Post subject: Re: Tactics Ogre
Joined: 1/14/2005
Posts: 216
Dromiceius wrote:
It would seem an interesting game from a TAS point of view, considering all the variables and options that are possible. Right from the start, an informed player can customize the player-character to be an ideal fighter or wizard, etc.
While Tactics Ogre is my favorite TRPG, personally I can't stand watching TAS's or console speedruns of TRPGs. From what I gather this is just me though.
Dromiceius wrote:
The game is Japanese only, and there seem to be similar games in progress for the GBA that are not Japanese, so this probably won't take off... but I still wanted to at least put the idea forward.
I think this game is a lot better than the GBA TO and FFT though.
Phil wrote:
The game is in japanese and imo, we should wait some PS emu with rerecording and use the US version. The music sounds better and graphically a little better. Plus, text is understandable.
How would rerecording work with load times on a PS emu? If it plays like on the console, I would rather see the SFC version since the load times are much better.
Dromiceius wrote:
I started a rough draft-I have no idea what the birthday thing is for.
IIRC, birthday is mostly unimportant. You can get presents for important birthdays I think.
Dromiceius wrote:
-Fire element seemed a safe choice; I'll probably want a fire element wizard who can burn grass to find hidden treasure, and if most of my team is fire elemental, I can use the "witch trick" later on.
What is the "witch trick" you are talking about? If it's the pump element spells, you can do that with any element of course, and water and wind are better so you can abuse storms. One time I played through the game with all wind element people and abused the wind buff as well as the storm spell. (I remember being able to affect characters' elements somewhat, so I agree with Boco.) Not sure it would be a good idea for a TAS though.
Boco wrote:
For females, Archer is the best Job in the game, by far. It might also be nice to have a Witch in order to paralyse opponents, in which case she should be trained as an Archer as much as possible (spell hit percentage is based on DEX). Aloser, the best unit in the entire game, makes a rather wonderful witch, if you don't want to train one up from scratch, thanks to her advancing from level 1 as Archer (rather than 5 or 6).
Archers are the best commonly attainable unit in the game period, IIRC. Paralyzing has the benefit of saving time by preventing enemies from moving, good idea. Also Aloser has the funniest name I've ever seen in a game. Funny because she is in fact not a loser in battle. One idea is that persuasion can be faster and more useful than outright killing. This is all I have for now, sorry I can't be of more help.
"I think happiness is just being able to loaf without stress." http://speeddemosarchive.com/
Joined: 4/29/2005
Posts: 1212
I only really have one question. Is this game in the same series as Ogre Battle? I'd really like to see a TAS of Ogre Battle too some time, hehe. ;3 I think I already saw the rough draft for this, but I can't remember, so I think I'll watch it again. ;3 EDIT: Ah yes, I have. But I must say, looks great for just a Rough Draft. ;3
Former player
Joined: 3/30/2004
Posts: 1354
Location: Heather's imagination
Kitsune wrote:
Is this game in the same series as Ogre Battle?
Yes. The first Ogre Battle game, March of the Black Queen, is Episode V of the Ogre Battle Saga. This game, Let Us Cling Together, is Episode VII, and shares a few of the same characters.
someone is out there who will like you. take off your mask so they can find you faster. I support the new Nekketsu Kouha Kunio-kun.
Joined: 10/3/2005
Posts: 1332
It took an hour, but I got a workable SNES-disassembler. Now I just need to review some documentation and then I can set to work on figuring out the AI and RNG.
shallow wrote:
the only good class with L ali. is Sword Master, and I don't think it'll be worth it. Although he can attack twice, he'll also take a lot of damage.
Right. Chaotic is probably the way to go for pretty much everyone. Having a ninja seems wise, as well. I can snag two matou claws before chapter 3, they dodge like crazy, and apparently dish it out too, when they get around level 25... of course, that's immaterial, since I don't know if any of my characters are actually going to get to such a high level, even by the end of the game.
Boco wrote:
I think Beastmasters are better than Berserkers in every way, and should be used exclusively until Terror Knights are available.
How do you mean, exactly? Stat growth, or is it just their ability to use whips?
Boco wrote:
Aloser, the best unit in the entire game, makes a rather wonderful witch, if you don't want to train one up from scratch, thanks to her advancing from level 1 as Archer (rather than 5 or 6).
