination, reflexes, and more complex strategy. There's also far less potential for grinding out of a difficult situation. Yes, I can hear the goalposts being hurriedly moved at this moment, claiming "Dark Souls is an RPG, you can't compare it to action games!" Most action games have RPG elements these days, including all of the ones I just listed, and the comparison is valid.

It is true that you can theoretically run past every enemy in the game without dying, smack the final boss around a bit, then win the game. I don't think this is how Dark Souls is typically played, since it bypasses a huge amount of content. It's generally assumed that the player will want to explore the world and fight most or all of the bosses to experience the content.

Dark Souls has almost nothing to do with the strategic depth and difficulty found in a turn based tactics game. Instead it piles tedium on the player for making mistakes or getting caught by trial and error nonsense, although there is less trial and error than in Demon's Souls. Remove the punishment and grinding/leveling from Dark Souls and you're left with a sluggish action combat game with bosses that don't take any particularly complex strategy to defeat, certainly not approaching the level of complexity that can be encountered in tactics games. Not to mention Dark Soul's lack of a scoring system and pecking order style PvP.

Of course, that's one of the reasons why Dark Souls is so popular. Almost anybody, even poorly skilled gamers that are bad at other action games, can eventually complete it with enough patience, tedium, and simple trial and error, then go around proclaiming that they "beat such a difficult game". If such gamers think they really do love difficult games, they should give this list a try and let me know how many buckets of tears they fill.

It's the same with Dwarf Fortress, which is a heavily random and punishing sandbox game. Dwarf Fortress is designed for the player to randomly and uncontrollably fail, and the randomized sandbox style method of failure is supposed to be part of the game's amusement, much in the way that random disasters in SimCity are supposed to be fun. You also need to familiarize yourself with dozens of obscure rules and systems in order to progress past the first few bits of game play. What does this sandbox play have to do with turn based tactics game strategic difficulty or depth? Pretty much nothing, which is why it makes little to no sense to be comparing X-Com's difficulty to Dwarf Fortress, either.

Feb 2012 News #1

2012-02-15T04:13:00.006-05:00

What's going on this month (and a bit of last month) in the world of turn based tactics games and MJ commentary? Even if the world ends (man-made or otherwise), we'll still have some great tactics games to play in the meantime! And I'm as opinionated as ever.

04/05 [PSP] [JP] [P] [1] 2nd Super Robot Wars Z Saisei-hen

New 2nd Super Robot Wars Z Saisei-hen Screenshots.

First 2nd Super Robot Wars Z Saisei-hen Trailer: Saisei-hen will almost certainly take the crown of best 2D graphics on the PSP.

Clear Bonuses Revealed: You'll get clear bonuses for completing 2nd SRW Z Hakai-hen up to 10 times, and another bonus for completing every Hakai-hen scenario. Hakai-hen was already pretty easy, so Saisei-hen with clear bonuses might be one of the easiest SRWs since MX. It's sad to see the series move so far in the direction of fanservice and flashy graphics, though. Even most SRW fans, most of whom play SRW for its fanservice value, though MX was too easy.

Fall [PC] [NA] [1] X-COM: Enemy Unknown

Gameplay Preview at Gameinformer: Looks like they'll be paring down the unnecessary cruft (Line of sight checks, awful default accuracy, etc.) and making a more streamlined tactics game that is more X-Com in spirit than in mechanics. That's fine with me, as I don't have some sort of ignorant, irrational adherence to the original game and all its design, balance, bug, and UI issues. Now if only people who are obsessed with a singular tactics game or series (FFT, TO, X-Com, Fire Emblem, etc.) would broaden their horizons a bit.

X-Com: Enemy Unknown Gameplay Preview #2.

Interview with Julian Gollop over X-Com. He's apparently not involved in the project, not even as a play tester or to offer feedback. I have a feeling they'll invite him to play the game and give feedback, at least.

04/19 [3DS] [JP] [P] [1] Fire Emblem: Kakusei / Fire Emblem: Awakening

New gameplay details. My Unit, Casual Mode, and multiple difficulties are making a return to Fire Emblem. Most of these features were introduced in Fire Emblem: Heroes of Light and Shadow, which was sadly not localized for NA. Lunatic difficulty mode is back, but no mention of Lunatic Reverse. Since FE: Awakening is a more open ended, RPG-like game with free battles, it will need an accurate scoring system to avoid trivializing its strategic difficulty. FE: Heroes of Shadow and Light had a decent scoring system, but I was disappointed that it only stopped at "A" rank, which was rather easy to achieve. Also, the downloadable Rainbow Potion significantly reduced its difficulty and I have a feeling they'll be adding more such items to FE: Awakening, not less, given how they're going to use it as a DLC guinea pig.

I'm fairly confident that FE: Awakening will be localized. It plays closer to Fire Emblem: Sacred Stones, which was chosen as one of the 3DS Ambassador games. The overworld map, class branching, customizable skills, and other RPG-like features such as free battles and grinding seems to be more popular with NA gamers, and I think Nintendo is giving the series one last try in NA. On the other hand, thanks to the 3DS region locks and lack of a 3DS emulator, this will likely be the least played Fire Emblem import in a long time. I'm still considering importing a Japanese 3DS, but it's expensive. If you want more Fire Emblem: Awakening details, check this Serenesforest link.

02/28 [DS] [NA] [P1] [P2] [1] [2] Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Survivor 2

New Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Survivor 2 trailer.

Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Survivor 2 screenshots.

04/17 [Vita] [NA] [P1] [P2] [1] Disgaea 3: Absence of Detention

New Disgaea 3: Absence of Detention Trailer: Do you like that prinny voice acting, dood? This trailer promises 10 million hours of "game time", but I'm pretty sure my graphing calculator has Disgaea beat. I guarantee you Disgaea 4 will make its way to Vita eventually.

Disgaea 3: Absence of Detention Screenshots.

iPhone News:

Long after Japanese developers have mostly abandoned tactics games in NA, indie iPhone developers are still producing decent or even great tactics games.

Toucharcade review of Time of Heroes, an iPhone tactics game.
Toucharcade review of 100 Trials, an iPhone tactics game.
Toucharcade review of Dungeon Crawlers, an iPhone tactics game.
Toucharcade review of Hero Academy, an iPhone tactics game.

Other News:

Civilization V Gods and Kings Expansion Pack Announced.

You'll be able to transfer most downloadable PSP tactics games from the PSN to your Vita.

Phantom Brave Goes Online With Browser Based Game. Trailer.

Pokemon + Nobunaga's Ambition Official Trailer

Pokémon + Nobunaga’s Ambition Extended With Free Downloadable Episodes

Similar to protein folding games, scientists have developed new games based on tracing the neural pathways of the brain.

Determining the mathematical type of complexity of a game or game system or set of game rules.

What else have I been doing aside from inadvertently making people angry on gaming forums? Mostly playing through Super Robot Wars 64. It's a big game with over 100 scenarios. It plays a lot like the older PS and SFC Winkysoft developed SRWs, and tends to be more difficult than your average modern SRW. You can check out my guide's progress here.

Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Survivor 2 (DS) Preview

2012-02-03T01:32:00.004-05:00

Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Survivor 2 is the sequel to SMT: Devil Survivor, coming to NA on Feb 28, 2012. It's likely to be the last turn based tactics game for the DS and will be a solid end to an excellent library of tactics games.

As I've mentioned before, Devil Survivor 2 plays very much like the original Devil Survivor. The game engine is the same, the menus are the same, and the time based plot progression with multiple endings is the same. It's still a SRPG where two units engaging in combat enter a sub-screen where a typical menu based 3v3 battle takes place to decide combat results. Recruiting and fusing demons to fight with is still central to customization and combat. Combat mechanics are almost identical with a few changes that only hardcore Devil Survivor fans will appreciate. Of course, there are new skills, over 200 recruitable demons, new allies, and new enemies to dig into.

So what's different this time around? There's the Enishi system, where your party members gain in friendship and trust as you make appropriate dialogue choices, granting you combat bonuses and access to more demon fusions. Your party members friendship rating determines whether you'll have access to their ending route(s). That's an improvement over Devil Survivor's ending routes, which required a dozen seemingly random and easy to miss dialogue choices.

