Lunar Threads

I might not be an RPG player at all if it had been on SegaCD. The only reason I played it is because a housemate of mine had a friend who gave him his Sega Genesis/CD/32X and a bunch of games, one of which was TSS. It's conceivable I would've encountered the series once it came out on the PSX, but unlikely.

I would've been unaffected if it had been on Sega CD, since I first played it on the Playstation. However, if its success meant that 8 Lunar games were released in Japan but most didn't make it over here, I might not have discovered it anyway.

Sincere question - how is the Ys fandom?

Shiva Indis wrote:TG-16 though? That was beyond exotic. So exotic that I only recently started to make sense of it.

It's interesting to think about since the situations are totally flipped! While no one could touch Nintendo in the 16-bit era in Japan, the closest rival by far was PCE, whereas I've never met a real living person who owned a Mega Drive, much less Mega CD. Lunar as a whole would probably have benefitted, though I thought that some of the advanced CD variants never even made it to the US, so even if EB had been made effectively on PCE, I doubt people could have enjoyed it internationally.

Ys is a fandom I've always wanted to explore. I think 3 and its PC remake, Oath in Felghana, were the best-loved from what I've heard, though 1 and 2 are doomed to be sloppily remade forever in a Lunar 1 sort of way.

I may be biased because I actually owned a Sega CD, and I think that would've been the only way the Lunar series would see the light of day in the US. Considering that that's how I got into this fandom, I wouldn't want that to change.

Temzin wrote:Ys is a fandom I've always wanted to explore. I think 3 and its PC remake, Oath in Felghana, were the best-loved from what I've heard, though 1 and 2 are doomed to be sloppily remade forever in a Lunar 1 sort of way.

I wouldn't necessarily say that... I have Ys I & II Chronicles for the PSP, and that remake is pretty solid. Very fun to play. KF

Kizyr wrote:I may be biased because I actually owned a Sega CD, and I think that would've been the only way the Lunar series would see the light of day in the US. Considering that that's how I got into this fandom, I wouldn't want that to change.

Temzin wrote:Ys is a fandom I've always wanted to explore. I think 3 and its PC remake, Oath in Felghana, were the best-loved from what I've heard, though 1 and 2 are doomed to be sloppily remade forever in a Lunar 1 sort of way.

I wouldn't necessarily say that... I have Ys I & II Chronicles for the PSP, and that remake is pretty solid. Very fun to play. KF

Ah, that's fair. A better analogue might've been "sloppily remade forever in a Final Fantasy I and II sort of way." Like Ys I&II, TSS seems destined to be ported eternally, often in a lackluster manner. Here's hoping for creative fan-driven reverse-ports onto old hardware just for good measure. Please anticipate PCE TSS, SFC TSS, etc.

SSSC isn't a sloppy remake. It's okay that the overworld shrunk but still existed because of the lack of random battles. I hate SSH's means of traversing the world, though.

Temzin wrote:Please anticipate PCE TSS, SFC TSS, etc.

Is the PCE homebrew scene a thing? Because it sounds like a delight.

Leo wrote:SSSC isn't a sloppy remake.

I agree that SSS is not, but Lunar Legend? SSH? Not herculean feats of game development.

Lunar Legend gets a pass because they did what they could with what they were working with. SSH could have been much more if they didn't decide to be lazy.

Leo wrote:Lunar Legend gets a pass because they did what they could with what they were working with. SSH could have been much more if they didn't decide to be lazy.

Agreed.
I mean look. I would think that the GBA would do better. (That game fits a 8mb rom, yet there's 16mb and 32mb. A card game like Yugi Oh had a 16mb rom for GAWD SAKES!!) but seeing FF4 and FF6 with their glitches and lower quality music that didn't come out as nice as Lunar's even though it seems to make better use of resources... maybe the GBA was just an awkward system.

Even some Super Mario games had lazy things about them. (Gosh, Super Mario and Lunar on the same console XD)

Temzin wrote:I recall another championship-level American rewrite in Althena's shrine

I died

Temzin wrote:rather than just karate chopping you for the entirety of the first fight.

I died again.
http://i957.photobucket.com/albums/ae53 ... npunch.gif
You mean this?
For a videogame, this animation certainly entertains.
I think it could be a reference to Garland, FF1. They both start with G... oh no. What have I done.

My hack of TSS... DEFINITELY better sound effects, holy crap.
I technically already hacked this, sorta, without hacking. I tried increasing the volume of the game's music so that the sound effects wouldn't be too loud in comparison. It worked. My playthrough of the game like that was much more pleasant.
It's crazy how loud the original sound effects are compared to the music. They aren't necessarily bad though, for their time. Lunar 1 seems to have issues with sound effects in general. TSS, SSSC, Legend and even SSH have a set of sound effects that even I could easily improve, while Lunar 2 sfx is excellent.

Another hack could be increased difficulty, yet lower encounter rate. I love the game to death, but there were parts that the player can easily fall asleep later in the game with so many random encounters... I want the game to punish me a little in difficulty, like Lunar 2, but not bore me.

The checkpoint system is actually a great idea, i don't remember exactly how it works, but it seems veeery nice in case one forgets to save. And that's the problem. Being able to save anywhere in a game means you can easily forget it. I like save points or at least reminders. Not sure how this can be applied in Lunar though. Maybe a question to save after you heal at a statue. Though sometimes there's a lot of these statues near each other... in TSS at least.

I think the item usage and spell usage didn't make too much sense sometimes. I would fix that, but... as far as a hack can go, that might get complicated.

Alunissage wrote:I might not be an RPG player at all if it had been on SegaCD. The only reason I played it is because a housemate of mine had a friend who gave him his Sega Genesis/CD/32X and a bunch of games, one of which was TSS. It's conceivable I would've encountered the series once it came out on the PSX, but unlikely.

It's totally likely. I saw Lunar SSSC in a few game magazines back around 1999, and it was curiosity at first sight. If I hadn't seen it there, I would have found it while reading about PS1 games online 2 or 3 years later. Or in GBA. I WAS already an RPG fan before Lunar though.

This is the inverse of the subject of this thread, but I've been trying to come up with ideas for suitable games to base a Lunar-themed graphics hack on. (As if I had the know-how, let alone the time, to make such a thing.)

But nonetheless, something just came to me -- Itadaki Street. If Torneko fits, so would Ramus. And Lemina. And whatever other characters.

Shiva Indis wrote:This is the inverse of the subject of this thread, but I've been trying to come up with ideas for suitable games to base a Lunar-themed graphics hack on. (As if I had the know-how, let alone the time, to make such a thing.)

But nonetheless, something just came to me -- Itadaki Street. If Torneko fits, so would Ramus. And Lemina. And whatever other characters.

I'm glad to hear this because just a couple of days ago, I was imagining the same sort of thing.

I think Super Mario Kart would be a good start.