Adventurer's Guild 𝙲𝙻𝙰𝚂𝚂𝙸𝙲 Issue #13 — Lufia II: Rise of the Sinistrals

[rusty_shackleford]

Androgynous

maxim.jpg

you gay

[rusty_shackleford]

Seriously, though, the puzzles are at a good level of challenge and there's a wide variety of puzzle types, but they can all be logically solved.

This one got me every ******* time


Also, apparently that's the Sword Shrine, the bugged place is somewhere else much later in the game.

[Acrux]

Seriously, though, the puzzles are at a good level of challenge and there's a wide variety of puzzle types, but they can all be logically solved.

This one got me every ******* time


Also, apparently that's the Sword Shrine, the bugged place is somewhere else much later in the game.

That was the original stumper for me. As a callow youth I remember looking online to see if there was a solution - a novel concept at the time.

[Bhaalspawn Jr]

Going to start running through it with the Frue rom hack. I played the original as a kid, but I don't remember it well enough to be able to compare.

That's the one I'm playing too. Been busy with moving recently, but I'll probably start playing this weekend.

[Tangerine]

It's a nice touch that the game makes a distinction between a character "joining the party" and "becoming a comrade."

[Tangerine]

20 floors of the Ancient Cave and not a single blue chest is some ********.

[J1M]

The dungeons in this game are still great. I'm like a quarter of the way through Metroid Prime 4 and it has been completely linear aside from save rooms. I'd go so far as to say it is no longer a "first person exploration" game and simply a "corridor shooter". Yet in Lufia 2 you have to do some thinking to solve the dungeons even before you have a full party.

[Tangerine]

The dungeons in this game are still great. I'm like a quarter of the way through Metroid Prime 4 and it has been completely linear aside from save rooms. I'd go so far as to say it is no longer a "first person exploration" game and simply a "corridor shooter". Yet in Lufia 2 you have to do some thinking to solve the dungeons even before you have a full party.

There are puzzles in Lufia 2 that are not just multi-room, but multi-floor. The complexity just blows post-2000s puzzles out of the water. Since I played it recently, I don't recall many puzzles in Darksiders taking place across more than a single room. The closest are the beam puzzles in the last dungeon, but that's really a sequence of puzzles.

[J1M]

The dungeons in this game are still great. I'm like a quarter of the way through Metroid Prime 4 and it has been completely linear aside from save rooms. I'd go so far as to say it is no longer a "first person exploration" game and simply a "corridor shooter". Yet in Lufia 2 you have to do some thinking to solve the dungeons even before you have a full party.

There are puzzles in Lufia 2 that are not just multi-room, but multi-floor. The complexity just blows post-2000s puzzles out of the water. Since I played it recently, I don't recall many puzzles in Darksiders taking place across more than a single room. The closest are the beam puzzles in the last dungeon, but that's really a sequence of puzzles.

The spider castle has a couple of puzzles that involve rooms on top of each other that might qualify, but yes, I agree.

[Tangerine]

Completed.

► Show Spoiler

Shamefully forgot to change the character names.

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This line had me laughing louder than was reasonable.

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A soon-to-be-not floating island.

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Playing this again after so many years hasn't changed my opinion on it, just solidified it.

► Show Spoiler

Good:
+ Great dungeon and puzzle design. There are several puzzles throughout the game that are only ever used once, like the magnet block puzzle, which makes them stand out. Modern game design would insist that you reuse them once you've taught the player that mechanic, but I find it makes the whole experience feel samey rather than having standout moments.
+ The IP system is good. IP abilities can turn the tide of battle and let characters who don't have magic, like Guy, have elemental attacks. Balancing equipment choice based on stats versus abilities is a good idea, but the game's not really hard enough to put that much thought into it.
+ I completely forgot about Maxim and Selan getting married and having a kid. Very wholesome.
+ Capsule monsters are cool. I turned armored dog into a dragon.
+ I don't know if this was coincidence or not, but for the first half of the battle Erim did nothing against me but low damage attacks. If it's intentional, I thought it was nice touch that Erim/Iris sandbags the first half for a surprisingly subtle bit of storytelling.

Neutral:
* The Ancient Cave is a neat novelty as bit of gaming history, but the execution could have used some work.
* It'd have been nice if they did a bit more with Tia. She drops off the face of the planet and then reappears in the end game.

Bad:
- I know it's a JRPG, but the writing is very anime. You've got the trope of the bad guy telling you several times there's a greater power without actually telling you anything relevant, lots of Deus ex machina, characters saying how they feel, etc.
- The middle portion of the narrative after rescuing the kid and probably up to the ruby icon quest is a real slog. You go around chasing the lights from dungeon to dungeon as you solve the problem of the week at each new location, but nothing really happens.
- I wish the feeding the capsule monsters was less opaque. Guess and check is not a fun mechanic. Them running away is also a nuisance and they end up several levels behind you because of it.

Edit: Changed spoiler type so you can see spoilers in your spoilers.

[rusty_shackleford]

► Early game spoiler

Gades can be defeated during your first fight with him, you get a special weapon for it, I believe. Been years.

[WhiteShark]

Playing this in bits and pieces on my Vita at times when I want to lie down but I'm not tired enough to fall asleep. The puzzles are fun. It gives me an 'if LoZ were actually an RPG' impression. I just got my second party member, so I hope combat will start to become more interesting. The system seems like it has some potential.

