Ni No Kuni: Wrath of The White Witch Catch-all

SixteenBlue wrote:
Aristophan wrote:

If you can't find it at a store, the PSN shop has it for $54.99. It is a 21.7 GB download.

Well, that officially rules out digital for me. I don't know if it's even feasible for me to have 43.4 GB free.

I thought the download was quite huge as well, which is why I included it. Also, based on past experience with Sony, it would probably take over 10 hours to download. It's nice to have the option, though.

Did you all decide to go with the Japanese language track or that other one?

English. And it's great, from what little I've heard of it.

Farscry wrote:

English. And it's great, from what little I've heard of it. :)

+1

English audio for me.

The localization sounds ace so far and after hearing Mr. Drippy's voice actor, it feels as though it should be a punishable crime to pass up on his talents.

While I will definitely be going with the Japanese, please keep posting your thoughts about the English voice over!

Had to drive all around town to find a copy of the game. Finally found a Gamestop that sold me someone else's preorder because it was almost closing time and she said they would be getting more copies in the morning. Seems awfully early to be getting restock but what do I know maybe she just liked me. I also decided to pick up the strategy guide as these tend to be useful for JRPG's. It's a nice hard cover, fairly large and looks very nice. I took a quick glance and it looks pretty useful. It mentions right in the beginning that there are hidden items all over the world and nothing directly points them out but that about half way through the game you will get a spell that will reveal them on the minimap but by that point most are not very useful as they are mostly low level items. Little things like that are why I like getting the guides, when I rely on just the internet I tend to only be looking directly for something and I never get little hints like that.

So far I'm only about two hours in and the story and graphics are amazing, the English voice acting is also very good except for Oliver, he just seems a bit off. Some of the reviews I had read mentioned that the game gets off to a slow start but I haven't found that to be true, like any RPG there tends to be a lot of mechanics to digest but the game was pretty swift in its explanations. Be warned though, I would steer clear if you don't like grinding as I can tell already that there will be lots of it.

Here is the giant bomb quick look. Spoilers if you are you are trying to stay completely clean.

I really want to play this. Dragon Quest 8 is one of my favorites and the last JRPG I've been able to get into, besides Lost Odyssey. I just can't justify it with the pile right now. My birthday is coming up soon. Maybe I'll try to get someone to buy it for me. It's not my fault if someone else adds to my pile, right?

After calling Digital River and experiencing the worst customer service of my life, I determined that they have my old credit card and billing address and basically refused to do anything about that.

So I've given up on Wizard's Edition and ordered a standard from Amazon, which should be here Friday. I wanted that book and soundtrack but it's not in any way worth trying to deal with those people. Maybe the soundtrack will even show up on iTunes at some point.

Demyx wrote:

After calling Digital River and experiencing the worst customer service of my life, I determined that they have my old credit card and billing address and basically refused to do anything about that.

So I've given up on Wizard's Edition and ordered a standard from Amazon, which should be here Friday. I wanted that book and soundtrack but it's not in any way worth trying to deal with those people. Maybe the soundtrack will even show up on iTunes at some point.

There's a 'pending' charge against the card I used for my order (from back in August), but still no other updates to the order status. I'm incredibly frustrated about the whole thing, but the budget just can't take going out and getting a stand-in copy. I knew I wasn't going to get it on release day, but I burned vacation for Thurs and Friday since I thought it would get here by then.

Well, I sincerely hope the folks that did pickup a copy are enjoying it. I'll be living vicariously through your experiences until DR manages to get me mine.

So yesterday I posted that I was going to give this game a miss as I'd read it was super grind heavy... Today I wake up to find it bought on the US PSN store (not released here in Aus for another week), not sure how that happened but I'm blaming the Hisaishi soundtrack calling me in my sleep.

Ended up costing me AU$60 for digital only. Trying to justify the purchase by telling myself I've saved AU$24 by going for the digital. Will dive in when I get off night shift.

EDIT: Also! TruffaloBuffalo, I'm thinking Japanese voice track. In the demo I really dug Drippys Welsh voice, but I also dug the Japanese voice, Oliver sounded a bit annoying in English but I liked the Japanese...

