Nintendo 3DS

[Gamerforlife]

Super Mario 3D Land is the only 3DS game where I really felt as if I wanted/needed the 3D.

As a fan of the 3D in that game, I'd say that Link Between Worlds trumps it.

That's what I'm playing right now and it's the best use of 3D I've seen on the system so far because it's never distracting. First 3DS game I've played where I've not felt the urge to turn the 3D off.

[Gamerforlife]

Not sure why the creator of this list seems so down on the system's 2014 line up. It looks pretty good to me. And he didn't even include Bravely Default, which we've yet to see in the States yet

http://www.pocketgamer.co.uk/r/3DS/Nint ... sp?c=56005

[MrPopo]

Super Mario 3D Land is the only 3DS game where I really felt as if I wanted/needed the 3D.

As a fan of the 3D in that game, I'd say that Link Between Worlds trumps it.

That's what I'm playing right now and it's the best use of 3D I've seen on the system so far because it's never distracting. First 3DS game I've played where I've not felt the urge to turn the 3D off.

Bravely Default's 3D looks really nice. I don't think it's necessary, but it's really well implemented.

[Aramonde]

Nintendo has to pay royalties for every 3DS sold

That sucks for Nintendo

[ZeroAX]

Nintendo has to pay royalties for every 3DS sold

That sucks for Nintendo

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S_q8L8Tksd8

I think they can just raise the price by 5€ and make up for it. Thank the universe, I already bought a 3DS so I don't have to worry about price hikes .

And in more serious matters, what's that game shown in that screenshot? Seems really cool

[Aramonde]

And in more serious matters, what's that game shown in that screenshot? Seems really cool

I don't know, the tank looks a little Metal Slugish but i doubt that's it.

[ZeroAX]

And in more serious matters, what's that game shown in that screenshot? Seems really cool

I don't know, the tank looks a little Metal Slugish but i doubt that's it.

That's what I was thinking too. Maybe an obscure indie game? But I think I've digged through the e-shop's platform section and looked at all the games there and nothing like this came up.

Anyone have any idea?

[ZenErik]

So the con consensus on the Bravely Default demo is alright to very good? I'll have to try it sometime. But I've been spending so much time with FFXIV that I haven't played much else.

[GSZX1337]

Nintendo has to pay royalties for every 3DS sold

That sucks for Nintendo

Huh, I assumed Ninty were already paying patent fees of some sort. Everyone else is paying licensing/patent fees for their products.

[Valkyrie-Favor]

The Bravely Default demo is all fetch quests and stuff, so can't speak about the story.

The music was fairly well composed and excellently preformed. Art design was pretty too. Turn off auto-save right away or you'll save yourself into a corner.

Exploring and battles feel much like Final Fantasy V, which was a very good jRPG. It's actually a bit harder in the beginning (although I'm only playing the highest difficulty. Nothing else is worth your time).

Job system is operational in the demo and it's the standard classes, plus a dragoon "valkyrie" unlocked at the beginning.

I haven't played long enough to comment about the character growth or difficulty over time - the more challenging enemies can be defeated with sound strategy, but grinding may end up being necessary, and I'm not interested in wasting my time with that.

I don't think Bravely Default respects the player's time either. For some reason you can't use the touch screen for menus in battle. The Brave/default system is cool, but you should always start out with one BP.

Starting with 0 forces you to waste a turn on charging every single battle, and each turn can take four to ten seconds. In a long, repetitive game like an RPG, that is pretty annoying. There's no point at all - the Brave command consumes 2 BP, and you're punished for having negative BP. If you started with 1 and used Brave on your first turn, you'd still go negative.

It's so obvious that it actually made me a little angry. I'm a chill guy, especially with videogames. It's ridiculous for the dev to intentionally waste the player's time, even worse there's no artistic purpose to make up for it. I was okay with Haruhi's Endless Eight, so I can't be too impatient.

The old FF games would pad out the game with unnecessary dungeons, bosses, and story, but these could be enjoyable on their own. Longer turns means less turns per battle, and this takes away from the appeal of the "long game" and the big payoff boss battles that require efficient use of your resources.

BP, though, are a strange kind of resource for jRPGs. Not unheard of, but unusual. I might compare them to a movement stat in grid-based games, but the best comparison is the Action Points in Valkyrie Profile 2 - where menu commands, group movement, and attacks all consume AP, and it can only be recovered with a new turn.

Knights and white/black/red mages, so far, do things on a tun-by-turn basis. Everything they do takes one turn. If they spend one turn on a brave and the next on two attacks, it's still one attack per turn - only later. The player must plan for an opportune moment to do a "normal" amount of damaged compared to similar classes in other games. This isn't a problem by itself - we could say Soulcalibur V is a great fighting game because all the characters are weak.

These classes boring to play, but you want to level them for their abilities. Their only advantage is against enemies who can only be hurt on certain turns. I'm predicting that type of enemy will be common in the early stages of Bravely Default. It could actually be interesting.

The other classes are interesting. Valkyries - yes, even the males are called Valkyries - can attack with a spear or jump offscreen for a turn, becoming immune to damage and unresponsive to commands, then landing on an enemy next turn for massive damage. Jump can be strengthened with Brave. You'd expect Valkyries to have weak DEF for being gone half the time, but their armor affinity is awesome. Obviously a top-tier class - even if I haven't played the others. Planning your battles around her are a lot of fun.

Stranger is the swordmaster's basic ability, Nothing Ventured. For the price of a normal attack, he can defend for 1/2 damage of a physical attack, countering for damage 2X his physical attack. Obviously he should do this every turn after the first, unless his enemy does not make physical attacks or is not vulnerable to them - or is just plain weak. It would be an overwhelming move if his HP weren't so low - that can be fixed, right?

Bravely Default has a lot of interesting classes and many are focused on commerce and character growth, not combat. Not sure if I'll be into that, but it's really daring. Can't wait to see how smart players use them - I'll probably stick to fighting.

I'll probably buy this game sometime, because that's the kind of strategy I love jRPGs for. That's why I'm crazy for Dept.Heaven and Megaten, but bored with Dragon Quest.

I give it points for being prettier, more unusual, and more complex than most of its kind. It will probably be a fun game if it has interesting enemies and environments, even with its few but major flaws. I'd call it well-designed if it would give me 1 BP on the first turn and a battle speed-up button.