[WhiteShark]

Does this game ever place chests in dungeons that you can't reach with the means you have available at that time? There's one beneath the castle in a corner of a big room with water around it, and I cannot for the life of me figure out how to get to it. There are a couple barriers of the type that were shown to go up and down during the cutscene with the thieves in the waterway, but those buttons don't do anything now, and I can't find anything else in the room to interact with. I'm wondering if I'm supposed to come back later after acquiring more dungeoneering tools.

[rusty_shackleford]

Does this game ever place chests in dungeons that you can't reach with the means you have available at that time? There's one beneath the castle in a corner of a big room with water around it, and I cannot for the life of me figure out how to get to it. There are a couple barriers of the type that were shown to go up and down during the cutscene with the thieves in the waterway, but those buttons don't do anything now, and I can't find anything else in the room to interact with. I'm wondering if I'm supposed to come back later after acquiring more dungeoneering tools.

Egg chests I think

[Tangerine]

Does this game ever place chests in dungeons that you can't reach with the means you have available at that time? There's one beneath the castle in a corner of a big room with water around it, and I cannot for the life of me figure out how to get to it. There are a couple barriers of the type that were shown to go up and down during the cutscene with the thieves in the waterway, but those buttons don't do anything now, and I can't find anything else in the room to interact with. I'm wondering if I'm supposed to come back later after acquiring more dungeoneering tools.

Yes. You get a hookshot later.

[WhiteShark]

Does this game ever place chests in dungeons that you can't reach with the means you have available at that time? There's one beneath the castle in a corner of a big room with water around it, and I cannot for the life of me figure out how to get to it. There are a couple barriers of the type that were shown to go up and down during the cutscene with the thieves in the waterway, but those buttons don't do anything now, and I can't find anything else in the room to interact with. I'm wondering if I'm supposed to come back later after acquiring more dungeoneering tools.

Yes. You get a hookshot later.

Thanks. I had a feeling it was something like that, but I was worried I was just overlooking something. I'll make a note and move on.

[WhiteShark]

The perspective shift in the tower really caught me off guard. It took me a few seconds to process what I was looking at the first time I went to one of the screens on the outside.

[Bhaalspawn Jr]

So, I know I was really hyped to play this, but after playing for 12 or so hours, I'm calling it quits. The story's uninteresting, the combat is monotonous, the puzzles are annoying... The music's great though... Meh, I'm not having any fun so I'm not going to force myself.

[WhiteShark]

Power was out for a long time this morning, so I cleared the next dungeon. I almost fell into despair when the spider boss started healing itself for more health than damage I could consistently do in a turn. Good thing the behavior is partially randomized so it doesn't just spam it forever.

I can't tell how much of an impact buffs/debuffs have and how long they last. There doesn't seem to be any sort of indicator, and experimentation didn't yield any noticeable results. Are they worth using?

[Tangerine]

I didn't bother too much with buffs/debuffs. Hitting elemental weaknesses is a better use of MP/IP.

[Norfleet]

Despite being called "Lufia 2", it's a prequel and if you play the first game then the ending of Lufia 2 will be spoiled immediately.

Pssh, spoilers. Science says they aren't real, otherwise nobody would have watched these movies.

1. The Mexicans win.
2. The Spartans lose.
3. The boat sinks.
4. Everybody makes it back to Earth.

[Bhaalspawn Jr]

I'm coming back to finish this one, boys. The completionist in me has spoken.

[J1M]

Despite being called "Lufia 2", it's a prequel and if you play the first game then the ending of Lufia 2 will be spoiled immediately.

Pssh, spoilers. Science says they aren't real, otherwise nobody would have watched these movies.

1. The Mexicans win.
2. The Spartans lose.
3. The boat sinks.
4. Everybody makes it back to Earth.

That's a poor measure. Spoilers may not stop someone from watching a movie, but they can remove or lower enjoyment of it.

[Norfleet]

That's a poor measure. Spoilers may not stop someone from watching a movie, but they can remove or lower enjoyment of it.

Science disagrees, test subjects who were spoiled in advance rated their enjoyment of the movie higher. If spoilers did anything, these movies wouldn't have been enjoyed.

[J1M]

That's a poor measure. Spoilers may not stop someone from watching a movie, but they can remove or lower enjoyment of it.

Science disagrees, test subjects who were spoiled in advance rated their enjoyment of the movie higher. If spoilers did anything, these movies wouldn't have been enjoyed.

It sounds like you are believing a headline from a journalist looking for clicks off the back of a psych study. Might be an issue with your methodology given everything we know about academia and the reproducibility crisis.

[Kalarion]

Guys.

If I look at maps of each dungeon after completing it to see secret passages, is that cheating?

[Stack of Turtles]

Despite being called "Lufia 2", it's a prequel and if you play the first game then the ending of Lufia 2 will be spoiled immediately.

Pssh, spoilers. Science says they aren't real, otherwise nobody would have watched these movies.

1. The Mexicans win.
2. The Spartans lose.
3. The boat sinks.
4. Everybody makes it back to Earth.

That's a poor measure. Spoilers may not stop someone from watching a movie, but they can remove or lower enjoyment of it.

I enjoy it more with spoilers

[J1M]

Context: Fightin' roun' th' world with the boys and the most capable female fencer:

[Bhaalspawn Jr]

Alright, I finally beat it:

► Show Spoiler

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Did I mention before that I didn't like it? I'm a big JRPG guy, but Lufia II is c-tier level. Pretty forgettable.

With that said...

► Show Spoiler

Maxim's last act of heroism at the end was awe-inspiring. A masculine hero saving the day is always inspiring to see.

► Show Spoiler

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Yeah, I don't think so.

[J1M]

I feel like none of you read the 4th screenshot I posted.