I'm torn. I love the art style. I don't love grinding. Seriously, I quit Dragon Quest 8 at the first boss when I found out you basically had to grind to beat him. I do love all the other parts of old-school RPGs. I love having to use an in-game book to do stuff. SO TORN.

The other thing is that I don't get much game time at home, but I've taken to playing games on my lunch hour at work. There's a PS3 in the game room at the office. How feasible is it to move the save file between my office and home systems in case I get time on the TV at home?

Picked it up on PSN last night. Now I just need to download it. It'll take a week or so, I'm guessing.

tuffalobuffalo wrote:

Did you all decide to go with the Japanese language track or that other one? :)

I'm going Japanese, but I'm also trying to learn the language right now and couldn't pass up the opportunity to cram it into my brain during leisure time. It is funny to try and jibe the two; a lot of times the Japanese voice actor will just say, for instance, Oliver's name, and the subtitles will have a full-sentence translation that does not, in fact, include Oliver's name anywhere. Interesting to see just how much liberty they take, sometimes.

So far I've met the king for the first time and am questing about town. This game just has a great feel. It's probably the most beautiful JRPG I've ever played. The world is packed with vibrancy and color; even the battle arenas have a lot going on, instead of taking the low-asset backdrop route. Combat is interesting at this point; curious to see how far they take it. No real grinding necessary...so far...

I may or may not have gotten up a couple hours early to adventure before work.

Can't remember the last time I did that.

Minarchist wrote:
tuffalobuffalo wrote:

Did you all decide to go with the Japanese language track or that other one? :)

I'm going Japanese, but I'm also trying to learn the language right now and couldn't pass up the opportunity to cram it into my brain during leisure time. It is funny to try and jibe the two; a lot of times the Japanese voice actor will just say, for instance, Oliver's name, and the subtitles will have a full-sentence translation that does not, in fact, include Oliver's name anywhere. Interesting to see just how much liberty they take, sometimes.

Interesting! I'll bet they have one set of subtitles, and it's the English dub's verbatim. That would be the easiest thing to do. I also bet that they took many liberties with the translation to match up the mouth movements. I know they worked really hard to do that with Howl's Moving Castle and some of the more recent Studio Ghibli movie dubs. I doubt that they had separate animations like they did for FF XIII.

Shift is done! It's 2am, why am I still in the office with you chumps. Home to Ni No Kuni, here's hoping the download I left running is completed...

Chaz, I'll be sure to update my feelings on grindiness. I'm just too old to enjoy that anymore...

Chaz wrote:

I'm torn. I love the art style. I don't love grinding. Seriously, I quit Dragon Quest 8 at the first boss when I found out you basically had to grind to beat him. I do love all the other parts of old-school RPGs. I love having to use an in-game book to do stuff. SO TORN.

The other thing is that I don't get much game time at home, but I've taken to playing games on my lunch hour at work. There's a PS3 in the game room at the office. How feasible is it to move the save file between my office and home systems in case I get time on the TV at home?

This is the exact same thing I'm contemplating on. I can get rid of 2-4 games from my pile rather than spend premium price for one. I can wait...but dang what I hear about the game sounds solid.

tuffalobuffalo wrote:

Interesting! I'll bet they have one set of subtitles, and it's the English dub's verbatim. That would be the easiest thing to do. I also bet that they took many liberties with the translation to match up the mouth movements. I know they worked really hard to do that with Howl's Moving Castle and some of the more recent Studio Ghibli movie dubs. I doubt that they had separate animations like they did for FF XIII.

Unlike the work Disney does to match mouth movements I'm not seeing get a lot of matching to mouth movements with the English dub. Can't blame them as the game is quite long, while the movies are an hour or two.

Ranger Rick wrote:

I have no notice of my order being canceled, nor do I have notice of it shipping, and when I go to my account, I see an order, but no order status ("in process", "shipping", etc.) and no error messages. Just... nothing to tell me if anything's happened. *Sigh*

We are in the same boat! There isn't even a spot to cancel the order (because for all I know it is still in process!) And when you go to contact support there isn't even an email just a phone number and address!

Pure crap is what that is. With today's technology there is no reason for this kind of crappy service.

Anyway I ordered a regular version from Amazon.

