Suikoden going downhill?

A place to post news and also give your ideas about the future of the Suikoden series.
Please justify all speculations with reasons why you think such an event could happen.
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Queens Knight
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Post by Queens Knight »

Every one is always comparing SV to SII, if anything SV is more like SI.
Both 1 and 5 were the only games were it was a cival war and not a war between other countries, McDohl was a member of the nobility, hero in 5 was a member of the royal family.

In both games the people are being oppressed, the strategist in each game both had something to do with a bad incident that happened before the game started, even the Armes invasion is similar to when Mathiu used the Jowston forces to invade and attack Kazim, Mathiu was just using them, this time Gizel did it against you and he was just using them.

The gameplay has elements of 1, 2 and 3. 6 man battle system and blacksmith were in S1, three rune allocation was first in SII and skill system was first in SIII.

There are other things in the game that feel more like SII and and some other things that feel more like SI, but while i was playing through it it felt more like the first Suikoden then anything and thats not a bad thing.
zrayaan
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Post by zrayaan »

This is just my two cents...

I bought the unbugged version of S2 in its retail run. I loved the first hour so much I hunted down S1. I played S1 5 times through before I even loaded S2 up again. S1 remains my favorite to this day (I have now run thorugh it 12 times). Of all the suikoden games, its gameplay was the weakest; its story was the simplest. But the characters and richly layered world hooked me in ways that no other rpg has (in fact, only a few movies come close). S2 had superior gameplay, and well developed characters but the story was poorly told (you spend an enormous amount of energy hating the villain who dies half way through, then spend the rest of the game chasing after your boyhood friend). But S2 built on S1, and I think the two are best seen as a block.

Those were tough acts to follow.

S3 was interesting. S3 was a good game. But it was less a suikoden game in the same way the mission impossible movies are good movies but hardly anything like the TV series. The themes were there, and the blurred lines of morality and the political realities of life. Taken with the two suikogaiden games (which came out prior to S3) this block added a richness and understanding to the world which made it possible for many of us to translate the computer rpg to the pen and paper kind. But I didn't care about any of the characters. There was a bit of fondness for Chris, who was wholly unsuited for the task she had to undertake. Jeane's character had yet to be developed, and viki's two selves were interesting but I missed the layered depth given to the previous stories' players.

For the record, S4 was great!!! It was a huge game inside that console. It showed what the designer's could do. Unfortunately, it was so big I think they ran out of room for the other stuff. It was interesting to see how the world got to the point it was in S1, but when i finished the first run I couldn't help but feel I just spent 60 hours setting up the next installment. And the characters were even weaker than in S3. Jeane's development was interesting, but again seemed solely geared to the next story. Everything seemed to have a point which was never really achieved.

Rhapsodia Tactics of course finishes that block, but as I have not picked it up yet (nor S5) I can't comment on it. If it drops details and clues about the world of suikoden it will be worth it. I have high hopes for S5, though I expect it will be similar to S4 in that it will prove a remarkable design achievement but fail to pay off. My main concern right now is that if Konami continues the franchise, they wills tick with the PS3, because I will be highly pi**ed if they make me buy an Xbox to play one series.

So has the franchise gone downhill? No. Actually i feel as if it has sped up and won't let me enjoy it fully. I'll be picking up tactics and S5 this weekend, and that of course will tell me. but as long as it maintains the quality of gameplay, tecnical achievement, and adds to the world I'll remain a staunch suiko fan.

-z
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patapi
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Post by patapi »

zrayaan wrote:This is just my two cents...

I bought the unbugged version of S2 in its retail run. I loved the first hour so much I hunted down S1. I played S1 5 times through before I even loaded S2 up again. S1 remains my favorite to this day (I have now run thorugh it 12 times). Of all the suikoden games, its gameplay was the weakest; its story was the simplest. But the characters and richly layered world hooked me in ways that no other rpg has (in fact, only a few movies come close). S2 had superior gameplay, and well developed characters but the story was poorly told (you spend an enormous amount of energy hating the villain who dies half way through, then spend the rest of the game chasing after your boyhood friend). But S2 built on S1, and I think the two are best seen as a block.
Finally an opinion on S1&2 that I can agree with. Genius.
Rune of Illusion
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Post by Rune of Illusion »

Suikoden is not going downhill. It is just the fans don't know what they want in a game. They complain about 3 and 4 being to different from 2 and then they complain about 5 being too similar to 1 and 2.

