Lost Odyssey:10 Minutes of Real Gameplay, 1st Real Fights

This looks a lot better than I was expecting. Thoughts:

- The time between random battles seems vastly improved in comparison to older JRPGs. I like that. I like that a lot.

- There's a run button to move through areas quicker. Nice.

- Nice music.

- Targeting system during fights could be cool.

- I didn't like that the battles themselves seem really, really slow going. Watching your guy run up to the enemy a zillion times in a fight is probably going to get old.

- The cinematic camera seemed really wonky. It would cut to party members doing nothing but scratching themselves or just standing there. Seemed out of place, if not silly.

Still, I'm way more interested in the game after seeing this footage.

Lost Odyssey has gameplay?

Lost Odyssey has gameplay?

LordAndrew

:lol:, yeah you have to play the game for a little before you can get to the real meat of it, the oh so sweet FMV's. What a bummer :P

[QUOTE="LordAndrew"]

Lost Odyssey has gameplay?

HiResDes

:lol:, yeah you have to play the game for a little before you can get to the real meat of it, the oh so sweet FMV's. What a bummer :P

Ah man, you had to remind me. Now I'm bummed out on it again. :P

I like the art style and the music, but the game looks slow paced and overly traditional. Monsters magically appearing in front of one's party needs to go away.

Also, while the art style is nice and the textures are sharp, the animators didn't really take things to the next level. Characters just kind of stand there looking indifferent or scratching themselves as monsters or magic speed towards them. How hard it would it be to depict people tensing up and trying to block, dodge or whatever? The way Lost Odyssey goes about things has almost always been the way they were done, but with the processing power of the X360 and the PS3 I expect things to improve.

If Lost Odyssey hits during a slow month, I could see myself picking it up, but it seems to be well crafted but uninspired, which is becoming Mistwalker's trademark.

So I've started watching the footage now, and my first impression is "damn, the camera sure is annoying."

I'm going to continue watching and see if it gets any better.

Watched through various bits of it, and here are my basic feelings:

Aside from the really cheesy sounding initial portion of the victory music, some of Uematsu's better work, with very good production quality...still, that victory music gets on my nerves.

After playing through RPGs with very rapid combat pacing in recent history (like Persona 3 and Etrian Odyssey), the combat in this game seems to currently be way too slow for my tastes, with the camera angles being cool for about the first few attacks, and little more.

Everything else I saw so far in the video really made this game feel like merely some extension of Final Fantasy X almost, though I'm wondering how other areas of the game pans out.

My feelings reflect others regarding how extremely traditional the game feels, which may be nice for some purists, but for a lot of us, traditional simply isn't as interesting as it used to be.

Looks good to me.

I'd say LO's saving grace and strength will be its strong story.

Looks good to me.

I'd say LO's saving grace and strength will be its strong story.

ASK_Story

One issue I felt is how the characters, in the gameplay shown, seem so...flat and uninteresting to me. Maybe there is a good story and cutscenes in play in the full product, but what I see here doesn't convey extremely compelling characters.

[QUOTE="ASK_Story"]

Looks good to me.

I'd say LO's saving grace and strength will be its strong story.

Skylock00

One issue I felt is how the characters, in the gameplay shown, seem so...flat and uninteresting to me. Maybe there is a good story and cutscenes in play in the full product, but what I see here doesn't convey extremely compelling characters.

You're right. But after hearing that the FMVs are written by a famous Japanese novelist, maybe that could be the game's strength.

And I can understand about your interest in soundtracks. I'm that way with art books. There are tons of Japanese RPGs that I never played but I have all the art books.

