Atlus Etrian Odyssey 4 demo up for US/Canada 3DS E-Shop Update: EU Release Confirmed!

[Jasede]

Yeah, well, your guess is as good as mine. We'll know for sure on the 28th.
And I'm in Land 4 ATM.

 

[Zboj Lamignat]

Or perhaps they will finally announce a precise release date for Eurofagistan

Also one change to EO that would bring incline is a better inventory system.

 

[Jasede]

The news and a leak are in-

It's a remake of EO 1 on the 3DS but in bad.

The latest issue of Japanese magazine Famitsu has confirmed a remake of the original Etrian Odyssey for Nintendo 3DS.
As translated by NeoGAF, the project will be fairly different to a straight remake, instead focusing more on the storyline and character development compared to previous dungeon crawlers. There'll be a main protagonist, unlike the original, who can be named with a full story and characters that can join your campaign. However these characters each have fixed classes instead of customisable party characteristics.
That said the overall story is based on Etrian Odyssey but with some changes - the main character meets a mysterious girl who's lost her memory this time round.
The game, titled Etrian Odyssey: Millennium Girl, is in development for Nintendo 3DS and expected to hit Japan on 27th June.

Spoiler

Gay. The appeal of these games is their solitude and subtlety, especially in 1.

 

[Zboj Lamignat]

Sounds like a pretty dumb idea.

 

[Humanity has risen!]

Mixing Etrian Odyssey with Persona really really is dumb. I only hope that this is a side story, and the main series will retain the same formula.

 

[evdk]

Mixing Etrian Odyssey with Persona really really is dumb. I only hope that this is a side story, and the main series will retain the same formula.

This might not necessarily help you. After all Persona is "just a side story" and I would wager it is more popular than main SMT games.

 

[deuxhero]

Bigger question: Did they nerf sleep gel and petaloids?

 

[Zboj Lamignat]

The EU release was just delayed till Summer

 

[Jasede]

Bigger question: Did they nerf sleep gel and petaloids?

This game is too easy if you played the other ones...

And if you didn't, well: I am watching my friend, new to EO, breeze through this. The only trouble he is experiencing is with the final dragon boss & the post-game dungeon level 2 due to the petaloid's evil cousin, the muskoid.

 

[deuxhero]

I was refering to the EO remake Jasede. In the first game your actual skill level meant shit against them, because their sleep rate and normal attack damage was high enough to kill everyone in the party on an ambush with no chance to do shit, and they came in pairs, just to make sure a lone waker couldn't run for it. Even a ranger with the "decrease ambush rate" passive doesn't do all that much, as it only takes a single one to wipe all your progress. I wouldn't hate that part of the game so much if there was any gear to reduce sleep chance at that point, but there isn't.

 

[Humanity has risen!]

Finally ordered this along with a pre-order for Devil Summoner.

 

[Jasede]

I was refering to the EO remake Jasede. In the first game your actual skill level meant shit against them, because their sleep rate and normal attack damage was high enough to kill everyone in the party on an ambush with no chance to do shit, and they came in pairs, just to make sure a lone waker couldn't run for it. Even a ranger with the "decrease ambush rate" passive doesn't do all that much, as it only takes a single one to wipe all your progress. I wouldn't hate that part of the game so much if there was any gear to reduce sleep chance at that point, but there isn't.

I don't remember having any problems with them. Were they only in the postgame?

 

[deuxhero]

Nope. Floor... 7 I think.

 

[Jasede]

Guess they never gave me problems, or I'd remember them.

 

[Humanity has risen!]

It's a fun game so far and it is quite polished, but at this point the formula is getting a bit stale and boring. This game somehow really bores me. Also, the bear FOEs who stalk you are an annoying gimmick.

It needs to follow a Might and Magic kind of open world for me to really be interested in this series again.

 

[Zboj Lamignat]

Sooo... this is finally coming to EU caliphate in a few days, they even uploaded a demo about a week ago. I'm still considering buying 3ds just to play this game. Did any of you guys finish it and have some more info/impressions to share?

I'm kinda worried that there won't be anything more for me to play after I'm done with EOIV. From what I gather the rpg front for 3ds apart from EOIV is:
- different SMT titles which I'm not interested in (tried many games from this universe, didn't really like any of them)
- the remake of EOI, which looks dumb as hell

Apart from that there is the new Fire Emblem game which looks potentially interesting, but I did try the FE game available for NDS and it was exactly the same as all other tactical jrpg I tried - got bored out of my mind after first few missions.

