Suikoden III: the first reaction post.
Since I fell so hard for Suikoden V (which I should maybe do a summative post on at some point, if people are interested?), Mith set me up with Suikoden III -- we didn't have a copy of I handy, though thanks to 
chuckro we do now. I'm somewhere in the middle of Hugo's Chapter 3 now (and only have Geddoe's left to go), but I've been spoiled for the entire game, so spoilers for future events are not an issue.
Overall, I'm enjoying it a lot, especially now that the plot's really kicked in and everyone's stories are starting to tie together. I can't help comparing it to Suikoden V in my head, obviously, though maybe I should save the in-depth comparisons for when I've made it through I and II. (I'm skipping IV, on the advice of nearly everyone I've spoken to.) I have issues with the story structure, mostly regarding tonal whiplash, but they seem to be resolving themselves, at least.
The turn-based combat is considerably more challenging than it was in V, which I appreciate; it's not "hates-you-and-wants-you-to-die" difficult, but I'm not yawning and waiting for Georg Prime to kill everything, either. I mean, I've actually died during this game particularly when I was horrifically underleveled and underequipped at the beginning of Geddoe's Chapter 2, whoops. Your party -- and your enemies -- don't stay in formation; they move around to attack, which adds a nice dimensionality to battles. You want to make sure your party's spaced out so they don't all get nuked by area-of-effect attacks, and you want to make sure your area-of-effect attacks hit as many foes as possible without hurting your allies. Everyone in your party is paired up, and each pair can only be given one command. Not too bad if you have a pair with a good combo attack, but frustrating when you're dealing with spellcasters, since you can only cast one spell at a time. I miss Suikoden V's formations and formation skills, which also add an element of strategy to where you place your party, but I'm down with this system, too.
The strategy battles are turn-based instead of real-time, which is easier for me to play because my hand-eye coordination is crap, but they operate a little too much like normal encounters for me to really get the "holy crap I'm leading an army" feel from them, the way I did in V. (Another thing I liked about V: even the furniture characters could command or bolster units on the battlefield, which made everyone in your army feel useful and saved grinding time.) They aren't cinematic in the same way, and I like cinema in my battles.
Visually -- well, first of all, FUCK THAT FIXED CAMERA ANGLE. God. Hate. I prefer FFXII's butt-cam to this. But I'll give Suiko III major props for avoiding something that bugged me enormously about V: each city and town I've been to has an incredibly distinctive feel. The closest you get to generic Western European fantasyland is some of the towns in Zexen, and even the design and architecture of those places are detailed enough that you know they're referencing specific cultures and periods, not Ye Olde Renaissance Faire. And while there's a fair bit of repetitive tiling in the dungeons, they feel a lot less copy-pasted than Suikoden V's did. The world's cohesive and coherent and there's a Balinese duck village, okay, how can I not be all over that.
Unfortunately, that kind of coherency in tone isn't always true for the characters and plot.
Suikoden III tackles a lot of weighty themes and complex political issues -- and then pulls back from them right when you think "oh shit, this is going to get good," and it's frustrating. Which isn't to say that I expect the game to be All Grimdark All The Time; that's not particularly realistic, either. I like stories that can blend heaviness and lightness, moments of heart-pounding plot and quieter scenes where characters can regroup and reflect. But those heavy and light moments should be tonally consistent. Jumping from a moving scene about loss and what it means to be a soldier and growing up to a scene where you're playing babysitter to a Wacky Girl from Tinto and her long-suffering sidekicks is jarring and weird and undercuts the mood and character development you were just building. (Yes, I think Hugo's chapters are the worst offenders in this regard, which is part of why his character arc still feels nebulous and he's acting more like a plot passenger than a protagonist. I do expect this to change once I give him the True Fire Rune, but.)
