I don't like consoles or the sort of games they have produced. I hate really bad console ports that can often ruin an otherwise decent game (looking at Dark Souls). I also hate how so many game companies and developers have given PC development the 'push of a ledge' and decided to concentrate on X Box or whatever. I hate how due to the 'consolisation' of American Football and Golf, I can't get a decent one of these on my PC. Looking at Electronic Arts now.
Part of the reason why I even have a PC was due to wanting to get hold of "Links: Golf".
I can't remember why I got Final Fantasy VII - probably on the strength of a magazine review. So I bought it - played it - quite loved it. Tried to teach my kids how to play it and failed. Understood the meaning of JRPG.
And forever since, I have absolutely failed to find anything similar. ABSOLUTELY FAILED. I banished the FF7 CDs to the place under the stairs which my wife then springs cleans and chucks everything away. Time passed.
Time passed. Grey hair turned to no hair at all. Kids became teens. Then Square Enix decided to release an "enhanced" version of FF7 as a digital download - no bloody CDs anymore. I bought it, played it - loved it all over again. That lovely melodic music. The development of the characters. For once, the back story, side story, actual game story was quite interesting. Where I hated all that stuff in Baldurs Gate and Mass Effect, I just liked how it was done in FF7. Maybe music makes a big difference in the emotional connection in games. I don't know. I think one of the FF7 tunes appears in Lords of Xulima for goodness sake!
So, before the days that Steam developed Tags, I bought a little game called "Recettear: An Item Shop's Tale" because it had decent reviews. I was hoping it was similar to FF7 - but this is what I got instead.
Before I go on and lose my respect - I need to remind you that this particular game is on Felipepepe list of games - and you guys posted about it here - four years before I joined the Codex. So - if you say this game don't belong here - look at yourselves. Saying that, in preparation, I played 40+ hours of Lords of Xulima and tried the Fallout New Vegas hard-core mode. I still know about RPGs. I have my mojo.
Imagine if the Disney Channel, Peter Pan and The Sims developed a game about opening a little shop, for little girls. For little girls that talk to fairies and wear pink and giggle a lot.
Recettear is the first ever Indy Japanese game to appear on Steam. A bunch of guys who had met on the Something Awful forums wanted to have a go and translate the game for an English speaking audience. It took them, Carpe Fulgur, 8 months to complete the translation and they needed to sell about 10,000 sales to break even. The game has now sold over 300,000 units in English. It has an 82 (professional reviews) to 8.6 average on Metacritic.
You play a young teen girl called Recette Lemongrass that needs to pay off her dad's debts to HSBC by opening a little shop in town that caters for the local people, including the adventurers guild.
Apparently 'dad' disappeared after a tragic fight with a dragon in the middle of a volcano and has not appeared the next morning to make breakfast pancakes. If the bank does not get its money back they will turf you out and sell your home. The story is explained via a "She said, she said" back and forth - similar to any early JRPG on console. The talking character appears prominently on screen and a little bubble appears with speech. The other main character involved is a Fairy character "Tear" that acts as your financial adviser and confidante. Tear does contract work for the bank. In the opening sequences she explains how to buy low and sell high, how to explore the little town and how to place items in your shop.
Although the text is now mainly English - a lot of the speech remains in its original Japanese form which is quite interesting to hear. It could almost be a Learn Basic Japanese phrases game. Whilst playing the game, Mrs Azlan burst into the room as the Japanese sounded to her a bit like our little baby nephew's baby speech. Later on she asked me to turn all that down as it was grating her nerves. I didn't mind so much.
The game could almost be a Primary School business educational software piece. As well as the concept of marking up sales of 30%, the concepts of time management and also repayment of bank loans appears. For example, each day is separated into four equal 'chunks' of time so you can do a bit of planning ahead. A trip to the town to purchase goods and visit the Square, Tavern and Chapel take a full turn. So your characters realises to save time it is best to do all town activities in one go - using only one turn. A calendar can also be produced that marks up the dreaded repayment day and outlines your outstanding amount. The storyline and various interactions are done in a light hearted manner and can be quite humorous. In the same way, for example, some of the jokes on The Simpsons will only be appreciated by adults.
In town you can buy food items, treasure, bracelets, hats, books, armour, swords etc. So we have loot and money. Your character can also level their "Merchant skills" up and achieve new abilities the higher that goes. At level 3 you can accept orders from customers. At level 5 you can 'fuse' items together to create advanced more expensive items.
A lot of time is spent in your shop. You choose where to place items and can haggle with customers that come in and want to buy.
Your customers. On first look they are bland 'old man', 'young girl' type. But, as in a lot of this game, there are hidden depths and complexities. The little girl only has pocket money so will get offended and walk out if you try and haggle too high. She likes to buy sweets and books. If she wants to put in an order for some hats, make sure you get the cheaper ones as her budget won't stretch to the more expensive versions. You also have the Rich Pensioner, Housewife and Young Man that appear every now again.
Your customers have their own levels and the trick is to make them happy with decent value purchases which in turn gives them more money to spend in your shop. You should learn that a mark-up of 10% will give you immense rewards. You should realise a mark-up of 10% turns out to be a 40% profit as you never buy items at 100% cost in any case. The Housewife has an initial budget of £3,000 but this can turn to a budget of £300,000 when she is fully levelled up.
We also have dungeons. These play out like a very simple console rogue game. You accompany an "Adventurer" into the dungeon and control their actions. They can melee attack monsters and gather treasure. On defeat monsters break up into little 'lego type pieces' that home in and get absorbed by your adventurer. The dungeons get harder as you progress. You can also meet other adventurers in the guild as well. Each has its own strength and weaknesses. Both main characters appear in some sort of 'bubble' in the dungeon and are protected. Items found in dungeons can be sold for total profit and some items are very rare and valuable.
Every now and again we get a newsflash that appears mysteriously over the town informing everybody that the market in trinkets has crashed or something similar. I am not sure if these incidents are fixed in time as pre knowledge of these could allow you to stock up on items that suddenly become very valuable.
So, in summary, visit the town and dungeon to acquire items. Place some of them in your shop and sell what you can. Level up. It is JRPG and looks a bit anime. There are some hidden complexities in the game. For example, some customers will only appear in your shop if it looks different. You can do that by changing the wallpaper and floor tiles. (Yes, pay attention, I did say it was like The Sims: Barbie shop edition).
Rinse. Repeat. Meet some other fairies. Level up.
In reality - I am having a bit of difficulty in recognising this one as a RPG or even JRPG. I hope there are much better ones available.
The most nifty bit is the "Cha -ching" sound accompanying every sale with the text "Capitalism, Ho!" appearing during the haggling process. I am beginning to think people who have found this game fun have found this particular sound addictive. There is definitely the "one more day of shopping" effect in play here. Similar to the way I play Diablo clones Titan Quest or Torchlight to get that next level up or find that slightly better weapon. Without that sound the game could be seen as very bland and boring. Extremely limited.
The writing is very good and fun but slightly too long. The translators did an excellent job. Thankfully there is an option to Escape out of it.
The game can be difficult if you are not very good at games, or very smart. I had a problem meeting the first milestone twice as I invested a lot of my funds in a Treasure Item that cost more than 4,000. Money invested in an item that is not moving is not making you anything. As I learned as an Eve Online trader for a long time, millions of items making a 10% profit can add up. The game has a decent Save Game feature and if like me you fail miserably, the game does not end but back tracks to an earlier time where you lose some progress but keep others.
Maybe another day or so but this one will have to be deleted soon. At least it has opened the door for other JRPGs like the beloved FF7!
Will post some pictures soon!