I only played an hour last night, but it was an utter joy. I probably won't be able to really touch it again until the weekend, but oh man am I excited about delving into this. Every facet of the game simply exudes everything I ever loved about jrpg's, and the Studio Ghibli influence is VERY strong.

Drippy is freakin' hilarious, too.

Minarchist wrote:

It is funny to try and jibe the two; a lot of times the Japanese voice actor will just say, for instance, Oliver's name, and the subtitles will have a full-sentence translation that does not, in fact, include Oliver's name anywhere. Interesting to see just how much liberty they take, sometimes.

That's actually quite common. The Japanese use proper names a lot more often than we do in English. If the subject of a sentence is clear from context, translators will usually swap in appropriate pronouns for a more natural feel. If you get a chance, you might watch some subtitled anime; you'll notice the same mismatch between the spoken dialogue and the translation.

I started the digital download at around 9pm last night. It was done when I checked on it before work this morning, so not as bad as I'd feared. Looking forward to having a crack at it tonight.

Pro-Tip: Use R2/L2 to cycle through actions/commands in the battle field.

The tutorial will tell you that pressing Left and Right on the directional buttons will select your next order, but that can be tough when you're also running around with the L Stick trying to avoid enemy damage. By using R2/L2 you can queue up your next action while staying on the move in the battle arena.

This is especially welcome when you have to quickly toggle Defend as an enemy fires up a Special.

On a semi-related note, if you start to get flustered in the field just press L1 (Change Leader) and it will pause the action as long as you want while you plan your next move.

ClockworkHouse wrote:
Minarchist wrote:

It is funny to try and jibe the two; a lot of times the Japanese voice actor will just say, for instance, Oliver's name, and the subtitles will have a full-sentence translation that does not, in fact, include Oliver's name anywhere. Interesting to see just how much liberty they take, sometimes.

That's actually quite common. The Japanese use proper names a lot more often than we do in English. If the subject of a sentence is clear from context, translators will usually swap in appropriate pronouns for a more natural feel. If you get a chance, you might watch some subtitled anime; you'll notice the same mismatch between the spoken dialogue and the translation.

What Clocky said. But also, they also use them in ways we don't.

Spoiler:

That's why King Tom is referring to himself in the third person that weird way in English. In English, it is sort of reminiscent of the "royal we" and that's what they're going for.

But in Japanese the construction is also used to imply a state where the person themself doesn't want to acknowledge their own person-hood. It's a sign they feel there's something wrong (and in this case, a foreshadowing of the fact that the King is heartbroken). So in the case of King Tom, it's a sign of his exalted state, and also of his troubles at the same time.

Another famous example is Ruroni Kenshin (Samurai X in America). Kenshin refers to himself this way because he considers himself an utter dishonored failure, and only when he has surmounted his obstacles does he start referring to himself as a person again. You'll run into this a lot in samurai films with ronin characters, too.

If it follows true to form, once I get the King back from the mice he'll probably still use that construction for himself, but imply with other choices of language that it's just the "royal we" because he is that kind of florid person.

Hopefully I'll know that sometime tonight.

Random pro tip to those still looking for the status of their Wizard Edition copy of the game. If you go to UPS Tracking (http://wwwapps.ups.com/WebTracking/track?loc=en_US) and select "Track By Reference" you can put in your order ID and get *some* information.

DSGamer wrote:

Random pro tip to those still looking for the status of their Wizard Edition copy of the game. If you go to UPS Tracking (http://wwwapps.ups.com/WebTracking/track?loc=en_US) and select "Track By Reference" you can put in your order ID and get *some* information.

I HAVE A LABEL FOR MY GAME!

cube wrote:
DSGamer wrote:

Random pro tip to those still looking for the status of their Wizard Edition copy of the game. If you go to UPS Tracking (http://wwwapps.ups.com/WebTracking/track?loc=en_US) and select "Track By Reference" you can put in your order ID and get *some* information.

I HAVE A LABEL FOR MY GAME!

Yeah. That's the step I'm at as well. There's a label. No clue if that means there is an actual game to ship. But they purchased a UPS shipping label.

Man, it's sad that not getting preorders is making news.

I still very early on in the game and it's charm is working on me so far. My patience with the battle system won't last though. I want to collect stuff now!