These cut-up versions of games don’t sound that appealing to me. I am reminded of the first Persona, where a really long and arduous dungeon was cut from the game, essentially because Atlus didn’t feel like doing the work (they didn’t think the game would do too well).
Then again Tea Society of a Witch does have very … extreme … character designs to be playing an 18+ version of the game…
shrug
not really extreme…
its just a style, note that you can still see relative ages between different chars, they dont All look 12
anyhow… i like it
nice cutesy light artstyle… kinda like Snow Drop
need more games in that direction
if you want to renew your faith in DVD games, play hourglass of summer! it’s just as complex as a pc game! and wonderful!
I am liking Hourglass of Summer, although I am finding it to be more difficult than pretty much any other bishoujo game that I have recently played… As has been mentioned before, it seems like all of the choices you are given make perfectly good sense, so it’s kind of hard to decide what you should be doing to accomplish your goals. It’s the first time I’ve walked straight into a “bad” ending on the first time through in a while. Oh well… it just strengthens my resolve to find the right answers. Most of the girls are so cute, though, that I kind of miss the idea of ero scenes…
Are there any special pictures with Ponika in Tea, because in the manual it has pictures I have never encountered.
I bet it’s in the console versions.
quote:
Originally posted by woodelf:
I think the lack of ero scenes lets the game designer concentrate on a better story. A month of time hopping does leave you confused but very interesting story line. Note the game is very long for a DVD. I was checking the board to get some hints tonight since I don't want to spend 12+ hours on the next girl I meet. [img]http://princess.cybrmall.net/ubb/smile.gif[/img]
Ah, but if the game's designers DID concentrate on ero-scenes, which were then arbitrarily removed - that would affect the story in other ways, right?
I assume that people are saying it's obvious that that's what happened to Tea Society of a Witch, right?
quote:
Originally posted by woodelf:
That to me looks to be the case. Also it looks to adapted from a B-game where Hourglass of summer looks to a new game created for the DVD media.
Hourglass originally started out as either a Dreamcast or PS2 game (I can't remember which came first), so it didn't have anything erotic in it. It was later ported to DVD, where nothing was changed, and the PC, where more than a few naughty pics and scenes were added to the plot. Ironically, that version was harshly criticized by fans, who felt that the extra scenes were too forced and artificial.
Huzzah! It only took three or four times through the darn thing, and several weeks, since I don’t have enough time on my hands, but I finally got the best Kaho ending for Hourglass of Summer. Only four more girls to go… sigh
I guess I’ll see if I can knock out Ai’s ending a little faster since I can skip a lot of the scenes now, and I have an idea of how to circumvent most of the “bad” stuff…
I just started Hourglass of Summer yesterday.
So far:
- The plot is really, really good. It’s about a guy (you) who time jumps from one period to another from before summer vacation, during, and after. Your girlfriend dies in an accident on the last day of summer vacation and you have to jump back and forth in time to figure out a way to save her.
- Since no installation is required, you can play it on your DVD player, DVD-ROM drive on the PC, or your PS2. But then the downside is you can’t just save whenever you want to. You have to go to the menu and the game would generate a password that will allow you to pick up where you left off. It’s clunky because you have to request for a password everytime you want to “save” before a decision and then you’d have to enter a password in order to “load” in case you change your mind about a decision. I’ve played in on the DVD player and my PC and both mediums have been problem-free so far.
- If you’re playing from a DVD player the game doesn’t seem to allow you to fast-forward or rewind, so if you miss a line of dialogue or two you can’t go back. This makes gaming tedious if you are replaying to get the other endings. However when played on the PC I found that I can fast-forward or rewind…
- You can’t access extra features until you actually finish at least one game to the very end.
- Each and every character is fully-voiced.
I’m about 3-4 hours into the game… hopefully I can review this soon.
Another question: Does anyone have a concrete idea of how many endings are actually available?
[This message has been edited by rowena (edited 09-24-2004).]
quote:That was my main complaint with Day of Love. To get through replay scenes you had to let the game run unattended for hours until the next decision point. I'll have to try it on a PC DVD player to see if it's any better.
Originally posted by rowena:
- If you're playing from a DVD player the game doesn't seem to allow you to fast-forward or rewind, so if you miss a line of dialogue or two you can't go back. This makes gaming tedious if you are replaying to get the other endings. However when played on the PC I found that I can fast-forward or rewind...
The other big limitation of DVD player games is they have an ultra-simple interface based on menu selections. You get to choose the next "chapter", and that's about it. There is no possibility of keeping statistics or running a simulation. Graphics are limited to TV (VGA) resolution and the input is restricted to a few remote control options.
I hope that DVD players never become the standard b-game console. Unfortunately, it's probably easier to port games to a dumb engine and easier to accommodate a uniform player standard than the multitude of Windows platforms.
