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Vagrant Story is $2.99 on US PSN

Begaria said:
Oh, and...uh, ha. If it wasn't abundantly clear by my long winded post, and my avatar, Vagrant Story is my favourite console RPG. So good!
Click to expand...

played it back in the day, it kicked my ass, loved it though, great game still waiting for a sequel


I like how combining two strong weapon types can earn you a weak ass weapon, fine piece of trolling that...
 
Begaria said:
Ahhh Vagrant Story. Basically Squaresoft's "Demon's/Dark Souls" of 2000.

Vagrant Story isn't actually difficult in the terms of "zomgz the enemies hit hard and kill me in one shot", rather the mechanics are so complex that the player's own actions can be detrimental to your survivability and not understanding even the fundamental basics of the game can and will destroy you. Here's a few tips for some of you getting into the game for the first time.

1. The protagonist is called a Riskbreaker for a reason - this game is completely governed by the Risk meter. When Risk is at 0, you will take normal damage and do a base amount of damage with good accuracy. As you use weapon techniques and string combos, your Risk meter will go up. The higher it goes, the more damage you deal, the less accurate your attacks become, and the more damage is done to you. As a rule of thumb, try not to go above 50 Risk (it's on a 100 point scale), otherwise you'll leave yourself open to getting your ass handed to you - trust me, this will happen, especially if you're trying to combo down a magic user, don't kill them, and they get a magic attack in that will one shot you.

There are items that reduce your risk meter, use them a lot, as you'll get a lot.

2. There is no experience in this game. All of your stats are obtained by equipping gear, finding elixirs/wines that increase stats, and killing bosses that will grant your random stat increases. You cannot grind for levels in this game and breeze through it like a typical JRPG. What you can grind for are items from certain enemies (such as better gear or wines/elixirs), and you can grind enemies to increase the affinities on your gear. Speaking of which...

3. Affinities. THE MOST COMPLEX PART OF THE MECHANICS.. Every piece of gear, whether it's your weapon (and there are a lot of weapon types), or a piece of armor, has stat values in every affinity. Your affinity levels will increase the more you use a weapon against a certain enemy type (i.e. use a sword against a lot of undead, and that sword's undead affinity will go up making it hit harder against undead). These affinities include three types (elemental, enemy type, weapon type) and include things like:

Elemental - fire, water, light, dark, wind, etc (typical JRPG stuff)
Enemy Type - Beast, Human, Dragon, Undead, etc
Weapon Type - Slashing, bludgeon, piercing, etc

Every enemy in the game has different affinity values of every one of these types. So that means you're going to have to carry an arsenal of gear with you and switch out on the fly to maximize your damage and accuracy. The game starts you off against enemies and with gear that will take it easy on you, but a 1/4 through the game it ramps up the mechanics and you will need to keep close eye on what you're using and what you're fighting. This game is not a "one weapon type takes care of everything" (except for a very powerful weapon you can grind for in the bonus dungeon after you beat the game and go through a second time). On top of this, the enemy's will take advantage of YOUR affinities as well (remember, armor has affinities), so if you equip gear that takes a particular elemental affinity into the negatives, and you run across an enemy that uses that elemental type, you will die, and you will die fast.

From my numerous play throughs, weapon type isn't the most important affinity type. What is important are the enemy type and elemental type affinities in that order. You'll want to build a Dragon slaying weapon (there are a lot of dragons), an Undead slaying weapon (there is a lot of Undead), an Evil slaying weapon (there are a lot of Evil types), and a Beast slaying weapon (there are a lot of Beasts). The final boss of the game is considered Evil Type, so it's very important to have a strong Evil slaying weapon.

On top of that, Elemental is very important to because you will face off against enemies that have specific weaknesses. A lot of enemies in this game are weak to Light, as you'll be fighting a lot of Undead and Evil types, but the other attributes are important to (though Light is the most important). The final boss is weak against Light. So having a very strong Evil slaying with Light affinity will be important.