I'm not looking to buy Lost Odyssey right now but maybe the artbook is good. :D

I unfortunately feel the same way as everyone else so far, the game just wasn't made for people like me, or anyone who desires well constructed gameplay and interaction. I really hope that the mainstream FF games follow more queues from Western developed RPGs (real ones, not diku MMORPGs or hack and slashers) and Zelda style action adventures, because while I don't want this thread to become "yet another WRPG vs JRPG thread" I really want to see the story section of FF and RPGs in general become more freeform and gameplay focused as opposed to a linear slog through to the end. We don't need random battles anymore, unless there is a specific in game reason to have homogenous battle scenes devoid of context there ishonestly no excuse for them.Ectomy

Yeah I totally agree, if a game is going to have random encounters then there should be some interesting context provided for them. For instance, if they made an rpg where the main character had some sort of psychological abnormality where he had to keep battling random foes or creatures in order to keep his sanity ( ala Silent Hill) I would totally be down...I'd like to see something creative like this, and it could give the developers a reason to create crazy looking levels, and creatures, I know Eternal Sonata does something like this...But I'd like to see it done with a much darker, gloomier theme.

You're right. But after hearing that the FMVs are written by a famous Japanese novelist, maybe that could be the game's strength.

And I can understand about your interest in soundtracks. I'm that way with art books. There are tons of Japanese RPGs that I never played but I have all the art books.:DASK_Story

[QUOTE="ASK_Story"]You're right. But after hearing that the FMVs are written by a famous Japanese novelist, maybe that could be the game's strength.

And I can understand about your interest in soundtracks. I'm that way with art books. There are tons of Japanese RPGs that I never played but I have all the art books.:DSkylock00

Yeah, then it would just be a animated movie.

I was hoping the FMVs and the game matched well together to make a compelling game. But maybe I'm hoping too much here.

[QUOTE="ASK_Story"]You're right. But after hearing that the FMVs are written by a famous Japanese novelist, maybe that could be the game's strength.

And I can understand about your interest in soundtracks. I'm that way with art books. There are tons of Japanese RPGs that I never played but I have all the art books.:DSkylock00

Ok, seriously folks, how about we consider some things in context here. These are among the first battles in the game. Name one, ONE, JRPG that had great battles right at the beginning?

Second, how many JRPG's were immediately satisfying right at the very start when your character has NO experience, skills, weapons or abilities?

This video is from the first hour of the game. Pretty much every JRPG (and even most western ones to be honest; Mass Effect included) just don't grab you immediately the way they do after a good 6-7 hours or so.

Jumping on this as representative of what the entire game truly is .... well, that's just not constructive, folks. I'm not saying the game IS great, but don't judge it by this. FFX was far better in hour 38 than I imagined it would be after hour 2.

Ok, seriously folks, how about we consider some things in context here. These are among the first battles in the game. Name one, ONE, JRPG that had great battles right at the beginning?

Second, how many JRPG's were immediately satisfying right at the very start when your character has NO experience, skills, weapons or abilities?

This video is from the first hour of the game. Pretty much every JRPG (and even most western ones to be honest; Mass Effect included) just don't grab you immediately the way they do after a good 6-7 hours or so.

Jumping on this as representative of what the entire game truly is .... well, that's just not constructive, folks. I'm not saying the game IS great, but don't judge it by this. FFX was far better in hour 38 than I imagined it would be after hour 2.

Darth_Tigris

Lost Odyssey has been a really hard read for me. I don't mind traditional RPGs, as long as the combat and story are strong. It's hard to tell. There are promising elements, but it's almost impossible to get a read on the quality of gameplay from a few battles early in the game. You don't really have that many abilities. It's cool to see that enemy AI is fairly aggressive, though. How many times have you fought an enemy that has a really awesome move that does a lot of damage, only to see it ignore its most effective tact? I saw that one creature cast a fairly effective spell against your party more than once in a row. On the other hand, aren't some of these textures and artificial barriers out of date? And what's with the awkward running animation? Oh, and those better not be the final English voice actors.

Lost Odyssey could be anywhere from mediocre to very strong. I haven't played Blue Dragon yet, but that game looked entertaining. Lost Odyssey, though, is Mistwalker's attempt at a Final Fantasy-esque game, so it will be very telling of how much they're capable of.

Ok, seriously folks, how about we consider some things in context here. These are among the first battles in the game. Name one, ONE, JRPG that had great battles right at the beginning?

Second, how many JRPG's were immediately satisfying right at the very start when your character has NO experience, skills, weapons or abilities?