The plot is similar to Devil Survivor, featuring the same 7 day time limit, demon summoning, and a device that predicts future calamities that your party must try to avert. It isn't a direct sequel to Devil Survivor, though. There are some oddly shaped beings and shady plot devices thrown into the mix, as well. As apocalyptic as the plot is, it feels lighter and more fanservice oriented this time around, with more jokes, more campy humor, and larger bust sizes.

On to the combat mechanic changes, which only the devoted Devil Survivor fans will appreciate. Skill cracks, the mechanic by which you target an enemy's skill and defeat them to learn that skill, is now easier because the main character and anyone with Enishi level 2 or higher can share their skill crack targets, instead of being limited to one party member per skill target. Instead of end of combat battle results and the magnetite skill swap system, you earn fusion pieces which can be used in demon fusion to add perks like new skills or bonus stats to your newly fused demon. Demon racial abilities can be leveled up to an improved version, giving a bit more incentive to stick with an aging demon or level it up. The 4 main stats have been altered slightly, with STR and MAG providing some physical and magical defense, respectively.

I can't say much about the campaign at this point as I haven't played much of it yet, but the party max is still 4, which I'm a bit disappointed with. There still doesn't seem to be much going on in the non-boss fights. I also think the addition of directional facing would have made the overhead grid portion of combat more interesting rather than a thin excuse to get you into the 3v3 fights. You can also expect the usual optional bosses that require lots of grinding and maybe even some strategy.

Other improvements over Devil Survivor include the addition of video clips, a demon compendium, and an end of game scoring system that's similar to the Tales of X franchise, allowing you to spend points on New Game+ carryovers. The latter two were added to Devil Survivor: Overclocked, so it's nice to see them included here. I'm not sure if there's an easy mode. The music is still good, with a mix of rock and some jazzy pieces.

Overall if you liked the original Devil Survivor, you'll like Devil Survivor 2. It's competitively priced at $30 so it's worth the purchase for turn based tactics game fans. Honestly given its popularity they could probably get away with $35 or $40 but I suppose the DS is on its last legs.

Devil Survivor 2 Amazon.com preorder (affiliate link).
Devil Survivor 2 Amazon.ca preorder (affiliate link).
Devil Survivor 2 Play-asia preorder (affiliate link).

Deconstructing the "localize it!" argument

2012-01-31T06:35:00.002-05:00

In niche game communities you'll find gamers who are frustrated that the Japanese games that they want to play aren't being localized in a language they understand. Unfortunately, this frustration can lead to irrational arguments as to why the game they want should be localized or why it's not being localized. They start with the conclusion that game X must be localized and build their argument entirely around that premise, regardless of logic, reason, or evidence. Here are rebuttals to a number of their arguments which are frequently found on gaming forums and sometimes even popular gaming blogs or web sites.

1. Blame "lack of marketing" or "lack of effort". If only the world at large was made more aware of the game, it would fly off the shelves! "They didn't advertise or support it" is a popular scapegoat and whipping boy for poorly selling games. On the contrary, the game they want localized isn't unpopular because nobody's heard of it, it's unpopular because it's in a genre very few people care for, using art styles and plot/characters that don't appeal to the majority of the NA market, and possibly the game itself just isn't very good or appealing. Spending money on advertising is not going to expand a game beyond that core audience. Ironically this suggestion is self-destructive as marketing is very expensive and would likely push a proposed niche game further into the red while having little effect on sales. The related argument is that "game companies expect us to do the marketing work for them!" This is called word of mouth, and businesses of all kinds rely on it.

2. Grossly exaggerate the popularity of the genre, name recognition of the developer or series, or promote random obscure and mostly meaningless trivia. This argument is rarely used to promote a game, instead it's used when someone rational points out the reality of the situation and explains why a game would likely sell poorly, or why another game would likely sell better than the one they want. If the game you like is complex, difficult, a turn based tactics game, text/voice heavy, or licensing heavy you're looking at an uphill battle convince a company to localize it. In a recent example, I had Sting fans trying to tell me how popular and recognized the Sting brand name was, how "Dept Heaven" was a known series, or how GBA Sting games being ported to PSP meant that Sting games sell well, all as proof that Gungnir would sell well or sell better than another PSP RPG, Growlanser. Unfortunately, the almost complete lack of activity in Gungnir related threads across the net tell a different story.
Read more »

Super Robot Wars Complete Box (PS) Review

2012-01-26T03:29:00.000-05:00

SRW Complete Box is a remake of three SRW titles using the Playstation F/FF engine: 2nd SRW for Famicom, 3rd SRW for SFC, and SRW EX for SFC. Many issues of 2nd and 3rd SRW were addressed or fixed, mainly being able to choose individual unit response on enemy turn, equippable items, unit upgrades, and a better UI. Animations are still unskippable, of course.

The 2nd SRW remake is very different from the FC original, owing to the evolution of the series. It's so different that you might as well consider it a completely different game, similar to the SRW 2G remake on Gameboy. Yes, this makes 2nd SRW Complete Box the second time 2nd SRW has been remade. 2nd SRW is a fairly difficult remake where you'll mostly rely on your supers, somewhat reminiscent of SRW F. Seishin pools are even smaller than F/FF and your Gundam pilots don't get much in the way of good seishins or robots. Most of the game is spent throwing Getta, Mazinger, and Grendizer at enemies while your Gundams soften up the grunts a bit with underpowered weapons. 2nd SRW Complete Box is the best of the three remakes, owing to the large improvements over the original, and the original's strong campaign.Read more »

Gungnir Preview (PSP)

2012-01-22T11:18:00.005-05:00

Gungnir is a turn based tactics games that superficially most resembles other speed based isometric games like Final Fantasy Tactics and Tactics Ogre. However, being a Sting game, Gungnir has an above average number of mechanics and systems working in the background to complicate things. Below you'll find a fairly concise overview of how Gungnir plays and what mechanics are involved.

Gungnir's turn order is speed based, similar to FFT/TO, but with one major difference. While enemies and NPCs all have their own individual speed and turn icon, you only have a single icon on the speed bar to issue orders to your entire army (it looks like a yellow P). Whenever it's your turn you can choose from any of your units to act with. This generally means that enemies have a significant turn rate advantage over you, especially in large numbers. Every action your selected unit makes (moving, attacking, waiting, etc.) causes delay which will set your next turn back by a certain amount on the speed bar. Units have a delay stat that subtracts some delay during their actions, and by choosing an Ace unit at the start of the mission some class types will benefit from a further delay reduction bonus.

Each unit has a stat called WT (wait time) which determines how fast they can act again without suffering a loss of Vitality, which temporarily reduces their max HP. Equipment has weight and equipping it increases the WT burden by a % of WT. Any WT burden over 50% causes a WT penalty. You'll see the "Ready" overhead if the unit is ready to act without Vitality loss. Also, each attack has its own recharge rate, and if you use it before it's recharged, it will deal less damage.

Performing the move action with your units will build up tactics points, 1 point per square moved. Units have a tactics stat that determines how many tactics points they can build by moving. Building up tactics points increases the damage multiplier of some attacks. Tactics points can be spent on reducing delay (overclock), group attacks (beat), support buffs (boost), reducing the weapon recharge rate, and performing certain special summoning attacks. Units can only join into beats if they are directly in line with the target enemy, while boosts have a more permissive radius. Up to 4 allied units can assist the attacker with a beat or boost. Beat and boost activation range can be increased by capturing flags scattered around the map. These flags also increase your maximum tactics point value. In almost all situations, overclock isn't worth burning your tactics points, so you almost never have to choose between "speed or damage".

At the end of a mission you earn up to 3 stars based on certain conditions. You're awarded a star each for not restarting a mission, having 0 allied units defeated, and clearing the mission under a certain time. However, if you take too long, you'll start to lose stars even if you had no allies defeated and no restarts. Earning stars will increase the rank, a multiplier viewable in the upper right corner of the battle objectives screen. On basic difficulty the rank starts at 0.75, on Advance it's 1.0, and on Nightmare it's 1.25 or 1.5. My guess is that rank only increases if you get 2+ stars. For each mission you clear with 2+ stars, rank increases by 0.01 points on basic, 0.02 on advance, and 0.03 on nightmare. The rank multiplier increases enemy damage and HP. I'm not sure what the cap is, but I think it carries over with a New Game+. On Advance and Nightmare modes, enemies have 1.5x and 2.0x HP and Speed, respectively, in addition to the rank multiplier. Nightmare mode is unlocked after clearing Advance mode. You may start a New Game+ on Basic or Advance modes, but not on Nightmare mode.