Yes... I remember deciding awhile ago that I would be recruiting her for that strategy (and, of course, so that I could mention in the commentary that "I just recruited a loser into the battalion." and "the end boss was just killed by a loser!") I still don't fully understand how the witch trick/elemental boosting works. It would seem that I should have Aloser and most of my team as wind elementals, so the stat-bonuses would stack up mightily, especially during a storm... assuming that's how the bonuses actually work, of course. As for the misc. classes... I was half-hoping to pick up a dragon, because, come on- it's a freaking dragon. Probably a bad idea, since they're slow, and probably not all good enough in battle to compensate. Though I did read that a certain kind of upgraded dragon could be handy as a tank. Going out of my way to pick up a lizardman seems like a poor investment, and hawkmen I'd probably want to put in high places and arm with bows, but I'll have plenty of archers for that, so there's probably no need... the mechanics guide on Gamefaqs suggests they make alright melee fighters, favoring axes. That would leave them outclassed by berzerkers, but they can fly... Then again, I Canopus is probably enough. I was also thinking it would be good to have a ghost. There are only a handful of enemies who can Exorcise them, and they can teleport, so I can have them muck with the enemy AI. What do you guys think?
Boco wrote:
March of the Black Queen, is Episode V of the Ogre Battle Saga. This game, Let Us Cling Together, is Episode VII,
Just out of curiosity, what are the first four Episodes? Novels? I googled, but they don't seem to even exist.
Enhasa wrote:
One idea is that persuasion can be faster and more useful than outright killing. This is all I have for now, sorry I can't be of more help.
Yes... that's good entertainment value, too. Which also reminds me that it may behoove me to employ a lawful/wrong element soldier as cannon fodder from time to time... Thanks for your support, everyone.
Former player
Joined: 3/30/2004
Posts: 1354
Location: Heather's imagination
Using a favored weapon only gives you a +3 bonus, and you already get a -3 penalty for being in the wrong weather or stepping on the wrong tile - I don't think it's that significant. (meanwhile Archers have a +2 vs everyone for no apparent reason in everything). Beastmasters do more damage, take less damage, and take more turns than Berserkers.. but really most of your army should be Archers with a few other people just for finishing people off. Attack+ is nice, BUT the two attacks only do 70% damage and the second attack is always to the front (so it does even less and it's easier to dodge too). L-size units are entirely worthless in this game.
someone is out there who will like you. take off your mask so they can find you faster. I support the new Nekketsu Kouha Kunio-kun.
Joined: 1/14/2005
Posts: 216
Dromiceius wrote:
Just out of curiosity, what are the first four Episodes? Novels? I googled, but they don't seem to even exist.
They don't exist. OB was originally planned as an 8 part series. The first was Ogre Battle (ep5), then Tactics Ogre (ep7), Ogre Battle 64 (ep6). The Saturn OB and GBA TO are gaidens. I'll assume you know about the Queen references in the titles, and how the FFT series is historically related through OB series creator Matsuno. What I haven't seen people realize yet is that the OB series is dead for all intents and purposes. Square Enix bought the rights to the series (and later all of Quest, the developers), but they never did anything with it, being more keen on pushing their FFT series. Matsuno left SE recently, so I think it's pretty much over and we will never see the series to completion.
"I think happiness is just being able to loaf without stress." http://speeddemosarchive.com/
Former player
Joined: 3/30/2004
Posts: 1354
Location: Heather's imagination
Yazz Matsuno didn't even have anything to do with OB64, KoL, or Prince of Zenobia (which is NGPC, not Saturn). And yeah, he left Squenix after he got too sick to work on FF12, and now he's developing games for the Wii but we don't know who he works for yet. Squenix might still continue the Ogre series but I think Ogre and FF merged a while ago. EDIT: Also, Square bought Quest after TO, and had them make FFT, then Vagrant Story, etc. So that happened before PoLC and KoL and PoZ too.
someone is out there who will like you. take off your mask so they can find you faster. I support the new Nekketsu Kouha Kunio-kun.