Me I played 4 and enjoyed it. 4 is a lot like the 1 and 2 and yet the fans let the face lifts it receive delude them into thinking that it has departed from the basic feel of the game. I don't get the idea about 4 departing from the basic feel of the game. It had turn based battles, random battles, weapon sharpening, and expansive world to explore, a betrayal, team attacks, items,etc. The was only two things that was different and those were the world you explored involved sailing to get from point A to point B instead of running, and the 4 party battle system. My question is how did these instances ruin the game for them? What is the difference( outside of the obvious) between running around getting in to fights on land and sailing around getting into fights on water? Is the lack of two members in battle going to make a huge difference? Still it was stupid to take away the basic battle formation that the other 3 had but that is not enough to hate the game. the storyline is subjective, because some like the story others don't. That is the same in the other games as well. In my opinion the only thing wrong with the game was the character development. They did not endear the players to characters all too well, but still it is a little too much to say that the game sucked.

I think that the problems lies with the fans inability to adapt to change. They want the game to stay exactly the same as was in 1995. This is not a good way to attract newer fans who would most likely want to see a more modern style RPG. People don't always appreciate a good story and just want exciting game play and this aspect is disheartening for me. It is especially disheartening to see this series destroyed by its own fans. Praising the games that are extremely hard to find and discrediting the new games only because they don't believe that game or frankly any game will be as good as their personal favorite and they don't seem to know that a 11 year period of supposed brain development may lead to a change in tastes so they might not have the same nostalgia buzz that had 11 years ago.
you can learn more about a person in an hour of play than in a year of conversation.
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Raging Barows Brat
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Post by Raging Barows Brat »

I agree about the story and characters of S1 being more endearing than any. Yes, even II, which I really have played an equivalent of twice, as opposed to multiple playthroughs of the first.

Rune of Illusion: I also enjoyed SIV. Sure, the characters weren't as fully developed (with the exception perhaps of Snowe), but it was still a solid, worthy addition to the series. Yay for pirates! :D

I think a lot of it might have to do with Suikoden fans having such high standards/expectations. Suikoden is really the only series I can say has consistently impressed me with each installment. And that's more than I can say for even the Final Fantasy series (remembers FFVIII, IX and X...and chooses to pretend X-2 never happened).

I do think people expect too much. But the Suikoden series in general is the most underappreciated series out there, and IV gets some horrible criticism that is, in my most humble opinion, undeserved.
Alcholism is a disease, but it's like the only disease that you can get yelled at for having. "Dammit, Otto, you're an alcoholic." "Dammit, Otto, you have lupus." One of those two doesn't sound right. --Mitch Hedberg
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Archer
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Post by Archer »

I wouldnt say its gone downhill but I think its definatley gotten up and moved over to another, slightly less passionate and endearing hill. The 108 stars are always going to be good as is the rune system and story of war that we all love. However, I think with the transistion to more realistic grounds and character designs, the ingame visuals are starting to seem tacky and less authentic. Suikoden 3 pulled it off well I think with really nice pale colourings and very asian and village like feel to it, same as the past two but Visually 4 was hideous and 5 was too blocky and dull.
The transition to 3D seems to be trying to follow in the footsteps of Final Fantasy. Make the characters look more human, add painfully high pitched american voice actors (to disrupt the smooth natural asian feel even more so) and sacrifice highly detailed attractive backgrounds for the more high tech yet bland visuals of the current times. However I dont blame them, these days the video game community scoff at anything that isn't 'z0MG t3h 13373sT GRAFIC Ev4r' and to produce a 2D game would cost them very dearly

Story wise, they all have the potential to be amazing games but I think some struggled. S3 was highly enjoyable but with such a long story line and view system it was difficult for them to develop certain characters and plot lines but I had high hopes. S4 had a great theory but character interaction and emotion was terribly poor and the epic battle between Lazlo's army and the Kulook seemed like a skirmish among two small groups of people. S5 visually was much nicer and a lot deeper. It was flawed, yes but it feels like they're back on track to picking the series up and making it a lot more wholesome and emotional. No video game is perfect but its hard to compete with the nostalgia and charm of the first 2. xD
Falenan_descent
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Post by Falenan_descent »

Okay, this is gonna be kept short and sweet.

