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Etrian Odyssey 4 (3DS) - Preview and Screens
- Thread starter duckroll
- Start date
For reference, EO3 was released in Japan April 1st, 2010, but the announcement of its September release in NA wasn't until May 26th - nearly a couple of months later.
vagabondarts
Member
Well I haven't even finished EOIII yet so if it takes a few months I'm alright with it.
It's going to be epic. Is there an OT yet? Where are JPGAF's impressions?
It's going to be epic. Is there an OT yet? Where are JPGAF's impressions?
Doubt it - especially when it sells more on 3DS and is cheaper to produce on 3DS ?
Actually, since 3 it looks like this series has been coming to adopt some of the connectivity aspects of it's portability.
I think this series may remain handheld for a while.
For some reason June was coming to me a lot, I guess because of E3 and all... but there you go. Though, for that we knew about the localization a bit earlier because someone found the english title graphic in the data, I remember.
I don't think these games are hard to localize, given they are all text, and not even much of that.
Cool. I'm particularly interested in the airship section (is it the same as EO3's sailing?) so keep us updated for impressions
Parakeetman
No one wants a throne you've been sitting on!
Cool. I'm particularly interested in the airship section (is it the same as EO3's sailing?) so keep us updated for impressions
Its a little different, since you no longer have limited range of movement based on supplies. You can pretty much fly around freely wherever you want. But there are FOEs wandering around outside and they are a lot stronger than the ones you meet in dungeons. So generally expect to die or nearly die if you run into one by accident.
There is the system of collecting items to be sold back instantly once you enter town. Its basically collecting food related items. Meat, Veggies, Fish which are found on the map. These can be used to bait the various FOEs or if consumed by your party act as a temp stats buff as long as you do not re-enter the town. The more rare food items can be traded to other NPCs flying around airships. They will ask you for X item if you deliver it to them before Y amount of days pass, then they will give you some sort of random reward.
There now are multiple dungeons too which can be found by flying around the airship areas. Some are surrounded by FOEs so need to use your head a bit with baiting them. Though good thing is once you find / enter a dungeon you can teleport there from town. Then when you exit the dungeon use the town portal item (no idea what the english item name is) and warp back to town.
The airship can be upgraded with a single item that has effects such as, food item rarity lv up, dowsing rod to find hidden treasures on the map, supply catapult which can launch food as bait an extra square. Its actually quite useful since gives you at least 1 square to breath between you and the FOE.
It looks like too there might be another item which will allow the airship to raise its altitude allowing for access to the higher plateaus which are visible on the first map. Have not found that yet so cant really comment on how exactly you reach those areas yet.
Thats about it for the airship though. If anything its a lot more user friendly than the ship was. Though I did enjoy the whole ship thing in EO3.
----
I like it, though am a bit let down with the character class selection. The skills seem to be useful though. But really preferred the classes in EO3. The whole airship and multiple dungeon thing is interesting though and it is nice that the airship is a lot more user friendly than sailing around. Though that was very cool also. The battle graphics have been improved and the music is quite different from EO3. So in all Id say its a good title in the series as it stands on its own. If you are a fan of the series please by all means do pick it up.
To give you an idea of the "broken" kind of party I had used in EO3. 2 Phalanxes, 2 Farmers, 1 Princess. Forgot what everyones sub jobs were though. I know with the Phalanxes it was ninja though since that was pretty useful making doubles of yourself to guard / taunt with. Front Row: Pha Pri Pha Back Row: Far Far
In EO4 the starting classes has really gone back to the very basics of classes for the most part. Not that its a bad thing, but I prefer the more interesting classes and by far the Princess / Prince was one of those due to the versatility of its usage.
Just got my teeth stuck into it and completed the first mini dungeon I couldn't do in the demo. Feels so good taking down my first F.O.E. Then came my second... After that was where I realised what I was getting in to. Up until now I hadn't had any difficulty what so ever, but then the big FOE came out and rather than running I stayed to fight it. Took me 25 turns with my Nightseeker and Swordsman dead, but my medic, fortress and sniper eventually killed it. I was all out of MP and luckily they kept missing my fortress. That was too close >.<
Horatorobor
Member
That's pretty much sums up my fantastic experience with Etrian Odyssey.
Are there any other europeans waiting a for PAL release?
Are there any other europeans waiting a for PAL release?
Here I am.
I bought just EO1, and I found it interesting but way too hard for me.
I've heard about some slight change into this 4th episode in order to make it a little more accessible for customers like me, and I would really love to buy this one.
I would like an EU release of EOIV very much.
I actually bought the first one, played it for a few hours, then sold it as I didn't get on with it. On hearing that other people said it got much better once your options opened up a bit etc, I picked it up again and played it through to the end!
