Ges has $80 to spend on CYBAR MONDAY

[Ges]

what's he getting?

Help me out! :P
------------------------------

Persona 3 Portable (PSP) - $29 or Persona 3 FES (PS2) - $26
Persona 4 (PS2) - $30
Resonance of Fate (PS3) - $17
Disgaea DS - $19
Prinny: CIRBTH? (PSP) - $20
Fallout: New Vegas (360) - $40
Ninja Gaiden: Dragon Sword (DS) - $14.67
Castlevania: LoS (PS3) - $42
Zelda: Spirit Tracks (DS) - $18
DQIX (DS) - $20
Valkyria Chronicles 2 (PSP) - $30
Sin & Punishment: Star Successor (Wii) - $22
Skies of Arcadia (DC) - $35
Donkey Kong Country Returns (Wii) - $44
Boktai (GBA SP) - $12
NHL 11 (360) - $35


feel free to add anything in there. I seriously have a love/hate relationship with Black Friday/Cyber Monday. Too much to choose from and everything is priced at Ges-purchasable levels. It's annoying.

[Phakiel]

I would go for persona 4 And castlevaania I haven't played either but You can never go wrong with persona and I hear good things about the new castlevania.

On the other hand if you haven't played skies of Arcadia go for that but couldn't you get it cheaper for gc and play it on the wii, I didn't even pay that when I first got it

[Ges]

I've never played a Persona, should I play 3 before 4?

And yes, I could get Skies for cheaper on GC, but I'm weird in that I want to play games for the systems they originally debuted on even if I miss out on some extras. Except with Persona 3 and Disgaea. Portability trumps nostalgia sometimes.

The funny thing is I probably won't be playing any of these any time soon. I still gotta play Okami, FF7:CC, Red Dead Redemption, etc. , ad infinitum. My backlog sucks. This ain't helping, either. Haha.

[Raph]

DQIX (DS) - $33 (I missed out on the $17 Target special. NOOOOOOOOO)

Amazon is having a Lightning Deal for Dragon Quest IX in 11 and a half hours or 1:20 PM Pacific Time. It will certainly be priced below $20.

Apart from that, this board is really in love with Demon's Souls and Amazon has it for only $15 for the next two hours, if you haven't bought it already. Here is the link to the all-purpose Cyber Monday videogame page at Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Outlet/b/ref=cm_video?ie=UTF8&node=409566&pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_s=left-2&pf_rd_r=195XEYMFJQQ889NS3KEM&pf_rd_t=101&pf_rd_p=1279333042&pf_rd_i=384082011

[Ges]

Sweet action on DQIX, that'll be purchased...and I got Demon's Souls already, but for $20 (garn).

Also, red italicized I have bought. So, yeah. Bump me up from $80 to about $110. Yay capitalism.

That pretty much leaves me ~$50 to work with on me list.

I want to vary it on the rest. So either Persona 3 or 4 but not both (or neither). And something's gotta be PSP.

[Luisfe]

I've never played a Persona, should I play 3 before 4?
.


YES. Also better if it is FES. even better if it is P3PSP.
P4 improved on P3 significantly, they are not connected plotlines (if anything, minor references, like P3 to P2), but the gameplay improvements P4 had over P3 are enough to make one not like P3 as much afterwards.

Mainly controlling the other characters (which is an option in P3PSP).

Edit: Get P3PSP or P4 then.

[Raph]

I started playing Persona 3: Portable, not having played the original on the PS2 before. I'm... skeptical. I came into this thinking Persona 3 and 4 were supposed to be the two last great JRPGs, but I don't really understand how this formula has mass appeal. I've spent most of my time so far talking to awkwardly-voiced drawn stills, giving me the distinct feeling that I'm playing a dating sim. And exploring Tartarus is already starting to grow dull, since it seems to be randomly generated and doesn't ever change in appearance.

I'm waiting for the game to find its rhythm, but right now I don't *get* what's fun about alternating managing my time as a Japanese high school student and grinding through some 200-odd repetitive dungeon floors. When I think about repeating that for 365 in-game days, it sounds tedious beyond belief. The personas look cool, at least.

[Cyrus the virus]

Keep playing the game, Raph. Tartarus is bland but the game is still somehow awesome.

If you can only get one Persona for some reason, Gessy, get 4. It's worth it!

[Luisfe]

I started playing Persona 3: Portable, not having played the original on the PS2 before. I'm... skeptical. I came into this thinking Persona 3 and 4 were supposed to be the two last great JRPGs, but I don't really understand how this formula has mass appeal. I've spent most of my time so far talking to awkwardly-voiced drawn stills, giving me the distinct feeling that I'm playing a dating sim. And exploring Tartarus is already starting to grow dull, since it seems to be randomly generated and doesn't ever change in appearance.


Yup.
It is a randomly generated dungeon, it has slight variations, and every 20 or so floors there is a tile change. The layout generator is pretty damn repetitive,.
And the main means of advancement is through the Dating-Sim-like aspect of the game, which is actually what distinguishes it from most other jRPGS. P4 also uses a variation of that formula, but the focus is LESS on the dating-sim aspects, and more in a "investigate what's happening" thing, less is done at the school segments, much more at the town-level.
Also, p4's random generator is considerably better, actually changint the layout types you get in each different Dungeon (since this time it HAS different dungeons, since it is all about getting "inside the mind" of the people involved, no it's not like Psychonauts, but it is better than Tartarus. Each area has its own tileset).

