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[thebagofsand]

First I should start with a little bit of history. My first entry in the Ogre Battle saga dates back to my younger years on the N64. I remember seeing it in Nintendo Power and everything about it fascinated me all the way down to the title, "Ogre Battle". To me it just sounded epic, but I was never quite sure what type of game it was. Granted at the time I had never played a "strategy" game, so I wasn't sure what that meant.

Jump ahead to when the game drops in North America and I buy it with my allowance money, $59.99 if I remember correctly. I get home and I pop the cartridge in and boot up the game and... I have no idea what the hell to do. I can't directly control my character and I have armies I have to send out??? It made no sense to me at the time and I was incredibly upset that this game turned out to be nothing of what I thought it was going to be. I kept trying to get into it time and time again but it eventually sat on my shelf collecting dust while I spent more time on other more "exciting" N64 games.

Before I delve into this next part I should mention that I was pretty late to the PSX. By the time I got one the PS2 had already been out for a few months, so I never got the chance to play the classics while they were around. I borrowed Final Fantasy Tactics but I could never wrap my head around it. The GBA drops and for my birthday my parents bought me one of those bundles that comes with the system, worm light, link cable and two games. One was Lady Sia and Tactics Ogre: The Knights of Lodis. Oh boy another confusing Ogre game that looks like that one Final Fantasy Tactics game. I pass on it for a few weeks and then I finally play it and for once everything clicked. It was such an amazing feeling. It became my all time favorite GBA game and it still is till this day. Tactics Ogre on PSP is probably the most perfect SRPG of all time. But those Ogre Battle games, they never clicked with me. They were WEIRD.

A few months ago one of my siblings finds our old N64 and games and mails them out of the blue for my birthday. I had been out of the gaming loop for a few years as I could never find the time nor had I the attention span of games. So I get the N64 in the mail and I am instantly overwhelmed with nostalgia. Then I see the Ogre Battle 64 cartridge and think, fuck it might as well try it out again and then suddenly... it clicked. Next thing I know I just clocked in about 15 hours in one sitting. I don't think I have ever done that before. Now I am hooked and it brought back my spark in video games.

Anyway sorry for the wall of text. Just wanted to say that OB brought back that little spark and it makes me happy.
What does GAF think of these games? What are your favorites? Are there anyother games like Ogre Battle that you would recommend? Any chance of a new game in the OB saga?

 

[DunDunDunpachi]

The only one I've played was Let Us Cling Together, but I thought it was amazing. It kind of ruined FF:T for me. I'd already played the mechanically-denser likes of Nippon Ichi (Makai Kingdom, Disgaea, etc) and then played Tactics Ogre, all on that glorious PSP (such a good system for tactical RPGs).

I like the plotline and the art style of LUCT. I wish it was more popular. ATLUS games get all the attention, and while I do love me some Persona and Radiant Historia, I wish the more "grounded" fantasy titles like Tactics Ogre and Ogre Battle would get attention again.



Great track that really captures the spirit of the game.

 

[Northeastmonk]

I have a special place in my heart for Front Mission 3. I had such a memorable time with the game. I imported Front Mission Scars of the War and I know that there's an English patch for it somewhere.

I played Let Us Cling Together and really enjoyed it. Final Fantasy Tactics never really clicked me at first. Back in 1997/1998 Id rent PS1 games. Tactics was one of them. It took me a couple tries and it finally clicked. It was very enjoyable. Tactics Advanced was fun and it's out on the Wii U eShop. I didn't quite get into the A2 on DS. However, tactics games are fun when everything comes together.

I did have Rhapsody: A Musical Adventure a long time ago and that game was fun. The music made it interesting, even though it felt simple. Outside of that I tried getting into Disgaea because people told me how epic it was and how much you could level your characters. I think that was about the time Wild Arms XF came out on PSP and War of the Lions.

I also have Ogre Battle: The March of the Black Queen on the eShop. You might like that type of game too.

 

[WaterAstro]

Played the first, SNES, one at launch. Amazing game.

 

[Pallas]

Played the first and Tactics, really loved both games. Tactics/LUCT really had a freedom
Of how to play that was really unique back then with her Law/Neutral/Chaotic system. I know its cliche but they really don’t make them like that anymore.

 

[Northeastmonk]

I was hoping Unsung Story would have come out by now. I backed the Kickstarter hoping for a revival of the genre. I'm guessing it will probably come out next year.

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/littleorbit/unsung-story-tale-of-the-guardians?ref=live

 

[Grimmrobe]

Noob series.

https://culture.vg/reviews/in-depth/tactics-ogre.html

"Nothing important about Tactics Ogre's mechanics was particularly new or innovative in 1995, and what's more the game was vastly inferior to most of its contemporaries in its combat pacing, tactical variety and content, strategically meaningful depth, user interface, and difficulty."