During intermission you're able to recruit new units, and buy, sell, equip, improve or disenchant equipment. As for Gungnir's plot and characters, it looks very much like a FFT/TO style medieval melodrama, with all the usual JRPG cliches. You're able to make choices during the campaign that alter which ending you'll get, similar to TO.

I'm still not sure why Atlus chose to localize Gungnir. Contractual obligation? Similarity to Tactics Ogre? It's certainly a sales gamble and not in line with their recent attempts to publish more high profile games. It should be a pretty good game for technical minded players, and probably enough plot related stuff to please the FFT/TO fans.

Gungnir Amazon.com preorder (affiliate link).
Gungnir Amazon.ca preorder (affiliate link).

2012 Tactics Game Preview

2012-01-19T16:36:00.006-05:00

Let's take a look at the major tactics games announced for 2012 thus far. New: The [P] link will bring you to an affiliated Play-Asia order page.

Fall [PC] [NA] [1] X-COM: Enemy Unknown
X-Com is back! Well, it's X-Com remade and simplified, but still technically X-Com. In X-Com you're tasked with fighting off an alien invasion by engaging in randomly generated levels until you've earned enough resources and power to complete the final mission. I am fond of squad based military tactics games such as Front Mission, Jagged Alliance, or the much maligned Operation Darkness, so I hope they put together a decent game that fixes up the UI and balance issues.

06/12 [PSP] [NA] [P1] [P2] [1] [2] Gungnir
Gungnir is another 2011 release being localized for NA. It's a traditional isometric tactics game, but since it's being developed by Sting, you can expect some complicated underlying mechanics to geek out over, if you're inclined to do so. I like the added depth and difficulty settings, but Gungnir's campaign feels a bit generic.
Read more »

Masou Kishin II (PSP) Review

2012-01-19T10:28:00.003-05:00

Masou Kishin II for PSP is a direct sequel to Masou Kishin I, released on the SFC in 1996. Despite the passage of 16 years, Masou Kishin II plays nearly identical to its predecessor. The developers have added a few new mechanics to try to liven things up, but they end up not having a significant effect. Terrain effects were added, but they are rarely an issue when most of the terrain in the campaign is neutral. You'll very rarely come across patches of unavoidable water or lava with significant terrain effects. Even then terrain effects are largely ignorable as the RPS element chart, unit height, and unit facing is far more important.

Pilots can now equip and swap skills instead of learning a fixed set as they level. Skills can be leveled up as they're used and new skills are learned as you progress through the campaign. There's not much in terms of depth or strategy for skills - the choices in most cases are fairly obvious. You equip damage dealers with damage or critical rate skills, healers with support skills, and fill in the remaining slots with defensive skills like Mirror Image or Sword Cut. In a few exceedingly rare instances you might want to use some movement altering skills, but otherwise you'll just want to stack the damage or critical boost skills. On the plus side, annoying random skills such as Double Attack have been removed.

Jan 2012 News #1

2012-01-17T20:39:00.005-05:00

More X-Com: Enemy Unknown for PC screenshots. From what I'm seeing, it's a simplified version of the original X-Com. What they really need to improve from the original is the AI, UI, game balance, and bugs/stability issues. I honestly don't have much hope for this game. The mechanics and difficulty are being dumbed down, and the developers are cluelessly referencing Dark Souls as a difficult game instead of anything from this list. If anything it will be a generic, easy, simple, and streamlined tactics game for mass market appeal.

With all the attention on X-Com, I learned about a commercial X-Com style tactics game called UFO Legacy Defense: Xenonauts. It will probably be closer to the original X-Com than the reimagined Enemy Unknown (with a cleaned up UI, of course). Looks pretty good.

2nd Super Robot Wars Z Saisei-hen for PSP will be released on 4/5/2012. This is likely to be the PSP's last big tactics game release. It's likely going to be a relatively easy game like Hakai-hen, but I expect the production values and scenarios to be good. Here's an article in Famitsu with some screens.

In this article a computer algorithm is used to solve Sudoku puzzles efficiently and find complex patterns. Just another example of how computers could theoretically solve or play strategy games much better than humans in the future.

More Pokemon x Nobunaga's Ambition screenshots and info. I really want nothing to do with Pokemon so I won't be discussing it much if at all. Apparently it's getting its own press conference.

X-COM: Enemy Unknown announced for PC

2012-01-06T09:14:00.005-05:00

Firaxis Games is working on X-COM: Enemy Unknown for PC, a turn based strategy game similar to the older X-COM games. Enemy Unknown has nothing to do with the X-COM shooter announced a while ago. I think much of the X-COM and Julian Gollop worship is a mixture of nostalgia goggles and lack of perspective due to limited localization. It was a good game for its time, but it hasn't aged all that gracefully, and X-COM adherents exhibit the same kind of blind zealotry that characterizes Final Fantasy Tactics/Tactics Ogre worshippers.

Apparently the strategic level is going to be real-time. I wouldn't be surprised if it was a WEGO style tactics game as well, because those player/enemy phase games are just so outdated.

Julian Gollop is apparently not involved in X-COM: Enemy Unknown. We'll see about that!

Tactical Insights 2011 Awards

2011-12-31T23:51:00.027-05:00

Welcome to the 2011 Tactical Insights awards. You'll notice there are import as well as localized games given awards. However, I'm not averse to rewarding the same game a second time in the future if it's localized for North America. Each system will have a winner and a runner up, with some other deserving nominations mentioned. Unfortunately, systems like the PS3, 360, and Wii frequently only have 1-2 games per year, so I've combined them. Some systems will also have a "Dunce Cap" award. The Dunce Cap award is not necessarily for awful games, as you can find those in abundance, but awful games that have been given undue prominence or praise.

Please note that the scope of these awards only covers turn based tactical level strategy games, generally keeping within the guidelines of the frequently updated tactics game list.

3DS/DS: The 3DS hasn't been out for long, but the tactics games are already coming in. Expect the 3DS to be a haven for tactics games in the coming years. The DS is on its last legs, but remains one of the best systems for tactics games.

2011 Best 3DS/DS Game: SD Gundam G Generation 3D (3DS), Trailer

SD Gundam G Generation 3D is one of the best yet in the G Generation series, the best tactics game on the 3DS as of yet, and a good SRPG in its own right. It plays a lot like a modern Super Robot Wars game with spirit commands (seishins) for pilots, a morale system, and generally similar stats and combat mechanics. You'll find plenty of content variety, depth, units, pilots, equipment, and overall mechanics. Several challenge conditions and end of mission rankings help encourage efficient play. Other features include unit capture, group assignments, MAP attacks, and building your own space colony/base. While there's no chance of this arriving in NA, it would be nice to see a port to a region free system such as Vita, PSP, or PS3.

2011 3DS/DS Game Runner Up: Devil Survivor 2 (DS), Trailer

This sequel to the original Devil Survivor on the DS is a bit formulaic and doesn't change the core game play much. What you do get is a new storyline, new characters, skills, demons, enemies, and everything else that comes with a numbered sequel. Devil Survivor 2 includes the improvements from Devil Survivor: Overclocked including an end of game ranking system, easy mode, and demon compendium. If you loved the original Devil Survivor, you'll find more to enjoy here. Devil Survivor 2 will be arriving in NA in 2012, which will almost certainly be the DS's last tactics game hurrah. More than likely you'll see Devil Survivor 2 awarded again next year when it's released in North America.

Other 3DS/DS nominations: Devil Survivor: Overclocked (3DS)
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Dec 2011 News

2011-12-24T10:16:00.007-05:00

2011 has been a pretty good year for tactics games. It's encouraging to see indie developers continuing to give the genre a try, and if you're willing to import you can play some fairly big releases. Working on an end of year award post for the next few days.

This Gundam Guy post covers lots of gameplay details about SD Gundam G Generation 3D. I'd like to play this but I don't feel like shelling out for a Japanese 3DS at this time. Maybe when Fire Emblem 3DS is released. It's the only noteworthy tactics game this month that I'm aware of.