Why is this important to know? If you go against an enemy using a weapon that the enemy is strong to that weapon's affinities you will literally do 0-1 points of damage. When I read comments like, "lol game is too hard, I am doing no damage!" I instantly know they're using the wrong weapon types with the wrong affinities against the wrong enemies. This game allows you to carry up to 8 (I think?) weapons at a time, so it's very, VERY important to keep different "slayers" (as I like to call them) so you can actually damage bosses. Seriously, it's the difference between literally doing no damage to doing 50-100 points of damage with better accuracy.

3. All of this is compounded by the very deep blacksmithing mechanic. You'll come across smithies in this game that can only smith certain armor/weapon types (Wood, Leather, Bronze, Iron, Hagane, Silver, Damascus). Smithing armor is pretty similar, usually combining two of the same type will result in a better item type, and off the top of my head here's a quick example:

Combining one Bronze gauntlet with one Iron gauntlet will give you a Hagane gauntlet. This is an example of creating a better material type with higher affinities of the same item.

Or

Combing one Bronze gauntlet with one Iron vambrace will give you a Hagane Plate Glove. This was an example of creating a better item with a better type with better affinities.

It's deep. It's simple to learn, but complex to master. Why is it complex to master? Because you can combine ALL armor types with ALL other armor types. Like a Helm + Body armor could create an Arm type. Find the right combinations and you can get advanced equipment early in the game, giving you an edge. Thankfully, there is a freakin' awesome guide on Gamefaqs by Jtilton that took all of the guess work out of it.

This all goes for weapons to (combining like "blades" will produce stronger "blades", criss crossing weapon types will make various weapon types).

4. There's a lot of menu traversing in this game. If you're the kind of type who wants quick action, this is not the game for you. You WILL be constantly going into your equipment menu and swapping out weaponry for the appropriate weapon for the situation, even swapping out gems to boost affinity levels on your weapon so you can damage your enemies. There is a short cut menu (I think it's L1? I don't remember).

5. There is magic in this game, but the attack magic sucks. It uses too much MP (you get a very small MP pool), does too little damage compared to physical attacks, so never use attack magic. However, the support and debuff magic is unparalleled. You will quickly get some good buffs which you will use at all times. You'll eventually get magic that can change your weapon and armor elemental affinities (or boost those affinities rather) which will be very useful.

By far the most useful spell is "Analyze" and this is important: when you use the Analyze spell on an enemy, it will look like it did nothing. It's dumb but this is what you have to do: after you cast Analyze, you have to go into the menus, go to "Status" (which usually shows your status) and press "right" or "left" to actually see the enemies status. Yup. This is why this game is considered obtuse and mechanically different to understand. Never does the game tell you this, so I'm here to alleviate that. Analyze will show your enemy's affinities, so you'll know exactly what to use against them.

6. Explore every map to its fullest. There are treasure chests everywhere. Those treasure chests are your main source of getting gear, items, and spells.

7. Get ready for box puzzles! Boy this game has a lot of box puzzles.

8. This game has a New Game +, which should be taken advantage of. A bonus dungeon opens up only on a NG+, AND new areas open up as well for the best gear in the game. There's no additional story in NG+, it's all pure gameplay.

9. Edit: Totally forgot to actually talk about the combat. If you've played Parasite Eve, then you'll feel a bit at home. Vagrant Story uses the same kind of "dome range" combat that PE uses. When you hit the attack button, a huge dome opens up (range dependent on weapon), and anything within that dome is within your attack range. You can target different parts of an enemy's body, and damaging a certain body type enough will give the enemy a status effect (it can happen to you to). For example, damage the head enough, and you will silence the enemy. Damage the arms, you will reduce their damage. Take out their legs, it reduces their movement speed.

It takes about an hour to get to, but eventually you'll unlock a bunch of Risk Arts. Using certain weapon types will unlock even more Risk Arts. You can consume HP to do a powerful attack of a certain affinity. Your normal attacks are based on a timing mechanic where you time the attack button press to keep a combo moving. Your equip attack combos to your face buttons - you can do an attack that does more damage, but damages you, or use an attack that doesn't do that much damage but restores your weapon's durability or phantom points, or does status effects on the enemy. You also have defensive moves you can use that you need to press when an enemy attacks you.

