Suikoden Tierkreis Reviews

Suikoden Tierkreis pre-release board.
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Sutarion
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Suikoden Tierkreis Reviews

Post by Sutarion »

With Konami shipping Tierkreis to the US today, media sites will be posting their reviews in short time. Metacritic is a good site to check for new reviews.

Metacritic - http://www.metacritic.com/games/platfor ... ntierkreis



IGN - Score: 8.8
http://ds.ign.com/articles/963/963533p1.html

Highlights:
Suikoden Tierkreis makes some serious changes from the original series, but despite any differences hardcore fans (myself included) will notice, Suikoden is a great DS RPG.
When it comes to the main story itself, however, I have to admit that I was let down a bit. The anime influence is great for things like animated character intros and specific plot devices, but the main story, while extremely lengthy and very ambitious, is extremely "light vs. dark" in nature.
If you want a great DS RPG, and don’t mind that it’s not the true Suikoden many of us have grown up with, Tierkreis is still very much the real deal. You’d be hard-pressed to find a DS game as well produced, beautiful, or polished as this.
I was a bit surprised by this review. I'm pleased to see that they enjoyed the game, and I'm looking forward to picking it up myself tomorrow. It will be interesting to see what the other news outlets have to say.


GameSpot - Score: 7.5
http://www.gamespot.com/ds/rpg/gensousu ... eview.html

Highlights:
The Good
  • Fantastic visuals and music
  • Streamlined game structure makes 40-plus hours feel brisk
  • It's fun to look for the 108 possible recruits.
The Bad
  • Main character's voice acting is atrocious
  • Wi-Fi functionality not available until well into the adventure.

EDIT: Added Gamespot's review.
Last edited by Sutarion on Sat Mar 21, 2009 12:51 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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patapi
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Re: Suikoden Tierkreis Reviews

Post by patapi »

How far did the reviewer play through the actual game? It's anything but your classic "light versus dark" storyline.
LanceHeart
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Re: Suikoden Tierkreis Reviews

Post by LanceHeart »

LanceHeart wrote:Probably not, though one big difference might be the game being locked in English (strange, North America speaks English, French, and Spanish...).

Edit: The first review is in. Unsurprisingly, it's a review from Nintendo Power. The score? 7/10
http://www.gamestats.com/objects/142/14 ... icles.html
http://www.gamerankings.com/ds/952637-s ... index.html
Two different sources, just for posterity.
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Sutarion
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Re: Suikoden Tierkreis Reviews

Post by Sutarion »

patapi wrote:How far did the reviewer play through the actual game? It's anything but your classic "light versus dark" storyline.
I tried to find some info on IGN's review methodology, but couldn't find anything. Kotaku adds that sort of information to the end of all their reviews, which is very helpful and something that would be nice to see become an industry standard.

The reviewer goes on to explain that he felt the game "beats you over the head" about the antagonists' desires. Not having played it yet, I can't comment on my opinion, but I wanted to clarify the reviewer's stance on the issue.
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Re: Suikoden Tierkreis Reviews

Post by RangerDeon »

patapi wrote:How far did the reviewer play through the actual game? It's anything but your classic "light versus dark" storyline.
Obviously not far, most Suikoden games have never been simply light vs dark.

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Raww Le Klueze
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Re: Suikoden Tierkreis Reviews

Post by Raww Le Klueze »

RangerDeon wrote:Obviously not far, most Suikoden games have never been simply light vs dark.
Tierkreis is.
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Re: Suikoden Tierkreis Reviews

Post by Oppenheimer »

First of all, I'm curious if the supposed huge fan of the series Mark Bozon, who wrote the article, is a member here.

Anyway, I don't have the game yet, but I'm not as looking forward to it after the review.

Basically, he keeps saying they dumbed it down for the little kids who play the DS. And yet somehow he still gives it an 8.8? It's a very confusing review. The only thing that he seems to be very positive about is that it's pretty.
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Re: Suikoden Tierkreis Reviews

Post by LanceHeart »

He's pretty much praising that even though Tierkreis is a watered down version of what we would've gotten in a main series game, it beats the crap out of most RPGs on the DS without even trying. I'll argue a few things like the complete overhauls of unique Suikoden systems (Runes & old-school MP; Blacksmith) and if there's a hint of Suikoden fanboyism that leaked into the score, but I won't deny that Tierkreis has many traditional JRPGs beat.

If that's the kind of praise it got from being simplified, imagine what a simply streamlined Suikoden game could've been...
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Re: Suikoden Tierkreis Reviews

Post by RangerDeon »

I try hard not to read reviews before playing something I think I might like.
When I do that, then their opinions become mine. . .despite what I might have thought prior to reading the reviews.

Sooooo I'm just going to look at the rating: 8.8, eh? Good.

"I wasn't getting rid of you. I want you to do whatever you want to do with me. I know that sounded dirty, and dirty things count, but I didn't mean the dirty things. You and me can hang whenever, wherever."
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Sutarion
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Re: Suikoden Tierkreis Reviews

Post by Sutarion »

GameSpot - Score: 7.5
http://www.gamespot.com/ds/rpg/gensousu ... eview.html

Highlights:
The Good
  • Fantastic visuals and music
  • Streamlined game structure makes 40-plus hours feel brisk
  • It's fun to look for the 108 possible recruits.
The Bad
  • Main character's voice acting is atrocious
  • Wi-Fi functionality not available until well into the adventure.
thcrock
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Re: Suikoden Tierkreis Reviews

Post by thcrock »

My copy came in the mail Friday. I'm not that far into it yet (just named my castle), but here's my initial impressions:

Pacing is much improved over Suikoden V.

Music is more memorable than anything since Suikoden III. I think working with less sophisticated audio hardware makes composers put more thought into the melodies. So far, what I've heard isn't anything like Miki Hagashino's scores, but I still kind of find myself humming the songs sometimes, which is a good thing.