 

[deuxhero]

One piece of advice I'd give is that your party may work fine for random encounters, but hit a brick wall against bosses (I learned that the hard way. Every boss was a struggle for my protector/nightstalker/dancer runemaster/medic party. Needed to grind a few levels for every boss. Stopped 3/5 of the way through while I waited for AR code quests for my level to be released. I should go back to it now)

As for Fire Emblem, you played one of the worst (potentially worst if you excuse the original for creating the genre and having nothing to improve on) games in the Fire Emblem series (it's a near direct port of the first NES game with only the bare minimum of mechanic upgrades), don't let it reflect the rest of the series. At the bare minimum, the fan-translated sequel to that (it's a remake of the 3rd game in the series, which was already good, with far more than the bare minimum upgrades) or the 7th game ("Fire Emblem" in the west) should give a better impession.

 

[Hobo Elf]

My impressions of the EO4 demo is that it's a great game now. I have EO2 but could not get into it. It just felt so shitty. I don't know what exactly it is about EO4 but it certainly feels and plays much better. Feels less grindy even though it's still a very grindy game by nature. I guess maybe the best thing about EO4 is that so far all the skills I tried felt useful, whereas in EO2 there were many skills to choose from and there was a high chance that what you would train ended up being shitty and useless. Take the Hexer's Poison for example. Very, very powerful spell, but virtually useless until you max it out. This doesn't seem to be the problem with any of the skills in EO4. Respecing is more reasonable now as well in case you feel like you goofed up your character. Losing 10 levels for a respec was too steep and only added in more banal grind because you accidentally specced crappy skills. I think EO4 sets you back by only 2 levels now so I feel more inclinied to experiment with all the skills. It's definitely a Day 1 purchase for me.

 

[Zboj Lamignat]

Well, EO I-III where pretty infuriating without skill calculator so I don't blame you for ragequitting if you tried playing without them

 

[evdk]

I wonder if we get some super cool promo for owning FE.

Spoiler

HAHAHAHAHA, yeah, right

 

[grudgebringer]

It's coming

 

[Zboj Lamignat]

I played the demo yesterday, it's still same old Etrian Odyssey, which is mostly incline, but also a bit of decline since I would really like to see a developed inventory system with paperdolls, more slots and more unique special items. Some more character development options would be nice as well.

Graphics were an unpleasant surprise. The 3d monsters are ok, because they look less pokemon, but the game is basically EOIII graphic wise. I'd even say it looks a bit worse due to the bigger screen (3ds xl) which is pretty shocking considering it's on the latest generation of the hardware.

Difficulty seems ok, you can still die in the very first dungeon if you're not careful and FOEs are as rapethirsty as ever.

The biggest incline over EOIII is that there are no more "lololo sucky" skills for classes, at least they're definitely less "lololo sucky" now and characters are easier to respec as well. I'm not sure about dividing the skills into tiers hardlocked before reaching certain level though. Waiting more than 40 levels for some skills will probably result in some extreme boring skill points hoarding for optimal builds.

I rolled protector/landsknecht/nightseeker/medic/sniper:

Protector - same old protector, you will die wthout one. Seems that later on he has a skill that works like a bodyguard, but for entire party... hardcore or what.
Landsknecht - in the demo he seems like the most useful class. Good in both offence and defence. Has a skill that makes him go first and he gives passive dmg bonus to whole party against a creature he strikes in the given round so he's probably the most vital against FOEs and bosses. Didn't manage to experminet with the link skills.
Nightseeker - a mix between ninja and shogun from EOIII and overall rather meh. Poor defense and hp, seems to depend heavily on status effects which was always a bad idea in EO games.
Medic - medic is medic, they now have a passive skill that is available from the get go and cures a fixed amount of hp for entire party after the batlle. It seems incredibly effective early on as I put 3-4 points there and used normal healing skill maybe on or two times through the entire demo.
Sniper - on one hand he seems to be heavily dependant on binds so see Nightseeker. On the other he is a ranged attacker which I assume are now more important because mob use rows as well. Also his skills can crit so I guess he can be some serious dmg dealer later on.

tl;dr: Japanese moonpeople are still the best at western rpgs in this century

 

[TigerKnee]

EO4 is more polished, but I think EO3 was more interesting overall than 4.

Might be mostly because of 3's original class design for me though (as opposed to 1/2/4 which are basically standard RPG classes).

And there are some things I hope would get fixed but still isn't, such as most of the forge options being of questionable usage.

Don't know how I'm going to feel about the new EO coming up.

 

[evdk]

Don't know how I'm going to feel about the new EO coming up.

Obviously the only thing EO is missing is a story.

 

[Hobo Elf]

Just got home while making a little detour through Gamestop. Managed to get the ONLY copy of EO4 that they had, apparently, ordered in the whole city. Only reason I even went there is because the store I pre-ordered the game from didn't get the game today for some reason. I swear though I saw the biggest turbo nerd in my entire life while waiting in line to ask the clerk if they had EO4 in stock. A mildly obese dude with long greasy hair, a fedora and a walking stick and Gary Oldman circa Dracula sunglasses in front of me was pre ordering GTAV. The most interesting part was that his first name was Pharaoh. Jesus. I'm not even making this up. I'm off to enjoy my weekend now with EO4.