Really, if you missed out on Vagrant Story, and absolutely love Demon's/Dark Souls, then this game is RIGHT up your alley.
Click to expand...

Thanks for posting this. I may give the game a whirl.
 
fvng said:
I thought Hz doesn't matter in the modern era? Since we all use HDTV's now doesn't the signal just get converted to an HD compliant signal?
Click to expand...

A 50 Hz game will run at 50 Hz on HDTVs that support them still.
So if you get Vagrant Story off EU PSN, it'll run 50 Hz regardless of HDTV as that is how the PS3 will emulate it.
 
It kind of sounds like i'm going to hate this game but i already bought it, all that menu time and weapon switching isn't for me.
 
Protip: There's an extra introductory cutscene when you let the game idle in the main menu. To my chagrin as much as I love this game I didn't find that out until over ten years later.
 
Could not stand this game back when I bought it in the PS1 days. Probably one of the first Square purchases I really, really regretted back in the day. Don't understand the hype this game gets in the least.

Glad for everyone who likes it, though!
 
Honestly you can get by with carrying just three weapons at all times.
I did it no problem on a fresh new game play-through.
I think it went something like this.
Human/Undead
Beast/Dragon
Phantom/Evil

Early on you get spells that buff your strength and equipment. USE THEM. Bosses don't have a lot of HP in this game, so going from 1-2 damage to 20-30 thanks to a spell is huge.

Chaining wise. I got the most mileage out of attacks that do damage at the expense of my HP, and one that does about a 1/3 of my initial damage. The thing is, even if you're in a situation where you absolutely can only do 1 damage, it doesn't hurt to chain. As you continue getting hits in the damage will raise by a few points every time. So from 1-2 per hit to 3-5 per hit and so on. Extending combos can make a difference, and you usually have the vera items necessary to reduce all the risk buildup.

-When you fight a dragon, rush straight for him. You want to be under his chin at all times. This is to avoid the far more damaging breath attacks.
-Shields are essential. Enemies go through a ". .. ... !" before they attack. If you're using a two-handed weapon and the enemy is reading "..." or "!", immediately swap it out for a shield. You'll mitigate quite a bit of damage.
-Don't try to min/max the roulette stat-ups after boss battles, you'll drive yourself crazy. It can't hurt to go for +4s when drinking elixirs/wines though. Just stock up, chill by a save point, and grab a book or something.
-Learn to use the shortcut menu (L1). It will save you a lot of headaches.
-A lot of equipment contains gems. Use these to bolster the stats your weapon specializes in.
 
MaverickHunterAsh said:
Could not stand this game back when I bought it in the PS1 days. Probably one of the first Square purchases I really, really regretted back in the day. Don't understand the hype this game gets in the least.
Click to expand...
I agree with you. It is a bit overrated.
I rented it the week it came out (OMG NEW SQUARE GAME), and while the cutscenes and characters were awesome, the gameplay quickly evolved into some kind of dull mess.
 
Begaria said:
Ahhh Vagrant Story. Basically Squaresoft's "Demon's/Dark Souls" of 2000.

Vagrant Story isn't actually difficult in the terms of "zomgz the enemies hit hard and kill me in one shot", rather the mechanics are so complex that the player's own actions can be detrimental to your survivability and not understanding even the fundamental basics of the game can and will destroy you. Here's a few tips for some of you getting into the game for the first time.

1. The protagonist is called a Riskbreaker for a reason - this game is completely governed by the Risk meter. When Risk is at 0, you will take normal damage and do a base amount of damage with good accuracy. As you use weapon techniques and string combos, your Risk meter will go up. The higher it goes, the more damage you deal, the less accurate your attacks become, and the more damage is done to you. As a rule of thumb, try not to go above 50 Risk (it's on a 100 point scale), otherwise you'll leave yourself open to getting your ass handed to you - trust me, this will happen, especially if you're trying to combo down a magic user, don't kill them, and they get a magic attack in that will one shot you.