I'm not sure whether or not I like the 3d yet. It seems like this would have been a perfect game to just use sprites. This isn't a big complaint, though.

Often when I go up to a character, I have no idea who it will be until I talk to them. I think I probably had this problem when I first started playing the first two Suikodens, as well. So I think its more a complaint with the graphical quality the DS (which seems like PS1-quality graphics, while the last 3 Suikodens were on PS2), than the game itself.

Main character's voice acting really, really sucks. To be specific, he always sounds like he just drank 5 Red Bulls. I guess he's supposed to be young and full of energy, but it seems too rushed, still. Excluding him, the voice acting is not bad, but with some spots that prevent it from being really good (sometimes, they forget what commas mean).

So far the difficulty seems a bit too easy - I'm sure this will ramp up though. I'm just comparing it to Suikoden I, where I died at the Zombie Dragon three times before getting my castle. I miss that difficulty level. I now have my castle, and I haven't died yet. But this isn't much of a complaint, as most Suikoden games are quite easy.

I will post my full review this week.
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Re: Suikoden Tierkreis Reviews

Post by LanceHeart »

nintendolife: 7/10
http://www.nintendolife.com/reviews/200 ... erkreis_ds

I'd suggest reading the entire review, since there's no easy way to summarize it. It does seem like the author's a longtime Suikoden fan, though.
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Re: Suikoden Tierkreis Reviews

Post by Vextor »

I got my copy and started playing in during the weekend.
I'm pretty fricking impressed with this game so far!
Perhaps my lowered expectation is helping with the perception, along with my abosoloute zero pre-exposure to this game's info... but this game really goes beyond a simple "spin-off."

I didn't even read the manual, but I was able to figure things out pretty easily, and the user interface is very responsive with no lag (thanks to it being on the DS). They seemed to have finally learned from previous mistakes in terms of user interface, and generally it's very easy to equip stuff, remove stuff, etc.

I actually like how you can equip different weapons on different people, and how some characters can / can-not equip certain types of weapons. It's fun to be able to let a magic-user character wield a sword and see how they suck at it. I was also shocked when I can make certain characters wield weapons in both hands (thanks to zero pre-exposure to game info). Not only can I wield two swords, I can even wield two maces (I love the brutal image). Weapon grafics also change, along with character's posture during battle, which is all the more pleasurable.

Suikoden 4 and 5 had problems with the user interface, making the game annoying to play to a certain extent. Tierkreis doesn't have this problem (so far).

I like the story so far. Plenty of countries with plenty of in-fighting, betrayal, etc. They also use music from Suikoden 1 and 2, which helps give it a suikoden feel.

I was concerned with continuity like many others, but after playing the game I got engrossed in the story anyhow, and I found it difficult to stop playing the game. I suppose continuity for continuity's sake isn't all that paramount for a game to be "suikoden-like," which is a refreshing realization.
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Re: Suikoden Tierkreis Reviews

Post by Oppenheimer »

I'm glad you're enjoying it Vextor. I'm going to be devils advocate here though as I do have a couple criticisms.

I got my copy on Friday and haven't gotten super far yet, but far enough for my initial impressions.

I'd have to say my biggest road bump is the graphics and the voice overs. As I had posted in the other thread I found that the sped up dialogue was something that took a bit of getting used to but definitely impacted my suspension of disbelief and therefore made it harder to get into the plot.

However, what plot there is so far is enjoyable. I love of course that there is no silent protagonist. You also get to make dialogue choices for him which is nice, although the few I've tried to pick the obviously "incorrect" choice have ended up having other characters just convince me I was wrong and do the first choice anyway. That's the kind of thing that's always somewhat annoying, why give a choice if you don't really have one?

The graphics end, it's hard to get used to the characters being so misshapen. Especially outside of battles they're so short and blocky. I guess I'm just used to the graphics in Final Fantasy IV DS where the body proportions seemed more accurate to the avatars (ie. most people were lean).

The monsters also seem to be somewhat blobby. The first monster you have to hunt in the game, I don't really know what it's supposed to look like, a yellow blob with a beak? But, considering that it is a DS game I suppose you have to give the graphics a hand wave.

The plot is far from boring however. It is a bit over wordy, I often understand what's going on far before the characters do and then when they receive an explanation about it and discuss it for quite a while, which doesn't help. Other than that it does make you want to continue on and find out what's next. It doesn't seem cliché either. I'm curious to see what it'll be like when I actually have an HQ and an army as opposed to just being a bunch of kids on a journey.

The game is extraordinarily easy so far. I know I'm early on so maybe it'll become just moderately easy near the end. But, so far I have put it on Auto Battle almost all the time. You also get wads of potch from selling the things you get from enemies so that's not an issue either. Plus, whenever you level up you get all your MP back which gives you infinite healing. In fact, the game makes it seem like it wants you to avoid grinding. With Suikoden's unique levelling up system still in play (thank goodness) you gain more experience when you're fighting tougher enemies and therefore you level up faster and get all your MP back sooner.

I think what it comes down to is I don't play tons of DS RPGs and I suppose this is a great example of one, but I'd rather have something like Suikoden V that has no limitations due to processing power and cartridge size. I think that would have made this game all the better. I have no need for portability.
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Re: Suikoden Tierkreis Reviews

Post by Runemaster »

I agree. The pacing is improved which decreases boring scenes. Though sometimes the infos aren't registering in my brain because of it.

Reviews arent very bad either.
Here's one form GameFAQs ( Scored 9/10!): http://www.gamefaqs.com/portable/ds/review/R132882.html
Well done, Tierkreis!
I will bring Lordlake's fate... to the entire Suikoden World! weeeeeeh!
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