The GWJ JRPG Club 2.0

I still count myself as a participant, even though I never finished FF 12. I made it about 30 hours in, though, before life and God War interrupted. I plan to pick it up again after vacation.

I was surprised SMT won but just bowed out of the round. I just wasn’t interested in it.

I’m ready for another game in the coming months.

I'm guilty. I thought I'd have more time for SMTIV, but study kicked my ass and I couldn't keep up with it. I may hold back on voting and play a little if the winner really appeals to me, but I sometimes find it hard to stick to really long games.

That's half the fun of this JRPG club, and one of the reasons I want to participate, but it's still a struggle with a busy schedule.

I missed this round too.

I had a great time playing FF 12 with the club but just didn't have any interest in SMT IV and my gaming time (and frankly) is too limited.

I'm interested in seeing/participating in whats picked next and will jump on board if it is something which I am keen to try.

Worth reiterating that the problem isn't folks who don't participate due to not being interested in a particular title. The problem is a game getting 5-10 votes but then only having 2-3 serious players. Of course it's cool if people who didn't vote for the winner get involved but that shouldn't be expected or relied upon.

Thanks for the discussion so far! Please continue to share any feelings or opinions.

I don’t mind if the club is small. Sure, the more the merrier, but I’d rather quality over quantity if I had to choose anyway. Plus, it doesn’t take much work at all to “run” it.

Also, I’m not calling anyone out for not participating, just gauging interest for next quarter. I assume most people vote with intention to play. Life gets in the way sometimes for all of us.

Fastmav347 wrote:

I am willing to make an honest effort to play this quarter. Maybe this is what I need to break out of my rpg slump.

Just a suggestion, instead of limiting to 1 nomination can we spend a week just bring up games that we may be intersted in playing and then picking from that list? That should bring some conversation back into the tread and it may bring back some curiosity about the games

Well, the main goal is participation. So, if there’s a change to the nomination system that could potentially increase participation, I’m open to it. Maybe we should adopt the CRPG Club’s requirement that a game be seconded to be eligible for voting?

steinkrug wrote:
Fastmav347 wrote:

I am willing to make an honest effort to play this quarter. Maybe this is what I need to break out of my rpg slump.

Just a suggestion, instead of limiting to 1 nomination can we spend a week just bring up games that we may be intersted in playing and then picking from that list? That should bring some conversation back into the tread and it may bring back some curiosity about the games

Well, the main goal is participation. So, if there’s a change to the nomination system that could potentially increase participation, I’m open to it. Maybe we should adopt the CRPG Club’s requirement that a game be seconded to be eligible for voting?

Feel free to copy/borrow/use anything you want from the CRPG Club. We pretty much lifted the whole voting system from here.

Thanks, Godzilla Blitz! I'll take you up on that.

So, let’s go ahead and say NOMINATIONS OPEN FOR QUARTER 3 as of this post, with voting happening from June 21st to June 26th. Henceforth, we'll be borrowing the CRPG Club's seconding for the voting. Here's how Godzilla Blitz describes it in their main page:

"To be included in the voting games must be nominated by one member and seconded by a different member. Each member is allowed one nomination, and may second any number of nominations."

Here’s how the voting turned out last quarter for anyone interested.

Shin Megami Tensei IV - 7
Ni No Kuni - 6
Suikoden II - 6
Final Fantasy X - 5
Final Fantasy XIII - 5
Trails of Cold Steel - 4
Fire Emblem Echoes - 3
Atelier Rorona - 1

Thanks to Godzilla Blitz's kind offer, I've also borrowed/stole the leveling system because people seem to like it.

For my own sanity, this only applies to the 2.0 version of the club, so 2018 onward.

Check the first post for the member list / levels.

Please let me know if:
- Your name is there and you want it removed (I put a bunch of people in Level 0 that have expressed interest this year)
- Your name is not there and you want it added
- Your name is there and I spelled it wrong
- You have finished one or both of this year's games and I didn't give you credit.

This also means I've extending the time to finish each game to six months, so there's about two weeks left to get credit for FFXII and over three more months for SMTIV. Like the CRPG Club, we'll still start a new game every quarter.

I nominate Tales of Zestiria, which has been in my backlog for a while and which I've been dying to return to.

steinkrug wrote:

Thanks to Godzilla Blitz's kind offer, I've also borrowed/stole the leveling system because people seem to like it.

Cool!

Sounds, neat, but I currently don't have anything I'm really itching to play, so I will not be nominating anything this time around, but will make an honest effort to join in, as long as I haven't beat it before.

A leveling system? You're gamifying games...!

I'm not sure how much time I'll have to start a new JRPG, but if the right game won I'd definitely consider joining in. Perhaps if it was a slightly shorter game or one that moved along quickly, with some cool character customization.

I may hold off on nominating now, but I'll keep an eye on the thread and likely 'second' one. Can we only second a single game?

You can second as many games as you like (would be interested in playing).

Yes, I thought Godzilla Blitz’s idea of gamifying the game-playing club was rather smart.

That new levelling mechanic makes me wish I'd made time to play FFXII somehow! Non portable games are almost always a no go for me though...

