He’s referring to his record being beaten by 20 minutes (in other words, someone beat PS2 in roughly 55 minutes). Now how does one actually beat PS2 in 55 minutes is the question (even given the idea that copious amounts of glitch abuse occurred, that’s still a ridiculously low number).
Destiny.
Phantasia is practically prehistoric mechanics-wise, but it has the tightest plot of the series since it was based upon a light novel or something. Destiny and onwards weren’t and the series became extremely character focused instead, to the point where one tries to briefly describe Symphonia only to realize that they can’t because it meanders so goddamn much. From what I’ve heard of the later games, the plot focuses more on taking tired tropes found all over anime and JRPGs and subverts them, much like Vesperia and The Abyss. However, the impression I’ve gotten of the series feels more like while the games are trying to subvert tropes and whatnot, they first need to establish them thus falling into them itself with the quality of the title being determined by how often they break from the formula that they’ve chosen to follow. Or in short, they become that which they try to parody.
It also doesn’t help that you’re basically playing the same 8 or so character archetypes from game to game (so you’re always fighting as your typical teenaged, spiky-haired, idiot-savant swordsman, except that he might use fists or guns instead; joined by a pure magical healer type love interest; though she might not be as pure, or a she (I’m looking at you Zesty) or a love interest; followed by a mage, a thief/ninja, a token loli, a summoner, and a second physical fighting dude who’s usually regulated to a bow or some other non-heroic/side character weapon type).
The only good thing about Enchanted Arms is the guest appearance of Metal Wolf Chaos.
It was actually around an hour and fifteen (1:15). it’s possible through a series of glitches that allows you to get all the Nei Items early (and other key items as well) and basically skip a majority of the game. The only dungeons you actually need to visit are Roron (for the Jet Scooter), the Dams, Gaira, Skure, Crevice, and Noah. Because of the glitches, all of the Dams, Crevice, and Noah have ZERO encounters so going through them can be fast, and since you never go through Climatrol, you can keep Nei throughout the game. Using the same glitch, you can basically make any character’s level 0, which confuses the game whenever you end a battle and in sense lets you power level any character (though the max is 50, in essence you can actually get a character’s “level” well over 200).
The only downside of this glitch is that it makes Rolf and Rudo virtually useless. You end up making Nei and Amy ridiculously powerful to the point where they can take down Dark Force and Mother Brain by themselves.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RMeccDRrbUc <— this is the current world record. Jiseed and I collaborated on the strategy until he finally made a run that beat mine. It is done in 58:28
Keep in mind that in the speedrunning community, using glitches that are found in game are completely legal but using anything outside of the game/console (like a Game Genie, Turbo Controllers, or even emulator/savestates) is not legal (speedruns through emulator/savestate usage would be referred to as a TAS, Tool-Assisted Speedrun, which are fun to watch too, but basically things are entered like a computer code and thus the game looks flawless, but it is mostly beyond human reaction). This run, much like mine, uses the Inventory Glitch and this category of the game is known as Nei%. A glitchless run of this game would take much longer even if you try to low-level it (I think the lowest level I’ve beaten this game was 27 with the team of Rolf, Rudo, Anna, and Shir, I think it took me somewhere around 8-10 hours, not sure though as I didn’t time it). A lot of games to speedrun use glitches to progress faster (take a look at some of the Mega Man speedruns and you’ll see what I mean). However, there are speedrunners who are still like being pure to the game and will run a glitchless category, which are accepted as well.
As much as it can be amazing to see certain glitches in the games (my jaw dropped the first time I had ever seen the Ocarina of Time 20 mins run), there is a simple beauty at watching a glitchless run or a 4 player race at events like Awesome Games Done Quick.
I always try to make time to watch the Megaman block, whenever possible.
I agree, a glitchless or even a 100% run of a game is simply amazing to watch, even though some glitches are fun to do (the glitch I run in my Phantasy Star II run is by far NOT a fun glitch to pull off, although it is easy to do). Races are simply amazing and there always seems to be one every AGDQ/SGDQ for Super Metroid and at least one Mega Man game. I watched an all dungeons race of Ocarina of Time during SGDQ2014 (I believe) that was fun to watch. Sometimes playing a game out of intended order is neat to watch as well.