Enjoyed it so much that I ordered EO2 from the US, finished that and immediately pre-ordered EOIII with the artbook. It's now one of my favourite series, so many moments with my team limping back to town, having had our warpwire nicked, praying that we can make it home.
The sailing in EOIII was brilliant. The perfect chilled-out bit of exploration/puzzling, a lovely, relaxing break from dungeon crawling, that still scrathched the exploration itch. The only bit I thought was weak was the 'quests', the multiplayer boss battles out on the island. They could have done a lot more with that, with mini-dungeons to find out at sea, so I'm really pleased to hear that is what EOIV seems to have.
I actually bought the first one, played it for a few hours, then sold it as I didn't get on with it. On hearing that other people said it got much better once your options opened up a bit etc, I picked it up again and played it through to the end!
Enjoyed it so much that I ordered EO2 from the US, finished that and immediately pre-ordered EOIII with the artbook. It's now one of my favourite series, so many moments with my team limping back to town, having had our warpwire nicked, praying that we can make it home.
The sailing in EOIII was brilliant. The perfect chilled-out bit of exploration/puzzling, a lovely, relaxing break from dungeon crawling, that still scrathched the exploration itch. The only bit I thought was weak was the 'quests', the multiplayer boss battles out on the island. They could have done a lot more with that, with mini-dungeons to find out at sea, so I'm really pleased to hear that is what EOIV seems to have.
SatelliteOfLove
Member
Good on the classes. EOIII had too many easily broken class combos.
"Accessible" in EO only means getting farther before hitting brickwalls that need overcoming. To hide from frustration in this series is to hide from success.
"Accessible" in EO only means getting farther before hitting brickwalls that need overcoming. To hide from frustration in this series is to hide from success.
Parakeetman
No one wants a throne you've been sitting on!
Truthfully the game in general isnt meant to be accessible. Its not what wizardry based games are about. Though truthfully in comparison to other Wizardry titles, EO lets folks off easy without the loads of more traditional terrible methods the game could have gotten put in with the design.
At least with 4 there is the "casual" mode, whatever that is.
But thats exactly what made it interesting. Now its too vanilla which = boring.
SatelliteOfLove
Member
When you look at a class's talents and immediately think of another class being broken by having them hand in glove, that's shooting fish in a barrel.
Spoilers? I'll spoiler it just to be safe. It's not plot relevant at all, but...
Wouldn't be unusual either, 2 came relatively quickly after 1.
There's a casual mode, but from what I've read all that does is send you back to town upon defeat instead of giving you a Game Over. The difficulty of the fights themselves haven't been effected. Someone else should probably clarify though...
According to some people playing the game now, on the guild cards there is a feature that allows you to save your party to the SD card for "future adventures". Leading people to think Etrian 5 may be in the pipleline already.
Wouldn't be unusual either, 2 came relatively quickly after 1.
There's a casual mode, but from what I've read all that does is send you back to town upon defeat instead of giving you a Game Over. The difficulty of the fights themselves haven't been effected. Someone else should probably clarify though...
Augemitbutter
Member
did they ditch the class combination in this episode? i thought it was lazy and boring, because there was nothing to look forward to skills wise. almost killed 3 for me.
No it's still in this game.
Is that how it is? I thought it was just an infinite use Warp Wire? this is a bit confusing...
Not 100% on it myself. I've mostly been going through google translated blog posts lol.
Although it would kind of be an infinite warp wire, given you can just wipe to go back to town whenever...
Parakeetman
No one wants a throne you've been sitting on!
Seriously its as simple as just perhaps you know not using a sub job?
Augemitbutter
Member
that's very disappointing.
no, if it's in the game i'm using it, but new content will always be better than recycled content. it was the worst feature in 3.
Parakeetman
No one wants a throne you've been sitting on!
If you dont like the feature and keep using it then the irritation Id have to say is your own fault.
Augemitbutter
Member
i don't know if you understand this, but me not using something doesn't open up new specialized character progression or new advanced classes. that was the point. don't recycle, add something new over time.
You do realize they completely retooled the skill system in this game, right? It's nowhere near exactly the same as it was last game.
Augemitbutter
Member
i don't know, that's why i asked.
SatelliteOfLove
Member
Not attempting to use advantages presented used to be the hallmark of the less skilled gamers, not the more skilled.
Parakeetman
No one wants a throne you've been sitting on!
Spoken like a true "modern gamer". Not to mention totally missed the point of what was being said, since in no way shape or form was "skill" (in regards to ability to play the game) even talked about in any of my posts.
