SuperStiltzkin
Member
Haven't run into offensively bad voice acting yet. Ryudo sounds a lot like Raiden, but turns out he's Liquid Snake. And Skye is Campbell. Solidus and Big Boss are also in this. But I'm only like an hour in.
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Grandia 2 Anniversary Edition on August 24, $20 (25% off sale at launch)
- Thread starter Robert at Zeboyd Games
- Start date
I'd place FFX's dub below this if only because FFX suffered from speed racer talk sometimes and it's dumb joke (Singular) was not as much fun as all of G2's dumb jokes.
One of your party members is Ariel (As in the mermaid) and another is Etna. You may be surprised to learn who!
AdawgDaFAB
Member
Thanks! I was able to extract my save from nullDC via VMU Explorer and import it into the game with no issues whatsoever.
Now I just need to figure out why my controller is giving me issues and I'll be golden.
I have a DS4 that I use with DS4Windows. With it running (XInput), the configuration menu sees the controller and lets me reassign buttons. However, no inputs are detected when the game starts. If I turn DS4W off (switching to DirectInput), now the configuration menu doesn't recognize any controller inputs (thus, no ability to change button mapping), but the controller actually works when the game starts up.
The DirectInput button mapping (when using a DS4) defaults as follows:
Interact / Confirm: Square
Cancel / Walk: X
Cycle Target / Party AI: Triangle
Rotate Camera Left: L1
Rotate Camera Right: R1
Menu: R2
Move UDLR: D-Pad/Analogs
The d-pad and analogs are mostly fine, however the right analog stick is set up reversed. Moving the right stick will move the camera opposite direction of the setting in the menu. Ex: Pressing L1 moves the camera to the left, as set in the menu option; while pressing the stick to the left moves the camera to the right.
Edit:
There seems to be a bug where the Left/Right camera option in the menu will lose effect / change from the selected upon changing screens.
Edit 2:
I was able to use XInput to change around the controls from the default above and then use DirectInput to play. I had to figure out what XI button = what DI button, but it worked.
Edit 3:
This fixed my XInput issues. However, the right stick doesn't work for XInput, instead putting the camera left/right controls of the RS over on L2/R2.
Cleared the game again. As blasphemous as it may be, Grandia 2 is still squarely my least favorite in the series, although I don't dislike it. I felt G3 only improved on the combat and dungeons, and made a few other tweaks that changed game-flow and challenge for the better (specifically regarding save points).
I should play Xtreme one of these days though.
I should play Xtreme one of these days though.
KainXVIII
Member
They can just stretch spells videos, not like we lose something (i think)
OmegaDL50
Member
Xtreme uses an improved and modified version of the Grandia II combat system. However it has the feel of a dungeon crawler, making have similar ties to games like Diablo II with the dungeon crawling aspect but wrapped up in the Grandia 2 battle engine. It's definitely different from typical Grandia game.
OmegaDL50
Member
He left Game Arts in 2000 to create G-Mode, and it's unfortunate he passed in 2011.
Outside of Grandia Online, and GungHo's acquisition of them. Game Arts projects have been relatively low key. For example outside of some minor releases like Lunar Genesis / Dragon Song on the DS, which is a prequel to Silver Star taking place 1000 years prior, and the 2nd remake of Silver Star called Silver Star Harmony.
Most recent game that I'm aware of that that old Game Arts staff did under the new name Gung Ho was Ragnarok Odyssey and it's improved re-release Ragnarok Odyssey Ace which is loosely based on the Korean MMO, Ragnarok Online
I never played it myself, but since it has ties to Gung Ho, I'm interested in checking it out. Norse myths are one of my favorite mythologies anyways.
Outside of Grandia Online, and GungHo's acquisition of them. Game Arts projects have been relatively low key. For example outside of some minor releases like Lunar Genesis / Dragon Song on the DS, which is a prequel to Silver Star taking place 1000 years prior, and the 2nd remake of Silver Star called Silver Star Harmony.
Most recent game that I'm aware of that that old Game Arts staff did under the new name Gung Ho was Ragnarok Odyssey and it's improved re-release Ragnarok Odyssey Ace which is loosely based on the Korean MMO, Ragnarok Online
I never played it myself, but since it has ties to Gung Ho, I'm interested in checking it out. Norse myths are one of my favorite mythologies anyways.
JailDesigner
Member
Sorry to ask but, is it 30 fps locked?
OmegaDL50
Member
It was 30 fps in the original Dreamcast release if you aren't aware. This game is a fairly straight port of the DC release with some small additions such as dual language for English and Japanese and a Hard difficulty mode.
For a fairly budget $20 release. I don't expect major work to be done to a 15 year old game, other than it receives Final Fantasy X level remastering work which would then probably bump the pricing up to the $30 to $40 range.
BONKERS
Member
http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/139869
Wishing I still had a drawing tablet hah
It's 15 years old, so it's a little more palatable to deal with.