However, the most impressive speedruns I’ve seen have to be the blindfolded runs. during AGDQ2015, someone ran all child dungeons for Ocarina of Time blindfolded, and it’s always impressive to see someone play Mike Tyson’s Punch-Out blindfolded as well. they aren’t the absolute fastest runs, but seeing people accomplish this feat is simply amazing.
The best races are when someone’s doofing around with a completely separate game that’s nowhere near the quality of the game being raced, like when someone breaks out Adventures of Tintin while everyone else is racing through Legend of Zelda: Ancient Stone Tables.
Either the difficulty in Dark Souls isn’t scaling upwards anymore or I’m just really that good. I’m on New Game++ and I just soloed Ornstein and Smough for the first time. I’m still a heavy melee build so I was able to take out Ornstein fairly quickly, but my strength, endurance and health are all high enough that I was able to go toe to toe with Mega Smough without much trouble. Even his lightning butt stomp attack only took away about 10% of my health meter if I had my shield raised.
Also, having since expanded my intelligence and faith stats, I’m glad my primary combat role isn’t a spellcaster. Magic is excellent for situational purposes, especially with PvP, but durability matters much more.
Haha, Orak I actually watched that speed run. It really puts into perspective how far we’ve come - those dungeons were long, even with no enemies, lol. To this day, I’m really not sure how I ever had the patience to beat Phantasy Star 2. Especially because I feel like the story really chunks it hard once you get to Dezo(lis).
Also, I’ve been thinking about it lately because I recently replayed Phantasy Star 4. I’ve finally figured out something that’s always really bothered me about the entire series: the soundtracks never have any unifying themes. Like, if you listen to Final Fantasy 6, there’s a lot of melodic motives that are re-used all over the place. The melody of Terra’s Theme is used in a ton of the tracks. Locke’s Theme shares motives with a few tracks related to his backstory. I bet you’ve probably played the LUNAR games, which reuse melodic motives all day - in particular, there are very few tracks in Lunar 2 that don’t contain the melody of one of the main themes within it.
(If anyone actually finds this discussion interesting, I’ll edit the post to link to some pieces of music and demonstrate what I’m talking about - I know Orak knows a little about music, so I’m using that to take some shortcuts with my explanation.)
Phantasy Star soundtracks don’t do any of that. The closest you get is that some of the tracks from the original games are re-used. This is weird, especially in Phantasy Star 4, which has such a large soundtrack (since I brought up FF6, it actually rivals FF6’s soundtrack in track number and running time). This seems minor, but it really helps give a soundtrack more emotional weight, along with making it more memorable. This is the kind of stuff that can even make a pretty mediocre soundtrack more memorable (see: Bahamut Lagoon).
It’s just something I thought of, cos whenever I play PS4, I think about how a lot of the music is really good (although some of it is just monotonous and irritating), but I never seem to remember a vast majority of the pieces after I’m done.
I definitely agree with the sentiment as well as I recall PS1 being the only game in the original series to have something resembling a unified theme (though it was more 80s style Jpopy/anime than anything else). PS3 was particularly egregious about this since its opening theme was by far and away the best part of the game but the rest of it was pretty mediocre or terrible even in regards to the dynamic battle theme (which if nothing else was a nice idea that needed better tracks since losing battles sounded like crap, while standard battles had that weird synthy grindy vibe that could’ve only come from the early 90s littered throughout it).
I know what you’re saying about going through Phantasy Star II. I first beat the game when I was around 5 and when it came to RPGs at the time, we didn’t have much else to choose from. A lot of the Phantasy Star series to me is nostalgia, but Phantasy Star II holds more of a special place in my heart because it was the game that taught me how to read. My father used to play this game in front of me and have me read pieces of the game, even some of the larger words that normal children couldn’t pronounce at the time. Even though we’ve come a long way in terms of gameplay, presentation, sound, graphics, and story, it’s always good for me to go back every now and then and see where we started from. It’s much like watching an old movie that may not be that great today but still is significant to you.