Suikoden is and never will go downhill. If you hope to call yourself a 'True Suikoden Fan' then you will like every piece of merchandise they put out on the market. I don't care if you think SIV was crap. But, you know what? I liked it. It's a suikoden game. It's better than no suikoden game. In fact, if Konami ever EVER stops producing Suikoden games...I'll blame it on you! The Suikohater D:

You're all wannabes! The lot of ya! D:
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Archer
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Post by Archer »

Well thats a little unjust. Every game has good and bad aspects to them and to think something is perfect just means you're simply overlooking the bad factors. You're welcome to your opinion that Every game is a blessing but that doesnt make you any more of a Suikoden fan than any other member who posted on this topic. Everyone is here for a reason and that is because they are a fan of the game. I dont see anyone that would want to waste their precious time in this life 'trying' to be a fan for a game. If Konami stops producing them it will most likely be because of sales and funding, not the comments on this topic. A lot of people played 1 and 2 during the old school era (I'm one of them) and to some of us, they just dont make games like they used to. If someone wanted to say 4 was crap but 2 was their favourite game ever, I wouldn't doubt their devotion to Konami. I'd just say they were perceptive. xD
Falenan_descent
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Post by Falenan_descent »

The whole point is to love every game to the death so that Konami will continually produce Suikoden. If they stopped because people complained too much...I'd be pretty angry. Angry enough to cast a level 4 Pale Gate spell D:
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Archer
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Post by Archer »

^^ Dont worry, There is no way they would cancel it unless there was an actual problem. ie. The games were not selling. People can complain about flaws in the game as much as they like, they still bought it and they will still continue to buy it because they enjoyed that one game, two games or even the entire series. The fact that they even bother with a European release these days is proof enough that there is a point in them continuing the series and the creators seem to have plans well in to the future about where to take Suikoden. With the birth of PS3, gamers will be delighted to see a familiar face in an ocean of the millions of new games that will be thrown our way over the next couple of years.
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Iku
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Post by Iku »

inreally like three, im surprised is hated by some of you! it seemed to have everything, its probably my favourite game! but im not new to the series i was playing them when they first came out admitttly at 7 i didnt really get the storyline but i still loved them! their not going downhill their merely changing! the three perspectives were good and fun to play with, would i want them in anothr suikoden game? no! because that was what was unigue about that game and they did it well! for better or for worse s4 had a four member party, which i must admit anoyed me but i played through they game and i was fun and added with rapsodia its a great game! konami needs to change the lay out, change how the story is told and generally make each game unique yet at the same time fit in with the whole series!
wanting change doesnt make me less of a fan it just show that i dont want ther to be such a thing (as philweasel said) a generic suikoden! :o
'Believed the evidence of your own eyes, did ya? In a place like this?' Granny Weatherwax
sunstar25
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Post by sunstar25 »

I for one didn't like S3's trinity system and the Tenkai not being the hero. During War Battles, I tend to get whooped alot since all they do is just attack. But it had a decent story though.

S4 brought back the traditional silent Tenaki and introduced voice acting. It did bring back actual strategy in war battles rather than just send in your troops and duke it out. What really sent this one to Davy Jones is the time consuming sailing from one island to another and constantly getting boarded by sea creatures every three seconds. Not to mention that you're only limited to just four people in a party.

It sure wasn't a good idea for S4 to take place a century and a half before the others. One good thing about S4 is we get to play with the Soul Eater again.

S5 was a major improvement. I just wish it had more voice-over cutscenes.
Michael Easton
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Post by Michael Easton »

Having only played SI, SII, SIV and SV I'd probably say that the series is back on track after SIV*, which (to me) suffered from an uninteresting plot and a litany of gameplay problems that many others have voiced and I'll not bother repeating here.

As for SV I'd confidently say that a lot of the gameplay problems have been ironed out and the story was actually quite interesting - it kept me coming back for "one more play" at a time when I really should have been doing some course work. If Konami can create a story as interesting as SV then SVI could be something rather special.

[* I've got Tactics but I've never played it.]
LanceHeart
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Post by LanceHeart »

If anything, the formula that the older games used is basically impossible to do again. Seeing as how Suikoden 2 was an enhanced Suikoden gameplay-wise and with a different setting, I'm sure you can see why the two first games created a style that would become hard to enhance each and every time. I think the radical changes in S3 and S4 actually paved a way for S5.

Now that we're back to something similar, one must wonder if the next game can enhance what we've seen in the latest installment without erring too far on the side of "innovation".

After all, the industry has double standards all over the place: You can innovate, but not too much. You can keep a certain style, but don't stagnate (the MegaMan series comes to mind). If you have too much of either standard, you get hammered with unhappy fans. If you're able to balance both innovation and style preservation, you can make something both popular and fan-appealing.
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Rune of Illusion
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Post by Rune of Illusion »

I agree completely lanceheart.

and its just as unjust to say that they don't make games like Suikoden 1 and 2 as it is to say you must love any game Konami pumps out. to right off any game based solely on nostalgic quality is wrong period. Not that I am saying you do this Archer, its just that a lot of so called fans criticize for any little difference they find in the newer games whether its good or not all because the what happened previously in the older games.
you can learn more about a person in an hour of play than in a year of conversation.
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