Seems like Capcom has pretty much given up of the Breath of Fire series. It’s a sad day for a lot of people.
It’s not completely gone for good, but the future doesn’t seem too bright for it.
Still, it kinda sucks, considering it had some pretty good games.
I blame BoF4, and the bunch of sniveling punks who cried foul when BoF5 did cool, groundbreaking things to the genre, but sold poorly because they wanted 100 dragon transformations and at least sixteen playable characters.
Still, the news that they’re ending BoF doesn’t bother me so much as what the implications of those statements are - Inafune basically said “We’re probably not going to make an RPG”, which sucks, because I don’t care of the BoF name is on the product, the ideas seen in Dragon Quarter were absolutely genius, and it wouldn’t take a lot of refining to perfect them. But seriously? Screw Breath of Fire - there were only like two good games in the whole series, and the ones that were bad were B-A-D.
BoF5 didn’t do badly because it had groundbreaking stuff. It did badly because it did the groundbreaking stuff badly. I think we’ve had this discussion about fifteen times already though. 8p
Personally I’m not sad to see them go. They had some neat ideas and the worlds/characters were cool, but none of the games really got above mediocre in terms of story or gameplay.
I agree with Cid. I also believe that the BoF series was not very good so this is good. The RPG genre needs to grow and mature. As it stands, classical RPGs are almost inexistant, compared to their ubiquity a decade ago. Its a sign of the times. Companies have to adapt.
I ain’t talking about that, Cid. I’m talking about, seriously, the TONS of people who don’t like Dragon Quarter for the reasons I’ve stated.
Either way, beyond that minor aberration, I agree with you and Sinistral. The Breath of Fire series was ass. BoF3 was a good game, but it aged TERRIBLY, and DQ had people sitting on two sides of either fence; in any case, it alienated the hell out of its audience, so of course it didn’t do so hot. Strangely enough, it became a “The Best” in Japan (their equivalent of Greatest Hits), so I’m not sure what happened. Maybe it hit sooooooooooooo far below the mark in the US and Europe that they had no choice but to pull the plug?
Or they gauged the public’s taste for the series and it just wasn’t very high.
I don’t think I’ve ever heard anyone who disliked DQ because there weren’t enough transformations. The argument that there weren’t enough characters is actually quite valid; if you’re spending your entire time with three people, you’d best make sure those three people are enjoyable to be around in some way. Making one of them entirely mute? Not the best approach. In any case, most of the griping I heard about it had to do with the gameplay mechanics, not the things you mention.
I think BoF III was one of the best games I ever played. OK, so it was like the third RPG I played, so I’m being at least partly nostalgic, but even after all the games I’ve played since then, I still fondly remember that experience. Playing the characters from childhood, and the surprisingly grey morality of the story, are not usual things in RPGs. I’ll agree that none of the other BoFs were as good, though (and I have yet to play Dragon Quarter. I will someday, if only just so I can see what the fuss was all about.)
As for the franchise being dead? These things live on while there is interest in them. So yeah, it’s been dead for years. But it could snap to life just as easily. It wouldn’t be the first game franchise to return after somebody gets the license and a new take on it. Me, I live in the present, so I don’t care either way.
I’m probably one of the few that would say they like BoFII, but I’ll concede that it is NOT a good game. Ever enjoy something and not know why? Yeah. BoFII.
BoF is a sack of shit though. I have absolutely no idea why it spawned sequels, let alone a passable game like BoFII and then a really, really good game like BoFIII. I guess there are some mysteries that shall never be solvéd.
I suppose churning out Megamen and Street Fighters is easier.
Well if you look at the profit margins of SF2HDR and MM9…
It sure fucking took them long enough to make some new MM/SF games anyways. Street Fighter is probably their highest-selling product and they hadn’t made a new one since 1999 (1996, if you don’t count the revisions of SF3), and they hadn’t made a quality 2D fighter since the beginning of the decade.
