Star Ocean Integrity and Faithlessness - How not to start your game.

I've never had a great experience with the Star Ocean series, I've always found the games a little on the meh side. The most interesting one I played was The Second Story and I really didn't like the battle system. But it had an interesting story and when it began I was intrigued. I sunk around ten hours into it before I finally quit (this was years ago, so maybe I should retry it and see if my opinion will change), frustration overcame intrigue and that was that. I love sci-fi and time travelling/alternate dimension stories and so when Second Story began it was ticking all the right boxes.

Jump forward to present day and I slide the latest Star Ocean into my PS4. The logos appear and fade and then there's this exciting full motion video of a spaceship hurtling past asteroids and strange planet in the distance. The main menu opens up, "Galaxy" mode! Ooh, space, sci-fi and wonder!... 
The game starts, there's a picturesque town on the edge of a cliff overlooking the ocean. The camera pans in to two young men dueling and then the game dumps a ton of text boxes on you, explaining the basic controls of combat. You spam your attacks and work your way through the tutorials and then the fight is over. There's some light chit chat and you walk around the town seemingly aimless until you bump into this girl you both know. She spotted some strange people and everyone is worried, so they go see the mayor who is that stereotypical spineless town official. Then afterwards it's night time and bandits attack. More fighting, then with no grand finale the bandits flee. The next morning you remark that the town cannot survive another attack (despite very easily dispatching the bandits). Then you selflessly decide to head to the nearby kingdom to request reinforcements. You leave and are joined by the girl you met earlier, she is atypically defiant in the presence of the overbearingly protective hero who is convinced within a single sentence that the once perilous journey this vulnerable girl (who can cast fire spells! Really vulnerable right?) could not possibly join in with, is permitted to follow. 

From here I went on into a fairly large environment fighting blobs, crabs and wolf men, accruing experience and skill points. Eventually everything culminated in a boss fight with a large blob, which was pretty easy but apparently we needed saving by some chap (by this point my attention span had diminished).
I turned the game off after this, popped it back into it's sleeve and sent it straight back to the rental service. 
This must have been the most blandest and vacuous beginning to a videogame I have ever played. The first thing that bothered me, is the game seemed so impressed with it's own visuals, showing off the town and the nearby coastal area in it's splendid 60 FPS beauty, that it totally forgot to properly introduce us to any of it's characters. It also forgot to give the player any context or meaningful purpose. 

I like an introduction, show me something about the characters that tells me they're interesting, that gives me some hint on their personalities. What is the world they inhabit, who is the bad guy, where might this story be going? I've played many games, even slow burners that take a while to get into themselves but nothing like this, this game literally sticks two fingers up to characters, story, plot and cohesion. 
Look at a game like Final Fantasy X, the introduction to that is slow. The very beginning is watching people around a fire with a ruined city in the distance. But the game shows the personalities of several characters immediately. Kimarhi can be seen standing stoically, Tidus rests a caring hand on Yuna, she leans in affectionately and comforted. Then Tidus stands upon the mound and makes that declaration: "Listen to my story... This may be our last chance". 
In just a couple of minutes the game has caught my attention, what is Tidus' story? Where are they? How did they get there? Why does everyone seem so somber? There are questions to be answered and I'm genuinely interested. What follows next, the Zanarkand section at the beginning is a mix of character development for Tidus (we even get a creepy appearance of a Fayth) and then when Sin arrives it kicks off and it's exciting and enthralling. The simplicity of the battle system at this point is overshadowed by the eventfulness of everything going on.

I could go on and on with other examples of how a game should start, but I would only be stressing my point. Star Ocean lacks integrity and I had no faith in it to continue. It couldn't even hold my attention for one hour with it's bland introduction into JRPG mediocrity. 

Game Diary: Final Fantasy 9 and the first round of April's Games with Gold!

Hello everyone and welcome back to The Love of Gaming blog, after spending an entire week writing, proof reading and editing my review for Battlefront 2 and writing the script for the narrated guide, my gaming itch finally overcame me and I booted up Final Fantasy 9. (My next target for my ABC game guide series!) 
I was supposed to wait on Far Cry 5 from my rental service, but it looks like it's going to be one of those games that'll take another week or two to arrive and I'm making notes on Final Fantasy 9 so I shouldn't get too sidetracked.

Any who, I cannot remember what number play through this is of FF9? What I can say is though, it is a truly timeless game. It looks fantastic still to this day, I love the hand drawn backgrounds brimming with little details and the warmth and charm of the world is captured at every fixed camera angle. The characters and creatures that inhabit the world are full of life and I love that there are anthropomorphic animals, side by side with humans, running shops and living and breathing in a wholly realised world. 

The gameplay is top notch too, it forgoes the freedom of the materia and draw systems and goes back to giving each party member a preset class. It works very well, beautifully even! (though even I cannot ignore the fact that Amarant isn't an appealing party member. He seems to be here to fill up the numbers!) It's great to see the Blue Mage appear as the enigmatic Quina, the Black Mage as the adorably courageous Vivi and the Dragoon return as the calm, introverted and skilled Freja. 

Without babbling on for much longer and very much sounding like the sentimental old fool I am fast becoming, I was also very pleased to see this months Games with Gold offerings! The Witness, I have never heard of but looks interesting. (I enjoyed the Turing Test off the back of a Games with Gold offering). Cars 2, whilst not everyone's cup of tea is the perfect game to play with my children, especially my son as he is Cars mad and has about ten different Lightnings.
But the latter half of the month is most impressive! Assassins Creed Syndicate! I really did fancy a go of that when it arrived but, I was knee deep in a Call of Duty binge back when it came out and so it slid under my radar. Then coming to backwards compatibility is Dead Space 2! The magnum opus of the series, Dead Space 2 is to Dead Space 1, what Aliens is to Alien. More action, less horror, but a far superior specimen. 

I liked Dead Space 3, forgiving it's poor single player balancing (same amount of enemies for single player as co-op... huh?) I played Dead Space 3 like a man possessed, but sadly the game didn't do very well, not helped by EA's at the time, maniacally aggressive micro-transaction method of operation. 
Also, the world at the time had lost sight of the pleasures of an eclectic range of genres in the videogame industry and everybody was pushing for first person shooters and action games in general. It's only now we're seeing a revival of genre with big budget RPGs like Final Fantasy 15 and Persona 5 leading the way and also the pleasurable return of survival horror, which was mainly thanks to the indie movement. (Which has done some good in reminding everyone there is more to games than run and gun).

So, hopefully Far Cry 5 will find it's merry way to my door step this week and I can give it a good go for myself. It looks really good and I've done my best to stay away from any 'spoilerish' content! 