I think Geddoe's chapters strike the best balance so far: there are some damn funny moments in there, but they don't arise from Wacky Joke Characters and their Wacky Hijinks. The members of the 12th bicker and crack wise in ways that are consistent with what's happening in the plot and with what we know about who they are and with how they interact with each other. Example time: At one point, after a meetup with the antagonists that left everyone pretty shaken, Aila, a Karayan refugee, says "I need a soda." It's funny, because at the very least you'd expect her to say "I need a drink," but then you remember how Geddoe's last chapter ended with her drinking soda for the first time, right after she escaped the destruction of her village, and it's still funny but also informative and a little sad.
This tonal inconsistency contributes to the pacing issues. I get that Suikoden games start slow because they like to immerse you in the world and give you context before the plot kicks off, but man, there are pacing issues in this game. The Trinity Sight system is another part of that; as cool as it is from a storytelling perspective to see the story from four different perspectives, it means that the ball takes a long-ass time to get rolling, and the characters don't always feel like they are part of the same story, at least in the beginning. (Dearly as I love Thomas and enjoyed his chapters, they had this problem bigtime. I thought the end of his first chapter was setting up for a wham moment that would tie his story to the Flame Champion and the Zexen-Grasslands-Harmonia conflict, but it didn't happen, and his eventual connection to the main story was tenuous at best and felt forced.)
It's hard to establish who's driving the action in stories about multilayered conflicts told from multiple points-of-view. I get that. I'm a GRRM fan, for crying out loud. But the point of videogames as a medium is that you, the player, drive the story -- you're in the center of the action, and the action is generally centered on you. But the only viewpoint character in III who feels that integral to the action (so far) is Chris; she's never really at a remove from the conflict, and her actions have an immediate impact on the main storyline. That's not the case for Hugo and Thomas, and it's not always the case for Geddoe, either. And while I know that the Zexen-Grasslands-Harmonia war is actually a distraction from the antagonists' plans, it's a little frustrating to present a conflict with that kind of scope and relegate the player characters to its sidelines.
To be fair, the story's already correcting some of my initial issues with it, and once I hit Chapter 4, I know a lot of my main complaints won't hold true anymore. But that's still a long time to wait.
Suikoden III's characters also took a little longer to grow on me than V's did, and I'm still neutral-to-negative on some of them. But once I fell, I fell hard. I loved Chris from the beginning -- seriously, is anyone suprised, nope, didn't think so -- and continue to love her more and more as her story progresses. And NASH. Mith has been telling me for years that I'd love Nash, and Mith called it right. God, I love dangerous smarmy assholes, particularly when they're teamed up with tough-minded ladies who refuse to put up with their shit. Seriously, though, why are they not making out why are they not making out now. I was saying that to the screen after their second scene together, I swear. What is it about Suikoden games making me such a ferocious het-shipper?
Predictably, I also adore Thomas and Cecile and their respective arcs, and I want to cuddle that little hobbit so much. (I, like the rest of the Internet, frequently noted his resemblance to Frodo Baggins.) Between her devotion and his determination and growing confidence, I am slain. I love those kinds of arcs almost as much as I love one's like Chris's.
Geddoe's a difficult guy to have as a viewpoint character because he gives so little away, but I'm liking him more and more, and I'm an easy sell on the rest of the 12th, particularly Queen. (Also, Aila and Jacques are adorable.) Hugo I like well enough, and I thought I'd really like him after the end of Chapter 1, but I'm not that sold on how his narrative has been developing thus far. Sergeant Joe, though, is fucking awesome, as is Lucia. Mmm, Lucia. I salute the Suikoden franchise's commitment to awesome ladies. Although I know basically everything there is to know about Albert Silverberg thanks to Mith, I don't have terribly strong feelings on most of the antagonists yet, save that I would probably find Sarah insufferable if she weren't so bitchy. She reminds me of CC a little. And Franz basically is Suzaku, so obviously I love him and want to poke him with sharp sticks.