I asked caspel in a PM whether it's possible at all to make the game run at half speed at 30FPS and then allow it to run at 60FPS even if it wasn't perfect along with some other stuff. (IE: Is there an email we can send issues to, to hopefully get fixed?) Said would show it to the team tomorrow
Wishing I still had a drawing tablet hah
It's 15 years old, so it's a little more palatable to deal with.
I asked caspel in a PM whether it's possible at all to make the game run at half speed at 30FPS and then allow it to run at 60FPS even if it wasn't perfect along with some other stuff. (IE: Is there an email we can send issues to, to hopefully get fixed?) Said would show it to the team tomorrow
Heh, it begins.
Any luck finding the fonts? I mean, they're obviously a bunch of bitmaps. Sprucing those up and giving e.g. the combat fonts proper outlines or shadowing so they pop (which wasn't worth it at 480p) along with the icons would make combat look so much better.
I may have to paste my face on top of every characters face
I'm having immense difficulties making out the face parts, though. Aside from the obvious eye, of course.
I mean, that's literally the only feature on a beige model on most early 3D JRPG character models.
You get ears if you're lucky.
BONKERS
Member
I asked Caspel as well if they could point us in the direction of the fonts
Heh, I mean you could always go through the first step of texture-replacement-101 which is to paint a bunch of fluorescent patterns of differing orientation and colors and see where they go in-game.
This is a long shot, but in case there are any old-school hardcore Grandia 2 completionists in here: I'm going through the cheevo list. Hurricane Belt? I only recall Hurricane Belts in Grandia 1. Any ideas re: Grandia 2?
Don't wanna do a 100% playthrough only to realize it's a missable item from the start of the game or something.
edit: It has a gold cost. Is it buyable somewhere?
SuperStiltzkin
Member
I first got Xtreme as a christmas gift, I remember not liking anything about it when I first tried it. I had only played Grandia 2 briefly when I borrowed it from a friend and liked it enough that I asked for Xtreme. I remember not liking the fact that you got every single party member right off the bat, the fact that there was one city hub, the fact that the dungeons were so long and exhausting , and the fact that there was so little story involved. It wasn't what I was looking for in a JRPG at the time.
Coming back to it a few months later and finally understanding the battle system, I really started to enjoy the game and understand that it was a dungeon crawler RPG first more than a tradition JRPG. And because of that, I think it might be the best (gameplay wise) in the series. Of course I still haven't beaten 2, so I won't jump the gun. But I remember there being a ton of content in terms of eggs, fusions, skill books, weapons, armor, accessories, and replayable dungeons where you could farm bosses for better loot. It really was more Diablo-like in that respect. Remembering it now makes me want to go back and play it with new party members.
Spectrasonic
Member
Is the game limited to 1080p resolution?
BoukenJima
Banned
Is Grandia 2 worth trying when I thought 1 was pretty dogshit? I didn't enjoy anything about the first aside from the music. Combat was okay but magic felt broken, writing felt pretty juvenile and downright cringeworthy at times and overall I thought there was just way too much extraneous dialogue to keep up a decent pacing.
Any chance 2 is... less of that?
Any chance 2 is... less of that?
Basileus777
Member
You can go higher if you edit an ini file.
timetokill
Banned
Played it for 3 hours with no issues. Right back in the swing of things.
Hello? This is Hailun!
Member
I thought 1 was better than 2, but this was 15 years ago.
timetokill
Banned
Also people are crazy for shitting on the English dub. it's not the best ever but it's perfectly fine, and was actually pretty good for its time.
It's not like the story is Shakespeare or anything. It's a fun little romp. I thought the voice actors did a great job of giving the characters personality.
It's not like the story is Shakespeare or anything. It's a fun little romp. I thought the voice actors did a great job of giving the characters personality.
Vincent Grayson
Member
As a younger man, this was the main reason I lamented the lack of Japanese VA in so many RPGs. Not that the normal dialogue in English was a problem, but hearing ability names yelled out in English over and over just...I don't like it one bit.
Grandia Xtreme was for me the best battle system of any grandia. Also the most challenging one, i remember the 100 floor secret dungeon + the hard mode of existing dungeon were really challenging. Some of the best boss fight to any grandia game.
Sir_Crocodile
Member
No.
Magic system has been changed - it was very exploitable in 1 for water especially, but I think with the other additions like skillbooks it ends up being easier even without grinding.
Story & battlesystem are the big plus points of G1 & G2 for me, so honestly speaking if you didn't find them so in G1, I don't think there's much for you here.
So, played a little while more.
Hard Mode is actually a decent boost in difficulty for being such a simple number adjustment. I'm pretty sure given time and determination some modders can make something truly brilliant for a challenge mode, but simply having mobs take longer to die changes strategy quite a bit. A lot of choices, even in normal battles, become thinking a few steps ahead and attempting to figure out how to minimize damage since you can't outright avoid it most of the time when enemies aren't going to die in the next hit.