Well, thanks for reading everyone and I hope you've all had a great Easter and hope you all have a great week! 
Happy Easter everyone!  

Final Fantasy 8 Review

Hello everyone and welcome back to The Love of Gaming blog. Not long after finishing Final Fantasy 7 I dived straight in to Final Fantasy 8, I was eager to create another ABC guide with my eyes next on Final Fantasy 9. 
Final Fantasy 8 was and still is, an incredibly divisive game. There are those that champion it for it's distinctive identity and decided shift from previous games. Then on the other side of the fence, people dislike it for all it's intent and being. It's the proverbial black sheep, if you will. 
Rather than string you along, I will tell you here and now that I straddle between the two lines, there are some impressive and unique elements to Final Fantasy 8, but there is an incredible amount of self indulgence and not entirely thought out designs that mar what could've been a damn near perfect experience. And so, I would like to begin my review with the story, plot and characters. 

STORY

The story is the heart of a JRPG, it's the combustion process inside an engine that moves the piston (the player) downwards, and then with reciprocation we come back for more, over and over, churning onward. Without a good story, a JRPG can be a hollow experience. Playing a game that can average 30+ hours must have a captivating hook to keep you engaged, so the question I ask myself is; does Final Fantasy 8 have a good story? My resounding answer is, yes. It does have a good story, but no matter how great a story may be, much like a joke, it's how you tell it. 
Final Fantasy 8 is ultimately a love story force fed into an interesting, mystical end of world impending plot. The pivotal character is Squall, a Mercenary who is contracted out to a small resistance group led by a young woman called Rinoa. The two instantly clash, Squall is cold, methodical and introspective, opposing Rinoa's warm, spontaneous and social manner. Of course, the tension between them is supposed to be sexually charged, but the dialogue struggles to convey that and they feel more like two people that have zero common ground that all of a sudden, realise they're in love.

Moving the plot along and creating the dramatic set pieces for the cast of Final Fantasy 8 is the Galbadian military and their enigmatic leader Edea, the Sorceress. 
Galbadia is a nearby, aggressive nation that is gradually occupying it's neighboring regions. Ultimately all of their actions are to assist Edea in asserting herself into political power and finding a young woman called Ellone. Edea believes Ellone to have special powers and will go through anyone and anything to find her. 
Edea and furthermore, the lore of the Sorceress is the most interesting subject of Final Fantasy 8. Talking about lore, I like the world building in this game. It's very organic, you don't have to read an annex about terminology and locations, it's not convoluted or incomprehensible like later entries. Things are kept simple, but interesting.

Along with Squall and Rinoa, is Zell, Selphie, Irvine and Quistis. The only other characters to get any real development in the story is Irvine and Selphie, the secondary romance. Only their's is a more charming and natural attraction but sadly gets a minimal amount of exposure in contrast to Squall and Rinoa's. 

As for Zell and Quistis, they're almost forgettable. They seem to be here to round out the playable group. They both play their parts during the first disc, but afterwards they get very little dialogue space and no further character development. Which is a damn shame, Quistis spends most of the first part of the game lusting after Squall, who in return shows little to no affection. Quistis is understandably hurt, there's a lot of interaction between student and instructor in the opening chapters, but as soon as Rinoa comes onto the scene Quistis backs right off and we never hear of her feelings furthermore. It could've been interesting like the Cloud, Tifa and Aeris love triangle, but nothing stands in the way of Squall and Rinoa's burning love.

The secondary cast of Final Fantasy 8 are the most interesting characters, I find the six playable characters very one dimensional and lacking any convincing development. Supporting cast like Seifer are ill treated, considering he is supposed to be Squall's rival and sides with the Sorceress. There isn't enough friction between them. Seifer's motives are subtle and deep, he had such potential for exciting dialogue and interaction but we don't see it. He doesn't even get a half decent part in disc three and is reduced to a plot mechanic, pushing the game into it's final act. He is followed diligently by his comrades Rajin and Fujin, but the game makes no effort to explain or help us understand why this trio are so inextricably linked. They are a trio, just because.

Pacing would have been fine, if it were not for all the self indulgent, self serving dialogue. Squall himself makes up most of the text with his own inner monologues. And it's hammy writing, the sort of thing that occurs when someone in their thirties is trying to emulate the thought process of a emo-like 17 year old. Whiny, self absorbed and self pitying. Some of Squall's thoughts go on for a very long time, and once he realises he is love with Rinoa, the groan inducing dialogue ramps itself up. For a teenager, it must read like poetry. But for a man in his thirties, it's tripe. 
Back to pacing, there are a great deal of set pieces that take you all over the world. The game is more restrictive than say, Final Fantasy 7 that sees you explore every continent in the first disc. I like that Final Fantasy 8 keeps it's cards close to it's chest and gradually introduces to the different parts of the world. In particular, the locales you visit in disc three are exciting, original and organic. I like it when a game keeps it's themes consistent throughout, subverting expectations can be tantalising, but everything must be comprehensible and this game does that well.

Overall, the plot is interesting but the cast is weak. Shallow development and an obsession with teen romance undermines a story about a cataclysmic event, that could see the end of the known world and possible universe. It's not nearly as memorable as Sephiroth's plan for ascension but that's what happens when the focus is off and the characters are forgettable. Final Fantasy 8 struggles to make me care about Squall and co and that ultimately detracts from the whole experience of the game.

 GAMEPLAY

Final Fantasy 8 is the last Final Fantasy for a short while that enforces no class restrictions. More so that it's predecessor, each character is a virtual blank slate. Leveling up plays a smaller role in character prowess, instead your level primarily effects the levels of the enemies you'll fight. In order to improve character statistics and make them stronger you'll have to obtain magic and "junction" that magic to a stat, like strength or magic. In order to junction magic to stats you need to have junctioned a GF, or Guardian Force (previously known as summonings). You also need the GF to have learned the ability that allows you to junction the magic. Sounds complicated? It's not, on the face of it, it may seem so but it actually works very well. 
It's a big improvement into total party customisation, but like it's predecessor, you're not rewarded for assembling three unique fighters. Adaptability and flexibility is king. 

I mentioned previously that you had to junction magic to your stats, in order to obtain magic you have to "draw" it from your enemies. Each spell can be stocked up to 100 times, affording 100 uses. A spell will improve a stat incrementally as you increase your stock of it, up to 100. Also, different spells are better suited to different stats. A simple example is HP; you'll receive a bigger boost to your HP total if you junction Cure to it, than you would if you junction Thunder to it. Conversely, Thunder is better junctioned to your Magic stat than cure. 
Naturally you can expect spells like Haste to give huge boosts to your Speed and Evasion stats. There's very little subtlety in the system, only a few nuances to take into account and that's a matter for the late to end game anyway. Overall it's a very natural and easily understood which spell to use for which stat.