I am quite excited for shit to start getting real. And for Thomas to welcome everyone into what I have renamed Occupy Castle. And for Nash and Chris to make out. I really am horribly predictable, aren't I?
.
chuckro we do now. I'm somewhere in the middle of Hugo's Chapter 3 now (and only have Geddoe's left to go), but I've been spoiled for the entire game, so spoilers for future events are not an issue.
Overall, I'm enjoying it a lot, especially now that the plot's really kicked in and everyone's stories are starting to tie together. I can't help comparing it to Suikoden V in my head, obviously, though maybe I should save the in-depth comparisons for when I've made it through I and II. (I'm skipping IV, on the advice of nearly everyone I've spoken to.) I have issues with the story structure, mostly regarding tonal whiplash, but they seem to be resolving themselves, at least.
The turn-based combat is considerably more challenging than it was in V, which I appreciate; it's not "hates-you-and-wants-you-to-die" difficult, but I'm not yawning and waiting for Georg Prime to kill everything, either. I mean, I've actually died during this game particularly when I was horrifically underleveled and underequipped at the beginning of Geddoe's Chapter 2, whoops. Your party -- and your enemies -- don't stay in formation; they move around to attack, which adds a nice dimensionality to battles. You want to make sure your party's spaced out so they don't all get nuked by area-of-effect attacks, and you want to make sure your area-of-effect attacks hit as many foes as possible without hurting your allies. Everyone in your party is paired up, and each pair can only be given one command. Not too bad if you have a pair with a good combo attack, but frustrating when you're dealing with spellcasters, since you can only cast one spell at a time. I miss Suikoden V's formations and formation skills, which also add an element of strategy to where you place your party, but I'm down with this system, too.
The strategy battles are turn-based instead of real-time, which is easier for me to play because my hand-eye coordination is crap, but they operate a little too much like normal encounters for me to really get the "holy crap I'm leading an army" feel from them, the way I did in V. (Another thing I liked about V: even the furniture characters could command or bolster units on the battlefield, which made everyone in your army feel useful and saved grinding time.) They aren't cinematic in the same way, and I like cinema in my battles.
Visually -- well, first of all, FUCK THAT FIXED CAMERA ANGLE. God. Hate. I prefer FFXII's butt-cam to this. But I'll give Suiko III major props for avoiding something that bugged me enormously about V: each city and town I've been to has an incredibly distinctive feel. The closest you get to generic Western European fantasyland is some of the towns in Zexen, and even the design and architecture of those places are detailed enough that you know they're referencing specific cultures and periods, not Ye Olde Renaissance Faire. And while there's a fair bit of repetitive tiling in the dungeons, they feel a lot less copy-pasted than Suikoden V's did. The world's cohesive and coherent and there's a Balinese duck village, okay, how can I not be all over that.
Unfortunately, that kind of coherency in tone isn't always true for the characters and plot.
Suikoden III tackles a lot of weighty themes and complex political issues -- and then pulls back from them right when you think "oh shit, this is going to get good," and it's frustrating. Which isn't to say that I expect the game to be All Grimdark All The Time; that's not particularly realistic, either. I like stories that can blend heaviness and lightness, moments of heart-pounding plot and quieter scenes where characters can regroup and reflect. But those heavy and light moments should be tonally consistent. Jumping from a moving scene about loss and what it means to be a soldier and growing up to a scene where you're playing babysitter to a Wacky Girl from Tinto and her long-suffering sidekicks is jarring and weird and undercuts the mood and character development you were just building. (Yes, I think Hugo's chapters are the worst offenders in this regard, which is part of why his character arc still feels nebulous and he's acting more like a plot passenger than a protagonist. I do expect this to change once I give him the True Fire Rune, but.)