As far as the soundtrack to Phantasy Star IV (actually, the entire series in general), I can agree with you there for the most part. Uematsu was great in all of his works for having some unifying themes that would basically change the key and tempo of a certain piece and and change the mood of the piece entirely. he has a talent for that which has made him so beloved by not just video game music enthusiasts, but music lovers everywhere. I will say though that a soundtrack doesn’t need a unifying theme in order to be memorable (though you are right that it can make mediocre soundtracks better). I look back to some of of my favorite soundtracks from the NES era (mostly the Mega Man franchise) and the soundtracks to both MM2 and MM3 were both some of my favorites. neither of them had unifying themes and each piece of work was different from the other, yet the whole work to me anyway was memorable. Shovel Knight has a similar soundtrack style and it is a very well-done work of art.
to me, the soundtrack to the entire Phantasy Star original series was memorable probably because that is the series I grew up on. Even when I’m writing, if I need a mood setter, this will be my go-to for some mood setting music. Phantasy Star IV had one of the saddest pieces of the 16-bit era IMO with “Her Last Breath” and I honestly cannot even go to a funeral to this day without humming that piece to myself. The battle theme does get repetitive in the game, but the use of “Laughter” (Zio/Lashiec), “The King of Terrors” (Dark Force), and “Ooze” (Profound Darkness 3) were used just enough and fit the mood perfectly, but you are right that as far as being memorable, they aren’t all that much unless you’re a die-hard fan.
I am surprised you remembered that I knew a bit about music. I haven’t even so much as looked at sheet music since high school. I still have the three midi pieces I composed and looking at them today, I laugh at them a bit. at least I can say that I wrote my own music. My expanded knowledge of such things have been lost, though I can recall enough to keep a conversation for the most part. thankfully I did have some idea of what you were talking about (I think :D)
I actually liked the soundtrack to the Phantasy Star III (which is a game I am attempting to speed run currently), although it was short. The Main theme probably was the best part with the dynamic battle themes probably being the worst. Though the overworld theme (at least once it was complete when you had 5 characters), the town theme (probably my favorite track), Skyhaven, Lashute, and Megido were all really good tracks as well. The style of the whole soundtrack was different than the others, but then again the whole game was different.
Actually, I know that MM2 at least had a unified theme for some of its tracks, see also Air Man/Bubble Man’s theme and compare to Wily Fortress 1.
MM3 I believe was also similar in that regard but less so due to the Rush-ed nature of the game’s latter half.
I actually liked the soundtrack to the Phantasy Star III (which is a game I am attempting to speed run currently), although it was short. The Main theme probably was the best part with the dynamic battle themes probably being the worst. Though the overworld theme (at least once it was complete when you had 5 characters), the town theme (probably my favorite track), Skyhaven, Lashute, and Megido were all really good tracks as well. The style of the whole soundtrack was different than the others, but then again the whole game was different.
You’re right, I forgot about some of those tracks (though I will fight you for saying that the Town theme was anything but just there). Though in my defense, most of those tracks are hard to get going and/or show up very briefly, and I’ve only played through the game once.
Just so we’re clear, I’m about only music themes. A motive is a small part of a melody, usually associated with a character, location, or sentiment in a story. Composers who set music to a narrative take advantage of this all the time - you can hear it in opera, film scores, and video game music.
So, here’s some pretty cut-and-dry examples. If you listen to the first track in the list where I’ve started it, you should hear part of a melody, which you’ll hopefully then immediately recognize in all the linked pieces of music that follow. (You should only have to listen for 5-10 seconds, tops.)
This is the kind of thing that I’m saying Phantasy Star lacks. It isn’t lacking good music (although again, some of it is just downright treacherous). But, it’s lacking melodic motives that tie the story together emotionally.
Honestly, I always thought it was kind of lazy of game programmers to reuse the same theme over and over again. Don’t get me wrong, there are some fantastic soundtracks out there which make heavy use of it, but I still find it somewhat refreshing to find the odd game in which every piece of music is unique.
I guess it all depends on taste. This is how I feel for the most part and it has been why I’ve always liked the soundtrack to Phantasy Star games. I wouldn’t call it lazy on the programmers’ part or even on the composer’s part as if done well it can work out great (again, almost anything Uematsu or even Koji Kondo does). There are some games though that just reuse the same track and it just makes it awful… like it’s nice when you first hear it, but playing it over and over it loses its value fast, sort of like how Bayonetta’s fight theme goes. Hearing the “climax” rendition of “Fly me to the Moon” was nice the first few times, but after hearing it over and over it just gets bad.
oh… and since I’ve now gone off topic, I am now playing Super Mario World in an attempt to speed run that game.