Going back to Guardian Forces, you initially start the game with two, Shiva and Quetzalcoatl. It's not long before you find a third and then several more are obtainable during the events of Disc one. Then several more in Disc 2, with the last GF's obtainable during Disc 3 and even into Disc 4. So they're spread out evenly across the game which is a nice bit of pacing.

Each GF has a list of abilities to learn, the aforementioned junction abilities firstly. But they can also learn abilities such as stat boosts like HP+20%, refine abilities that allow you to obtain magic through item synthesis, unique skills for the party characters to use such as Darkside and Doom. Then lastly there are the GF stat boosts, SumMag+10% and GFHP+10%.
I mentioned the last two stats at the end because I'm about to tell you one of the biggest changes to Final Fantasy 8. No MP. As said, magic is now a per-use item of sorts, so having an MP resource is obsolete. Each GF can be summoned as often as one likes in battle, so to balance out their limitless use, GF's have a HP pool. 

When a player summons a GF in battle, a secondary bar appears over the players original turn bar. When this bar depletes the GF is summoned dealing large damage to the entire enemy group. (or bestowing a buff to the entire party). During this secondary gauge, the GF's HP pool is displayed over the characters. Any damage inflicted against that character drains the GF's HP. When that HP is reduced to zero, the GF is dead and can no longer be summoned until revived, outside of battle I might add.
In practise, GF's are not as useful as you would think. Whilst the damage they inflict in the beginning of the game is impressive, once you are able to junction some decent magic to your Magic or Strength stat, you can easily deal more damage per second, than you could with a GF. Throw in the buff Triple, that allows a character to cast a spell three times and the Guardian Forces are completely outmatched. 
Ultimately, in the end, the GFs are only useful for improving your characters. 

Going back to the Draw mechanic, it's an evil necessity. Other than through item synthesis, Drawing magic is the only way to obtain a full stock of a spell. How many copies of a spell you can draw at once is determined by your Magic stat, you can even fail to draw a spell if your stat is too low. However, you're capped at drawing only 9 copies of a spell at a time, which is really disappointing. This means to fully stock up on one spell, you have to use the Draw command ten times! Needless to say, it's incredibly time consuming and laborious. Most spells you'll want to fully stock for at least three characters, for no other reason than for junctioning spells to stats. 
Fortunately some spells are incredibly easy to stock up on, given a few instances where the game gives you lots of a item you can refine. For instance, defeating the Diablos GF in disc one affords you his card, which you can synthesis into another item you can synthesis for twenty copies of the Demi spell. You'll obtain a hundred of this item, meaning you need never ever draw Demi to restock. It's also a very potent stat boosting spell.

I've talked in great detail about the key mechanics of the combat and stat boosting system, ultimately Final Fantasy 8 is another ATB game. It does play a lot different to it's predecessor, in some good ways. For instance, status effects are in play far more often and most enemies and bosses have several vulnerabilities. It's great to see them make an effort to change things up, however in practise, it's not a deal breaker in battle. You do find yourself casting Esuna often, especially in the endgame. 
Interestingly, Dispel is also a common use spell on both sides. I only ever used the Debarrier spell in Final Fantasy 7, but in Final Fantasy 8, Dispel is a necessity. Many bosses, especially near the end of the game bestow buffs on themselves frequently, like Triple and Regen. If you failed to debuff them you'd be in for some big trouble. 
  
The limit break system makes an immediate return, however this time there is no gradual charge. Instead, when characters HP falls into critical levels they can begin to spam their Limits for as long as they remain in a critical state. The balance being that a single strike will remove that character. Sadly, it's a design rife to abuse. Later into the game you can obtain a very rare spell called Aura that grants the same buff but irrespective of HP, for a short while. 
Limits are by far the most damaging attacks in the entire game. Oddly though, it's character sensitive. Zell, Squall and Irvine all have combo style Limits. With strong magic junctioned to the Strength stat, each of these characters can do a ridiculous amount of damage to a single adversary. 
For example, Zell's limit requires the player to input button combos. Each entry adds to the combo. A timer appears that lasts from anywhere between four and twelve seconds. The quickest inputs I was able to do was .4 of a second. If Zell is able to land each blow at 1000 HP damage, and you can input each command in .4 seconds of a twelve second timer, that's thirty blows. 30,000 HP damage is massive. Even if you're using Triple and your spells can do 9999 damage each (the cap), you're still just short of the mark. Plus, it's much more difficult to get your spells dealing this sort of damage, it's much easier to increase your Strength and let rip with even stronger blows.

Compared to the aforementioned trio, Selphie, Quistis and Rinoa don't stand a chance in the terms of DPS and since Limits are the only thing that separates the characters mechanically, not having a party of Squall, Zell and Irvine isn't just preference, it's detrimental to your overall DPS. 
There are lots of little forms of abuse in Final Fantasy 8. It's very easy to take advantage of lucrative AP spots to farm very early on and just make yourself ungodly invincible. Granted, it'll be at your own detriment of enjoyment, if you're looking for challenge.
The freedom of the Junction is perhaps it's own downfall, in granting the player such unlimited options has only served to make it more difficult to balance the game. Once you enter a certain part of disc 3, the game almost throws out balancing, digs it's heels into the ground and firmly asserts that if you have failed to properly junction your party you will be defeated over and over. The difficulty curve is lacking for the most part, only right at the end will you find yourself up against any real threat. 

GRAPHICS

The polygon models of Final Fantasy 8 far surpass that of Final Fantasy 7. That is undeniable. There is a lot more detail in the models, they look far less deformed and the animations less stiff. That extra level of detail makes Final Fantasy 8 easy on the eyes and visually enjoyable. The pre-rendered environments lack some of the charisma of the previous entry. Some locations can actually feel a little bland. Detail wise, Final Fantasy 8 has more animated pieces in the environments that add to the visual splendor. 
It carries on the tradition of bizarre enemy designs, some of the creatures are really odd against the robots, soldiers and dragons you'll atypically fight. 
The cast look good, great designs and there is more identity in the NPCs, even between towns. I was especially impressed with this extra level of detail which no doubt increased the work for the design team. 
Final Fantasy 8 looks good still, that's undeniable. Save for some resolution quirks that can stretch the pre-rendered sections, it's still a visual treat. Some of my favourite locations in this game include the city Estha, the Fire Cavern and the final dungeon, which is absolutely stunning. Without spoiling things it really upsets the aesthetics of the game, but in a completely great and amazing way. Subverting your expectations and pulling the rug from right out under your feet.