"Tactics Ogre's campaign is sorely lacking in tactical variety. Almost every mission is completed by killing the enemy leader with a few token trash mobs strewn about. Almost every map is a hill gradually rolling from bottom to top with a few randomly placed obstacles. The strategy for almost every mission in the game is to build up your units' TP meter, which allows you to use powerful special attacks, then dump TP attacks on the boss while working to negate their own TP abilities. It gets worse later as even trash enemies start using TP skills, so it's always in your best interest to finish the mission quickly before someone gets one-shot by a TP skill. You'll end up sniping off countless bosses and watching their allies fade into nothing as the battle automatically ends. That's literally the extent of the game's strategy in almost every mission. Almost all of the game's depth — its physical attack and element types, skills, stats, statuses, spells, races, tarot signs, terrain, height, directional facing, finishing moves, battlefield conditions, etc. — can be soundly ignored in favor of a few simple strategies that are repeated ad nauseam."

It's a huge review that trashes every aspect of the game. I am just posting an excerpt because the mods don't want me to rip the entire page.

It's basically a series for people who are bad at tactics. Like FFT, and quite a few other golden calves. If you have trouble with tactics, play this series.

 

[Bolivar687]

Noob series.

https://culture.vg/reviews/in-depth/tactics-ogre.html

"Nothing important about Tactics Ogre's mechanics was particularly new or innovative in 1995, and what's more the game was vastly inferior to most of its contemporaries in its combat pacing, tactical variety and content, strategically meaningful depth, user interface, and difficulty."

"Tactics Ogre's campaign is sorely lacking in tactical variety. Almost every mission is completed by killing the enemy leader with a few token trash mobs strewn about. Almost every map is a hill gradually rolling from bottom to top with a few randomly placed obstacles. The strategy for almost every mission in the game is to build up your units' TP meter, which allows you to use powerful special attacks, then dump TP attacks on the boss while working to negate their own TP abilities. It gets worse later as even trash enemies start using TP skills, so it's always in your best interest to finish the mission quickly before someone gets one-shot by a TP skill. You'll end up sniping off countless bosses and watching their allies fade into nothing as the battle automatically ends. That's literally the extent of the game's strategy in almost every mission. Almost all of the game's depth — its physical attack and element types, skills, stats, statuses, spells, races, tarot signs, terrain, height, directional facing, finishing moves, battlefield conditions, etc. — can be soundly ignored in favor of a few simple strategies that are repeated ad nauseam."

It's a huge review that trashes every aspect of the game. I am just posting an excerpt because the mods don't want me to rip the entire page.

It's basically a series for people who are bad at tactics. Like FFT, and quite a few other golden calves. If you have trouble with tactics, play this series.

There is a login at your link, so I doubt anyone will ever read it, but what little you posted is contradictory. It starts off accusing TO of being "vastly" inferior to "most" of its contemporaries in strategical depth, only to go on to enumerate its litany of mechanics, which it then somehow disregards. The author very clearly has a grudge against the game's popularity and is falling into the trap of using a high powered microscope which no other game could survive scrutiny if it were similarly applied. I completely disagree about every battle being a race to snipe the leader with a finisher. Although many do end that way, there's so much that goes on up to that point and there are many important battles where it's completely irrelevant.

The game is a critically acclaimed fan favorite, if you want to show us it's a golden calf, the onus is on you to do better than that. If you genuinely know of strategy titles that are so vastly superior to TOLUCT, please let us know, because I genuinely would love to play one ASAP.

 

[thebagofsand]

I also have Ogre Battle: The March of the Black Queen on the eShop. You might like that type of game too.

I think I'll try that one out next. I want to play the PSX version but have no way of playing it.

 

[bigedole]

Tactics Ogre: LUCT and FF:Tactics are probably my 2 most favorite video games of all time. I can not possibly guess how many thousands of hours I've spent between the two games. Claiming TO was too basic is a travesty, it was a genuinely challenging game with a wonderfully written branching story line. Especially the way they let you move through the story on the PSP release, it was just really, really well done. To this day I am constantly looking for new tactical RPG games to play, even though nothing ever gets close to how much I enjoyed these two.

 

[michaelius]

I loved the PSP remake - such a pity PSP we never got next games. It's one of my favourite games of all times.

 

[Terra_Ex]

Tactics Ogre:LUCT was amazing, I remember being disappointed when FFT didn't have any branching paths like its forebear. Shame we never got more games out of the series besides Knight of Lodis but I guess we can thank Square for that.

 

[Daniel Thomas MacInnes]

I really loved Ogre Battle on the Gameboy Advance. It was an early title for the handheld but I thought it held its own against the other strategy-rpg's such as Onimusha and Final Fantasy Tactics. There are also two games on Sega Saturn that I really ought to sit down and play for a while.

 

[bigedole]

I loved the PSP remake - such a pity PSP we never got next games. It's one of my favourite games of all times.

I really wish they'd re-release them on PSN with trophy support. I'm dying for a reason to replay them yet again!