My nomination:
Xenoblade Chronicles (New 3DS/Wii)
- the 3DS version is currently on sale with a modest discount

LastSurprise wrote:

I nominate Tales of Zestiria, which has been in my backlog for a while and which I've been dying to return to.

Love some Tales but looking at my backlog there's Hearts R, Xillia 2, Graces f, Symphonia Dawn of the New World.

I think I have Xillia 2 on the pile as well. Hm.

But yeah portable or PC is much easier than getting 60+ hours of the TV away from my wife.

Mr GT Chris wrote:

That new levelling mechanic makes me wish I'd made time to play FFXII somehow! Non portable games are almost always a no go for me though...

My nomination:
Xenoblade Chronicles (New 3DS/Wii)
- the 3DS version is currently on sale with a modest discount

Seconded

Nominating Legend of Heroes: Trails of Cold Steel.

I'll nominate Ni No Kuni

brokenclavicle wrote:

Nominating Legend of Heroes: Trails of Cold Steel.

Seconded.

Mr GT Chris wrote:
brokenclavicle wrote:

Nominating Legend of Heroes: Trails of Cold Steel.

Seconded.

How much do you need to have played the Trails in the Sky series to enjoy Trails of Cold Steel? And is there any carry-forward stuff in Trails of Cold Steel?

I played Trails in the Sky through to the final chapter, but found it got to be a slog. The writing was great but I thought there was too much dialogue related to the action. The combat got very same-y and grindy to me after a while.

LastSurprise wrote:
Mr GT Chris wrote:
brokenclavicle wrote:

Nominating Legend of Heroes: Trails of Cold Steel.

Seconded.

How much do you need to have played the Trails in the Sky series to enjoy Trails of Cold Steel? And is there any carry-forward stuff in Trails of Cold Steel?

I played Trails in the Sky through to the final chapter, but found it got to be a slog. The writing was great but I thought there was too much dialogue related to the action. The combat got very same-y and grindy to me after a while.

You don't need to play Trails in the Sky in order to enjoy Cold Steel, there maybe couple cameos for the fans, but other wise it is a whole unrelated story. Cold Steel 1 and 2 are one of my favorite games ever.

Fastmav347 wrote:
LastSurprise wrote:
Mr GT Chris wrote:
brokenclavicle wrote:

Nominating Legend of Heroes: Trails of Cold Steel.

Seconded.

How much do you need to have played the Trails in the Sky series to enjoy Trails of Cold Steel? And is there any carry-forward stuff in Trails of Cold Steel?

I played Trails in the Sky through to the final chapter, but found it got to be a slog. The writing was great but I thought there was too much dialogue related to the action. The combat got very same-y and grindy to me after a while.

You don't need to play Trails in the Sky in order to enjoy Cold Steel, there maybe couple cameos for the fans, but other wise it is a whole unrelated story. Cold Steel 1 and 2 are one of my favorite games ever.

How does the combat in Cold Steel compare to the combat in Trails?

And, does Cold Steel do something similar to what Trails did with Bracer Points? That drove me nuts. I enjoyed certain collectibles like recipes, but I found the Bracer Points system was sometimes obtuse and that the game didn't always do a good job of communicating whether one slip-up (like not stalking the monster properly in an early game quest) or one bad dialogue choice (all over the place!) would prevent you from getting full points for a mission and would prevent you from getting the item that can be carried into the second game.

I'm not always a completionist, and I'm fine with some optional content that I can decide to skip. But Bracer Points almost demanded that I find a guide and follow along if I wanted to get it all right, and I didn't like that.

They have a grading system, but its not as obtuse as Bracer Points, basically if you did all the side quests in the chapter you got a good grade, I don't recall any of the side quests being difficult to find ether.
Combat I thought was miles better than the TitS.

Do you think we’ll end up getting the PS4 versions of the Cold Steel games? I haven’t heard much about them as far as if they’re notable improvements in any way.

steinkrug wrote:

Do you think we’ll end up getting the PS4 versions of the Cold Steel games? I haven’t heard much about them as far as if they’re notable improvements in any way.

the worse part about Cold Steel is that we are two games behind with no word of localization.

I would like to nominate Trails in the Sky: Second Chapter for this next quarter.

Jumping in on the Cold Steel discussion, it's good to hear that the story is unrelated. I have always worried that playing it would spoil something in the TitS story. As for platforms, it is currently PC and PS3 correct?

Fastmav347 wrote:
steinkrug wrote:

Do you think we’ll end up getting the PS4 versions of the Cold Steel games? I haven’t heard much about them as far as if they’re notable improvements in any way.

the worse part about Cold Steel is that we are two games behind with no word of localization.

Ah, yeah that would be the priority.

Malkroth wrote:

I would like to nominate Trails in the Sky: Second Chapter for this next quarter.

Jumping in on the Cold Steel discussion, it's good to hear that the story is unrelated. I have always worried that playing it would spoil something in the TitS story. As for platforms, it is currently PC and PS3 correct?

Cold Steel? It’s also on Vita.

I’ll second TitS 2nd Chapter and Tales of Zesteria.

So far we’ve got (all seconded):

Legend of Heroes: Trails of Cold Steel
Legend of Heroes: Trails in the Sky Second Chapter
Tales of Zestiria
Xenoblade Chronicles

Let me know if missed anything.

I’m still deciding what I want to nominate.