Yeah…if it’s your taste, then that’s one thing. But, yeah, speaking as someone who write music, it’s anything but lazy (on the composer’s part; programmers have nothing to do with that). The time you might save coming up with a new melody is made up for by finding a way to incorporate it into a different piece of music that not only sounds normal and not forced, but also contextually appropriate. Not to mention…I won’t say that coming up with a good melody is easy, but it is definitely the one aspect of a composition that can be “brute forced”, so to speak. Like, if you don’t have a melody, but you have the rest of the piece, you can totally wing it on the melody and then just edit it as needed. If you try to do that in reverse, your music will sound a pack of velociraptors playing vuvuzelas.
It doesn’t scale up each time, enemies get harder something like NG, NG+, NG+3, NG+6. Also you probably are just gitting gud, and are no longer a scrub. Congrats! Do you have the DLC? I highly recommend it.
I just finished my SL1 playthrough, so I’m doing a mage now. So far, I absolutely crushed the Taurus demon (but that was also with my handy club…) and the Gargoyles on my first try.
Oh, the most beautiful thing about this playthrough? That sweet, sweet vitality. Look at my hp bar go up!
This is definitely true, and is one reason I love the Lord of the Rings soundtrack so much. The music is beautiful, obviously, but the way the motifs are used throughout the movie in different ways which always serve to improve the scenes is just amazing.
On the other hand, the same is not true for the Hobbit movies. I think he’d have been better served mostly coming up with new music for it. And making Peter Jackson do at most 2 movies. And making Radagast the Brown not be so damn stupid.
I havent ventured too far into the NG cycles but smoughs butt stomp is usually easily absorbed by a shield provided you aren’t too close. I solod them a few weeks ago and I can’t honestly see not using a shield in that fight.
I literally can’t play a RPG at home any more. I mean…it’s probably due to the fact that I can’t really sit down and play a game for more than an hour at a time anymore (being an “adult” sucks), I just can’t get engrossed. But, I just fucking hate shit like leveling now. I don’t know how you can sit down and play through a game like Phantasy Star 4 again. Holy crap, the grind, the eternal grind. I tried to replay Baldur’s Gate cause i know that it’s awesome. I got some good time in playing on airplanes, cause I had to fly around a lot the last few months, and it was easy to get engrossed again when I didn’t have distractions like emails and shit popping up, or my dog having to go out, or whatever. But now that I’m done traveling for a few months…I just can’t finish it.
So I’m just resigned now…I pre-ordered GTA V for PC, so I’ll just use that for my quick easy gaming fix. (I havne’t played it at all yet…cause I don’t have any consoles).
A lot of it for me is that I find grindey shit like that easy to play on my phone when I’m on a break at work or something. Even if I haven’t progressed the story, just getting strong enough to not-die in dungeons feels like tangible progress. Hell, I’ve finished the first two Dragon Warrior games - something I would have never envisioned myself doing - cos they’re available on Android.
But, specifically to Phantasy Star 4, the game actually moves incredibly fast. In about 6 hours, you’ve stumbled upon an evil wizard, uncovered their plot to populate the earth with monsters by messing with forgotten ancient technology, stormed his castle, found a few macguffins needed to foil his plan, and stopped him, all while meeting a few different characters along the way that actually have a bit of personality and character interaction. And this is while doing every sidequest, of which there are an alarming amount. The equivalent of this ordeal in Final Fantasy 6 takes, what - 12-15 hours? Phantasy Star 4’s replayability is mainly because it progresses at lightspeed.
It can still move pretty slowly if you don’t know where you’re going or what you’re doing, especially later on in the game. That said, its definitely the fast PS game by a factor of at least 3 (PS3 can be surprisingly quick if you know exactly where to go or what to do). But then again, every PS game has some kind of vague bullshit to muddle through the first time around.
Also PS4 does not have an alarming amount of sidequests (there’s about half as many as Radiant Historia has), unless you’re referring to how alarmingly few sidequests there are in this game (by the point you just described, you’ll have done maybe 2 of the 8 sidequests of the game). Now if you want to see a game with an utterly insane number of sidequests, go play Xenoblade Chronicles. That fucker is just shy of having 500 sidequests available (400+ of which can be done in a single playthrough).