This video is from the first hour of the game. Pretty much every JRPG (and even most western ones to be honest; Mass Effect included) just don't grab you immediately the way they do after a good 6-7 hours or so.

Jumping on this as representative of what the entire game truly is .... well, that's just not constructive, folks. I'm not saying the game IS great, but don't judge it by this. FFX was far better in hour 38 than I imagined it would be after hour 2.

Darth_Tigris

No one complained that the attacks weren't flashy enough or that there wasn't enough variety. I would be incredibly surprised if seven hours in, random battles disappeared, the slow (in comparison to the likes of Persona 3) pacing of the battles was speeded up and characters stopped ignoring oncoming attacks and started reacting appropriately (i.e. tensing up, raising their sword to block or what have you).

The game might be enjoyable despite all those issues, but those are serious issues.

Equal what they say...If the name "Final Fantasy"was printed on the cover they whouldn´t dare to say a negative thing...

The game looks great and seems far better then a lot of RPGs so far.

Equal what they say...If the name "Final Fantasy"was printed on the cover they whouldn´t dare to say a negative thing...

The game looks great and seems far better then a lot of RPGs so far.

Ash2X

no wrong..look at FF12...so many ppl said negative things..even to older ff's ppl said what they wanted...this seriously wasnt what i was expecting from sakaguchi after he hyped it so much and talked $%^& about square and sony and etc...it looks just like FF 10 and 12 ...the guy walks really lame...and it was way slow and already done 100 times.hell square has realised that and changed it's formula..just watch the new ff13 trailer which JUst got out..the gameplay is amazing the battle is fast and crazy awesome....he should have stayed with square...i know he is the brains but he cant accomplish what he did in square without his full team....

[QUOTE="Ash2X"]

Equal what they say...If the name "Final Fantasy"was printed on the cover they whouldn´t dare to say a negative thing...

The game looks great and seems far better then a lot of RPGs so far.

kirk4ever

no wrong..look at FF12...so many ppl said negative things..even to older ff's ppl said what they wanted...this seriously wasnt what i was expecting from sakaguchi after he hyped it so much and talked $%^& about square and sony and etc...it looks just like FF 10 and 12 ...the guy walks really lame...and it was way slow and already done 100 times.hell square has realised that and changed it's formula..just watch the new ff13 trailer which JUst got out..the gameplay is amazing the battle is fast and crazy awesome....he should have stayed with square...i know he is the brains but he cant accomplish what he did in square without his full team....

Now I'm going to have to disagree with you there. When FF12 came out last year, I certainly know I wasn't the only one praising its new systems (with the exception of the god-awful sphere grid rip off). I personally know a ton of friends on this site and others that were really enjoying an actual "adult" Final Fantasy, with a great political story and finally being able to play as someone who WASN'T an amnesiac saviour who was the only one who could save the world. I found it a pleasurable change of pace being just an ordinary guy who was in the middle of something that even he thought was too big for him. And the combat, and loss of the random battles was a refreshing change of pace.

There were a few months there were most of the people were liking FF12. The the great Internet Scourge of Differing Opinions hit and quite a few people suddenly changed their minds about the game to somehow fit in with popular opinion. I'm not saying that there weren't people who loved the game, a few peeps posting in this very thread had negative opinions from the beginning. And I respect them for at least sticking to their guns.

And while Lost Oddysee may seem like a "throw-back" to old RPGs, have we really gotten so far along that we can call FF10 "old school"? Saguchi (can't spell) left Square after FF10, because they didn't like the way SquareEnix was taking the FF series. (not to mention the fact that he also made "Spirits Within"). But if you look at it like that, Lost Oddysee is simply Saguchi's "Final Fantasy 11"... his next entry into the series. So its only natural that it seems like FF10.

And after a year of playing "non-traditional" RPGs, I must admit that I REALLY enjoyed Blue Dragon, which was about as traditional RPG as you can get.

[QUOTE="Ash2X"]

Equal what they say...If the name "Final Fantasy"was printed on the cover they whouldn´t dare to say a negative thing...