My main problem with P3 was that it had like 2 songs plus variations. FES kind of alleviates that. Sure, the point was that, like the dungeon, it built itself over the time, becoming more complex and complete. While the music did that, the dungeon failed to keep up, and the sheer amount of time you spend listening to the same variation of the song makes the basic tune become grating has hell. Sure, in the end I can appreciate how the song increased in complexity, but by then I hate the goddamn thing.
If they had made the Tartarus grind slightly SHORTER and more manageable, it would have been better. P4 handles that in a more satisfying way, and the levels are more self-contained, requiring much less grinding (again, the best way to advance is to first strenghten the social links, to get stronger Personae, and then advancing through the dungeon in one or two tries), which was not really all that viable in P3. It IS a better and more tightly designed game, but both are worth playing.

Another issue I had with P3 (that did not prevent me from finishing it) was that 90% of the plot events happened OUTSIDE of the dungeons. The point of the dungeon was just to get to the top, but it got boring and repetitive. P4 also fixes that. Dungeons are not just there just because, it is actually where the character developement mostly happens, SO besides being mandatory there is actually a reason to explore them

End result: Don't play P4 before P3. If at all possible, get P3PSP since it includes fixes from P4. If you will get just one of them, get P4.

[Luisfe]

That being said, P3 automagically developes the characters a bit, except those that you get to have social links with. P4 doesn't do that since every party member is also a S. Link. The developement is mostly about them overcoming their hangups, which you get exposed to when you first recruit them. It is also less drama-filled than P3, since it has a smaller and tighter scope than P3.

[Ges]

DQIX bought.

From what I'm hearing P3 doesn't sound too special, guys. Does it have a good story? What would you say the battle system is similar to?

[Phakiel]

Ehhh, I dont know really, the closest thing is of course P2 but its more advanced and without the contacting demons thing, but you havent played P2 so this is useless.

I am a bit rusty since it has been I think a year since my ps2 died and thus havent played the game and was about to beat it too, so its a bit hard to recall much of it.

Its actually a pretty simple system. It doesnt have much depth in it but once you get the hang of it, its quite fun, even if you end up going auto for most of the farming, I would actually greatly enjoy my sessions and would overreact when i did something cool.

So ok, you get this persona, unlike the previous game(s) you are stuck with one persona per party member and its the same one except for the main character who is the only one who can use multiple personas. Persona's are like summons in FF but instead of calling them to make only one attack or fight for you, you attack through them when you want to use magic, as in YOU get hurt and all, the persona just sort of shadows you. Each persona has its strengh and weakneses and your characters' str and weakn are the same. Each characer has a melee attack, i think the main character can equip whatever and the rest are set to their "class" like he redheaded chick uses a fecning sword and somebody else used gloves (the robot?).

Eventually your main objective in the battles is to knock out the enemies, knocking out being having the enemy fall and be open to attacks with less defense and watse a turn o get back up. The fun begins when you manage to knock out all enemies (abusing its weakneses or just a really strong hit) and you get to perform an all out attack for extreme damage.

You get to summon new personas once you get enough tarot cards and like P2 then fun is to get any new persona and to try it out. I always like to reach Jack Frost as quickly as I can but he is jus so damn adorable.

As for why people cream over this game, i think its the whole experience. Its really a well written game and it gets very hard sometimes, not impossibly so but you are gonna find youself pretty dead if you dont pay attention when fighting. Even a random demon on lv 35 of Tartarus can kill you if you are no careful.

As for Tartarus, this is the main dungeon, there is no way around it, there is no exploration. Like Luisfe said the story happens outtside of Tartarus and you just log into Tartarus to advance the game and it can become very repetive and boring, particularly since the music is the damn same. Music is awesome but after 100 hours of the same dungeon song you get a bit ticked off.

P3 also has much of a dating sim in regards of school and relationships. The way you get some personas to be stronger is to improve your relationship link with certain persons. In order to do so you go on "outings" with either chicks, guys, a kid, an elderly couple, you talk to some weird dude near the mall, joining after school activities (this leaves you with a choice sometimes, either student council or fencing class) and etc. You can sometimes fuck up and end up losing a link (i lost one with the dude from the symphony I think, or one of the chicks) so its pretty fun.

There are also a couple of other things to do in Persona 3, they are not endless but they are entertaining, and sometimes you will be almost forced to spend hours not going to Tartarus but working on your links and doing well in school. Oh yeah you actually need to study and pay attention in class, this is cute because you dont actually expect the game o quiz you on something you heard in class three weeks ago, there is no other way to know the answer in the game without paying attention, i liked it.

[Cyrus the virus]

P3 is definitely worth playing, but it isn't perfect.

[Ges]

Aaaand Castlevania: LoS ends up finishing me up.

Persona 3 Portable is getting bought. Eventually. Thanks all.