The Backlog Check-in Vol. 169: 3/27/21: Outriders Edition

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isthatallyougot
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Re: The Backlog Check-in Vol. 169: 3/27/21: Outriders Edition

Post by isthatallyougot »

I'm not playing anything, but I thought I'd just step in and say hello. I should pick up something and give it a spin. Maybe I'll do it soon.
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Dragon kick your a$$ into the Milky Way!
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sonuckles
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Re: The Backlog Check-in Vol. 169: 3/27/21: Outriders Edition

Post by sonuckles »

Hi everyone. I'm still alive. Just figured I'd poke my head in and see how everyone is doing.

crim, my wife and I bought a house in August of 2019, and yeah, it sucks trying to find a good one. I'm still a little upset that we didn't get the first one we put an offer down on. They initially rejected it, then later came back and asked if we still wanted it at our asking price. Unfortunately my wife got cold feet and we said no. The place we have now cost roughly the same amount, is slightly smaller, slightly less finished, has a way smaller backyard, and is maybe 5 minutes closer to my wife's library. We've also had to spend a few grand here and there getting wiring added for ceiling fans, getting some trees cleaned up (and one outright removed), and various other maintenancy things.

That said, I think I'm glad we own. If we ever want to move, it won't be quite as hard making the down payment on the next place, since we actually get to keep some of the money that we will make on this place. And we have really awesome neighbors who have been a major help when we have issues.

Anyway, for what I'm playing right now... it's a crapshoot. I've been doing a lot of ROM maintenance and whatnot. I'm biding my time until SaGa Frontier remake comes out on Switch next month. I couldn't possibly be more excited for that.
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canedaddy
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Re: The Backlog Check-in Vol. 169: 3/27/21: Outriders Edition

Post by canedaddy »

Hey! Glad you are alive and well and a homeowner and all that. :)

What's special about SaGa Frontier? I've never played anything in the series.
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sonuckles
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Re: The Backlog Check-in Vol. 169: 3/27/21: Outriders Edition

Post by sonuckles »

canedaddy wrote: Thu Apr 01, 2021 9:51 am Hey! Glad you are alive and well and a homeowner and all that. :)

What's special about SaGa Frontier? I've never played anything in the series.
SaGa Frontier is a hard game to recommend, but I love it mostly for nostalgic reasons. Frontier is also the most different from the rest of the series. You're given 7 different characters to pick from (8 in the remaster), each with their own completely different story and scenarios, and dropped into a game world with very little explanation other than your initial motivation. The setting is part modern, part futuristic, part fantasy, which makes it pretty unique. The stories vary greatly.

The most popular story (Asellus) has you playing a girl who gets run over and dies, but who then wakes up to find out she's been revived by "mystics" (vampires) and is locked in their secret village. You have to work your way out of the village and find out who killed you and decide if you want to ultimately become a mystic, or reject their ways. Depending on how you play the game and what skills you use will determine your ending. Avoiding the use of mystic skills is hard to do because they are so powerful.

There's another character, Red, who is secretly a sentai hero who has to perform episodic missions to fight an evil group of baddies. You start the game with all sorts of cool super powers in your hero mode, but are a total weakling in your normal mode.

Some of the plots are more vague like Lute who is just a wandering dude who's mom kicks him out of the house and you're pretty much left to build a party and fight whatever world-ending evil you stumble upon along the way. Funny enough, you can recruit Lute as a side character in your party in most of the other stories.

The big gripes about the game are that while most stories begin radically differently, you'll often find yourself scrambling to recruit the same side characters, and do the same side quests to get the more powerful weapons and spells. Also, the battle system is very experimental. There is no EXP. You level up individual stats on a per-fight basis (ala Final Fantasy 2), and gain skills and spells at random based on the weapons you tend to favor. Usually taking on riskier enemies causes you to learn more powerful skills mid-fight.

The other big gripe is that the game feels largely unfinished. With the remaster, they are adding a good deal of cut content.
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canedaddy
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Re: The Backlog Check-in Vol. 169: 3/27/21: Outriders Edition

Post by canedaddy »

Thanks for the info. When you're finished with the remaster, let us know if you think it's worth a spin for those who have no nostalgia for it.
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argyle
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Re: The Backlog Check-in Vol. 169: 3/27/21: Outriders Edition

Post by argyle »

Hey nuckles, great to hear from you! And congrats on becoming a homeowner. I'm glad to hear things are going well for you. :) I've seen you popup on my Xbox feed the past few months competing with me for most 'cheevos each month, so I knew you were still alive & kicking. :P