Super Robot Wars Masou Kishin II 10 minute trailer.

Info on the Vita Disgaea 3 port.

Atlus is localizing Gungnir for NA, estimated 6/12/2012. Here's some gameplay footage. It's a fairly generic SRPG. Hopefully I don't see too many copies in the bargain bin next year. Maybe they'll announce Blaze or Gloria Union next? Or maybe the PS3 Super Robot Wars.
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Introducing Strat

2011-12-12T17:58:00.004-05:00

My brother Chris and I have been working on a turn based tactics game called Strat. Each level in Strat is separate with no growth system between levels, and the entire game is deterministic (non-random). It's definitely more of a pure strategy title and much closer to a puzzle game than an RPG. There are 18 playable units with 5 abilities each, along with a number of CPU only units and bosses. Each class has a defined role with unique and balanced abilities that are all useful in certain situations. It's a far cry from your typical imbalanced powers based tactics game where the majority of classes or abilities are inferior or useless. There are lots of mechanics in Strat like multiple objectives, doors and panels, triggers, reinforcements, teleports, terrain status effects, custom scripting in each level, etc. in order to keep combat varied and interesting. There is of course a scoring system as well as a real time limit per turn to keep the pressure up.

While I've been able to give feedback and advice on Strat's development, I don't have the final say on what goes into it, so I don't necessarily agree with every design decision. Most of my work on Strat has been designing and scripting the levels, which are later edited by Chris. Even with my experience playing tactics games, it's often a challenge developing and testing quality content. Please give the development build a try and let us know what you think.

November 2011 News #2

2011-11-17T14:25:00.001-05:00

A bit of year end news incoming. I'm trying to get my hands on some more 2011 tactics games to give out some end of year awards, but I'm sure you can already guess FFT, Disgaea, and TO won't be on the list. My playtime and writing time on games has been stalled for a couple weeks because I've also been working on a turn based tactics game with my brother. It's coming along well. I'm designing most of the levels and giving feedback on balance and gameplay issues. I'll be making a full post about it soon.

SD Gundam G Generation 3D is a new entry in the long running G Gen series. Don't think for a second that a game with this level of effort and production values will stay on the 3DS. I guarantee you they'll be porting this to Vita minus the 3D. New screenshots here.

New screenshots for Super Robot Wars: Masou Kishin II. From what I can see, it's going to play very similar to the original game, with the same low unit counts and low depth relative to other SRW games.

Super Robot Wars F/FF are now on the PSN. I recently played through F/FF and thought it was the best classic SRW. You can't speed up or skip the animations in the PSN version, unfortunately, which I don't have the patience for.

Ghost Recon: Shadow Wars announced for iOS. It looks like a straight up port with no attempt to address any of the issues I had with the game on the 3DS. Hopefully it's at least less crashy and buggy.

A new iPhone game by Robot Entertainment called Hero Academy has been announced. It's a PvP game with emphasis on simplicity and fast paced action. Smartphones are a great platform for mobile turn based gaming since they are always connected and you can take your turn whenever you have a spare moment.

Let's look at one of the games coming out in early 2012. Daisenryaku Perfect: Senjou no Hasha is a port of the PSP game of the same name. I tried the PSP game but it seemed to suffer from a lot of interface lag and loading time. For a little history, Daisenryaku is the only hardcore tactical level turn based military simuator still being produced for consoles. It's similar to PC military sims that most console gamers run screaming from, featuring hundreds of realistic military units, dozens of real world nations, complex combat rules, and long and difficult scenarios. The PC version of Daisenryaku Perfect will probably remain the definitive version of the series, IMO. At the very least the PS3/360 versions should have less UI lag and load times that the PSP version suffered from.

November 2011 News #1

2011-11-03T04:25:00.002-04:00

The latest turn based tactical level video game news! Even the stuff Andriasang turns its nose up on! The only web site on the planet that covers both console and PC turn based tactics games! Why both camps largely ignore each other like the other doesn't exist is beyond me.

New SD Gundam G Generation 3D screenshots. We get a good look at some of the combat screens. It looks like there will be timing prompts to get bonus accuracy or damage or something. This is also the first G Gen game to feature seishins (spirit commands), probably as an attempt to make G Gen more appealing to the larger SRW playerbase. You'll be able to take on optional missions for funds. There's a skill point-like system called 'break trigger' or 'challenge mission'. It looks like break trigger is the easier skill point to achieve, while challenge mission is a harder version of the skill point. While G Gen 3D still retains some of the series quirks, it seems like the most SRW-like title yet, which should help broaden its target audience. Unfortunately the 3DS region lock will continue to be a sore point for the system. (note: my analysis may be completely wrong since I don't read fluent Japanese)

Here's an article going into detail on Rainbow Moon, a PSN exclusive SRPG. It's made by the developers of Soldner-X and X2, quite a change from shoot em ups to tactical RPGs. It looks like it will be more RPG than tactics game, so FFT and TO fans should start rejoicing. "It’s a strategy role-playing game (or, for short, “SRPG”) with a strong emphasis on exploration, character development and turn-based battles." Nothing about an SRPG means it has to be a traditional RPG with a turn based grid slapped on it like FFT and TO. Fire Emblem and Super Robot Wars are both SRPGs that follow a linear campaign with little or no exploration and grinding, not to mention they usually have useful scoring systems. However, there is a "ranking" tab on the Rainbow Moon official site, so we'll have to see what they come up with.

Article on Unity of Command, a turn based operational level game. While I don't usually cover operational or strategic level strategy games, this one stands out as having a very smart AI and a good mix of tactical action and operational style supply and support lines.

Panzer Corps DLC #1 is out.

Battle Academy: Operation Sealion expansion announced.

Frozen Synapse is coming to iPhone/iPad in 2012.

Tactics Ogre: Let Us Cling Together (PSP) Review

2011-10-30T01:23:00.021-04:00

Tactics Ogre: Let Us Cling Together for PSP is a remake of the original Tactics Ogre released in late 1995 on the Super Famicom. Claims that Tactics Ogre "invented", "innovated", or "is the grandfather of" the tactics genre are false. Series such as Front Mission, Fire Emblem, Super Robot Wars, Langrisser, Daisenryaku, X-COM, Shining Force, Nectaris, Jagged Alliance, Panzer General, Famicom Wars, and well over 200 other turn based tactical level video games were released earlier than Tactics Ogre, and did just about everything first. Nothing important about Tactics Ogre's game play was particularly new or innovative in 1995, let alone in 2011. So how well does this remake stand up to the sleek, efficient, and well designed modern tactics games of today? Not very well. Tactics Ogre fails in its combat pacing, tactical variety and content, strategically meaningful depth, user interface, and difficulty.

Tactics Ogre's campaign is sorely lacking in tactical variety. Almost every mission is completed by killing the enemy leader with a few token trash mobs strewn about. Almost every map is a hill gradually rolling from bottom to top with a few randomly placed obstacles. The strategy for almost every mission in the game is to build up your units TP meter, which allows you to use powerful special attacks, then dump TP attacks on the boss while working to negate their own TP abilities. It gets worse later as even trash enemies start using TP skills, so it's always in your best interest to finish the mission quickly before someone gets one shot by a TP skill. You'll end up sniping off countless bosses and watching their allies fade into nothing as the battle automatically ends. That's literally the extent of the games strategy in almost every mission. Almost all of the games depth - its physical attack and element types, skills, stats, statuses, spells, races, tarot signs, terrain, height, directional facing, finishing moves, battlefield conditions, and etc. can be soundly ignored in favor of a few simple strategies that are repeated ad nauseum.

Tactics Ogres depth is strategically meaningless in the face of TP attacks. For example, in one Chapter 2 mission you're (optionally) tasked with defeating a fleeing enemy with above average stats. Is there any use for all of the debuffs and dozens of items/spells you can pile on him? Nope, he's practically immune to all of it and takes almost no damage from spells. The only strategy is to surround him and beat him down before he gets enough TP to unavoidably one shot one of your units. The only guide I looked at suggested skill and level grinding to unlock your own TP consuming attacks to accomplish this. It's a similar story for most bosses you'll run into. In the same mission, you're tasked with taking out a bunch of priests who will constantly heal each other. Yes, I really wanted to watch 10 priests slowly cast Heal on each other over and over for the next 10-15 minutes while I slowly kill them, thanks.