There are items that reduce your risk meter, use them a lot, as you'll get a lot.

2. There is no experience in this game. All of your stats are obtained by equipping gear, finding elixirs/wines that increase stats, and killing bosses that will grant your random stat increases. You cannot grind for levels in this game and breeze through it like a typical JRPG. What you can grind for are items from certain enemies (such as better gear or wines/elixirs), and you can grind enemies to increase the affinities on your gear. Speaking of which...

3. Affinities. THE MOST COMPLEX PART OF THE MECHANICS.. Every piece of gear, whether it's your weapon (and there are a lot of weapon types), or a piece of armor, has stat values in every affinity. Your affinity levels will increase the more you use a weapon against a certain enemy type (i.e. use a sword against a lot of undead, and that sword's undead affinity will go up making it hit harder against undead). These affinities include three types (elemental, enemy type, weapon type) and include things like:

Elemental - fire, water, light, dark, wind, etc (typical JRPG stuff)
Enemy Type - Beast, Human, Dragon, Undead, etc
Weapon Type - Slashing, bludgeon, piercing, etc

Every enemy in the game has different affinity values of every one of these types. So that means you're going to have to carry an arsenal of gear with you and switch out on the fly to maximize your damage and accuracy. The game starts you off against enemies and with gear that will take it easy on you, but a 1/4 through the game it ramps up the mechanics and you will need to keep close eye on what you're using and what you're fighting. This game is not a "one weapon type takes care of everything" (except for a very powerful weapon you can grind for in the bonus dungeon after you beat the game and go through a second time). On top of this, the enemy's will take advantage of YOUR affinities as well (remember, armor has affinities), so if you equip gear that takes a particular elemental affinity into the negatives, and you run across an enemy that uses that elemental type, you will die, and you will die fast.

From my numerous play throughs, weapon type isn't the most important affinity type. What is important are the enemy type and elemental type affinities in that order. You'll want to build a Dragon slaying weapon (there are a lot of dragons), an Undead slaying weapon (there is a lot of Undead), an Evil slaying weapon (there are a lot of Evil types), and a Beast slaying weapon (there are a lot of Beasts). The final boss of the game is considered Evil Type, so it's very important to have a strong Evil slaying weapon.

On top of that, Elemental is very important to because you will face off against enemies that have specific weaknesses. A lot of enemies in this game are weak to Light, as you'll be fighting a lot of Undead and Evil types, but the other attributes are important to (though Light is the most important). The final boss is weak against Light. So having a very strong Evil slaying with Light affinity will be important.

Why is this important to know? If you go against an enemy using a weapon that the enemy is strong to that weapon's affinities you will literally do 0-1 points of damage. When I read comments like, "lol game is too hard, I am doing no damage!" I instantly know they're using the wrong weapon types with the wrong affinities against the wrong enemies. This game allows you to carry up to 8 (I think?) weapons at a time, so it's very, VERY important to keep different "slayers" (as I like to call them) so you can actually damage bosses. Seriously, it's the difference between literally doing no damage to doing 50-100 points of damage with better accuracy.

3. All of this is compounded by the very deep blacksmithing mechanic. You'll come across smithies in this game that can only smith certain armor/weapon types (Wood, Leather, Bronze, Iron, Hagane, Silver, Damascus). Smithing armor is pretty similar, usually combining two of the same type will result in a better item type, and off the top of my head here's a quick example:

Combining one Bronze gauntlet with one Iron gauntlet will give you a Hagane gauntlet. This is an example of creating a better material type with higher affinities of the same item.

Or

Combing one Bronze gauntlet with one Iron vambrace will give you a Hagane Plate Glove. This was an example of creating a better item with a better type with better affinities.