Joined: 1/14/2005
Posts: 216
Yes I slipped up, the Saturn OB and TO are just ports of the originals. Poor SNK, I don't think the NGPC did very well. I think we might be saying the same thing (I tried to keep things simple for Dromiceius), but this is what I remember, in detail. I'm pretty sure it's more or less correct since OB is a favorite series of mine. I'm going to leave out the ports (Artdink did the PS1 ones, with Atlus localizing): Quest makes OB for SFC Quest makes TO:LUCT for SFC Matsuno and others from Quest get hired away to form a team at Square Matsuno et al makes FFT for PS1 Quest makes OB64 for N64 Matsuno et al makes Vagrant Story for PS1 Quest makes a OB gaiden (haven't played it, that's all I know) for NGPC Quest makes TO:KOL for GBA Square obtains rights to Ogre Battle franchise from Quest Square buys out Quest Matsuno et al makes FFTA for GBA (don't know if Quest was reunited during this project or afterwards, but the acquisition is during development... I'd guess afterwards) Square merges/is bought by Enix Matsuno et al and some mostly FF9 people (of course nothing with these teams is 1-1) make FF12 for PS2, with Matsuno co-directing and quitting during development Matsuno leaves SE, later says he would like to develop for Wii I think the rest of Quest stays and works on FFT, currently their flagship TRPG series. SE is amassing their armies for 3 (!) FF13 games, but I don't think the Quest people are working on that. Personally, now that Matsuno is gone, tri-Crescendo's first solo game is going to be published by Namco on 360, and tri-Ace's next game is going to be published by MS on 360 (I have a gut feeling this move is going to be permanent), I could give a rat's ass about SE now. Even though Square merged with Enix, bought Quest, then Game Arts, then Taito, and maybe some I forget, I don't care about any of their franchises anymore, which is liberating in a way. This is just a personal thing, certainly not something I would push on others. Edit: The precise reason why I think OB is dead is because it's Matsuno's baby, and since SE owns the rights, it wouldn't be easy for him to make a new game. And I don't even think he wants to since the last OB game he worked on was TO:LUCT. On SE's side, they own the rights to OB, but it and FFT share the same niche. Since FFT is a lot more famous by now, and everything with FF in the name sells a lot better anyway, I think any TRPG they make from now on in that vein (as opposed to a Front Mission type TRPG), will just be FFT. Also, out of courtesy, they would probably want to get Matsuno's approval to continue OB, and there's no reason to bother with that either. I could say what I think about Lufia, Lunar, or Grandia, but that's another topic.
"I think happiness is just being able to loaf without stress." http://speeddemosarchive.com/
Joined: 10/16/2006
Posts: 174
I heard a while back that he really wanted to make more on the series, though the person I heard it from never gave a source.
Joined: 10/3/2005
Posts: 1332
Zomg. FFT on SDA. Just as a bit of an update, I've been playing around with ZSNES and Geiger's debugger Snes9x a little bit this week. I looked into the address of the first inquisition question to try and get a sense of how the game uses it later on, for NPC elements and whatnot. Still haven't done a proper disassembly, but saturday is right around the corner...
Joined: 8/1/2006
Posts: 428
I just recalled a strategy I used on the GBA version. I completed the first mission normally, then ran a quick mismatched multiplayer battle, in which I lost on turn 1. From this I won a power-72 weapon. This allowed one of my heros to OHKO anything in the first five or six missions, saving more than enough time to make it worthwhile. Such a tactic is probably not allowed on this site, but there may be something similar available.
Trying 127.0.0.1... telnet: connect to address 127.0.0.1: Connection refused telnet: Unable to connect to remote host
Former player
Joined: 3/30/2004
Posts: 1354
Location: Heather's imagination
The GBA game completely isn't the same game. There's no like system here, training doesn't give you items.
someone is out there who will like you. take off your mask so they can find you faster. I support the new Nekketsu Kouha Kunio-kun.
Joined: 10/3/2005
Posts: 1332
Hmm... So I guess the random battles would never leave an item of that quality?
Joined: 10/16/2006
Posts: 174
I apologize for bringing up such an old topic, but I was looking through all my TAS movies, and I got back around to this one. It must be because I'm a pretty hard TO fan, but even though it was only two battles, I could really tell this run would be entertaining. I know I've offered a little help before, but now I'm off for the summer and though I probably couldn't help with the run itself, I could probably help with any info you need or if you get stuck somewhere. So I was just wondering, are you still working on this? Or have plans to?
Joined: 10/3/2005
Posts: 1332
I haven't forgotten about this. TO was actually the original inspiration for the thread about botting I made in the TAS Labs section a few months ago. Not sure how good TO would be for botting, but I'd rather try that approach (assuming I ever get my hands on some decent hardware) rather than run the entire thing by hand. Any info you could give would be of great help, methinks. Reason being, the purpose of the bot would be to decide where to move and what/when to attack, but things like which items need to drop from certain enemies, buying stuff, managing equipment- that stuff is going to take a lot of know-how about actually playing through the game, and not random guessing. I actually got a new job lined up this morning, so if no one else picks this project up in the meantime... *crosses fingers*
Joined: 10/16/2006
Posts: 174
I see. Guess I asked just a little bit too late. But I went to your other topic and the Warbot seems like an interesting idea. Either way it doesn't matter; I am not savvy on TAS'ing and no others seem interested in running it (probably because they'd want the Warbot first, and understandably so), so it doesn't look like TO will be worked on for quite a long time. How disappointing. :/