I wouldn’t say that the picture quality is limited on a TV. If you have a high def TV then you’re fine. When people spend big bucks to watch the newest hollywood movie at home with the best possible setup, they won’t tell you that they prefer to watch it on the PC. But if you have an older TV, of course, the PC screen will have a better picture quality. PC games are better in many ways, but you get what you pay for. Where the ero scenes truly just added for the Japanese PC version? If that’s the case, I should buy it. I don’t like to pay for a game that has scenes cut out, but if that’s the way it was in the beginning then I’ll get it. And souces to back up this idea that the ero scenes were just added later?
I don’t really have complaints with regards to picture quality, it’s just that it’s very inconvenient retracing your steps – I myself have to keep a detailed password log with notes as to which choices are on which password. And I don’t “save” at each decision point because it’s really too tedious! Although I want to see everything this game has to offer I’m not so sure I can… as it is I’m already 10 hours or so into the game and so far only one bad ending under my belt. I’m on my way (hopefully) to a good ending though now that I’ve “saved” Mana.
US DVD players output an NTSC standard video signal. That limits the display to an equivalent 640x480 pixel resolution. Line doublers, widescreen tubes, HDTV, etc. cannot change the fact that each frame is restricted to 525 horizontal lines of information and the equivalent vertical bandwidth. Try setting your computer monitor to 640x480 resolution, and you’ll see just how low-end VGA is.
Many PC game graphics are drawn for VGA displays, but they need not be. Modern graphics controllers can handle twice the resolution and number of colors of NTSC. Game graphics appear as “good as anime” on a TV screen, but they can look a lot better if drawn for a PC monitor.
quote:
But then the downside is you can't just save whenever you want to. You have to go to the menu and the game would generate a password that will allow you to pick up where you left off. It's clunky because you have to request for a password everytime you want to "save" before a decision and then you'd have to enter a password in order to "load" in case you change your mind about a decision.
quote:
If you're playing from a DVD player the game doesn't seem to allow you to fast-forward or rewind, so if you miss a line of dialogue or two you can't go back. This makes gaming tedious if you are replaying to get the other endings. However when played on the PC I found that I can fast-forward or rewind...
quote:
Originally posted by Benoit:
That's kind of a luxury if it would have that. Older games didn't have those features, and people still loved them. Think True Love.
It isn't really a luxury anymore. Standards have changed; for me, at least, it is now an expected feature.
quote:
Originally posted by Benoit:
...So what exactly is bad about the password? You would prefer to play it all over again? Choosing the Save button on a PC game is just the same thing, only here you have to write down a password. I don't see what the big deal is.
No, I wouldn't want to play it all over again, that's just plain masochistic. :P
Saving and using passwords are not the same thing. Saving is much, much more convenient.
As I explained in my previous post: In my case I have to keep a detailed password log with notes as to which choices are on which password. And I don't "save" at each decision point because it's really TOO tedious.
In games with built-in saves I don't have to go through such lengths, I can easily access decision points and see where I am in the game without having to record every single little thing on paper. O_o
quote:
That's kind of a luxury if it would have that. Older games didn't have those features, and people still loved them. Think True Love.[/B]
But then True Love didn't have dialogues that even comes close in length to Hourglass of Summer's, True Love being more of a stat-based sim where scheduling is everything rather than an intensive story-based game. So forwarding and rewinding weren't really all that necessary...
I found that I could just skip scenes once I knew what the scenes were. It made going through the game much quicker the last couple of times I did it… I didn’t have to sit around waiting for all of the dialog to play through.
I started only checking my password at decision points that seemed pretty critical to the path I was on. All in all, it sped up game play tremendously. I was able to get through to Ai’s best ending in several hours, compared to the many hours it took me just to get to the bad ending on my first time through.
A word of warning, though… on my system anyway (I’m using a PC DVD-ROM drive), if I used the fast forward option to just skim through the dialog too much, it eventually screwed up the way the DVD wanted to read, and started the game into a series of loops, and eventually it crashed. Just skipping scenes doesn’t seem to have that effect, however.
Mana has got me stumped though… I can’t seem to figure out what triggers her path exactly…
[This message has been edited by Wolfson (edited 09-24-2004).]
Still, I wouldn’t bash the password system. It’s the best equivalent to saving we have now, and an improvement over previous DVD games.
quote:
Originally posted by Benoit:
Still, I wouldn't bash the password system. It's the best equivalent to saving we have now, and an improvement over previous DVD games.
Saying "this is the best we have now and is an improvement" means something, but it does NOT mean that passwords aren't annoying. I think the general consensus is still "DVD-only games = annoying".
[edit: *learns to spell*]
[This message has been edited by Nandemonai (edited 09-25-2004).]
quote:
Originally posted by bishounen_blue:
I don't like to pay for a game that has scenes cut out, but if that's the way it was in the beginning then I'll get it. And souces to back up this idea that the ero scenes were just added later?
Here's one source:
http://www.getchu.com/soft.phtml?id=20493
If anyone is interested, here's the homepage of the main artist/chara designer who worked on this game:
http://ww5.tiki.ne.jp/~msuigun/