It's deep. It's simple to learn, but complex to master. Why is it complex to master? Because you can combine ALL armor types with ALL other armor types. Like a Helm + Body armor could create an Arm type. Find the right combinations and you can get advanced equipment early in the game, giving you an edge. Thankfully, there is a freakin' awesome guide on Gamefaqs by Jtilton that took all of the guess work out of it.

This all goes for weapons to (combining like "blades" will produce stronger "blades", criss crossing weapon types will make various weapon types).

4. There's a lot of menu traversing in this game. If you're the kind of type who wants quick action, this is not the game for you. You WILL be constantly going into your equipment menu and swapping out weaponry for the appropriate weapon for the situation, even swapping out gems to boost affinity levels on your weapon so you can damage your enemies. There is a short cut menu (I think it's L1? I don't remember).

5. There is magic in this game, but the attack magic sucks. It uses too much MP (you get a very small MP pool), does too little damage compared to physical attacks, so never use attack magic. However, the support and debuff magic is unparalleled. You will quickly get some good buffs which you will use at all times. You'll eventually get magic that can change your weapon and armor elemental affinities (or boost those affinities rather) which will be very useful.

By far the most useful spell is "Analyze" and this is important: when you use the Analyze spell on an enemy, it will look like it did nothing. It's dumb but this is what you have to do: after you cast Analyze, you have to go into the menus, go to "Status" (which usually shows your status) and press "right" or "left" to actually see the enemies status. Yup. This is why this game is considered obtuse and mechanically different to understand. Never does the game tell you this, so I'm here to alleviate that. Analyze will show your enemy's affinities, so you'll know exactly what to use against them.

6. Explore every map to its fullest. There are treasure chests everywhere. Those treasure chests are your main source of getting gear, items, and spells.

7. Get ready for box puzzles! Boy this game has a lot of box puzzles.

8. This game has a New Game +, which should be taken advantage of. A bonus dungeon opens up only on a NG+, AND new areas open up as well for the best gear in the game. There's no additional story in NG+, it's all pure gameplay.

9. Edit: Totally forgot to actually talk about the combat. If you've played Parasite Eve, then you'll feel a bit at home. Vagrant Story uses the same kind of "dome range" combat that PE uses. When you hit the attack button, a huge dome opens up (range dependent on weapon), and anything within that dome is within your attack range. You can target different parts of an enemy's body, and damaging a certain body type enough will give the enemy a status effect (it can happen to you to). For example, damage the head enough, and you will silence the enemy. Damage the arms, you will reduce their damage. Take out their legs, it reduces their movement speed.

It takes about an hour to get to, but eventually you'll unlock a bunch of Risk Arts. Using certain weapon types will unlock even more Risk Arts. You can consume HP to do a powerful attack of a certain affinity. Your normal attacks are based on a timing mechanic where you time the attack button press to keep a combo moving. Your equip attack combos to your face buttons - you can do an attack that does more damage, but damages you, or use an attack that doesn't do that much damage but restores your weapon's durability or phantom points, or does status effects on the enemy. You also have defensive moves you can use that you need to press when an enemy attacks you.

Really, if you missed out on Vagrant Story, and absolutely love Demon's/Dark Souls, then this game is RIGHT up your alley.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the post. Now I have some idea what to look forward to. I asked this before, but doesn't the game explain this in-game?

I kind of wish I hadn't read about the final boss though, as that felt somewhat spoilery.
 
PepsimanVsJoe said:
Honestly you can get by with carrying just three weapons at all times.
I did it no problem on a fresh new game play-through.
I think it went something like this.
Human/Undead
Beast/Dragon
Phantom/Evil

.
Click to expand...

Quick possibly obvious thing, but that seems like 6 weapons?
 
sillymonkey321 said:
Quick possibly obvious thing, but that seems like 6 weapons?
Click to expand...

Nope. Classes in VS are set apart with 'gaps' so that it is possible to have one weapon be strong against two types of enemies, if those types are far apart from each other in the line. So Human is far part from Undead that even if you use the weapon against human types and then against undead types, the affinity won't be reduced that much and you can use that one weapon against both humans and undead without penalty. The same goes with the other types.

