Help With a Mecha game newbie

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mondamoto
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Joined: Thu Mar 24, 2011 3:58 pm

Help With a Mecha game newbie

So I broke down and purchased a P# 3 for the sole reason to play Mecha related games and Godzilla :).
I purchased some Used Mecha games from ebay for reasonable price such as Macross 30, Gundam VS and A.C.E. Another Century's Episode R and I have also noticed Amazon sells a lot of these from US sellers at reasonable prices.

I was wondering if there is a good site to help me with figuring out what to get and maybe even some menu translations.

Also if you could recommend some must have games for the PS# that would be great.

Thanks, Mond
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AmuroNT1
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Re: Help With a Mecha game newbie

I kind of wish you'd waited for advice before buying those games, because I would have warned you away from ACE: R. As someone who loves that franchise it's probably the worst entry.
Sakuya: "Whatever. Stop lying and give up your schemes, now."
Yukari: (Which lies and schemes are she talking about? It's hard to keep track of them all...)

-Touhou 07.5 ~ Immaterial and Missing Power
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GVmanX
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Re: Help With a Mecha game newbie

How is ACE: R? I've played a bit of ACE 2 and have beaten ACE 3. Isn't it supposed to be a lot slower?
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AmuroNT1
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Re: Help With a Mecha game newbie

Ah, to give the ACE: R rant again...

-Control system is completely revised for the worse. The only decent addition was the ability to do a Hyper Boost in order to cross the map quickly. Otherwise, they instituted a Tension system where EVERYTHING except for your primary ranged and melee weapons cost Tension, even things like vulcans.

-Plot is incredibly weak compared to past ACE or SRW games. The characters get plucked out of their home worlds and warped to a new universe, so the crossover aspect is minimized and you don't get nearly as many big battles because only a small number of enemies got brought along with the heroes. The only series to get its conclusion in-game is Macross Frontier, and that stage is basically a five-minute long cutscene with about one minute of rail-shooter split in between. Everyone else just gets abruptly dumped back home at the end of the game to sort things out.

-Original characters are pretty forgettable. They're androids who were designed to defend this Ark ship, only one developed a God complex and all the others except for one joined his side.

-Character selection is pretty bad. In order to deal with criticism that ACE3 got too bloated, they limited the cast of most series to three or four characters. The problem is that they decided to include extra units, but not change the number of pilots; for example you can unlock the original Lancelot and Guren Mk-II for Code Geass characters when you already have the upgraded versions from R2.

What really makes it hurt is that R was the first game for a lot of cool series like Geass, Frontier, Full Metal Panic, and Crossbone Gundam, and yet this is what they got instead of decent representation.
Sakuya: "Whatever. Stop lying and give up your schemes, now."
Yukari: (Which lies and schemes are she talking about? It's hard to keep track of them all...)

-Touhou 07.5 ~ Immaterial and Missing Power
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GVmanX
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Re: Help With a Mecha game newbie

Good God, that Tension thing sounds awful. Someone thought that was a good idea? And what happens when you run out?

I'm guessing the other series present just get some sort of "To be continued" thing?

People COMPLAINED about ACE 3's roster? I think that's one of the biggest strengths of the game. It's why I hoped R would get a little more crazy in terms of roster development.
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AmuroNT1
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Re: Help With a Mecha game newbie

Like I said, you can still use your basic gun and melee when you have low Tension, but you need to build it up to do anything else.

At the end of the plot, the characters just get sent home, get to briefly comment on the adventure, then roll credits. The implication is that they'll be continuing their own storylines as if nothing happened. The sole exception is the SRW OG crew, where Ryusei and Kyosuke arrive home just fine, but Masaki doesn't appear with them; that was used as a plot hook for the later Lord of Elemental games.

And I dunno if it was fan complaints about ACE3's roster, but Banpresto certainly felt it was too bloated (and in fairness, did we really need things like both Ray and Charles' mecha?). So when ACE R was being teased, we were told it'd be about 3 characters per show. When fans got upset, Terada explained on the official blog that he meant CHARACTERS, not mecha, and that they'd certainly have people using more than one mecha. Aquarion is an obvious exception since they included all eight main pilots (but with only the one mech), and Macross Frontier got six (Alto, Ozma, Mihkail, Luka, Klan, and Canaria).
Sakuya: "Whatever. Stop lying and give up your schemes, now."
Yukari: (Which lies and schemes are she talking about? It's hard to keep track of them all...)

-Touhou 07.5 ~ Immaterial and Missing Power
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GVmanX
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Re: Help With a Mecha game newbie

AmuroNT1 wrote:and in fairness, did we really need things like both Ray and Charles' mecha?
Yes. Yes we did.

Well, I think I can see why people generally disliked the game. At least we have 2 and 3.

While I'm posting, how were 1 and Portable?
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AmuroNT1
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Re: Help With a Mecha game newbie

I always compare ACE 1 to the first Assassin's Creed, inasmuch as it's a good game, but you can see that with a bit more polish it could have been a great game. If you played the later ACEs, the original will feel kinda slow and prototypical; overall though, I'd only recommend playing it if you really want to see how they handled Gundam Wing (since every other show featured in that game showed up in another).

As for Portable, I never played it, but it was pretty well made as an apology for the mistakes of ACE R. It reverts to the old mechanics while retaining the one or two things that worked from R like Hyper Boost, and had a fairly sizable cast list (including some shows that never showed up elsewhere in the series, like Gundam 00 and Lamune & 40 Fire). The main issue is that there's no overarching story for the game, just missions inspired by certain episodes of the anime involved. I understand it was decent enough, but not amazing.
Sakuya: "Whatever. Stop lying and give up your schemes, now."
Yukari: (Which lies and schemes are she talking about? It's hard to keep track of them all...)

-Touhou 07.5 ~ Immaterial and Missing Power
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GVmanX
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Re: Help With a Mecha game newbie

I see. Portable sounds kinda nifty; I might have to look into it.

Thanks for all the info you've given me.
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