The skills are now a lot more streamlined in the sense of useless stuff taken out, such as having to have a single point in harvesting of X type to even be able to perform the skill. Though there are others which you will have to level up now to go into the other skill trees in the Advance and Master skill trees. So with that in mind its a little more planning required. Some trees require multiple lower tier skills to unlock.
Example X attack skill (2 pts) --Lv 20--> Y attack skill (3 pts) --Lv 40--> Z attack skill
While its not that huge of a change its still different slightly from 3. Though as always your first characters may get gimped by picking skills you dont find useful. At least if you dont mind losing 3 levels you can reset them.
Isn't it 2 that you lose to reset them?
Either way the skills have been somewhat weird for me. I've been trying to not only get my classes ready for level 20, but some of them I've been skipping skills completely.
Most of my early points were put into the class skills and also the general class defense/attack/TP ups since I thought later on they'd be really useful, but with the rest of them especially for medic I've been spreading as many around as possible while levelling up basic healing and line heal. I may when I get to later levels swap that out considering you get a full on party heal in the next tree, but that depends on how much TP it costs I guess.
I've not tested, but on the rune master is the thunder spells still by far the best? In the demo I remember reading on 2ch that thunder did the most damage and was just wondering if it'd changed. If it has I should probably reskill my rune as I've almost maxed out her thunder attack.
you can definitely not kill the Abyssal God with a party that contains 3 pure farmers, out of the question.
on topic, I think the job mixing was weird and like already said, it led to some very overpowered combinations, from the top of my hed Ninja/Bucaneer was lethal. I don't think I really am a fan of it but if it's in EO4, I am o.k with it, I guess.
SatelliteOfLove
Member
*WHOOSH*
An RPG gives classes that perfectly cover another classes' skills weakness drastically making the game less difficult in the process, and the game encourages you upon arriving upon that feature to use said feature, not doing so would be ONLY in the act of making the game harder and would be from a gameplay perspective making a game that is of a certain difficulty "harder" for the player doing so. For a judgement call, this is rather ineffective.
An RPG that offers less obvious methods of finding advantage (EOII's Hexer, full stop) which the player is not lead to, is an example of the previous method's polar opposite: the game is naturally harder than the first example, and the search to make the game easier takes place (ie, Revenge). As a judgement call, finding these is rather effective.
For a bonus, this methodology ALSO allows for restricted play later once PCs reach a level of power possible for it or for the very savvy player, whereas with the first it is paired with "steamroll".
This is what you are talking about and I got tired of that flavor of comment back in 2009 both for being a drastic shift in philosophy and also as it came from people who would say to do that only to mock those who did so for being egomaniacs. It's a vapid, bullying mentality.
Parakeetman
No one wants a throne you've been sitting on!
Isn't it 2 that you lose to reset them?
I've not tested, but on the rune master is the thunder spells still by far the best? In the demo I remember reading on 2ch that thunder did the most damage and was just wondering if it'd changed. If it has I should probably reskill my rune as I've almost maxed out her thunder attack.
Bout the level thing was either 2 or 3. Glanced at it once and just remembered 3 for some reason.
No idea which elemental damage is the best, but in the current 2nd area there is a monster that appears to be doing thunder damage to me, so am not sure if that means the creature will be resistant to it. One thing for sure is having a magic user or at least elemental based attacks will help. Was surprised how in the first area they already had a monster type that was more resistant to physical but weak to elemental.
Was that the death stalkers? God they were really annoying when I first got to them. I wasn't using my Runemaster at the time and wasn't really using any of my TP attacks as I had such low numbers so took me a while to kill them.
Parakeetman
No one wants a throne you've been sitting on!
Was that the death stalkers? God they were really annoying when I first got to them. I wasn't using my Runemaster at the time and wasn't really using any of my TP attacks as I had such low numbers so took me a while to kill them.
Yep thats them. Not to mention they still hit pretty hard, which makes the whole process of slogging it out a pain in the ass. Thankfully with the Night Seeker and that ice slash / attack with the blind ability really did help when I first ran into those things.
I didn't beat the optional boss but I did the rest of the sixth stratum with a full party of Farmers.
Parakeetman
No one wants a throne you've been sitting on!
*Disclaimer, mods or if anyone else thinks this pic is too larger let me know in the next post and will have it removed.
Figured you would like this pic being a farmer fan.
*Anyone who wants the original sized image send me a PM and will get you a link with it.
3 favorite classes in the game was the Phalanx, Farmer and Princess. Id have to try a party of all farmers just for laughs. Do hope in the next game they make a class that can actually create items within the dungeon themselves. Sort of like a "Merchant" class or something. Its far more interesting to have odd classes like the Farmer from 3, than just a vanilla bunch from the start.