It doesn't get any more difficult or complex further into the campaign, either. You'll be cruising through chapter 4 using the same TP building and dumping strategies that won you battles in chapter 1 against similarly generic and easy opposition. Even if you avoid all random encounters, the main story content is so repetitive, uneventful, and full of filler battles that you might feel like the whole campaign is a bit of a chore. Being a port of an older game doesn't excuse it from being criticized by today's standards, either. A quality tactics campaign will have interesting things happening in each scenario, whether it's reinforcements, varied objectives, mission specific AI scripting, a wide variety of terrain, etc.

Much of TOs depth is needlessly convoluted, contrived, and confusing, on top of being mostly useless in favor of TP skills or damage boosting skills. Learning and casting spells is a convoluted process involving scrolls, skills, and "arcanas". Making one skill per enemy race and status effect only serves to intimidate players with a long yet almost entirely useless list of skills. The insistence on naming every spell some sort of pseudo-latin gibberish is particularly ridiculous. It feels like an attempt to browbeat and befuddle the player with similarly strategically meaningless options that have little applicable effect on the game. Many times the shop and crafting list will flood with items and gear for classes you can't even use yet. It's telling that mid way through the game the developers give up and hand you spells that cure all buffs/debuffs instead of creating an individual spell for each effect. The "Tactics Ogre is so deep!" emperor has no clothes.

The developers require the player to grind to experience most of the games famed "depth". Classes all level up at once, but you can't level a class if it isn't used during a mission, and new classes start at level 1. Since level 1 classes tend to be very weak beyond chapter 1 you'll have to cripple your team or start grinding if you wish to bring a new class up to speed. This means any new class you get past chapter 2 is going to be a dead weight on your team unless you spend time grinding. In addition, any new characters you get won't have the same skill point base or optimal build that you've developed with your older ones, putting them at a significant disadvantage. it's actually more efficient to stick with your initial roster that you begin the game with. Playing Tactics Ogre "any way you want" is only possible if you're willing to put in the hours grinding new class levels and new recruit skills.

Random encounters are frequent and encourage the player to grind, although in what I can only call a minor miracle of design decisions, you can avoid fighting them and run away. Optional areas exist solely to pit players against randomly generated enemies with no other purpose than a boring grind. Clearing these areas even once will over level your party for the next story battles. Recruiting units is a boring, repetitive grind consisting of surrounding a weakened enemy and spamming the recruit skill until they yield. The only positive point is that you can still dominate the game without grinding or getting into random encounters, owing to the games easy difficulty.

The AI is incompetent, coded to run forward recklessly and hit the target that they'll do the most damage to, with no regard to focus fire or even the simplest of strategies. Even worse, the game constantly saddles you with uncontrollable, badly behaved AI allies. Your guest allies will ignore your own breakable crowd control such as sleep and won't exorcise undead. In one mission, I successfully slept a hostile enemy that you're supposed to leave alive to recruit later, only to have guest/NPC Catiua attack her and wake her up. This led to the hilarious solution of attacking guest/NPC Cautia with one of my own units so she would prioritize healing herself instead of attacking the sleeping target and breaking my CC. Trying to save potential NPC recruits units that prefer to run away from you and not heal themselves is ridiculous as it's completely random as to whether they'll survive long enough for you to rescue them. Not that recruits are particularly valuable since they'll almost always have a worse skill set than what you can build onto the troops you begin the game with.

The pace of combat is slow and tedious for no good reason, with no way to skip any animations. There are additional, intentional delays when the AI targets something or moves or performs any action at all. These delays aren't the PSP slowing down or processing AI code, but pauses deliberately designed into the game so that slower players can follow what's going on. Any experienced tactics gamer will be bored to tears watching the poorly animated, low-res sprites target something, slowly use an item, cast a spell, or make an attack for the umpteenth time with no way to skip it. As a result, Tactics Ogre's combat progresses at a slugs pace and it is irritating for players who don't want to sit through it. As badly designed and boring as the rest of the game is, the sluggish combat pacing is what will irritate skilled and experienced tactics gamers the most, as it's an unbearable, complete waste of time and drags down my score for the game. There's really no excuse for unnecessarily slow and turgid combat in today's tactics games when you have modern tactics games where you can skip as much or as little of the combat animations as you like.

Moving on to the user interface, it's outdated and lacking features. There's no L/R function to switch between viable enemy or allied targets in target selection mode. There's no way to rotate the camera to anything but an overhead view - a huge issue for an isometric 3D game. The menu tree is a UI disaster. Instead of a context sensitive cursor that intuitively speeds up the battle flow by allowing you to move, attack, etc. without going into a menu, you'll have to have to select move, attack, or wait every time. A common series of actions like moving then waiting takes 4+ extraneous button presses due to the poorly designed menus. Abilities, skills, and items are inexplicably split up into different trees for no particular reason. Multiply that by the tens of thousands of times you'll have to navigate the menus to perform the simplest action and combat becomes an unnecessarily laborious chore. Compared to the refined, streamlined control afforded to players of modern tactics games, Tactics Ogre is left languishing somewhere back in the gaming stone age - around 1995, to be precise.

The shop and party management screens are similarly cumbersome and borderline useless. There's no way to see a spreadsheet list of character stats, instead you're forced to view one stat at a time. You can't check whether your classes are at a given level to wear a piece of equipment or learn a spell from inside the shop, nor can you compare shop items and currently equipped gear. The description text in the shops scrolls by at an agonizingly slow pace. Having to jump back and forth between the shop and party management screen when you're trying to outfit 12+ units is tedious, to say the least. There's no indication of what's new in a shop as the story develops, forcing you to scroll through absurdly long item lists hoping that you spot what's new mixed in with the old. This of course ties in with the attempt to befuddle the player with long lists of mostly useless items, gear, and skills. The only saving grace is the auto-equip button, which kept me from going nuts trying to deal with the interface.

On to the battle preparation interface, there's no way to preview the upcoming battle during preparations or see how your unit placement grid relates to their positions on the map, nor can you save during the placement grid screen. You're unable to change the battle party grid on the world map. You can't save during preparation while doing a series of linked missions inside a fortress, forcing you to do your party management all over again if you want to restart. There's no button to immediately remove every person on the battle party grid, instead you have to do it manually. The skip cut scene button(s) are annoyingly inefficient. You'll need to use it multiple times times just to get through what should be a single cut scene. Post-battle results features an annoying flag waving around maniacally, a perfect way to distract someone actually trying to read whatever info the game is trying to present.

The crafting system is tedious, obtuse, and needlessly time wasting. First, you can't check the stats of anything you want to craft, so you won't know whether it's worth the time and effort. Most materials needed to craft items are found in the store, which then need to be synthesized into more refined items. Why bother making the player combine base items into refined items when they could just sell the refined items instead? Although there are certainly some materials that are only obtainable from random encounters (read: more grinding). After an eternity of pointlessly and repetitively clicking and watching a little jar shake around turning your store bought materials into refined materials and combining those refined materials together to finally make an item, you'll usually find out it wasn't even worth crafting in the first place. Even worse, there's a chance your crafting effort will completely fail. You can save/load until you succeed, but then why bother with a sadistic failure rate in the first place? I think the developers have been playing a few too many Korean MMOs, as this sort of nonsense only appeals to gamers for whom grinding, spending hours crafting, watching progress bars, and item failure rates are a way of life.

An autosave system going by the gimmicky acronym of "chariot" is present in TO, along with unlimited quicksaves that completely negate the purpose of the autosaves. The quicksave and autosave features reduce the games difficulty for several reasons. First, it's worth noting that Tactics Ogres quicksaves and autosaves preserves the RNG (random number generator) table that is used to decide if an attack hits, misses, is a critical hit, etc. If you were forced to replay the mission, you would have to deal with a different RNG table, which would cause different events to occur, forcing you to alter your strategy. Reloading from the same RNG table avoids this challenge as you only have one RNG table to worry about. You can reload multiple times to figure out the RNG table, then act in a way that is best suited to whatever the numbers are. It is in a sense no longer random as you know what the numbers coming up are, even if you can't directly control them. The players execution skill, which is their ability to consistently perform actions without making a mistake, is completely nullified with unlimited quicksaves to make up for unlimited mistakes.

