Lunar Threads

...to finish this game. I'm having a hard time. I love the world art, especially the towns, but the battles are REALLY wearing me down. It would be much easier to tolerate them if I could choose who to hit, or enemies I can't hit couldn't steal my stuff, or if I didn't have to choose to endure these battles for only one form of gain at a time, or even if they were pretty I thought I would be among the last to say this, but this game has me debating whether any Lunar really is better than no Lunar

Honestly, after the Blue Dragon Cave, I got fed up and ran through the rest of the game to see the end. It just got so bloody boring.

And I still haven't been able to make the heroic sacrifice of hitting level 99. There are limits to even my desire for mechanics.

Ooooh, are there any masochists here who have seen level 99? Just curious...

Defintitely not me, I made it half way... I think Jian was a lvl 56 or 57 when I finished the game. I don't think I'd be sane at this point if I had decided to lvl up that high - lol

Me neither. I beat it at lvl 58 the first time. It'll be a little higher this time, but definitely not lvl. 99. What would be the point if the enemies could still steal your sundires or break your equipment? I rarely go for 99 anyway, and I definitely wouldn't do it for L: DS, no matter what.

It could be worse, you could be trying for lv.99 on the Japanese version, which has no speed-up function.

I was rather startled by people saying they completed the game in 30 hours. I've only played the Japanese version, and I came out at 55 hours - I didn't waste a lot of time either.

Yeah, I think my time was around then. I would be playing while reading...oh, here's a battle with 8 enemies, this'll take 10 minutes or so... Once I realized I was losing my equipment (I didn't know it was breaking rather than being stolen, but it didn't matter) I had to start paying attention...or at least have the sound on so I could hear when that happened and reset.

Yeah, the first time it happened to me, one of the top-screen bats (which of course, I couldn't attack anyway) swooped down and pilfered my gear. I thought to myself, "it's no problem, I'm sure I'll get it back after the battle..."
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O_o Dammit.

Me neither. I beat it at lvl 58 the first time. It'll be a little higher this time, but definitely not lvl. 99. What would be the point if the enemies could still steal your sundires or break your equipment? I rarely go for 99 anyway, and I definitely wouldn't do it for L: DS, no matter what.

I'm suprised you had the balls to play it again. I could never do that, especially because I'm getting Mario Kart DS tonight, baby! Though I still have to beat SSSC before I start playing MKDS. I'm on Ghaleon, so I should be able to beat it tonight and start the Mario Kart madness this weekend!

GhaleonOne wrote:Honestly, after the Blue Dragon Cave, I got fed up and ran through the rest of the game to see the end. It just got so bloody boring.

I agree, that's exactly what I did. Of course, perhaps some plot and/or character development would have made things more interesting. Ah well.

Kind of makes me glad that my car broke down and I couldn't afford a DS, let alone a DS and a Lunar game when it came out. I have a DS being shipped to me right now, and I've aready called 2 EB Games, a Gamestop, a Best Buy, and a Circuit City but no luck. No one carries Lunar DS around here! I don't know if it was the poor sales, or what, but online's the only place to buy it.

After reading about quirks like being hurt for running, lengthy battles where you can't target enemies, stolen equipment, breaking equipment, and a boring plot... I think I might just get Dawn of Sorrow, and a full tank of gas instead of Lunar DS.

And I'd just like to point out that translations aside, Working Designs would've done a better job of aestheticlly cleaning it up. You might end up paying for saves, but they'd probably fix a lot of the annoyances. And you'd have a soundtrack disc, hardbound manual, and most importantly, the last pages of the manual going over why they took out silly things like "getting hurt for running."

Shiva Indis wrote:I was rather startled by people saying they completed the game in 30 hours. I've only played the Japanese version, and I came out at 55 hours - I didn't waste a lot of time either.

I clocked in at around 50 hours myself, but I did waste a lot of time with sidequests and the like.

I'm starting to think that some of the people who allegedly reviewed the Japanese version never did, and somehow got their hands on a beta of the first part of the game. KF

I still haven't had time to play this damn game, and with school draining my life I don't have much motivation to even sit down and progress in it. I haven't even left the first town yet, which for me is really bad. I really pray that GameArts didn't purposely shoot themselves in the foot with this game, just to have an excuse to kill off the series. The world of Lunar deserves so much better, and for the game to be developed for a handheld makes me feel as though their heart wasn't in it.

The original team needs to get their ---- in gear, and create a sequel on par with the original Lunar games; especially The Silver Star. Even listening to the tracks that Parn ripped from the Saturn version of L:EBC, the Sega CD composition sounded so much better in many ways. While some tracks had better arrangements, they still sacrificed certain strong instrument notes that gave the music more oompf. If anyone has the pcm tracks from the original EB, you should compare them with the remake music.

I agree. That was something I always noticed about EBC. Even on the Saturn, I liked Taben's Peak and Zophar's Domain, specifically, more on the Sega CD due to the instruments used.

The Pentagulia music lost something in the transition as well. There is no vocal chorale chanting in the EBC remake, and without it the music isn't as gothic. It's just weird listening to the Sega CD tracks, and then listening to the remake tracks. The clarity of the instruments is much cleaner in the Sega CD tracks. There is also noticeable difference in Honorable Horam among others. Taben's Peak has much more childlike influence due to the humming in it's EBC arrangement. While I like the original Golden Voice, the remake is a bit more ephemeral.

I don't know if Parn ripped every track from the remake, but aside from WD's omitted Star Dragon theme in the remake, there are other tracks missing from the original.

The biggest one besides Star Dragon Tower is the other theme for Ghaleon. In the original, he had two, and the one ommited from EBC had more sinister-like qualities to it. Not to say the other one wasn't as good, but each song had good fits depending on the scene.

I want to remind you that one huge cause of the loss of quality in the remake's tracks has to do with the crappy sound chip used in the PSX.

If you had the Saturn version of the remake, you'd be blown away by how crystal clear the music and sound effects were.

If you had the Saturn version of the remake, you'd be blown away by how crystal clear the music and sound effects were.

Actually, the Saturn music is what Parn ripped. I agree that it's better than the PS version. The problem is, they seemed to have changed some of the instruments. You can notice them especially in songs like Taben's Peak, Zophar's Domain, Horam's music and a few others. It made some songs better, and some worse. I thought Zophar's Domain was better in the original, and Taben's Peak I like both equally.

I have the Saturn EB myself, and noticed the changes in the music immediately when first playing. I don't remember the other Ghaleon theme from the original Eternal Blue, G1. Was it a variation on his theme from The Silver Star? I'd have to hear it again, because it's been so long.

Lou, I do agree that the music is crisper and clearer when it came to the Saturn EB over the PS version. It just baffles me how the Sega CD music has more vibrancy to the instruments though. The clarity is richer, and even the composition has better arrangement. It's sad that we're discussing a ten year old game versus it's remake when all we really want is to discuss a brand new *console* release.