Shin Megami Tensei IV

[Menegrothx]

I don't recall any interesting twists in P4.

Are you honestly claiming that you knew who the killer was from the beginning? I might have bad detective skills, but I never even suspected it before

the hospital scene where you have to figure out who's the real killer.

Now that's some Hercule Poirot/Agatha Christie/Sherlock Holmes level writing in my books, not that I read a lot of murder mysteries.
The writing/characters on P3 was as good as in P4, but you can't honestly claim that the story is better written on that one. I don't mind one bit if you say you prefer P3 story (I liked the darker atmosphere), but to say that it's better than that of P4?

On the rest of your post: pardon me for sounding hostile but why the fuck do you criticize my choice if you can't think of any yourself?

I do agree that JRPGs generally don't have good stories. I think it's sort of ironic that even though generally WRPGs focus more on combat, having deeper character customization and more freedom/unlinearity while JRPGs focus more on telling a good story, pretty much all the WRPGs that put effort into having a great story/writing/characters, do it a lot better than the best of JRPGs, while having more branching story paths, moral choices, choice&consequence etc. Though probably some, or in some cases a lot, of JRPG plots are lost in translation (and in the olden days: Nintendo censorship).

Btw do the characters have considerably more dialogue in the PS1 versions of Lunar? I played the Sega CD version of Silver Star Story and I liked the characters and the humor, but was a bit underwhelmed after seeing how praised that game is. Now I'm wondering should I get Eternal Blue on SCD or PSX. PSX naturally looks a lot nicer, but having something worth playing on the much maligned Sega CD (and the fact that I own SSS on it) draws me towards the SCD version.

[marlowe221]

Well Persona 4, a more lighthearted and story driven spin off title to the Shin Megami Tensei series has possibly the best JRPG&console RPG story of all time. I haven't played SMT IV yet (hasn't been released in EU), but generally SMT games have a more minimalistic story and a dark/serious/mysterious tone with little to no "anime BS". Might have some stuff that doesn't make sense because the games are all about demons, gods, darkness&light, cyberpunk and stuff like that. Atleast it shouldn't get too convoluted. The games can be at tiems "trippy" and mysterious (ie you don't understand what's going on around you) in a good way.

SMT is basically a series that many hardcore RPG fans who only like pen&paper and oldschool WRPGs love (or atleast like/tolerate), even if they hate all other JRPGs besides hardcore dungeon crawlers (like EO and Dark Spire) and possibly the classics. It's so different from all the other popular JRPG series. Especially SMT: Nocturne/Lucifer's Call (SMT 3) is respected on sites like RPGcodex.

Well, I generally prefer minimalism over nonsense. And though I may take some crap for this statement, I will admit to being of the belief that 95% of JRPGs made after the 16-bit era make no sense at all from a story perspective or make sense up to a point where they take a hard turn into left field and never come back. I don't know if it's bad translations, huge cultural ideas that we just don't have in the West, my absolute lack of experience/knowledge with anime/manga/etc., or what but JRPGs lost me somewhere between 1996 and 2000.

I like the game mechanics of JRPGs but often have don't have the first damn clue what is going on or why I am doing what I am doing.

If the focus of SMTIV is more on gameplay than story, it might be for me.

Edit: I really like EOIV so far and it's story is pretty minimal - just a background motivation for playing the game at this point. That and I cut my teeth on Eye of the Beholder in the early 90s and have a soft spot for first person dungeon crawlers.

[Valkyrie-Favor]

Got to the Minotaur. I'm level 11 right now. This thing is pretty tough. Flynn and two demons are equipped with Bufu and a defense buff, and the other demon is a healer. The buffs don't seem to make any difference. Halfway though I'll be doing fine, but Walter will cast Agi, the Minotaur will smirk, and my party gets wiped out in one or two turns.

Do I need to grind or something? I think my party is already pretty well suited to this battle.

[MrPopo]

Remember that buffs/debuffs stack up to 3 times. You can get a quick look by hitting X.

[Valkyrie-Favor]

I'm already stacking them - twice in the first turn, once in the second. They last 3 turns each, right?

[MrPopo]

They last until cancelled or reversed with the opposite buff/debuff.

[noiseredux]

LVL 31, just watched the Black Knight get executed...

[ZenErik]

Yea. Persona 3 and 4 is (I think) where buffs and debuffs last 3 turns.

[Valkyrie-Favor]

They last until cancelled or reversed with the opposite buff/debuff.

All right, that makes sense. When he casts War Song, would three stacked buffs be removed, or just one?

Not like it'll make a difference. Maybe I'll just recruit another demon with Bufu.

[MrPopo]

So in SMTIV every buff/debuff skill moves the appropriate stat(s) +1 or -1, to a max of +3 or -3. By contrast, in Nocturne there were buff skills that moved by +/-2, and the cap was +/-4.