The game looks great and seems far better then a lot of RPGs so far.

kirk4ever

no wrong..look at FF12...so many ppl said negative things..even to older ff's ppl said what they wanted...this seriously wasnt what i was expecting from sakaguchi after he hyped it so much and talked $%^& about square and sony and etc...it looks just like FF 10 and 12 ...the guy walks really lame...and it was way slow and already done 100 times.hell square has realised that and changed it's formula..just watch the new ff13 trailer which JUst got out..the gameplay is amazing the battle is fast and crazy awesome....he should have stayed with square...i know he is the brains but he cant accomplish what he did in square without his full team....

Well the system looks fast...actually if I want a fast action-oriented game I buy a Action-RPG or a Action game.They seem to destroy FF even more and I hope it´s not at the cost of all other aspects again.

And every Inernet-Page and Magazine praised FFXII like crazy.Even the Storyline,which was almost the flattest RPG-Storyline I´ve seen in years and I played all RPGs I can get!The game was fun but not great.Eveyone known that before,everyone knows who played it and I know only 1 Magazine who gave 86%...because the game lacks of Story and it´s still fun,but far from awesome.The Magazine buys it´s copies private.

[QUOTE="kirk4ever"][QUOTE="Ash2X"]

Equal what they say...If the name "Final Fantasy"was printed on the cover they whouldn´t dare to say a negative thing...

The game looks great and seems far better then a lot of RPGs so far.

CrimsonpugTwo

no wrong..look at FF12...so many ppl said negative things..even to older ff's ppl said what they wanted...this seriously wasnt what i was expecting from sakaguchi after he hyped it so much and talked $%^& about square and sony and etc...it looks just like FF 10 and 12 ...the guy walks really lame...and it was way slow and already done 100 times.hell square has realised that and changed it's formula..just watch the new ff13 trailer which JUst got out..the gameplay is amazing the battle is fast and crazy awesome....he should have stayed with square...i know he is the brains but he cant accomplish what he did in square without his full team....

Now I'm going to have to disagree with you there. When FF12 came out last year, I certainly know I wasn't the only one praising its new systems (with the exception of the god-awful sphere grid rip off). I personally know a ton of friends on this site and others that were really enjoying an actual "adult" Final Fantasy, with a great political story and finally being able to play as someone who WASN'T an amnesiac saviour who was the only one who could save the world. I found it a pleasurable change of pace being just an ordinary guy who was in the middle of something that even he thought was too big for him. And the combat, and loss of the random battles was a refreshing change of pace.

There were a few months there were most of the people were liking FF12. The the great Internet Scourge of Differing Opinions hit and quite a few people suddenly changed their minds about the game to somehow fit in with popular opinion. I'm not saying that there weren't people who loved the game, a few peeps posting in this very thread had negative opinions from the beginning. And I respect them for at least sticking to their guns.

And while Lost Oddysee may seem like a "throw-back" to old RPGs, have we really gotten so far along that we can call FF10 "old school"? Saguchi (can't spell) left Square after FF10, because they didn't like the way SquareEnix was taking the FF series. (not to mention the fact that he also made "Spirits Within"). But if you look at it like that, Lost Oddysee is simply Saguchi's "Final Fantasy 11"... his next entry into the series. So its only natural that it seems like FF10.

And after a year of playing "non-traditional" RPGs, I must admit that I REALLY enjoyed Blue Dragon, which was about as traditional RPG as you can get.

ff12 was adult yes..but it was like an offline mmo..extremly hard..and myself love adult oriented stories..but it also very negative to alot of fans...and you kno why i dont like sakaguchi? coz he made the second box office bomb in history (120 million loss) I loved ff:spirits within let me say that...but the thing that pissed me off was that when he screwed up he resigned and instead got angry at square..poor square had to merge with enix or it would have gone bankrupt..and also he made his best games on pS and when he made mistwlker and was backed by MS then he said and i quote"i dont like sony..and i dont like ken " (head of sony gaming entertainment." thats why he made me MAd..and seriously i really wanted to buy X360 for LO but EVEN the graphiks look like ff10 and 12..just has better textures