I also like the revamped user interface, the menu is clean and neutral with a grey background. The blue, whilst classic, was always a little in your face, and so I really got on with this UI. 
For the battle system they went for a minimalist theme, you literally see current HP and the ATB gauge. The only other element on the screen is the menu bar that appears once an ATB gauge has filled. Some people may not like it and prefer seeing their total HP, but you do get used to it and you get to know your max HP values just by being in the menus, junctioning magic to stats, so having that information on the screen in front of you all the time isn't really that important. It's a shame to lose the barrier bar, now all you get is a pop up at the top of the screen letting you known when your timed buffs have worn off. Does mean you have to really pay attention, not seeing it could wind up costing you a game over if you miss that "shell has faded" warning, only to then be struck with a powerful magic attack that wipes you out.
Overall, a nice clean user interface that personally, I find refreshing.

SOUND

I'm going to have to say, not my favourite complete soundtrack to a Final Fantasy game, some of the tracks are forgettable, like certain towns or atmospheric tracks. The boss music Force Your Way is an absolute classic though, it's heart pumping adrenaline, pulsing in your ears and gets you worked up and focused in the heat of battle. Such a great track and it's timelessness is proven by the plethora of remixes this track has had since the game's release.
Other memorable tracks to note is the theme from the intro, Vivos Luna Sic, I believe it is called but I'm probably wrong. I also really like the Dollet attack theme, Lunatic Pandora, Man with the Machine Gun and lastly, but oh so not least is the track to the final dungeon. It's amazing, as is the final dungeon and is very original to a Final Fantasy game. It's a piece of music, really, rather than a track. It evolves as it plays on, changing itself through the entirety of it's run time, which I think is about eight or nine minutes. Pretty long for a piece of music in a videogame.
The sound quality of Final Fantasy does surpass FF7, the quality of the sound effects is better. The tracks sound less midi-like, not to be disrespectful to the previous title. You can clearly hear the improvements in this game, less synthesised sounds and a greater variety of instruments used in each piece of music is a pleasant upgrade.

OVERALL

Final Fantasy 8 is never going to be my favourite of the series. The story is held back by a teen inspired, melodramatic love story that's yawn inducing, it bogs down gameplay with repetitive mechanics. It's a shame because the visual and audible improvements belong to a far more refined game. 
There were lots of moments in Final Fantasy 8, especially towards the end where I really felt my endurance tested to continue to play. There is far too much dialogue to get through, I reckon there is twice as much text in Final Fantasy 8 than there is seven, or hell, even nine! Nothing pulls me out of an immersive experience like reading a 17 year old's self pitying thoughts, complete with bed withering. 

I like the junction system, it's a shame it's never been used since in any shape or form and I like the method of powering up using the Summonings, it gave them an additional dimension than just power houses. It also gave us the brilliant Double and Triple spells that I feel are a better way to balance "all" magic, giving the player extra tools for DPS is always a great thing. 
It's worth playing it through to the end, if anything just to see and experience that amazing final dungeon that is so different to any Final Fantasy game that has come before. To give you a little clue about it, it's reminiscent of a haunted house that you have to explore. There is back tracking but it's so worth it. Truly an enjoyable location. 

I hope you enjoyed reading this review and hope my opinions haven't upset or offended anyone. I like to think of myself as a generally unbiased person with an objective mentality when it comes to appraising video games, but I could be blinded to my own faults.

If you enjoyed this blog entry, then do please hit the +1 button and as always, have a great week everyone!    

Septerra Core Legacy of the Creator: Ambition, the enemy of success

Septerra Core Legacy of the Creator is an RPG game that attempts to blend western RPG mentalities with JRPG sensibilities. It's got oodles of dialogue, world map exploration and even a ATB system. It was generally well received when it released back in 1999 and garnered praise for it's visuals and voice work and you know what? They both still hold up well today but I'm going to be honest here: Septerra Core hasn't aged well.
What it got somewhat away with back then doesn't cut dry now. It's a slow game, with slow player progression, pacing and combat. A linear story with vague cues on where to go next it's quite a frustrating experience and I was reliant on reading a strategy guide just to make sure I wasn't going backwards and forwards for tens of minutes because I didn't realise I had to speak to one particular generic looking NPC to gain some intel to progress the story.

I hate to be utterly critical of a game and it's true it's still visually beautiful and interesting to look at and that voice work was years ahead of it's time.
Each character and environment has had a lot of attention to detailed paid to it and it really does have it's own sense of character. The story itself is interesting and layered and filled with a memorable core cast. If there was one thing going over and over in my mind when playing this game it was that it seriously needs to be remade with all the mod-cons of modern gaming.

To give you a bit of context about Septerra Core; it's plot revolves around a young woman named Maya. She lives on the planet Septerra that has all it's landmasses split apart and revolving around the planet's computerised core.
Now the bad guy in this story is Doskias, a direct descendant of a powerful hero. He's arrogant and entitled and sets out to manipulate the world so that he can access the planet's core and receive the "gift" which is obviously going to be the power to control the planet.

He's pretty much hell bent on achieving his goal so much as to destroy anyone who he thinks will even pose the slightest threat or hindrance to his plans, even some of his own allies are dispatched without a second thought.
We're pretty much assured within the first ten minutes of the game that Doskias is a bad guy. However, he is interesting with it, not just some hell bent power monger, Doskias believes this to be his birthright, that it was almost prophesied for him to "save" Septerra.

Maya on the other hand, is a humbled character in the beginning: her parents were killed in a war and she just lives day by day in her piece of the world just trying go get by. We learn that it's a pretty harsh world for most with only a few civilisations achieving prosperity.
One of the other orphans that Maya knows gets involved with smuggling goods to people from another continent (or a shell in this game), whom are directly working for Doskias.

Maya is a well rounded out character, she's proactive, not whiny. Portrayed as strong and confidant, Maya takes on the defacto leader role in the group. It's great to have seen this in a game from 1999 where strong female characters were even struggling to be on the cinema screens.

Maya is joined atypically by a rag tag group comprising of an old friend and his robot dog, an exiled soldier, a general's daughter, a bounty hunter and surprisingly Doskias's lover who interestingly is trapped between stopping him for the sake of the world or selfishly hoping to "save" him from himself.
And this isn't even the full roster, there is a total of nine playable characters in Septerra Core.

