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Descartes
12-03-2005, 03:09 PM
Space Shooters

Eastern: R-Type, Gradius, Life Force, etc

or

Western: Space Invaders, Defender, Galaga, Galaxian, etc.

Which do you prefer and why?

RPG

Eastern: FF, Dragon Quest, etc

or

Western: Ultima: Exodus, The Bards Tale, Wizardry, Might and Magic, etc


I prefer Western on both counts. As far as space shooters, I love the psychotic feeling of having one bullet at a time, two at the most. Left and right left and right all day long picking the enemies off in their movement pattern. To master the art of perfect shots takes many years, which I consider time well spent.


As for RPG, I prefer the non-linear approach to the dungeon hackers. The total emphasis on gameplay allows me to create a party of my desire, and makes me feel like I'm actually in the game. This added freedom captures the original essence of role playing to me. I prefer to focus on building my party, by accomplishing random tasks and gaining experience without being pushed from place to place. The Jrpg style, while I do enjoy the DQ series, places heavy emphasis on story, which makes me feel like more of a spectator rather than the person in charge. The large (usually 6) party and fully individual characters gives combat much added depth, with every one contributing an individual part to a group effort. plus the feel of trudging through a first person dungeon makes my bones chatter. I do acknowledge that the JRPGs have many perks, such as the tension created by linearity when it is done right. That feeling of suspense, knowing a huge situation is afoot and not being able to do much about it. Still, give me my lemonade, apple pie, and straw hat when it comes to this genre. I'm an all American boy.

Kid Ice
12-03-2005, 03:16 PM
Space Shooters

Eastern: R-Type, Gradius, Life Force, etc

or

Western: Space Invaders, Defender, Galaga, Galaxian, etc.

Which do you prefer and why?


Aren't these all Eastern except Defender?

ubersaurus
12-03-2005, 03:36 PM
Space Shooters

Eastern: R-Type, Gradius, Life Force, etc

or

Western: Space Invaders, Defender, Galaga, Galaxian, etc.

Which do you prefer and why?


Aren't these all Eastern except Defender?

Yeah if you're gonna use Western shooters, I'd go with, let's say, Asteroids, Tempest, Defender, Robotron, or even the venerably Spacewar.

punkoffgirl
12-03-2005, 03:45 PM
What're you using to decide what is Eastern and what is Western?

Descartes
12-03-2005, 03:48 PM
My apologies, perhaps I was a bit confused. My mind is very eager to separate Galaga style from Gradius style for some reason. Probably the difference in freedom of movement, beside the obvious screen scrolling direction.

Descartes
12-03-2005, 03:51 PM
What're you using to decide what is Eastern and what is Western?

Japanese developed VS American Developed. For some reason I was under the impression that the Galaga games were U.S.

Haoie
12-03-2005, 03:55 PM
Then I just guess it'll be horizontal [Gradius, Darius, etc], against vertical [Strikers, 194X, etc].

In which case I take horizontal, mostly because of my fav, Einhander.

s1lence
12-03-2005, 07:56 PM
Yeah, typical shooter debate is vertical or horizantal. I prefer the vertical shooters myself.
I guess I also prefer eastern because of all the Treasure gems like Gunstar and Ikaruga.

Ze_ro
12-03-2005, 09:24 PM
Space Shooters
Well, I think it's safe to say that the Japanese have made (by far) the best shooters around. Tempest, Asteroids and Defender are excellent games, but there don't seem to be any American companies actually making shooters anymore, so stuff like Border Down and Zero Gunner 2 take the cake.


RPG
Eastern: FF, Dragon Quest, etc
or
Western: Ultima: Exodus, The Bards Tale, Wizardry, Might and Magic, etc
I definitely prefer the western RPG's... I always felt that eastern RPG's like Final Fantasy led you through the story too forcefully while western RPG's gave you more control over the flow of the game. It's really unfortunate that most western RPG companies seem intent on making MMORPG's these days rather than old-school single player quests.

What ever happened to SSI anyways?

--Zero

Tanis178
12-03-2005, 09:56 PM
yeah western rpg's for me as well, i'm not a huge anime fan for fmv fan for that matter, but companies like bioware just seem to hit the right chord with me, even a eastern themed game like jade empire