There are a series of meaningless "titles" added to the remake, most of which are vapid "gimmie" awards for the ADHD achievement/trophy generation and have little or no relation to the players skill level. The ever present level and skill grinding makes any sort of challenge completable by patience instead of skill. Some of the titles are more a reward of patience than skill, such as "Finish the game without using autosaves and without ever retreating." Retreating from optional battles simply means the player doesn't wish to bore themselves by plowing through easy and tedious random encounters. Furthermore, fighting every optional battle ends up making the game easier to complete due to higher player stats. It's ironic when it takes more skill to deliberately avoid getting an "achievement" than it does to earn it. Like most RPGs it's so riddled with flaws and loopholes that allow the player to avoid difficulty that it is useless as a measure of player skill. Using or not using autosaves is meaningless as you can use the provided quicksaves to achieve the same effect and still get any related titles. Tactics Ogre is useful as an emotional experience only.

Speaking of emotional experiences, I haven't touched much on the plot. It's your standard fantasy tale liberally borrowed from the superior western mythology and fantasy classics that set the standard for the genre, with the typical added melodrama, ham fisted moralizing, evil villains, false dilemmas, the "violence to end violence" motive, the teenaged cast, saving the world plot, etc. The faux-olde English translation seems like a desperate attempt to give the plot some sort of authenticity and hide its JRPG trappings, but it's all there for anyone who sees past the medieval fantasy veneer. While it's better than your typical JRPG dreck, it's clearly a JRPG at heart with many of its standard cliches. Suffice it to say, there's a reason Tactics Ogre's story isn't regarded outside of anime/JRPG circles as some sort of masterpiece.

The music has a few catchy tunes, but it quickly gets repetitive. The one or two minute battle loops are repeated so frequently that I quickly tired of them and wanted to play my own music. There's no option to turn the music off, so the only option is to mute the game entirely. The terrain being in 3D is not particularly useful since you can't freely rotate the camera. When the PSP is capable of 2D graphics of the sort found in Super Robot Wars Z2, games like Tactics Ogre look like barely touched up SFC games in comparison. Oh wait, it is a barely touched up SFC game, my bad.

Tactics Ogre is more oriented towards people who like easy, simple, repetitive, and grind-happy "sandbox" style games such as Disgaea, Final Fantasy Tactics, or other traditional RPGs. Tactics Ogre's customization and combat is mostly designed for players who want to spend dozens or hundreds of hours grinding up a dream team of ninjas, faeries, dragons, and busty witches then steamrolling the campaigns meager opposition. It's more like a traditional RPG slapped on a grid that rarely takes advantage of the increased strategy and skill that a turn based tactical level game can offer. Gamers who want fast paced, varied, strategic content that takes advantage of the medium should look elsewhere.

If all turn based tactics started playing like Tactics Ogre (and by extension, FFT and Disgaea), the turn based tactics genre would be almost entirely pointless, and all we'd be left with is a lot of RPG-esque, grind heavy sandbox mush. For that reason, Tactics Ogre is a series that would be better off as a traditional RPG, instead of making a mockery of the turn based tactics genre. Tactics Ogre isn't a completely awful game, just below average game by today's standards, riddled with problems that make it a barely tolerable experience at best.

Namco-Bandai announces SRW Masou Kishin II for PSP

2011-10-25T22:19:00.005-04:00

In the newest Famitsu magazine (Scan 1, Scan 2, Scan 3, Scan 4), Namco-Bandai has announced a new Super Robot Wars entry titled Masou Kishin II. It's a sequel to the original Masou Kishin released on SFC and recently remade on the DS, which I recently reviewed. It's being developed by Winkysoft, who last made SRW F/FF and Complete Box for the Playstation. Hopefully they figure out how to add animation skipping this time!

Masou Kishin II will also come in a limited edition bundle with Masou Kishin DS remade for the PSP. They're taking the DS version and adding additional voice acting and better animations. Masou Kishin for PSP will only be available in the limited edition bundle, not standalone.

Release date is Jan 12, 2012. Trailer coming on Nov 1, 2011. Official website here.

Super Robot Wars F/FF (PS) Review

2011-10-24T07:32:00.001-04:00

Super Robot Wars F/FF is the final entry to the classic SRW storyline, meant to replace 4th SRW. It's loosely based on the plot of 4th SRW, but is otherwise an almost entirely new game. SRW F and FF have a combined 78-80 scenarios per playthrough and over 100 total scenarios. It was longest continuous SRW campaign at that point and isn't for the fainthearted.

You can again create your own main character, although you have less control over which seishins they can use. The disparity between real and super MCs is quite large, which leads to super MC having a far easier time in F compared to real MC. The affinity mechanic makes its first appearance in SRW F, allowing two pilots who are friends or lovers to gain a stat boost when standing close to one another. While it's undocumented and fairly useless in practice, it shows how SRW continued to progress even in the classic series. Not to be left out, several mechanics from SRW Gaiden reappear in SRW F. This includes EXP for unused seishin points at the end of a mission and EXP for healing. Items are dropped by enemies instead of being hidden on the map, a trend that thankfully continues into modern SRWs.

A couple new seishins are added to mix things up such as Taunt and Dream, while other favorites like Rage have been removed. Formerly exploitable seishins in 4th SRW like Ressurect and Re-Enable are extremely rare and cost far more SP. There aren't nearly as many scenarios that can be finished by killing a single target like in 4th SRW, either.

Newly added series such as Ideon, Gunbuster, Gundam Wing, and Evangelion come with their own unique mechanics and abilities that help to add some much needed variety to the otherwise familiar classic roster. The Evangelion pilots have AT Fields to absorb damage and if Shinji's health is reduced to 0 his Eva will go berserk with a heavy case of the munchies. The Eva series also gets its own ending route, although it's more of a bad ending that skips the final 15 or so scenarios. Ideon is an extreme super robot that can wipe out entire maps with its Ideon Gun, or go berserk and aim at your forces instead. Gunbuster and Gundam Wing are more traditional robots and pilots without much in the way of unique mechanics, but it's still nice to see some new faces and units.

SRW F is one of the most difficult SRW campaigns, especially if you chose a Real pilot main character instead of a Super pilot. You'll frequently find yourself facing high armor, beam shielded L-Gaim, Guest, and Dunbine enemies, often on difficult terrain like forests, bases, and underwater. The two part scenarios where anyone used in the first scenario suffers a morale loss in the second scenario if their morale was over 100 are particularly brutal. In addition, you'll frequently be hounded by extremely powerful Evangelion angels and Guest bosses that are usually only possible to defeat with copious upgrades and lucky hits/critical hits. Sometimes it can get boring or annoying waiting around for these bosses to retreat if you don't feel like defeating them.

SRW FF is the direct sequel to F, allowing you to use your F save data to continue where the last game left off. SRW FF's campaign is significantly easier, with the exception of a few scenarios. Your Gundam pilots will reach double act, learn Spirit seishin, and get some decent robots with funnel attacks. Your super robots in FF are incredibly powerful and make most of the F supers look poor in comparison. Your other pilots learn a wide variety of seishins that make combat much easier. You'll often be fighting in space and not dealing with difficult earth terrain. Once you have full access to Ideon, it can make quick work of the last 10 or so scenarios.

Despite the huge number of scenarios, there is little empty filler. There's usually always some kind of reinforcement, event, retreat, or objective to keep things interesting. Most scenarios usually have multiple reinforcements and events that need to be carefully considered in any kind of efficient playthrough. There are two end game route splits of 10-11 scenarios that are both worth playing through.

4th SRW certainly had its game breaking combinations, and FF is no different. Late in FF, you gain full access to the robot Ideon which has two MAP attacks with infinite range and the maximum possible damage of 9999. On top of that, the Ideon pilots have both Strike and Spirit which guarantees the attack will always land and deal 3x damage. However, in order to use the MAP attacks Ideon needs to get attacked by enemies to raise its Ideon Gauge, and if it gets attacked too many times it will go berserk and start firing its MAP attack at anything it pleases, including your own units. In addition, if Ideon dies or is attacked too many times while berserk, you get an immediate game over.