I liked the story and it has that JRPG thematic feel to it coupled with the FMV sequences for the more bombastic moments. It makes sense, the world is well constructed and each of the shell continents have their own personalities and politics all for the player to immerse themselves in.

Where I have to become critical of Septerra Core isn't in it's story or it's graphics, it is in it's gameplay. Level design and battle scenario design, just doesn't work well.
I definitely feel this game got let off it's less than amazing gameplay in reviews partly because of it's graphics and plot. Sure this is a RPG game and we generally have a lot of dialogue to get through but at least 50% of the game is fighting and exploring so these areas should be just as polished.

So combat, it'll be familiar to anyone who has played a JRPG. Forgoing western RPGs of the time, combat doesn't play out in real time. Instead characters enter battles in fixed positions. You cannot alter this in any way at all, but positioning can be exploited by you or the enemy party by using attacks that cause damage in a direct line or area of effect.

All characters in battle have an ATB (active time battle) bar that is segmented and slowly fills up during battle. Each segment represent an attack. The longer you wait the stronger the attack. Also some skills you can "equip" also have a preset ATB position. For instance you can equip Maya with the grenade skill but her ATB must reach segment two in order to use the move. Later you can equip Napalm which acts like Grenade but requires all three segments of the ATB bar.

Makes sense? Sounds technical, has the opportunity to deepen combat but it doesn't a whole lot. But more or that later, Septerra Core also has a magic system along with regular attacks and skills and magic too takes advantage of the ATB bar, spell power increases in correspondence with how full the bar is.
All characters share the same MP bar, which is called CP (which stands for Core Power) and it's consumed by using spells or in the case of this game; fate cards. Skills also consume CP as well and so spamming multiple spells and skills eats up the universal CP gauge at an alarming rate.

The biggest flaw of Septerra Core's magic system is that it's just not that versatile for the main game. Spells and skills are vastly under powered compared to regular attacks with the only obvious benefit being that they have 100% accuracy.

You can attach a fate card to multiple characters to create combo attacks but again, very pricey. Uses up a lot of the ATB gauge and only useful in the endgame. No one character has an exceptional magic stat, they lose huge points in strength but don't have the gains elsewhere other than speed leaving them quite underdeveloped.

Honestly, there is a lot here to work with but it's all underbaked. Enemies don't have elemental weaknesses to be exploited and so elemental spells are just attacks with special effects. Ultimately battles resort to waiting out the ATB bar for level three attacks. Rinse repeat. Every now and again you can use skills but the opportunities to experiment in battle are just not there.

I applaud Septerra Core for it's interesting ideas but I'm so let down at their execution. Battles are incredibly slow paced and they make exploring dungeons feel really tedious and that's when your attacks connect! When you have several misses in a row it's infuriating.
Having detailed animations is all well and good but they're long winded and repetitive, in a bad way. The generic attacks lack flourish and enemies interrupt your ATB charge way too often. Even when you're in the middle of a boss fight the game lacks urgency. A boss should be bang, in your face! Best strategy... Nope. It's rinse repeat, it's disappointing. All the drama happens outside of combat.

 Speaking of outside of combat, here is another critique I have of Septerra Core and it's what is the point of having all these beautiful textures and interesting locations when the map design is so bland?
Textures repeat themselves over so locales feel like mazes rather than livable spaces and this problem is compounded by the camera distance - it's close. Really close.

When I think of Chrono Trigger and how well the map design is in that and then I look at Septerra Core I'm just puzzled. It could have made so much more interesting places to explore.
To make things worse, there is almost no soundtrack. You have three random battle themes, a world map theme and that's about it. So, whilst you're exploring the labyrinthine dungeons you get to do it to the sound of gentle wind, humming machinery or nothing. I think if we had some music for the towns and dungeons it might've helped stem boredom but listening to nothing but the odd battle theme for hours is a joy kill and inexcusable in a game like this.

I'm really disappointed replaying Septerra Core. Games age, that's true but the elements it fails on are as crucial today as they were then, the only difference is that it's harder these days for game to succeed on looks and story alone. We're spoiled, we have played decades of games that have pushed gameplay so far and refined what a RPG is or a shooter or a platformer. We're know what near perfection looks like, we know what is competent and it isn't here.

Septerra Core could use a remake, it's story and world deserve to be told to a large audience but someone needs to take the game mechanics, sling them out the window and start from the ground up. My first thought is that the reward for charging the ATB gauge should be better. Instead of just a small damage modifier, how about Maya's level 2 is a cone AOE attack against all targets in a direction and her level 3 is a an all out barrage against all foes. They don't even have to deal huge damage, slight reductions even to balance it. But make it not cost CP, you want the ATB gauge to open up options of attack with no cost penalties.
Mentioning CP, each character should have their own. It differentiates between magic casters and non-magic casters. You can also boost the CP cost of fate cards and their damage, coercing players to use CP to it's fullest potential as long as they have the reserves.

There needs to be a greater variety of enemy types with dedicated elemental properties. In an RPG, elements are essential to keeping the combat engaging and not reduced to 'spam the most strongest attack' scenario that Septerra Core certainly suffers from.

The Shin Megami Tensei games have shown how well elemental play keeps players on their toes in battle, we all love to feel powerful and outsmart the computer. It's not rewarding to just obliterate them because we've grinded to god-like levels.


Visually, if Septerra Core was updated hands down it would look great cel shaded. I would even like to see them keep the isometric view point but give the players control of the in/out zoom of the camera during exploration and to be able to rotate the camera during both exploration and combat.
Obviously these are just ideas off the top of my head and the chances that Septerra Core will be remade is incredibly low to non-existant but I like to dream up how a game from the past would look if it benefited from what we've learned up today.

Hope you've enjoyed reading this article, and if you have thoughts or experiences of your own please leave a comment.

Have a good day, everyone!

RetroAspect: Final Fantasy 6, the Apex game.

Final Fantasy 6 is the hotly contested "best" entry, in the long running Final Fantasy franchise and for good reason. With a deep plot, layered characters and an engaging world, FF6 by far surpasses it's predecessors in so many ways.
The battle system is the most refined out of the SNES series, utilising the best elements from 4 and 5. Characters each have their own unique skill sets as they did in FF4, but you can also tune and customise characters using Magicite, which borrows slightly from the open ended job system of FF5.
The soundtrack was a treat as well and felt more dynamic and eclectic than what we had previously in the prior games. Each piece captured the mood perfectly and were far more complex arrangements than that if it's peers at the time.