Also, the BEST FAQ for Vagrant Story is this:

http://www.gamefaqs.com/ps/914326-vagrant-story/faqs/7745

I've played VS to pieces back in the 90s and no guide EVER have been as comprehensive as that one.
 
Nice. Even though I own the disc of this, it's cheap enough for me to buy in the event I ever want to play on the PSP/Vita. Thanks OP!
 
Keep meaning to retry this. Think I got about halfway through and decided I was finding the game more annoying than fun and quit.

Breath of Fire: Dragon Quarter felt to me like it had similar design goals as Vagrant Story but was much more accessible (though still very difficult).
 
Once you get the hang of all the stats and rules you pretty much end up dominating everything, it's extremely satisfying. I made it pretty far
limestone quarry
, though, with neither an understanding of phantom points or armor stats, so I restarted and am enjoying it much more. The armor stats are on the lower right of the armor piece screen, for some reason I didn't think much of them and just went through the game thinking all that mattered were the 3 affinity screens. I played through the game in 2000 but, the only thing I remember was beating the final boss by the skin of my teeth, and probably not an insignificant amount of Vera roots :3
 
Ocaso said:
Thanks for the post. Now I have some idea what to look forward to. I asked this before, but doesn't the game explain this in-game?

I kind of wish I hadn't read about the final boss though, as that felt somewhat spoilery.
Click to expand...

Nope! This game never explains ANYthing to you. It plops you in, tells you to figure this out for yourself, and you better damn learn quickly. There is a Tutorial section on the menu you can read through, but it's really only the basics. Everything else is learned by doing and experimenting.

Sorry about the final boss stuff, I wasn't trying to spoil anything. I really was just trying to give a heads up, because the final boss can be very annoying if you don't have the appropriate weapon.

Robert at Zeboyd Games[/quote said:
Keep meaning to retry this. Think I got about halfway through and decided I was finding the game more annoying than fun and quit.

Breath of Fire: Dragon Quarter felt to me like it had similar design goals as Vagrant Story but was much more accessible (though still very difficult).
Click to expand...

Another underrated game. Almost everyone hates on it, but I think it's the second best in the series. I love complex, difficult games, and both Dragon Quarter and Vagrant Story fits the bill. Also, Sakimoto did the music for both games. So good!
 
Just picked this up and chrono cross. Remembered my nephew bringing this by back in the day and it looked really great. Looking forward to playing this finally.
 
So can anyone here verify that PAL PS1 games work and display fine on NTSC TVs/PS3s

(from experience, not speculation)
 
I have the disc already...

$3 is nothing but I'm kind of scared to go down the road of re-buying games I own just because they are digital....
 
If you sincerely felt $5.99 was too high of a price to buy this before, then you are a lost cause. I've only played three hours of this game (for the first time a few months ago) and it is amazing. There is no need of a price drop for this work of art.

I never understood why so many people feel the need for a guide. The game did a fairly good job of explaining stuff for me. Between it and the manual, everything made sense.
 
nice! still have my copy, still never got past the mine carts or whatever that was, pretty far into the game though.

man, this is such a title that'd benefit hugely from an overhaul (voice!), shame Matsuno gems like this rarely see that treatment.
 
Is there anyway I can specifically add $2.99 to my wallet without have to put $5.00 in? I'm getting a Vita next week and I want FFX so, if I spend the $2.99, I'll have exactly $40 left after I bought all of the games from the sale plus a memory card and Vita bundle.
 
NoSkillz187 said:
Is there anyway I can specifically add $2.99 to my wallet without have to put $5.00 in? I'm getting a Vita next week and I want FFX so, if I spend the $2.99, I'll have exactly $40 left after I bought all of the games from the sale plus a memory card and Vita bundle.
Click to expand...
I think you can do it by using PayPal.
 
Begaria said:
Ahhh Vagrant Story. Basically Squaresoft's "Demon's/Dark Souls" of 2000.