While it's a double edged sword and requires careful management of the Ideon Gauge, the Ideon Gun can wipe entire maps clean of all enemies due to its enormous radius, infinite range, and extreme damage. The Ideon Sword is just as damaging, but is much more difficult to aim since it only fires in two straight lines instead of a huge cone. While building up the Ideon Gun or Sword isn't nearly as easy as the 4th SRW tactic of spamming Resurrect, Ideon Sword/Gun can still one shot any enemy in the game when combined with a Spirit seishin, final bosses included. Even when using Ideon to its fullest, though, the end game of FF is still more difficult than 4th SRW's endgame as the situation can quickly go bad when using Ideon.

F/FF uses the same engine as Shin, with a near identical UI. Sadly the feature from Shin where you could activate the same seishin across multiple pilots is not in F/FF. Animations are still unskippable so you'll want to use a speedup toggle to avoid sitting through them.

Overall F/FF is a great SRW entry for veterans, although a nightmare for the inexperienced. The only issues are balance between real and super type MC, Ideon being overpowered, and the usual unskippable animations.

Reviewers experience: Completed with no upgrades, no units destroyed, low turn counts, and no save/load spamming for low %. (Space/DC): 401 turns / 79 scenarios = 5.07 avg, (Space/Guest): 403 turns / 78 scenarios = 5.16 avg

Guide here!

October 2011 Update #1

2011-10-12T08:41:00.007-04:00

What's good folks? We have a few bits of news in turn based tactics land.

New trailer for SD Gundam G Generation 3DS and 3DS bundle. If the bundle is cheaper than a plain Japanese 3DS + game, it's probably worth it if you plan on playing other Japanese Region Locked 3DS games like Fire Emblem, Super Robot Wars, and anything else that happens to be published.

A Sega rep confirmed what we already knew, that Valkyria Chronicles 3 will not be seeing an official English translation.

Touch Arcade review of a new iPhone/iPod Touch strategy game called Squids. In this game you take turns ricocheting sea life into enemies, a bit of a departure from the usual grid based format.

Panzer Corps expansion pack announced. This is an excellent turn based strategy game for PC that has drawn a lot of comparisons to Panzer General.

I was made aware of a card based tactics game called JollyGrim. While this isn't exactly a turn based game, it's grid based, tactical, and features a lot of strategy, so you may want to check it out.

I'm still playing through the Super Robot Wars series. I've been playing through F and F Final which combined is a 79 scenario campaign, so it's quite a long haul. Looking forward to getting into the more modern games in the series, especially animation skipping. If you would like to read my current playthrough log for Super Robot Wars F/FF check out this in progress text here.

Shin Super Robot Wars (PS) Review

2011-09-28T04:01:00.002-04:00

Shin SRW was the first original Playstation entry, attempting to make a big splash as the series new vision. It's one of the few SRW titles to be re-released on the Japanese PSN as a digital download. It uses the same engine created for 4th SRW G but but includes a number of UI and control improvements. Shin SRW represents more of a leap in graphics than in gameplay or plot. It plays very similar to an easier, less eventful 4th SRW.

The campaign is split into two long routes which basically make it two games in one, adding up to ~71 total scenarios. While the core gameplay is fairly solid SRW fare, there's not much variety to be had throughout the campaign. Almost every scenario is completed using the same basic strategy with few alterations for scenario events or unique challenges. For most of the game you'll find yourself in massive, nearly empty maps with only a token amount of enemies. The kid gloves come off a bit near the end of each route, but by that point the you've gone through so many uneventful scenarios using the same strats that it might not feel worth the effort. It hasn't aged particularly well compared to other older SRWs. It doesn't help that the pilot and robot roster is relatively small compared to 4th, and it doesn't have much at all in the way of new seishins, skills, or unique features. Not to say that you can't get some enjoyment out of it, but if you're spoiled on modern SRWs, you'll probably be bored.

Graphically Shin SRW uses non-super deformed art. This works well for some robots designed to look realistic, but others look ugly or strange when not shrunken down. Shin SRW also adds cut-ins, close up face portraits, and long cutscenes to its attack animations. This turns out to be a double edged sword because like all older SRWs up until SRW Alpha, animations are still unskippable. When running at default speed the load times and animations are atrociously long and unbearable. Unless you have a way to speed them up in an emulator I don't advise playing Shin SRW. Much of the poor reputation of Shin stems from its slow load times and absurdly long, unskippable animations.

The seishin search menu, first added in SRW Gaiden, now lets you select multiple pilots with the same seishin and activate them all at once. This is a big improvement over past SRWs where you could only activate one seishin at a time.

The Shin SRW Special Disc was an encyclopedia or compendium of Shin SRW. In it you can view attack animations, FMV, tons of profiles, and listen to music. There's also a simple concept scenario where you can deploy a wide range of pilots and units, some of which you couldn't control in the main game.

Overall Shin SRW is hobbled by a fairly bland campaign and unskippable animations with long load times. It's not a surprise that any sort of sequel to Shin was aborted and replaced by the Alpha series. Only the most dedicated SRW fans should bother checking it out, and even then only if you can speed up the attack animations to 500% or greater of normal speed.

Reviewers experience: Challenge conditions: No upgrades, no units destroyed, low turn counts, and no save/load spamming for low chances to hit or dodge. Total turncount for both routes + final mission: 295 turns / 71 scenarios.

Super Robot Wars Review/Guide Compendium

2011-09-20T21:28:00.007-04:00

Last updated: Oct 24, 2011

SRW (Gameboy) - Completed it. Not too much to say here. I wasn't recording turn counts or trying to avoid deaths, in fact I sacrificed a few units when I saw better robots to recruit. Unlike most SRWs it seems losing units is a natural part of the game as there are always more recruits available. I didn't take this game too seriously as it plays so different from anything else in the series.

2nd SRW (Famicom) - Completed with no units destroyed and no teleport seishin, 243 turns. I wasn't aware that teleport could be used to shorten some levels so I didn't get an amazing count here, but I don't really feel like going back and replaying it. The last couple of levels were a pain to keep everyone alive, with powerful bosses and aggressive reinforcements.

3rd SRW (Super Famicom) - Completed with no upgrades, no units destroyed, low turn counts, and no save/load spamming for low chances to hit or dodge. 159 turns, 34 scenarios complete. Fairly easy until you start running into double act Inspector bosses and huge waves of double act grunts. Again the endgame is the most difficult with multiple powerful bosses that take a huge beating, have double act, and can one shot most of your units. Wrote a challenge run guide here.

SRW EX (Super Famicom) - Completed with no upgrades, no units destroyed, low turn counts, and no save/load spamming for low chances to hit or dodge. 200 turns total for all 3 episodes. Very easy game, only a few tricky stages. Good for beginners though. Wrote a challenge run guide here.

4th SRW (Super Famicom) - Completed with no upgrades, no units destroyed, low turn counts, and no save/load spamming for low chances to hit or dodge. 146 turns, 44 scenarios completed, 3.31 turns per scenario. Starts out a fairly difficult, but drops off a cliff once you get lots of ultimate attacks and Awaken/Re-Enable spam. Bosses are high HP punching bags, there are no waves of double act grunts that you have to deal with, and it's easy to get double act for almost all of your pilots including super robot pilots. If you use upgrades and Revive seishin it's even more broken. It's still fairly tough in the early-mid game before Awaken/Revive/MAP/ultimate attack spam. As an example, you can complete the last 6 scenarios of the game in 1 turn by fully utilizing those features. Wrote a challenge run guide here.

2nd SRW G (Gameboy) - Completed with no upgrades, no units destroyed, low turn counts, and no save/load spamming for low chances to hit or dodge. 106 turns, 25 scenarios completed. Easier than the NES version with the exception of Bain. Bain has an extremely high hit rate, double act, can one shot any of your non-upgraded units, and has tons of armor/HP. Guide here.

4th SRW S (Playstation) - Played through the first couple scenarios. I don't plan on doing a full playthrough of this game since it's nearly identical to the SFC version. Added a section for 4th SRW S to my previous review. Good enough! I might play through the Super route someday.

Super Robot Wars Gaiden/OG Saga (SFC/DS) - Completed with no upgrades, no allied units destroyed, low turncounts, and no save/load spamming for very low chances to hit or dodge. Wendy Route: 221 turns, 45 scenarios. Baravia Route: 218 turns, 45 scenarios. Shuu Route: 232 turns, 43 scenarios. I felt this SRW was overly simplified and too RNG heavy. It has some fun moments but generally the randomness with pilot skills is too irritating. Guide here.