We never had an official release of FF6 in the UK, until the PSX port came out (with some unpleasant hang ups; mainly the load times).
I eventually came to play FF6 on the Gameboy Advance, which by all accounts is the definitive version with many of the bugs and quirks from the original SNES game ironed out. I was ready for this, and I was assured that I would see FF6 through to the end and see for myself what it was so many found great about this game.

My journey through FF6 had some ups and downs, this is a very old game by todays standards and some of the pacing can feel really off. I also found chunks of the game were not at all difficult and I could breeze by, simply spamming the usual over powered attacks over and over.
FF6 does offer many ways to plan out battles but with such a huge party roster you end up with a lot of characters who are substantially less useful than others and you generally end up using the same foursome over and over again, so as not to handicap yourself.
There's no denying FF6 was an ambitious game, it's party roster is huge and unlike previous entries you get to use the whole lot of them by the endgame and it's pretty much essential to have a well balanced full compliment of teammates by the time you get there.

Final Fantasy 6 essentially is a 5 act game. It's incredibly story driven and pushes you to each area through narrative, rather than allowing you to explore at your whim.
Whilst some may find this takes away from the game, making it more linear it certainly does a great job of conveying the story and the urgency of the situation FF6's characters find themselves in.

Act One; starts with the intro and concludes at the point where Terra, Edgar, Sabin, Locke and Banon are split up.
Act Two covers the next several hours of gameplay that ends in Zozo.
Act Three is by far the longest segment and spans right up until the end of the floating continent which leads to Act Four: The World of Ruin and finally comes to end with Act Five, Kefka's tower.

Each act establishes a goal and ends with said goals completion. Each act also effects the flow and pacing of the game.
In Act One the game establishes that Terra has to choose to aid the Returners or risk being captured by the Empire.
In this act we also learn the basics of combat and that each character has a specific skill set. The enemies in act one are pretty simple and don't really take any tactics to beat, but you get to experiment with the party skills without a great risk of failure.

The final boss of this act is Vargas, who is actually the first real formidable enemy you fight in the game and requires you to use what you've learned in a very immediate fashion.
Once this battle ends it's a pretty straight forward path to Terra agreeing to aid the Returners and promptly sets up act two.

In act two the goal is to reunite the Returners and gain the help of the Frozen Esper in Narshe. It's a long segment that spans multiple continents and also introduces us to three (possibly four if you hire Shadow), party members.
Sabin's journey is effectively the core element of this act. It's not only the longest but also contains the most character development. When you meet Cyan there is a lot of character depth explored through the loss of his wife and son.
It's also in the Doma area where we see that Kefka is not just another general in the Empire but an altogether cruel and heartless enemy. It's here we're supposed to hate Kefka and root him in as the main villain.
His clownish appearance and unhinged personality give Kefka inhuman qualities that inform us he is an incredibly dangerous enemy that must not be taken lightly.
It's a well paced scene that sets the stage for later sections.

This act largely becomes gameplay based once the player escapes off the haunted train and there is no plot or character development. Though the game uses this opportunity to introduce us to Gau and teach us how to improve Gau's character skill by allowing us explore the Veldt in order to obtain him.

You may think this act comes to a close when Terra interacts with the Frozen Esper atop the cliffs in Narshe, but I disagree. The goal is to gain the help of the Espers in fighting the Empire and this goal is only achieved when you find Terra in the tower, in the town of Zozo.

Ramuh gives us some exposition and that awards the player with Magicite for the first time.
Magicite can be equipped one at a time to a party member and allows them to learn magic at variable rates.
Gaining access to this key element of party development, changes the tone of fighting for the rest of the game as you become more and more dependant on magic and cannot just spam the usual attacks as before.
Gaining Magicite also makes characters such as Locke and Celes more viable in battle as their character skills alone are so context sensitive, they really pale in comparison to characters like Sabin or Cyan who have powerful attacks right from the off and with no MP cost..

In Act Three we are finally set the goal of stopping the Empire, which is not a straight forward process in terms of narrative or gameplay.
You're first trip to the Magitech Research facility is a wake up call for using magic. Almost all the enemies in there have specific elemental weaknesses and the damage foes can dish out ramps up. Spells such as cure become absolutely essential from here on out and pretty much renders potions redundant in every situation.

We also get a hefty dose of character development for Locke, Celes and Terra. The former two gaining the most attention as the writers setup the love story for them.
It's also the point where we see our character roster begin to bloat with Setzer, Rem and Strago joining the ranks. None of them are particular amazing in terms of battle utility, Strago comes into his own later with amazing Magic stat improvements that combined with powerful endgame spells, make for some serious damage.

In this act Kefka's backstory is explained, being the first magic infused soldier or rather, Magitek Knight (of which Terra and Celes are also), Kefka's sanity was broken in the process and he becomes obsessed with power and obtaining it.
Due to his exploits with the Empire's dictator Emperor Gestahl, Kefka learns of the Warring Triad and in this whole act, we the player are pretty much oblivious to Kefka's goal of obtaining the Warring Triads power.

We also learn the full story of the Espers and how the world was formed in the wake of the Warring Triad, powerful Gods that battled endlessly and almost inadvertently destroyed the world in their ongoing battles.
They eventually agreed to stop and entrusted the Espers with protecting their statue forms from anyone who would upset their balance for power.
It's not explored too well but Kefka performs two of his most shocking deeds in this act with the first being the complete eradication of all Esper, when he converts every single last one of them into Magicite.
And then lastly he comes to destroy the world as we know it in the final location we explore in act 3 and the World of Balance itself.
Kefka's final action occurs on the floating continent, effectively a fail safe if the Espers are to fail protecting the Warring Triad, the Esper homeland is levitated into the air and becomes only accessible to airship.

This location I personally found required me to start grinding for better magic spells and levels up, not so much for stats but for more HP.
The Floating Continent difficulty curve is pretty steep with enemies unleashing all manner of powerful attacks - instant death spells, multiple ailments and lastly the Behemoth that has a nasty trick of raining down a powerful meteor spell on your party when it's beaten. This spell alone can wipe a party, it's a harsh lesson for the player.

We both succeed and fail at the end of act three; the Empire is ultimately destroyed but Kefka achieves his goal of obtaining the power of the Warring Triad and the party end up scattered all over the world in the ensuing calamity.

Act four sees Celes trapped on an island with the former Magitech research scientist Cid, who has fallen ill eating sickly fish.
This beginning section is all about instilling despair into the player. Even when we leave the island we see that the entire world map has been changed to reflect the catastrophic damage Kefka has caused in disturbing the Warring Triad.

