Anybody played this? Made by Atlus.
Granted, the graphics are not top-notch, the voices can be pretty annoying, and the techniques/magic look like a paint store blew up in the middle of a clown festival; still a pretty good game. I like it, at least.
Anyone else tried?
I love this game to death, but I can’t seem to reach the 100+ levels without falling to crushing boredom. 
:hahaha;
I have Larharl, Etna, Flonne, Marjoly, and Priere up in the early 3000’s to the late 5000’s, and Larharl has near 2 million HP. Towards the end of the game, it gets much easier. You just have to find the right places to level up.
What are they?
FYI Disagea was made by Nippon Ichi. Atlus published it in the U.S.
points to sig and title
As to levelling up, here’s two words: “Item Worlds”
I beat the game awhile ago and I’m working on Phantom Brave now. I got all the secret characters and defeated Baal in his original form. I could beat him as a Prinny and I wanted to start Phantom Brave so I just finished the game then.
If you have strong weapons, go to the Cave of Ordeals. The third area has a bunch of those space monsters, and any strong 3x3 attack can take them out. At their highest level (790) a level 1000 character can still increase their own levels by around 5-15 levels per stage.
NEVER underestimate the power of stealing. Even high-level normal characters/monsters can steal with a MAX of 50% accuracy. Steal Prinny suits from Baal, and high level weapons like the Yoshitsuna, Omniscient Staff, and the GodHand from from item gods in the item world.
What he said. Cave of Ordeals 3. Get Laharl with a decent sword and Winged Slayer and it’s cake. But keep some weaker big-area attacks handy for leveling up weaker characters or ones that can’t multi-target, like Axe and Gun users.
BTW, Nippon Ichi has a US branch now, <A HREF=“http://www.nisamerica.com/”>complete with onilne store</A>.
Because I am probably the only one who thinks so, I’m going to post my negative opinion of the game here.
Disgaea is an absurdly mediocre game with a crazy fanatical niche following. Seriously, what on EARTH is so good about this game? I still haven’t figured it out.
Let’s look at everything individually…
Graphics: No one will argue this. They’re plain. They’re nothing special. In fact, what makes them even worse is that they’re sort of crappier-looking versions of La Pucelle sprites. In fact, some of the sprites were re-used, if I remember correctly. While this is no indicator of whether the game will be good or not, it’s still the truth. Nothing special here.
Music: A few songs stand out in their originality. I will give the game its credit there; however, there are just as many equally boring songs, too. Nothing to write home about.
Story: You’re the Prince of the Underworld, and you’ve been woken up after god knows how long because your dad died and you need to make a name for yourself and claim the kingdom. Okay, so the truth is, that’s not supposed to be the big deal. The big deal in the story is supposed to be the zany, crazy humour, which mimics anime humour and pokes fun at American cartoons. Quite frankly, I am NOT a big fan of anime, and so my laughs were far and few between. The game DID get a lot funnier when Captain Gordon and Co. joined the group, because that’s when the poke-fun-at-American-cartoons part started up, but all the anime humour was just like every other anime’s humour I’ve ever seen; to put it bluntly, not funny. Laharl is about the only exception, as he pretty much carries the game’s humour for the majority of it. But all of the other main characters are dull and boring.
Gameplay: I believe the tagline of Disgaea was something like “Strategy RPGs are about to recieve a kick in the ass.” What was it? Something like that. You get the idea. Well, all I have to say to that is: tee hee. This game gave SRPGs a stamp on the foot, if anything. There’s plenty of neat things in this game; tons of side quests, job classes, and these neat things called Geo Panels which induce certain effects on units standing on certain spots of the map. Sounds great, right? Well, don’t get your hopes up too much. Here’s why.
Tons of side quests – Totally a niche thing. If you’re into the MAIN game, you’re gonna be severely dissapointed, cos this is the majority of the game. If you talk to most Disgaea fanatics, they love the game and are always just level crunching and doing sidequests. You seldom hear about the actual GAME part of the game - you know, with the dialogue, and the characters, and the GAME? Yeah. So, this alienates anyone who doesn’t have the time or care to level up to level 5734895734895 to fight some fucking side quest battle, when you can beat the game with way, way (and I mean WAY) lower levels.
Tons of job classes – Wow, and you can even recruit monsters! Sounds cool right? Nah. You don’t need any of that. I beat the game with three people: Laharl, Etna (Both of which do not HAVE job classes), and a Cleric (Healer). Laharl was at level 96, Etna at 64, and the Cleric was in her late level 20’s. As you can see, this is nowhere NEAR the level million-trillion-billions that you need for some of those sidequests. A lot of the harder battles, I did with ONLY Laharl, anyways; I almost never needed that Cleric. So, basically, I beat the game with mostly two people with no job classes at all (Cleric is the PRIMARY healer class, btw). Why are there even job classes if you don’t need them? Why would you level up a shitload if you can beat the last fight with one Lv 96 character? What’s the point?
Geo Panels – This sounds fun, right? Well, it kind of is…it could have been a LOT better. Geo Panels take certain squares on the map and effect them in certain ways…some spots might heal you or harm you, some might be impassable, boost all enemy stats, or even grant invincibility! The problem is, Geo Panels aren’t really used in creative ways. There are only two hard fights in the game that I can remember, and both of them are maps where the entire map was affected by enemy boost panels that are across the map. So, what’s the trick to beating these? Well, in Disgaea, you can use your party members to pick up and throw other party members. SO, you just figure out a way to use throwing to get your better party members across the map and destroy them. This takes, at most, 3-4 trial-and-error processes, and then the map is all yours. Not all that hard.
