I'm losing my patience with Tengai Makyou II. The game is crazy big and long for a PC-E JRPG, and that's not a problem per se, the issue I'm having is that I'm now at lvl 30, around half way through the game clocking more than 20 hours already, and despite the game having 2 party members, I've only ever had 2 party members max at once so far. And it's worse than it sounds, there 16-17 regions in the game apparently; you're alone for quite a while in the first game, going through 3 regions all by yourself, then you finally get another party member. But after 4 more regions together the 2nd party member leaves and you're left alone again until you find the third party member to accompany you.... Except that the guy can not use spells, so I lost a versatile fighter/spellcaster only to find someone who can't use spells.Combat was already very one dimensional even with those 2 spellcasters due to the low MP pool and how it's not worth using attack spells in many cases because of their low hit rates; and now it's even worse than that right when random encounters are starting to get really challenging too. I really hope I'll get the second guy back soon because I can't take it anymore and such design decisions baffle me.
>>3844782>despite the game having 2 party membersSorry I meant 4, see the cover.
>>3844782this was translated??
>>3844813Nope
>>3844782>and how it's not worth using attack spells in many cases because of their low hit ratesIm not an expert at this game but I think the way it works is your level delta from the enemy youre fighting affects your accuracy so if you are underleveled you are very inaccurate. There are many situations where offensive spells are good but that might be a little later. I assume since you are playing this you played the first one and just like that game you are expected to grind in multiple places before progressing to the next area. Coincidentally im currently playing 桃太郎伝説 which was hudsons first foray into the comedic heian japanese folkhistory genre and the DNA is very similar and you are expected to spend some time leveling up here too.
>>3844875>桃太郎伝説Original or Turbo? I played both and Turbo is pretty much a straight improvement and that comes from someone obsessed with Famicom RPGs. I don't think they even lowered the required grinding.Anyway Momoden was 1986, grinding was a lot more expected than by 92 (Tengai Makyou II) already. It's true I haven't grinded much and did manage to get by so far, I did die a few times like at the tree dungeon which has 3 bosses in a row and I was out of ressources by the third boss; but the game overall doesn't feel like it wants me to grind that much I sure hope spells get better indeed
>>3844882original>but the game overall doesn't feel like it wants me to grind that much to me it felt expected because of how disadvantaged you are being low level. I cant remember if tengai2 had this leveling quirk from 1 but I remember in 1 there were certain levels where when you reached them you got like 5x stats compared to a normal level up. It felt like a, hey get to this level at least before you go any further, milestone. Early on I might not have done much grinding but later when you get more party members I can remember 3 distinct instances where I had some multi-hour long sessions (theres some tools you get later that aid in this grinding as well that you want probably want to take advantage of.) Pace yourself its a long game, I have in my notes it took me 55 hours to beat it.
>>3844875>>3844891Anyway you're in for a treat if you're just getting into the Momoden series. I played through the entire series (minus the GBC ports of 1-2) and I had a blast though. Between Turbo, II, and the PSX version there is a lot of repetition and retreading the same ground however. Turbo is a straight 1:1 port of the original with some improvements. II is a direct sequel but it takes place in the same world with the same world layout and locations you go through in the same manner except it's extended and with some differences; and then the PSX version is basically a remake of 2 (so, the same things, again!) but with the plot of the first game and most of new additions are taken from Gaiden and Shin.Gaiden and Shin, the "spin offs", are my favourites becauser that's where they experimented the most. Gaiden is a 3 mini scenarios game, each inspired by DQ1, 2 and 3 respectively and I really enjoyed scenario 2, with its tight balancing and its final dungeon that puts Rhone to shame, as well as scenario 3 to the party build up choices; while Shin is overall a much darker and serious game (though it still has some humour). Shin really picks up mid way through the game as you get to build your own castle to use a base and from there you can recruit something like 15+ party members to pick and choose for your party including bosses from the previous games, as well as recruit NPCs to improve your castle like adding a shop etc and the castle is used as a mean of transportation both overwater and underwater as wellso yeah unless you become a dedicated fan I think you can skip Turbo and the PSX version for now but make sure to give Gaiden and Shin a try. It's weird that II wasn't backported to Famicom while Gaiden was and I feel like the main reason for this is pic related: the Famicom couldn't have handled so many characters in line
>>3845110Do you know the turbo differences off the top of your head besides the obvious graphical changes? The game is pretty brutal about an hour ago a black kappa stole my 10,000 yen and ran away so im pretty broke at the moment.