This whole act is very open ended, as Celes you're more or less free to explore the world of ruin as you wish. It's alien, after such a structured and linear experience the game takes the leash off and says have at it.
I've found through my discussion with other players that this point of the game was incredibly divisive. Some players loved finally getting the chance to do it how they wished while others didn't enjoy dumping extra hours into just getting their bearings.

The singular goal of this act is to reunite, but much like the free reign exploration, the extent of uniting you do is up to you. You can finish the game with just four characters (madness!) or you can explore every corner of the world and get the whole gang back, even Shadow if you were kind enough to wait for him at the end of the floating continent section.

Once you're done here and you have an airship you're free to initiate act five: ending Kefka.

The tower is plot light, what you need to know occurs in the previous chapter and the degree of involvement you have depends on how much you sympathised with each party member you rediscovered.
What the tower is though, is a true test of your mastery of combat.
I'll be honest, on my first playthrough of Kefka's tower I was decimated over and over again. Getting wiped out was a serious concern, enemies boasted some formidable skills and you're also forced to split everyone you've found in to three groups. Most players will have settled on a standard team of four, but having four OP party members and a load of others very under levelled is a recipe for disaster in the tower.

I had to grind in a desert against sandworms for a very long time before my teams had enough HP to survive and enough variety of high level magic to swiftly deal with the enemies in the tower.
Now, FF6 is the second to last FF game I have finished (the latest being FF15!) so I've been incredibly spoiled. No endgame dungeon in a JRPG has given me as much trouble as Kefka's tower. It was a real hurdle to overcome, but once I got to the Warring Triad bosses I had pretty much conquered the dungeon.

Now to say that the final boss of FF6 is something to behold is selling it light. I can only imagine how excited and pumped those who first played FF6 were, when the orchestral music begins to boom and the harrowing choir shriek as Kefka descends from the heavens in his ultimate form.

He questions life, existence and the purpose if it all. Kefka is alone with his perceptions of the world. His ascension to godhood has fully dissipated any sense of sanity he had.

It's an interesting but brief interaction you have with Kefka prior to the fight. Kefka spent much of the game's plot, cruelly carrying out Emperor Gestahls orders.
We never really get to see things from Kefka's perspective or even get a hint of what he knows and is planning.
Throughout the entirety of the World of Ruin we don't hear a peep outta Kefka. Only stories of his cruelty and the effect he has had on the world.
In this final moment, before we set about to destroy him Kefka chooses to reflect on the essence of existence.
It's the hint of a more complex character, and I so wished he got more development in the World of Ruin but perhaps it's a good thing. It gives some levitation to the moment, Kefka's final words...

As a final boss he is quite straight forward, primarily just dealing out huge sums of damage for you to heal through. By the time I came face to face with Kefka I was spamming auto-life and dealing out huge DPS, to say I was overpowered might have been an understatement...
Regardless, Kefka is an enjoyable thematic fight and defeating him does grant a sense of victory and closure.

The final act draws to a close as our heroes flee Kefka's crumbling tower, there is a nice bit of character bonding here and independent stories are wrapped up nicely.

Final Fantasy 6 is a swan song for the SNES and serves as a fine example of classic JRPG. Even with the limitations of the SNES system they oozed every last drop of tech to get out the best game they could.
The battle system is pretty dated and it lacks the balance of later games, but you cannot deny the eclectic cast and narrative really make this journey something special.
You feel the desperation and sorrow of these little pixel people and get truly immerse into their little oblivious world, teetering on the edge of destruction.

For me FF6 deserves it's spot in gaming history as a true classic.

Digital Devil Saga; In the shadows of others. But a marvel all it's own

Shin Megami Tensei is a series of games that have rapidly increased in popularity since the release of the Persona titles on the PS2. That sub-series is still very popular and to date is the last Shin Megami game to be released, and the only one to receive a release on the current gen main consoles. (There are still many games on the 3DS)

It's a shame because I fell in love with the series after playing Nocturne (SMT 3) on the PS2 many years ago. At the time it felt like a Pokémon game for adults: catch Demon, raise Demon, fuse Demon. Gotta summon them all.

One of the biggest criticisms of the Shin Megami games is that the difficulty is rather steep. But this is something of a fallacy, SMT games reward tactics and planning and having the right resistances and skills is the make or break of any battle.
Granted there is the occasional cheap one hit KO scenarios from instant death attacks but most of the time the game gives the player enough time to protect themselves from those attacks before they become far too frequent but the occasional cheap game over is a bit of a mainstay of the series.

Eventually the SMT team decided to make a more accessible game, one with a shallow learning curve and with a greater emphasis on narrative and characters.
The game they made was Digital Devil Saga: Avatar Tuner (that's a mouthful.) It utilised Nocturne's press turn icon battle system which I personally find to be one of the most intuitive battle systems known to JRPG.

But before I run off on a tangent about battle systems lets mention one great thing about DDS and that's the focus on a character driven narrative.
We're all familiar with Final Fantasy's cinematic take on JRPGs and their memorable and most of the time lovable characters, but in the SMT games we're often introduced to a silent protagonist that is effectively us, the player.
And thus the story tends to be about personal discovery and is more interested in challenging your thoughts and perception on religion, philosophy and existence. Interesting and deep stuff but it's A) not for everyone and B) lacks variety for want of a better word.

So one of the things DDS does as soon as you hit new game is introduce us to core cast:

The intro also introduces us the Junk Yard; the world the characters of DDS inhabit. It's a barren wasteland that rains constantly. There is no vegetation or any other signs of life other than the warring Tribes.
In the intro we learn that our main character Serph, is the leader of the Embryon and they're currently skirmishing against a neighboring tribe; the Vanguards. During a skirmish the two tribes come across an Egg shaped object on the battlefield. Perceiving this as some sort of new weapon the two clash attempting to capture it, but are caught in it's sudden detonation where it the Demon Virus that transforms the soldiers including Serph into insatiable demons that devour each other in a blood bath.

With their blood lust sated, Serph and his comrades discover a girl called Sera resting in the spot where the Egg had been, they take her back to their base where she continues to sleep while they ponder who she is and why she appeared.
It's learned when Sera awakes that she can calm Demons from their insatiable bloodlust and refers to herself as a Cyber Shaman.
Serph decides to talk with the Vanguards' leader Harley and travels there with Heat and Argilla (two soldiers from his inner circle).
Unfortunately Harley is in no mood to chat and flees, sending his soldiers to fend you off. Serph and Heat accept that it's devour or be devoured and so embellish their new forms while Argilla refuses to eat the defeated enemy demons.
Upon finally confronting Harley, after laying waste to his base, he finally succumbs to the Bloodlust and goes berserk, transforming into his Demon form and is subsequently Devoured by the Embryon soldiers upon his defeat.