So what are you left with? You’re left with a game that caters to level crunching goons that don’t have much better to do than sit around and level up for hours on end. IF THIS IS WHAT YOU LIKE, DISGAEA IS THE GAME FOR YOU! If you want a real fucking game, don’t play it. Even if you are one of those people that plays Disgaea for 25 hours a day, heed this advice - Go ride a bike. Go flirt with a chick. Go play a BETTER game. Take up a cool hobby like salsa dancing or bowling…Just stop playing this game so damn much. 
Imagine if Sephiroth was a small, spiteful, blue-haired, emaciated, half-naked child. Now, when he summons Meteor, instead of sitting around waiting for it to hit, he jumps on top of it and rides it down onto Cloud & Co., laughing all the way.
Say hello to Disgaea.
Letsee…I have Laharl around level 900 or so, but I just kind of lost interest once I realized how long it would take to get him into the high thousands, to get a good team of Majin going, and that I’d have to pass level-lowering legislation to get to the bottom of the item worlds I needed to. I finished the game, though, and wish I could see every ending.
You make alot of good points, but that was a wee bit harsh towards the end. Yes, RPGers, 99.9% of the people on this forum I think, are known for giving insane amounts of time on an RPG. This game beats almost all other RPGs, hands down, in that catagory.
Satisfaction, I say, in the game comes from those giant numbers you stats can go up to (the MAX is 9999999, I think. 99999999 for HP and MP).
The controls are fairly easy to understand, allowing novice players to pick it up and play with little or no difficulty.
Big selling point: Multiple endings. This game has about 8 or so. Granted, a few are just subtle differences from each other, but there are several that are completely different.
Another big hit on this game is customization. Any character can equip any weapon/armor. All characters can use stealing items. Nearly 100 different classes to choose from: Archers, Knights, Majins, Wizards, etc. You name a class, the game probably has it. If you like sifting through hundreds of combinations and tactics, this is the game for you.
Replay value goes with customization, here. Endless amounts of combinations could be used. From challanging, to super easy.
Dood?! Where can I level up resonbly Quickly for my “new” members of Capt. Gordon and Co. for Movement Tech for 10-1(?)?
BN
Isn’t that a bit excessive even for RPGs?
I thought so, too. The usual 9999 or 999 would have been fine, but you have to facter in that most of the game is in that ‘way-out-there’ situation.
As for the Captain, Jennifer, and Thursday, go to where you faught them: The Stellar Graveyard. Go to the stage again, and you will see one of those space monsters. Might take a few turns to beat him, but just make sure the person you want to level-up does the final blow. Long range attacks work best. Use a gun with Gordan, Jennifer’s fists, and Thursday’s strong techniques.
Actually, you might want to use an axe with Gordon. He has an S in axes, and his ultimate technique, Gordon Blitz, is Str-dependant. I used guns with him, so I wouldn’t know, but I hear that Gordon Blitz does insane damage if you level Gordon with an Axe.
Also, Calamity Drive absolutely rocks. That just needed to be said.
Bah! That’s nothing! In Phantom Brave, stats can go into the MILLIONS!
I agree that all Nippon Ichi games are really just giant level fests, by I LIKE level fests. Therefore, I am one of those niche gamers you are talking about.
The games aren’t for everyone, just like any other game. I just really enjoy what others consider repetitive levelling sprees.
As for the story, Disgaea’s isn’t anything to go nuts about. However, it’s lighthearted feel and funny paradies are enjoyable. Although, I did want to punch Gordon’s light out after his second “Defender of Earth” speech. Flonne and Etna will always be two of my favorite female support cast characters.
I like Etna’s “Next Episode” V/O my self, Partulally when other characters are talking as well.
Big Nutter
Like the one where she is talking to General Carter about their mass weapons.
Etna “Our ultimate weapon: Love Freak Flonne! Her ideas of love and peace will pound you into submission.”
GCarter “Ugh, how dreadful.”
I’ll have to say that you’re making an unbased claim about the users in this forum. I’ve met quite a few of them personally, and almost all of them I’ve met are just normal people who HAPPEN to like video games, and RPGs. They’re not people who spend all their leisure time playing RPGs. For that reason, I still think that the whole level crunching stuff is really lame for any casual gamer.
I would say the multiple endings would be the selling point of the game, but it really isn’t what the selling point of the game was. It was supposed to be the customization, originality, and the level crunching (strangely enough). But, the customization and originality of a TACTICS RPG don’t matter much unless you have to actually use TACTICS. Like I mentioned before, why even USE job classes if you can just use Laharl and kill every enemy in one shot?
I still stand by my original stance that Disgaea is pointed at a very specific target audience, that being an audience that wants to spend several hours just messing around with inane options and leveling up. You could always level up in a DIFFERENT game, or maybe a game where it’s a necesity…but no. Fanatics choose Disgaea.
I like it since it was final fantasy tactics with a little more shine. The graphics were very pretty for 2d (had that painted feel) and all the skills were fun to watch. I just beat the game once though and I didn’t get my levels into the 100s.