>>3845112>Updates and differences from the NES original include animal helpers who now walk behind the protagonist and who occasionally help out in combat, upgraded world map, different events and quests such as item trading, revamped equipment, being able to store items at the bank, etc . Also the age mechanic, which would give an approximate play time, was replaced by a clock and an easy difficulty setting was also included.You can leave money at the bank in Turbo (pîc related, it says the amount in the Run menu) so overall I'd say the game is a bit easier with the animals helping out in a combat but it's close.Also in the next games you can buy Cucumbers and as long as you have some on you the Kappa stole that instead of money/items, but I can't remember if that was a thing in Turbo already or not.IIRC the Kappa swamp is at around 60-70% through the game so restarting now may not be a good idea. Just push through, you're pretty much guaranteed to lose everything you have at that point in the OG but you'll get it back quickly once you're past the swamp and you're going to have to grind again anyway
>>3845115>so restarting now may not be a good ideaI wasnt planning on it, I found an easy grind spot and im not really worried anyway, it was pretty funny though.>You can leave money at the bank in Turboyou can do that in the original but it costs 100 per 1000 so I havent been doing it and I paid the price>with the animals helping out in a combat they also help in the original but its fairly uncommon, maybe one in 10 attacks they help out. The version is called turbo I was expecting like 2x speed and 2x experience or something.
>>3845116oh I genuinely didn't remember the animals helped out in combat in the original ( Maybe the chances are higher in Turbo though? It seemed common).... nor the bank, which probably makes it the first JRPG with a bank.So I guess both versions are pretty close outside of some quests/puzzles and items being different; also Turbo has battery back up instead of passwordsI always thought it was called Turbo for Turbografx... even though the console wasn't called that in Japan.The easy difficulty may yield more experience I haven't tried it
>>3845118>nor the bank, which probably makes it the first JRPG with a bankits a "bank" just for money, cant store items.
So back to Tengai Makyou II, I was complaining about the lack of party members right? Every time I reach a new town I hope to myself that Kabuki, the 2nd member who left a while ago, will appear and come back... instead I got a gold mine dungeon that seperated my two characters and the hero found himself alone, AGAIN. Turns out you can get your companion back pretty quickly but I didn't realize that because of some shitty requirement he rode a mine cart and you have to SEARCH it for him to appear in the next roomI had gone through the entire dungeon not finding him so I thought I had to beat the boss by myself... You do need your companion back to finish the dungeon but not to face the two bosses it's kinda misleading.The other thing that pisses me off is how shitty buffs and debuffs are. Buffs only last 1 or 2 turns. That's right, buff your defense? Get hit once, and it's over. Total waste of time and ressources. Debuffs can last 2-3 turns except that they can also fail, and they often do too, so again, total waste of time. Bosses tend to have really high defense so you're left doing puny damage little by little.
Of all the games mentioned in this thread, any English ports/translations that do justice to the originals?
>>3845302The original Famicom Momotarou Densetsu and Tengai Makyou on PC-E both have english fan translationsTengai Makyou Zero (SNES) also but that one is very bland imo I wouldn't recommend it
>>3845302ive played the first momotarou for about 14 hours and have encountered 14,000 puns. An good english translation would probably be very difficult.
>>3844782you aren't even half in the game yet, is longer and takes lot of trial and error which you didn't get.even zero is quite long but some won't notice it.level 30 on tengai makyo games is something that can be achieved on the start but doesn't mean you are half in the game, i reached level 30 on the first cave on zero and still haven't seen the old man on the cave yet.
Shiro from Tengai Makyou II or Pochi from Metal Max 2?Who's the best JRPG dog party member ?
>>3845110I'm getting cute aggression from not being able to hug you through the internet.
Yeah okay holy shit, lvl30 wasn't even close to being half way through the game. I'm starting to think this game is longer and has more content than DQ7
Couple of protip spoilers:Starting from the Naniwa region gear is crazy expensive and you'll struggle to buy a couple of things. However, in the final dungeon of this region you can pick up a Trick Cloth in this chest which can be sold for 19k. The chest respawns. There is a teleporter in the same room to go back to the entrance of the dungeon so you can quickly go back&forth too; on top of this some ninja enemies occasionally drop a sword that can be sold for 80kAlso the girl is a purely support character that can't attack on her own but she can use equipment... meaning if you give her swords that can be used for free spells she can attack using them
>>3846821When I played and wanted some cash there was a cave with a respawning golden spider egg (I think) and I would just quickly grab it then go sell it in kyoto. I think it sold for 10k and it was pretty early on.
>>3846844I knew about this but I couldn't find the guy in Kyoto anymore for the life of me so I sold them for 1k instead of 10k at random shops... Also sometimes the egg would hatch even if you warped quickly so it was annoying
>>3846845>Also sometimes the egg would hatch even if you warped quickly so it was annoyingYeah I remember that I dont know why that happened, sometimes it would hatch like 1 step after picking it up. I guess theres some random number generated on when it hatches or some constantly ticking value in the background that resets.