Vagrant Story isn't actually difficult in the terms of "zomgz the enemies hit hard and kill me in one shot", rather the mechanics are so complex that the player's own actions can be detrimental to your survivability and not understanding even the fundamental basics of the game can and will destroy you. Here's a few tips for some of you getting into the game for the first time.

1. The protagonist is called a Riskbreaker for a reason - this game is completely governed by the Risk meter. When Risk is at 0, you will take normal damage and do a base amount of damage with good accuracy. As you use weapon techniques and string combos, your Risk meter will go up. The higher it goes, the more damage you deal, the less accurate your attacks become, and the more damage is done to you. As a rule of thumb, try not to go above 50 Risk (it's on a 100 point scale), otherwise you'll leave yourself open to getting your ass handed to you - trust me, this will happen, especially if you're trying to combo down a magic user, don't kill them, and they get a magic attack in that will one shot you.

There are items that reduce your risk meter, use them a lot, as you'll get a lot.

2. There is no experience in this game. All of your stats are obtained by equipping gear, finding elixirs/wines that increase stats, and killing bosses that will grant your random stat increases. You cannot grind for levels in this game and breeze through it like a typical JRPG. What you can grind for are items from certain enemies (such as better gear or wines/elixirs), and you can grind enemies to increase the affinities on your gear. Speaking of which...

3. Affinities. THE MOST COMPLEX PART OF THE MECHANICS.. Every piece of gear, whether it's your weapon (and there are a lot of weapon types), or a piece of armor, has stat values in every affinity. Your affinity levels will increase the more you use a weapon against a certain enemy type (i.e. use a sword against a lot of undead, and that sword's undead affinity will go up making it hit harder against undead). These affinities include three types (elemental, enemy type, weapon type) and include things like:

Elemental - fire, water, light, dark, wind, etc (typical JRPG stuff)
Enemy Type - Beast, Human, Dragon, Undead, etc
Weapon Type - Slashing, bludgeon, piercing, etc

Every enemy in the game has different affinity values of every one of these types. So that means you're going to have to carry an arsenal of gear with you and switch out on the fly to maximize your damage and accuracy. The game starts you off against enemies and with gear that will take it easy on you, but a 1/4 through the game it ramps up the mechanics and you will need to keep close eye on what you're using and what you're fighting. This game is not a "one weapon type takes care of everything" (except for a very powerful weapon you can grind for in the bonus dungeon after you beat the game and go through a second time). On top of this, the enemy's will take advantage of YOUR affinities as well (remember, armor has affinities), so if you equip gear that takes a particular elemental affinity into the negatives, and you run across an enemy that uses that elemental type, you will die, and you will die fast.

From my numerous play throughs, weapon type isn't the most important affinity type. What is important are the enemy type and elemental type affinities in that order. You'll want to build a Dragon slaying weapon (there are a lot of dragons), an Undead slaying weapon (there is a lot of Undead), an Evil slaying weapon (there are a lot of Evil types), and a Beast slaying weapon (there are a lot of Beasts). The final boss of the game is considered Evil Type, so it's very important to have a strong Evil slaying weapon.

On top of that, Elemental is very important to because you will face off against enemies that have specific weaknesses. A lot of enemies in this game are weak to Light, as you'll be fighting a lot of Undead and Evil types, but the other attributes are important to (though Light is the most important). The final boss is weak against Light. So having a very strong Evil slaying with Light affinity will be important.

Why is this important to know? If you go against an enemy using a weapon that the enemy is strong to that weapon's affinities you will literally do 0-1 points of damage. When I read comments like, "lol game is too hard, I am doing no damage!" I instantly know they're using the wrong weapon types with the wrong affinities against the wrong enemies. This game allows you to carry up to 8 (I think?) weapons at a time, so it's very, VERY important to keep different "slayers" (as I like to call them) so you can actually damage bosses. Seriously, it's the difference between literally doing no damage to doing 50-100 points of damage with better accuracy.

