Delays...

So, I have the next three entries or so in my countdown as well as a half written blog about anime on my computer, But as of a week or so ago, it's broken. I'm not sure when it will be fixed, or if it can be fixed at all.
 So, untill then I won't be updating this much. I plan to start a diary blog soon, after school stuff dies down,  so at least there will be something.

Until further notice,

Peace out and geek out,

Mikeke352

My top 10 Favorite J-RPG's #7

7) Lunar: the Silver Star (Sega CD, PS1, PSP)

            Ah, Lunar the Silver Star. This is one of those games that I look upon quite fondly. It’s a great game in every incarnation available. But, before I go any further, I think I should mention that the nostalgia factor doesn’t really apply here, as I only started playing this game a few years ago. I had long since been aware of the Lunar games, but hadn’t had the chance to play them until 2009-2010ish. When I bought a Sega CD add on for the Genesis in mid '09, the first game I got to go along with it was Lunar the Silver Star. It had a lot of heart for a little 16-bit RPG, and a good story with good characters. Unfortunately I never got to finish the game on the Sega CD as it broke about five months later.

            The version of Lunar that I really came to love was Lunar: Silver Star Story Complete. I have the PSP version as well and the only real difference is that the graphics are a bit nicer. Lunar Silver Star Story Complete has longer, higher quality cut scenes, a full voice acting cast, and more streamlined gameplay. The battle system is very similar to the one used in the Sega CD version and that’s ok, because it works. Your party has a wide area to move around in, and wherever you move to make your attack, that’s where you stop at the end of your turn. In battle you don’t just attack and retreat to your side of the screen, you always have to take movement into account. Different characters have different ranges of movement, so if you select the heroine Luna for example, to use a close range attack on an enemy on the far side of the screen she probably won’t make it that far and just stop along the way, ending her turn. This causes the player to choose moves wisely and it adds a fun strategic element to the game.

            The story for Lunar: Silver Star Story Complete is excellent. It takes the story from the Sega CD version and fleshes it out completely. It’s a true hero & heroine story about a boy who seeks adventure and to be like his hero. In this case the young protagonist Alex, sets off on a journey to be the next dragonmaster just like the one before him, the legendary dragon master Dyne who helped rescue the Goddess Althena. He sets off with his friend he has known forever, Luna, and an annoying flying cat-monster thing named Nall. Together the three encounter people and situations that enrich their lives forever. Sound corny? Well, it’s not. The characters are so good and the scenario writing so rich, that even if the base story is a little cliché’ the game is still completely engaging. If you play more than 30 minutes into the game I can almost guarantee that you will be caring about the characters and wanting to know what happens next. And that my friends, is why Lunar: The Silver Star makes the list.

My top 10 Favorite J-RPG's #8

8) Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 3 (PS2, PSP)

            Up until five or six months ago, I had only been peripherally aware of the Shin Megami Tensei (SMT,)series. Then one day on a random trip to Gamestop I spotted the remake of the Persona 1 for the PSP really cheap used and picked it up. Now, while the random encounter rate was annoyingly high and the maze like qualities of several of the buildings sort of pissed me off, I really enjoyed the game world, mythology, and persona system. It’s uniqueness is what kept me playing.

Fast Forward a month or two and I’m totally addicted to Persona 3 portable for the PSP. Seriously, I carried that thing around everywhere to play it in my spare time. It keeps what I like about the first game, improves it and adds on a whole bunch of new elements that just work great. This time around you see enemies in the map screen and the battle go by faster and more enjoyably.

The way you gather and develop personas have changed from the previous games: first you can win persona tarot(ish) cards at the end of battles and fuse them to make complex, powerful personas. Determining what persona you make and how powerful it is depends on the levels of Social Links. This time relying on developing social links between  the hero and the other characters in this game. This means you need to spend time talking to certain characters, and build up personal attributes like charm or academics. It really pulls you in and makes the daily life of the protagonist genuinely interesting.

The graphics are stylish and fun and the story is engaging, albeit dark. You play as a transfer student who has the rare ability to be conscious during a hidden 13^th hour in the day called the dark hour, a time where monsters called shadows wreak havoc. At the school is a team of students who are aware of the “dark hour” and have figured out how to awaken “Personas” to fight for them using a gun-like object they fire at their heads. You join them on investigating the dark hour and trying stop the shadows. That’s about as much as I can saw without spoilers, so you’ll have to take my word for it, it’s really good and really fun.