I think Geddoe's chapters strike the best balance so far: there are some damn funny moments in there, but they don't arise from Wacky Joke Characters and their Wacky Hijinks. The members of the 12th bicker and crack wise in ways that are consistent with what's happening in the plot and with what we know about who they are and with how they interact with each other. Example time: At one point, after a meetup with the antagonists that left everyone pretty shaken, Aila, a Karayan refugee, says "I need a soda." It's funny, because at the very least you'd expect her to say "I need a drink," but then you remember how Geddoe's last chapter ended with her drinking soda for the first time, right after she escaped the destruction of her village, and it's still funny but also informative and a little sad.
This tonal inconsistency contributes to the pacing issues. I get that Suikoden games start slow because they like to immerse you in the world and give you context before the plot kicks off, but man, there are pacing issues in this game. The Trinity Sight system is another part of that; as cool as it is from a storytelling perspective to see the story from four different perspectives, it means that the ball takes a long-ass time to get rolling, and the characters don't always feel like they are part of the same story, at least in the beginning. (Dearly as I love Thomas and enjoyed his chapters, they had this problem bigtime. I thought the end of his first chapter was setting up for a wham moment that would tie his story to the Flame Champion and the Zexen-Grasslands-Harmonia conflict, but it didn't happen, and his eventual connection to the main story was tenuous at best and felt forced.)
It's hard to establish who's driving the action in stories about multilayered conflicts told from multiple points-of-view. I get that. I'm a GRRM fan, for crying out loud. But the point of videogames as a medium is that you, the player, drive the story -- you're in the center of the action, and the action is generally centered on you. But the only viewpoint character in III who feels that integral to the action (so far) is Chris; she's never really at a remove from the conflict, and her actions have an immediate impact on the main storyline. That's not the case for Hugo and Thomas, and it's not always the case for Geddoe, either. And while I know that the Zexen-Grasslands-Harmonia war is actually a distraction from the antagonists' plans, it's a little frustrating to present a conflict with that kind of scope and relegate the player characters to its sidelines.
To be fair, the story's already correcting some of my initial issues with it, and once I hit Chapter 4, I know a lot of my main complaints won't hold true anymore. But that's still a long time to wait.
Suikoden III's characters also took a little longer to grow on me than V's did, and I'm still neutral-to-negative on some of them. But once I fell, I fell hard. I loved Chris from the beginning -- seriously, is anyone suprised, nope, didn't think so -- and continue to love her more and more as her story progresses. And NASH. Mith has been telling me for years that I'd love Nash, and Mith called it right. God, I love dangerous smarmy assholes, particularly when they're teamed up with tough-minded ladies who refuse to put up with their shit. Seriously, though, why are they not making out why are they not making out now. I was saying that to the screen after their second scene together, I swear. What is it about Suikoden games making me such a ferocious het-shipper?
Predictably, I also adore Thomas and Cecile and their respective arcs, and I want to cuddle that little hobbit so much. (I, like the rest of the Internet, frequently noted his resemblance to Frodo Baggins.) Between her devotion and his determination and growing confidence, I am slain. I love those kinds of arcs almost as much as I love one's like Chris's.
Geddoe's a difficult guy to have as a viewpoint character because he gives so little away, but I'm liking him more and more, and I'm an easy sell on the rest of the 12th, particularly Queen. (Also, Aila and Jacques are adorable.) Hugo I like well enough, and I thought I'd really like him after the end of Chapter 1, but I'm not that sold on how his narrative has been developing thus far. Sergeant Joe, though, is fucking awesome, as is Lucia. Mmm, Lucia. I salute the Suikoden franchise's commitment to awesome ladies. Although I know basically everything there is to know about Albert Silverberg thanks to Mith, I don't have terribly strong feelings on most of the antagonists yet, save that I would probably find Sarah insufferable if she weren't so bitchy. She reminds me of CC a little. And Franz basically is Suzaku, so obviously I love him and want to poke him with sharp sticks.
I am quite excited for shit to start getting real. And for Thomas to welcome everyone into what I have renamed Occupy Castle. And for Nash and Chris to make out. I really am horribly predictable, aren't I?
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