As for MM9, I think it was kind of a bullshit game, but oh well. Obviously, people will buy them.
MM9 would’ve been a lot better if they had more than one or two tunes worth listening to, but it was an otherwise decent game (I’d say somewhere between 4 and 6 in quality with a better soundtrack).
And speaking of which I didn’t think BoF VI (aka MMX:CM) was that bad of a game either. But yeah, not a series that I’m going to miss much.
I used to like BoF III, then I played it again after having played FFXII. That was a bad idea. And SG, you aren’t going to get any argument from me about how long its been since Capcom made a game I really liked. Capcom rates poorly on my quality meter. I was enthusiastic about DMC4 after my friend showed it to me. The problem is that I played it after Ninja Gaiden II. Another bad idea.
I know you don’t like most Capcom games, but I think it’s not fair to say “How long has it been” when you enjoy the Ace Attorney series, probably more than I do. 
Also, I recommend trying Age of Booty, since you enjoy RTS games. Hell, it’s got a two day free online for the demo, so I’ll even try it with you! But I digress 
All I’ll say on BoF3 is that I still think it’s good, but something can be good for its time and still be obsolete. It’s unfortunate; video games are one of the only arts, I think, that aren’t timeless if they were good at one point.
Well to be fair, I can’t really comment much on the series since I never played any of them. (My excuse: Never got around to it.) I did hear all about Dragon Quarter though a few of my friends.
I will agree with SG that many games can be good for their time and end up being obsolete. Those things just happen. And then there’s the fact that some games just can’t really stand the test of time.
But…depending on what happens down the line, someone will probably pick up BoF and revive it (but to good results?).
The big reason for that, I think, is that stories, art, music, etc. can be timeless if they’re effective in evoking emotion. The same isn’t true for gameplay mechanics. As game genres evolve, older methods run a chance of becoming obsolete if no changes are made to the original formula. This is why Breath of Fire 3, despite having a pretty compelling story (at least, up until the end), is such a draaaaa-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-aaaaaag to play now.
I think ultra’s right that one day someone will bring BoF back. Nostalgia can be pretty compelling. For example, people got really excited about the return of the Atari name for some reason, despite the fact that aside from the name, it was completely irrelevant as the current technology doesn’t compare in the least to the technology the original Atari dealt with 20 years ago. Ironically, Atari died 20 years ago and we’re all waiting for the current Atari to go belly up so we can forget the pile of garbage its now associated with.
Yeah I forgot about the AA series. I don’t really consider them Capcom games though, probably because they’re not crap and thus not synonymous with Capcom. Joking aside, the AA series are so recent, its not really part of the image Capcom has cultivated, as the parents of MegaMan and Streetfighter, aka shallow brand milking.
I’ll agree that Street Fighter 4 is probably brand-milking, but the new Street Fighter 2 definitely isn’t. While the basic mechanics are still the same, it’s not like they just put new paint on the same game. The HD remix got a large gameplay update, and even though you don’t like Street Fighter 2 much, it’s essentially the Starcraft of the fighting game scene - that is, it’s a 2D fighter whose gameplay balance, mechanics, rules, etc. have stood the test of time, and it’s still played in almost every large fighting game tournament in the world, and seriously every 2D fighter you can imagine borrows heavily from its original ideas, except like, Mortal Kombat and Smash Bros - the former being just bad, and the latter being more like a 3D fighter in a 2D plane.
Mega Man 9? Yeah, I agree the shit out of that shit. I made my peace with that game, but it’s way out of touch with what made the series good in the first place, in my opinion.
Not really for Mega Man, unless you mean just the original series. Ace Attorney is good though, truth be told.
I like how you tell Sin SF is the Starcraft of fighting games and diss MK in the same sentence
I am not a fighting game person but I won’t challenge you on the SF2 thing since its not my field. However, you can’t deny SF2 wasn’t milked. There have been so many revisions of SF2 with so many extra name extensions, its ridiculous. Its milking.