I think I was getting Saga Frontier confused with the notorious Unlimited SaGa from the OG PS2 Backlog Committee days - cane, I *know* you have to remember talk of that one. Who was it that defended that game all the time back then? I want to say it was Stawn - man, good times! :D I'll probably import the English physical copy of Frontier & give it a go - waiting until they announce a physical release of Legend of Mana to order them together, that's the one I really have nostalgia for. You built your game world map in that place, as you "discovered" new areas you placed them on the map & where you placed them affected stats or something - it's been a long time, but I remember really enjoying what I played & regretting never having finished it.
"When I was ten, I read fairy tales in secret and would have been ashamed
if I had been found doing so. Now that I am fifty I read them openly. When I
became a man I put away childish things, including the fear of childishness and the
desire to be very grown up.” ― C.S. Lewis

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sonuckles
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Re: The Backlog Check-in Vol. 169: 3/27/21: Outriders Edition

Post by sonuckles »

argyle wrote: Tue Apr 06, 2021 5:06 am I think I was getting Saga Frontier confused with the notorious Unlimited SaGa from the OG PS2 Backlog Committee days
A lot of people get those confused. They are very different games. The SaGa series in general plays roughly the same way across games, but Unlimited SaGa did some CRAZY weird things that they never bothered revisiting. The SaGa series makes a lot more sense when you realize they were made by the director of Final Fantasy II (not FF4). If you look at them as spiritual sequels to that game, then the exp-less weirdness falls into place.
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canedaddy
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Re: The Backlog Check-in Vol. 169: 3/27/21: Outriders Edition

Post by canedaddy »

argyle wrote: Tue Apr 06, 2021 5:06 am I think I was getting Saga Frontier confused with the notorious Unlimited SaGa from the OG PS2 Backlog Committee days - cane, I *know* you have to remember talk of that one. Who was it that defended that game all the time back then? I want to say it was Stawn - man, good times! :D
Oh wow... :lol: I do remember that, although I don't recall the players or positions. It would be pretty funny to go back and find that.
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Phaseknox
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Re: The Backlog Check-in Vol. 169: 3/27/21: Outriders Edition

Post by Phaseknox »

canedaddy wrote: Wed Apr 07, 2021 9:05 am
argyle wrote: Tue Apr 06, 2021 5:06 amI think I was getting Saga Frontier confused with the notorious Unlimited SaGa from the OG PS2 Backlog Committee days - cane, I *know* you have to remember talk of that one. Who was it that defended that game all the time back then? I want to say it was Stawn - man, good times! :D
Oh wow... :lol: I do remember that, although I don't recall the players or positions. It would be pretty funny to go back and find that.
I dug up my old Romancing SaGa SUCKS!!!! thread that includes some discussion of the different games in the series, schizogony appears to be the one who liked Unlimited Saga:

https://www.ignboards.com/threads/roman ... 123935059/

Please keep in mind that the thread is from 15 years ago. I didn’t know at the time that the game was a remake of a SNES game. It looked far more appealing as a 16-bit pixel art game compared to their 3D rendition of it for PS2 IMO. I recently bought the remasters of Romancing SaGa 2 and 3 for PS4, I hope that I like them more. :P
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crimson_tide
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Re: The Backlog Check-in Vol. 169: 3/27/21: Outriders Edition

Post by crimson_tide »

Sup Snux (this is your name now, deal :P )! Also, thanks for house hunting commiserating, I think it's a huge part of my general blah's as of late.

Played: Yakuza 3 (I...man...nope, not going to say it!), Mendel Palace...a tiny bit of DQ11S...a smidge of what I bought this week...think that's it...

Bought: Jotun (...eh), Sundered (...eh), Namco Collection 1 and 2...oh yeah, Gunlord X (...eh. I should just buy the Turrican collection because this ain't Turrican).

This week: Well, I downloaded and started The Division already. It's fine. I guess. I don't know what I am doing yet. But I get to be a middle aged black lady with a touch of gray and some really awful hair options (I don't know why she can't have cornrows or twists but the dudes can...) so that was kinda fun. For a minute. Also Avengers is on PS Now. So now instead of playing Puzzle Fighter and the boss segments of Sonic Generations exclusively, I will finally play something on the service new! Yay...I think. Everybody hates this game but as part of a subscription, I can finally try out the story which is the only thing I care about. Mostly because Kamala Kahn is flipping BALLER and having the sheer gall to make Modok the big boss is definitely a choice...so I will give it the 10-15 or so hours and likely ignore the online part they want me to play because I am a curmudgeon and don't want to play with other people. Ew.

Yeah, I cannot get into anything lately. Don't know what's up with me, I have a TON to play but nothing ain't hitting right for some reason. That's why I am trying to branch out into some different things for me like The Division and old school stuff. Something's got to hit sooner or later :) .
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