Shin Super Robot Wars (PS) - Challenge conditions: No upgrades, no units destroyed, low turn counts, and no save/load spamming for low chances to hit or dodge. Total turncount for both routes + final mission: 295 turns / 71 scenarios. A bit of a boring SRW even when you can speed up the animations in an emulator. Guide here.

Super Robot Wars F/FF (PS) - Completed with no upgrades, no units destroyed, low turn counts, and no save/load spamming for low %. (Space/DC): 401 turns / 79 scenarios = 5.07 avg, (Space/Guest): 403 turns / 78 scenarios = 5.16 avg. A great SRW, challenging as well. Definitely the best of the classic SRWs. Guide here.

Super Robot Wars Gaiden/OG Saga (SFC/DS) Review

2011-09-20T21:08:00.002-04:00

SRW Gaiden is the last SRW title to be released for the Super Famicom and was recently ported to the DS in 2010. It's developed by WinkySoft, not Banpresto, which explains why it's very different from the rest of the series. It's more like an entirely different game that just happens to use SRW characters. The DS version has some interface improvements, skippable animations, plot alterations, and a new game+ feature, but the game play itself is nearly identical to the SFC original.

SRW Gaiden ditches the 2D overhead view for a 3D isometric view which happened to be all the rage in 1996.
As in most 3D isometric tactics games, height difference and unit facing plays a role in accuracy and damage. Zone of Control was added to make it more difficult to maneuver behind an opponent. Terrain bonuses, penalties, and movement rates are entirely removed.

In addition to EN and Ammo, a third weapon resource has been added called Prana Points, which are used in MAP and ultimate attacks. Prana Points work like EN except your robot loses stats such as HP, EN, and mobility when the points are used. When put into practice, though, Prana Points aren't much different from EN and they add little to the games depth. MAP attacks are still around but they are far less useful than previous SRWs. There aren't big groups of enemies to MAP anymore, MAP damage is fairly low, and MAP attacks share Prana Points and EN with ultimate attacks which need to be conserved for high HP bosses.

Weapons can be upgraded into new forms with improved properties aside from more damage. A rock paper scissors style elemental system and "caste" system was introduced so that certain unit types deal more or less to others. Pilot skills including double act are learnt at a range of possible levels instead of at a fixed level. Other minor changes from previous SRWs include EXP gain for healing, unused SP at the end of a scenario granting EXP, enemies capable of using seishins, and enemy stats no longer being hidden.

SRW Gaiden is one of the most shallow games in the series in terms of depth and customization. You can't switch pilots between units and there are no items to equip, unlike previous SRWs. The only thing you can do is upgrade your robots stats and weapons. You don't get to choose deployment spots until mid-late in the game and even then you can only choose 4-6 units. Similarly, SRW Gaiden only has about 40 combined allied pilots and robots compared to 4th SRW's count of almost 200. Enemy and ally counts during scenarios are significantly reduced, further lowering the games complexity.

Costs for seishins are so expensive that even near the end of the game you can only expect to use 3-4 seishins before running out, further removing strategic options from the player. Formerly cheap seishins like Flash now consume 30-50% of a pilots SP pool early in the game. The only strategy the player has control over is unit positioning, taking advantage of elemental weaknesses, conserving ultimate attacks for bosses, and using a tiny pool of seishins. The added directional facing, ZOC, and a simple rock paper scissors damage system doesn't make up for all of the other things removed or reduced. It's a shallow game compared to 4th SRW. There are still some scenarios in the game that push the available depth to its limit in terms of difficulty, but such scenarios exist in 3rd and 4th SRW as well.

SRW Gaiden adds a significant amount of randomness in the form of new or changed pilot skills. Branching (bunshin) is now always active instead of only active at 130+ morale. Double attack is easily the worst skill added to Gaiden, allowing any unit to attack twice for full damage. Bosses that can double attack will usually kill any of your units in two hits. If you unintentionally double attack, you might waste ammo/EN you were trying to conserve, or kill an enemy you were just trying to weaken for a lower level pilot. This is exacerbated by the low dodge rates of your pilots, the high cost of seishins, and the lack of a Focus (30% hit/dodge) seishin.

Bosses appear early in the game with many pilot skills before your pilots have any, leading to highly random and uncontrollable situations. Mid-late in the game every enemy pilot including the low level grunts have branching, block, double attack, and double act. The combination of simplified customization, low unit counts, and highly random pilot skills makes this the most dumbed down, RNG heavy SRW yet. The developers could have made changes like making double attack only deal 25% of normal damage, branching only at 130 morale, and make it so you can't block attacks from behind. Then the game would only be simple, instead of simple and uncontrollably random.

The scenario flowchart is complex with 3 ending routes and dozens of variables to keep track of. There are about 100 total scenarios, but quite a bit of that is filler. Much like SRW EX, there are a lot of heavily scripted "event scenarios" that are merely formalities. A good number of scenarios are simply mirrors of other scenarios with minor changes due to plot branching or feature reused maps. Even though the scenario count and branching looks intimidating, there aren't any more unique missions than you'd find in 3rd or 4th SRW. However, it is impressive how they managed to cram so much content and plot branches into an SNES game while avoiding game breaking bugs.

As usual the interface continues to improve. You can now check a list of enemies as well as allies. There's a new list of seishins which you can select to see which pilots currently have that seishin. By holding down select then pressing L or R, you can switch between enemies on the map instead of allies. This turns out to be very useful because you can't zoom out to a minimap view, likely a limitation of the isometric map. As usual animations cannot be skipped in the SFC version, so I suggest the DS version.

Reviewer's experience: Completed with no upgrades, no allied units destroyed, low turncounts, and no save/load spamming for very low chances to hit or dodge. Wendy Route: 221 turns, 45 scenarios. Baravia Route: 218 turns, 45 scenarios. Shuu Route: 232 turns, 43 scenarios.

2nd Super Robot Wars Gather (Gameboy) Review

2011-09-18T15:02:00.000-04:00

2nd SRW G is a retelling of 2nd SRW for NES with new characters and scenarios. While some map layouts are reused from the NES version, there are so many other changes and new maps that it feels like a new game. Despite being released after 4th SRW and being based on the NES 2nd SRW, almost everything about 2nd G's mechanics are identical to 3rd SRW. Three major features from 4th SRW are weapon upgrades, and being able to select attack/dodge/defend when attacked on enemy phase, confirmation of hit/dodge rate before committing to an attack. Even the sprites are mostly downgraded versions of 3rd SRW sprites. Basically you're getting another serving of 3rd SRW with the addition of weapon upgrade and full upgrade bonuses.

New to SRW are full upgrade bonuses which reward a fully upgraded unit (7 points in HP, EN, Armor, and Limit) with extra stats or abilities. There are a few minor bits that made it from 4th SRW such as being able to quickload by resetting and holding A. One annoying limitation of the hardware is that you can't see whether a unit is flying or not on the map. On a related note, air/ground capable units can't land, probably a limitation of the game engine or hardware.

2nd SRW G's campaign is fairly short, taking 24-25 out of 33 scenarios per playthrough. Most scenarios can be completed in 4 turns. Difficulty is fairly easy overall - don't expect any harrowing challenges. Most of the bosses are lightweights except for the final boss, who has some fairly intimidating stats. Any experienced player will have no problem destroying the campaign in 2-3 days. The pilot and unit roster is tiny compared to 3rd and 4th SRW, and there are no equippable parts, so you'll be doing little party management throughout the game. Unlike 4th SRW with its 80+ pilots and robots with equippable parts, you can figure out which pilots and robots are worth using in 2nd SRW G in a couple minutes as opposed to hours.

With that said, it's still easily one of the best single player tactics games for the Gameboy, if not the best. Cramming a miniature but fully functioning SRW game into the Gameboy is no small feat. It looks good and animates well for a Gameboy title. The user interface is good and they manage to cram an impressive amount of features, including using the select and start buttons to sort units by HP/level. Give it a try if you love retro gaming and tactical strategy.

Reviewers experience: Completed with no upgrades, no units destroyed, low turn counts, and no save/load spamming for low chances to hit or dodge. 106 turns, 25 scenarios completed.