The following day all the surviving tribe leaders are called to the Karma Temple: a colossal tower that somewhat governs the Junk Yard and will grant the victorious tribe access to Nirvana.
At the temple the leaders are spoken to by a voice that refers to itself as Angel. It restates that the purpose of the tribes is to fight until only one is left and that the introduction of the Demon Virus was to end the stalemate that had occurred.

Now as these revelations are made, the characters of the Junk Yard's eyes flash and their grey iris' become coloured. Along with this slight physical change the person's complete personality changes and they become more human.
For instance; Heat becomes passionate and reckless. Argilla becomes empathetic with a strong morality.
There are also two other primary characters introduced in the beginning that join Serph proper after the Karma temple and they are Gale and Cielo.
Gale is an intelligent and calm taciturn and Cielo is well, always cheering everyone up and not taking things too seriously.

Serph's team also affect the gameplay; each one of the team has elemental strengths and weaknesses that play into the press turn system. Each party member gets one turn, if they hit an enemy with a weakness or a critical attack they gain half a turn. The maximum amount of turns the entire party can have is six as you only allowed a maximum of three party members.
Conversely your enemies can also take advantage of the press turn system by exploiting your party's weaknesses, the enemy can also double their own turns and there in and of itself is the basis of all encounters. Knowing weaknesses and resistances.

Mastering the press turn system is key to survival in DDS, you are always forced to have Serph in your party and so will always have him weak to fire attacks but very early on you can learn skills and one of those allows you to void an elemental attack for all party members once per turn.
So as well as gaining bonus turns by exploiting weaknesses, in the press turn system you can also block attacks and prematurely end an enemies turn. A missed or voided attack loses the enemy two turns, but you can also repel and absorb attacks and they incur further turn penalties. These penalties also apply to your own party. It's great to see a JRPG enforce the same rules on the enemies as there are on the player.

So as you can see there is a lot to consider in each battle but unlike Nocturne, DDS eases you into this gameplay. Elements are introduced gradually with more complex enemy party groups only really appearing late in the game and instead of obtaining and fusing Demons, you always know your party's elemental attributes. Unlike in Nocturne where without pre-warning, it's very difficult to discern enemy weaknesses and resistances by the area you're in or by the enemy's appearance.
Coupled with the fact you may have fused or caught demons that are not suitable to the next area you're in this can all add up to be a bit of a nightmare and frustrating.

Now a static party does help simplify this system but it's not the only way the SMT team made DDS more accessible. Skills are no longer inherited or learned automatically through levelling, each party member has access to an expansive shared skill tree that requires AP to master. Each skill node has one or more skills and/or abilities within it that you can view before purchase.
The game puts you directly in the frame of what skills you wish each party member to learn and to top it off you can equip these abilities as you see fit with the only restriction being that AP can only be spent at save points.

So if you enter an area that's full of fire skill using enemies who are also weak to Ice, you could have Heat (who is resistant to fire), learn some Ice skills to counter these foes.
It's a really helpful feature that removes the punishing element from Nocturne when you don't have the correct abilities for the situation you're in.

Also as mentioned, skill nodes require AP which is obtained by defeating demons. However you can gain amazing boosts to AP by defeating enemies with "Devouring Skills". These skills are context sensitive and require the player to exploit enemy weaknesses to have them enter "fear" states that then grant Devouring Skills damage modifiers so they can deal killing blows.
It's a great addition that rewards tactical play with a genuine benefit and helps player progression in a big way. In fact the quickest way to learn late game skills, is to Devour demons with stronger Devour skills that further increase AP gains.

One gameplay element that is still very SMT but has been streamlined is dungeon environments. Most SMT games rely on labyrinthine style of level design with lots of branching paths that lead to dead ends and traps.
Their dungeons also tend to contain puzzle elements that the player must overcome in order to complete them. For instance in Nocturne the player finds themselves in a construction yard that has been taken under control by troublesome fairy demons. The demons patrol catwalks above the pathways and if you take the wrong path you get teleported back to the entrance of the area. And only by luck or by process of elimination can you discern which catwalks are safe to walk under. It can be an irritating process at times and most of Nocturnes puzzle dungeons work in this way, sending the player back to the beginning or in loop. It's time consuming and frustrating when it goes wrong and Nocturne begins to rely on this gimmick a lot in the later dungeons.

Both games contain well designed mapping tools that aid the player's navigation, which is pretty essential as the dungeons in either game are quite expansive. Fortunately DDS's dungeons are more simplified with less branching routes and rewarding players for going off the beaten track with useful items or unlockable shortcuts for save points.
There are no horrible looping or progress resetting traps until the final dungeon and even then they're not spammed as much as they are in Nocturne.
Most dungeons in DDS centre around one theme, barring the first dungeon that is extremely straight forward and works more or less as a tutorial. Players will find themselves in a creepy castle that contains light puzzles where the player has to line up rays of light to progress. A derelict ship that's a straight forward gauntlet and a complex sewer system with one way pathways that force the player to consult their map and consider their routes.

Save points are also more commonplace in DDS and allow the player to fully heal themselves for some ingame currency and spend accumulated AP in the skill tree menu.
In Nocturne save rooms are separate from healing rooms and fusion rooms and in dungeons you only encounter save rooms and so you must be fully prepared to tackle the whole dungeon or be forced to retreat to a hub area to fuse more powerful demons or heal up.
Shops are detached from the save points and require the player to return to the Embryon base to purchase items and equipment.

It's been a long time since I heard anyone talk about a Shin Megami Tensei game that wasn't one of the Persona games. Indeed those titles have taken the series into the forefront of popular JRPGs but SMT has an expansive back catalogue of amazing games and I personally find their PS2 selection to be the undisputed finest works the company has released.

Having recently played Persona 5 I was glad to see that Atlus wanted to make Persona more accessible and while that game has a pretty big hurdle for players to overcome (90+ hours to finish means you need some endurance). It does a lot to encourage new players dive in and have a go with it's gentle learning curve and relaxed attitude to dungeon completion.

If you have a PS2 and some free time and have never tried Digital Devil Saga I wholeheartedly urge you to do so, it's a fabulous piece of gaming. Or if you've been too afraid to delve in to a Shin Megami Tensei game because you've heard they're "hardcore" or "too hard". Give DDS a try. You'll be surprised at how welcoming this game is and how easy it is to master the mechanics of the press turn icon system.

For me Digital Devil Saga is a beautifully crafted game that I always come back to every so many years. Far more often that I return to Nocturne or other SMT titles.