3. All of this is compounded by the very deep blacksmithing mechanic. You'll come across smithies in this game that can only smith certain armor/weapon types (Wood, Leather, Bronze, Iron, Hagane, Silver, Damascus). Smithing armor is pretty similar, usually combining two of the same type will result in a better item type, and off the top of my head here's a quick example:

Combining one Bronze gauntlet with one Iron gauntlet will give you a Hagane gauntlet. This is an example of creating a better material type with higher affinities of the same item.

Or

Combing one Bronze gauntlet with one Iron vambrace will give you a Hagane Plate Glove. This was an example of creating a better item with a better type with better affinities.

It's deep. It's simple to learn, but complex to master. Why is it complex to master? Because you can combine ALL armor types with ALL other armor types. Like a Helm + Body armor could create an Arm type. Find the right combinations and you can get advanced equipment early in the game, giving you an edge. Thankfully, there is a freakin' awesome guide on Gamefaqs by Jtilton that took all of the guess work out of it.

This all goes for weapons to (combining like "blades" will produce stronger "blades", criss crossing weapon types will make various weapon types).

4. There's a lot of menu traversing in this game. If you're the kind of type who wants quick action, this is not the game for you. You WILL be constantly going into your equipment menu and swapping out weaponry for the appropriate weapon for the situation, even swapping out gems to boost affinity levels on your weapon so you can damage your enemies. There is a short cut menu (I think it's L1? I don't remember).

5. There is magic in this game, but the attack magic sucks. It uses too much MP (you get a very small MP pool), does too little damage compared to physical attacks, so never use attack magic. However, the support and debuff magic is unparalleled. You will quickly get some good buffs which you will use at all times. You'll eventually get magic that can change your weapon and armor elemental affinities (or boost those affinities rather) which will be very useful.

By far the most useful spell is "Analyze" and this is important: when you use the Analyze spell on an enemy, it will look like it did nothing. It's dumb but this is what you have to do: after you cast Analyze, you have to go into the menus, go to "Status" (which usually shows your status) and press "right" or "left" to actually see the enemies status. Yup. This is why this game is considered obtuse and mechanically different to understand. Never does the game tell you this, so I'm here to alleviate that. Analyze will show your enemy's affinities, so you'll know exactly what to use against them.

6. Explore every map to its fullest. There are treasure chests everywhere. Those treasure chests are your main source of getting gear, items, and spells.

7. Get ready for box puzzles! Boy this game has a lot of box puzzles.

8. This game has a New Game +, which should be taken advantage of. A bonus dungeon opens up only on a NG+, AND new areas open up as well for the best gear in the game. There's no additional story in NG+, it's all pure gameplay.

9. Edit: Totally forgot to actually talk about the combat. If you've played Parasite Eve, then you'll feel a bit at home. Vagrant Story uses the same kind of "dome range" combat that PE uses. When you hit the attack button, a huge dome opens up (range dependent on weapon), and anything within that dome is within your attack range. You can target different parts of an enemy's body, and damaging a certain body type enough will give the enemy a status effect (it can happen to you to). For example, damage the head enough, and you will silence the enemy. Damage the arms, you will reduce their damage. Take out their legs, it reduces their movement speed.

It takes about an hour to get to, but eventually you'll unlock a bunch of Risk Arts. Using certain weapon types will unlock even more Risk Arts. You can consume HP to do a powerful attack of a certain affinity. Your normal attacks are based on a timing mechanic where you time the attack button press to keep a combo moving. Your equip attack combos to your face buttons - you can do an attack that does more damage, but damages you, or use an attack that doesn't do that much damage but restores your weapon's durability or phantom points, or does status effects on the enemy. You also have defensive moves you can use that you need to press when an enemy attacks you.

Really, if you missed out on Vagrant Story, and absolutely love Demon's/Dark Souls, then this game is RIGHT up your alley.
Click to expand...

Wow, thanks for this post. I bought it, and sounds like I'm going to love it!!
 
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