Last night I laid in bed about 2 to go to sleep and thought I'd have a quick play again and ended up spending almost an 45 minutes doing the first mini dungeon in the second dungeon. The FOE's in this place make me wish I had a party of two medics ><
Got the item from the end of it though so I can now
<3
Got the item from the end of it though so I can now
fly up higher in both areas
Parakeetman
No one wants a throne you've been sitting on!
Yeah those FOEs in there are pretty brutal.
You are going to LOVE the next place, that you should be able to reach with the new item you obtained. This is one of the few RPGs where
will really ruin your day. I used a that escape BURST a lot in there. Esp when doing that room
Also on the 2nd world map where you can fly around
You are going to LOVE the next place, that you should be able to reach with the new item you obtained. This is one of the few RPGs where
poison
where you couldnt walk more than 10 spaces in any direction so was a lot of running from one door to the other while avoiding the FOEs.
Also on the 2nd world map where you can fly around
on the higher plateaus which you are now able to access watch out for what looks like the large praying mantis. They can reach an extra square out to attack you. The sheep on the other hand dont seem to aggro which is good considering how much they are in the way on occasion. Have not bumped into one yet and dont plan on attempting to do so yet. The other weird purple monster that looks kinda like a huge gator standing on its hind legs with the 2 long arms on its back, that thing can see super far for some reason. So its hard to avoid it. Not sure what type of food it likes yet.
At first I did something really stupid as I paid attention to what the
woman
teleported back due to the gasses or whatever, but it took me a while to realise you could move from door to door.
Parakeetman
No one wants a throne you've been sitting on!
*Folks who have not played the game yet or gotten to the 2nd area dont read the following below if you want to keep your experience fresh.
it seems that the ones that dont attack you will attack if you are engaged only in a battle. Its how I got attacked by one of those giant moth things, before hitting the other town. Yeah its confirmed someone in the bar says that basically the moths have poor eyesight, but good hearing. Which is why when you get into a battle they become active and start to track down your location.
The praying mantis world map FOE that thing its not that it has an attack range of +1 the damned thing moves 2 spaces per move. Makes it a HUGE pain in the ass to get past. Plus its sight distance is wide enough to spot you and cockblock. Almost killed it but ran out of MP then things went south so had to escape.
The praying mantis world map FOE that thing its not that it has an attack range of +1 the damned thing moves 2 spaces per move. Makes it a HUGE pain in the ass to get past. Plus its sight distance is wide enough to spot you and cockblock. Almost killed it but ran out of MP then things went south so had to escape.
cultureculture
Member
So is this where the importers are hanging out, then?
Let's see some GAF guilds. Here's mine (click to see front/back):
I used names that I thought I sounded cool, so don't read too much into them. Especially "Die Mauer" for my Fortress. Or Alda for my Medic.
Let's see some GAF guilds. Here's mine (click to see front/back):
I used names that I thought I sounded cool, so don't read too much into them. Especially "Die Mauer" for my Fortress. Or Alda for my Medic.
Finally beat the last boss of the second main dungeon. Took me so many attempts but even my kill time was close. Only my medic and fortress was alive and a burst skill killed the boss for me (fire/flame wall).
I like your guild/names, here's mine.
spent ages coming up with the names for everything, took me about an hour during the demo -.-
I like your guild/names, here's mine.
spent ages coming up with the names for everything, took me about an hour during the demo -.-
cultureculture
Member
Nice! Thanks for the compliment too.
You should attach one of your characters to your guild card so that I can export them!
I'm just starting the second main dungeon. Got to the second floor and feeling grateful for the new map icons.
Parakeetman
No one wants a throne you've been sitting on!
I need to figure out how the hell to get the QR code thing. Havent played in a while. Did something stupid and got killed / setback about 3 hours. But was working on my way to the 3rd floor of the 2nd area dungeon.
- Cargo exchange
- Guild Card
- Press Y to change page
- Create QR code.
Then you get your QR code off of your SD card and host it. You've got the instructions on the atlus site here incase I missed anything. http://blog.atlusnet.jp/sq4/2012/07/post-33.html
Actually, there's a lot of QR presents on both blogs. You can find them here:
http://blog.atlusnet.jp/sq4-four/
http://blog.atlusnet.jp/sq4/
cultureculture
Member
Updated my card:
I'm mid-20s now. If you've got a character around that level, stick 'em on your card! Characters from other guilds don't get EXP, so they're useful to have around if you want to train a specific character. And I have plans for a couple of mine...
I'm mid-20s now. If you've got a character around that level, stick 'em on your card! Characters from other guilds don't get EXP, so they're useful to have around if you want to train a specific character. And I have plans for a couple of mine...