Also the looping bug - I'm 90% sure that the engine, for whatever reason, is ignoring looping points and going right back to the start of the audio clips. (This is assuming the ogg files have that data embedded in the header. If they don't, then depending on how the engine is handling looping that may be the issue)
As mentioned in the thread, this affects both BGMs (first really noticeable in Agear Inn, since that track is rather short and you spend some decent time in there) and ambient SFX like wind blowing, etc.
I think the overall tone is radically different from Grandia 1 and 2. Grandia 1 at its very core is a coming-of-age story, with a heavy emphasis of forging out into the unknown. Grandia 2 has a much less juvenile and much more snarky main character, and ditches a lot of the exploration vibe the first game had for a more traditional (by JRPG standards) mega-clash-between-good-god-and-evil-god story.
Hard Mode is actually a decent boost in difficulty for being such a simple number adjustment. I'm pretty sure given time and determination some modders can make something truly brilliant for a challenge mode, but simply having mobs take longer to die changes strategy quite a bit. A lot of choices, even in normal battles, become thinking a few steps ahead and attempting to figure out how to minimize damage since you can't outright avoid it most of the time when enemies aren't going to die in the next hit.
Also the looping bug - I'm 90% sure that the engine, for whatever reason, is ignoring looping points and going right back to the start of the audio clips. (This is assuming the ogg files have that data embedded in the header. If they don't, then depending on how the engine is handling looping that may be the issue)
As mentioned in the thread, this affects both BGMs (first really noticeable in Agear Inn, since that track is rather short and you spend some decent time in there) and ambient SFX like wind blowing, etc.
I think the overall tone is radically different from Grandia 1 and 2. Grandia 1 at its very core is a coming-of-age story, with a heavy emphasis of forging out into the unknown. Grandia 2 has a much less juvenile and much more snarky main character, and ditches a lot of the exploration vibe the first game had for a more traditional (by JRPG standards) mega-clash-between-good-god-and-evil-god story.
Grandia 3 seemed to try to bring back the coming-of-age and exploration focus of 1 and fell flat on its face :'(
This is what i don't understand, other then
Valmar eyes
Last Boss
I don't disagree. But considering that the rest of the port is simply functional, I don't think having someone come up with a complete numbers overhaul and then sinking the QA hours in to test it and then evaluate it against the base game at every point of the game to make sure it's a truly 'hard mode' is within the scope of this version.
Like I said, pretty sure some dedicated modders will eventually get on it. Heck, there were/are rebalance mods for the old PC version.
Like I said, pretty sure some dedicated modders will eventually get on it. Heck, there were/are rebalance mods for the old PC version.
Yep, I'm aware Xtreme is crawler-like and places less focus on story and to be honest that sounds pretty good to me.
I would like to check out Ragnarok Odyssey Ace as well, I think it's one of the best games Gung Ho can port, as it's pretty recent
There's interest by Gung Ho in porting pretty much the entire Game Arts catalogue to PC, so they choose Grandia II as the flagship title. I really hope this one sells enough so we can get more. It's still in the top sellers list, at a least.
And what's the excuse for the 30fps lock?
robotzombie
Member
That it's the DC version?
Sir_Crocodile
Member
Grandia 3 spoilers
Travelling around with your mum for a chunk of the game didn't help much lol
Ahahahahahahahaha
edit: Wait, I thought that was an attempt at non-sequitur humor. My bad.
If the text font is a bitmap, I'm either blind or it's in an unusual format and as such can't find it.
Bunch of combat png dumps:
Lol. I swear some people forget what the year 2000 was like for games. The above statement is true: the Anniversary Edition is based on the DC version, which ran at 30fps. No need to label it as an excuse since we have found that fans appreciated the DC version the most and hated the old PC version the most.
Caspel what's your excuse for no facebook integration
???
Oh man. Now that I think about it, all I recall of Grandia 3's cast is:
- Yuki
- Yuki's
- Alfina
- Big boobs gypsy woman
I desperately need to replay Grandia 3 too. (GungHo pls
but after Grandia 1
Huh. Wonder if the game will choke if the dimensions are bumped up.
But...
she was one of the better developed characters in the game :< I cared more for her troubles than most of the characters in that game.
Need to jump on this when I can, I prefer Grandia 1 to 2 in all but the battle system, and I love playing Grandia games purely for the battle system (it's what got me through Grandia 3).
and how come Keith David didn't redub Ryudo
GhostTrick
Banned
Eh, really appreciate GungHo's efforts though. Really looking forward your next release
Yourself included. 30fps locks on PC were unacceptable then, still are.
If it's anything like many Japanese-made games, the framerate might be tied to game logic in order to optimise things more on the limited platforms that they were originally made for, so "unlocking" it to 60fps may have unintended and adverse side-effects (see: Valkyria Chronicles and Dark Souls 1 PC ports as more recent examples). This might be especially true for a 15-year old console game originally programmed for the Dreamcast. Worse case scenario, things could actually break the game.
I'm certainly not defending not going for 60fps where possible, but it's an acceptable reason if they choose not to do it for a port.