roushimsx
04-17-2006, 06:00 PM
So for the last few days I've been playing TurboDuo games Exile I and II via the wonders of Mednafen, and it's been an interesting experience, to say the least.
http://img119.imageshack.us/img119/4554/mednafen20060415061118069lh.th.png (http://img119.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415061118069lh.png)
For those that haven't experienced them, they're a bit like Zelda 2 in that you move around a map in an overhead view and then enter action stages where you hack and slash stuff via a side view. Of course, coming out a few years after Zelda 2 means that you get better control, better graphics, better music, the whole 9 yards. It was developed from the same people that brought us Valis, so if that means something to you then good....but if not, that's ok too.
The first game was released on Genesis, but it had quite a few things cut out. The music wasn't as good, it was missing one of the towns and some quests, and the translation was your typical early-90s engrish-a-thon.
Enter Vic Ireland and crew.
After Cosmic Fantasy 2, Vic decided to localize Exile. Overall the localization went pretty well, but it did suffer from some trademarked Working Designs translation "quirks" (inconsistant writing for the main character, attempts to interject humor, making pop culture references, etc) but for the most part it was subtantionally better than the genesis' translation. Hell, even the voice acting wasn't that bad; compared to a majority of what was being done in the realm of voice acting back then, it was some seriously top teir stuff.
http://img215.imageshack.us/img215/8703/mednafen20060415151622626sy.th.png (http://img215.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415151622626sy.png)http://img119.imageshack.us/img119/5810/mednafen20060415075123577bp.th.png (http://img119.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415075123577bp.png)http://img119.imageshack.us/img119/1688/mednafen20060415080227350xy.th.png (http://img119.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415080227350xy.png)http://img119.imageshack.us/img119/470/mednafen20060415080836547uc.th.png (http://img119.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415080836547uc.png)http://img119.imageshack.us/img119/2057/mednafen20060415164550042re.th.png (http://img119.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415164550042re.png)
The one downfall of the game, however, was that it was just too damn easy. You don't even need to really abuse the respawning enemies to breeze through the game, but if you DO decide to abuse them then you're assured a smooth ride. Some people may have been miffed over being able to plow through the game in 4 hours, but it was still a damn good 4 hour game.
http://img119.imageshack.us/img119/6969/mednafen20060415061144501bj.th.png (http://img119.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415061144501bj.png)http://img119.imageshack.us/img119/7535/mednafen20060415061824895km.th.png (http://img119.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415061824895km.png)http://img119.imageshack.us/img119/4164/mednafen20060415061956348qn.th.png (http://img119.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415061956348qn.png)http://img119.imageshack.us/img119/6435/mednafen20060415062618531kg.th.png (http://img119.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415062618531kg.png)http://img119.imageshack.us/img119/7057/mednafen20060415064340213fn.th.png (http://img119.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415064340213fn.png)
http://img119.imageshack.us/img119/7172/mednafen20060415064900320ha.th.png (http://img119.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415064900320ha.png)http://img119.imageshack.us/img119/5233/mednafen20060415065244281hc.th.png (http://img119.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415065244281hc.png)http://img119.imageshack.us/img119/7727/mednafen20060415071122377gx.th.png (http://img119.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415071122377gx.png)http://img119.imageshack.us/img119/2598/mednafen20060415072034685qq.th.png (http://img119.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415072034685qq.png)http://img119.imageshack.us/img119/9168/mednafen20060415074619547yh.th.png (http://img119.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415074619547yh.png)
Then came Exile 2, which was released as Exile - Wicked Phenomenon but should have been released as "Exile - What The Fuck?".
http://img157.imageshack.us/img157/4585/mednafen20060415183658745xw.th.png (http://img157.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415183658745xw.png)
First, let's cover the good:
In the first Exile you had a border around the play field similar to Ys. In Exile 2, the border is gone and now the entire screen is the play area, which is actually quite a nice change of pace. Your character sprite feels a bit smaller as a result, but it's nice to have all of that extra screen realestate.
http://img157.imageshack.us/img157/5858/mednafen20060415183934233gq.th.png (http://img157.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415183934233gq.png)http://img157.imageshack.us/img157/634/mednafen20060415184038517hm.th.png (http://img157.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415184038517hm.png)http://img157.imageshack.us/img157/9517/mednafen20060415185757481qn.th.png (http://img157.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415185757481qn.png)
http://img157.imageshack.us/img157/1820/mednafen20060415190201783ce.th.png (http://img157.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415190201783ce.png)http://img157.imageshack.us/img157/7172/mednafen20060416093716209er.th.png (http://img157.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060416093716209er.png)http://img157.imageshack.us/img157/2550/mednafen20060416102712820xk.th.png (http://img157.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060416102712820xk.png)
The music also took a jump up in quality in the second game. While the first game had "damn good" music, the second one has "damned awesome" music.
The biggest change from the structure of the first game is that you can now control one of up to five people during the action segments, with each one having their own strengths and weaknesses. One character can jump really high and has ranged attacks, one is stupidly strong but can't jump to save his life, etc. Some of the bosses have attacks structured around you being able to effectively employ the unique abilities of your party, but from what I've seen ...the magic user is completely worthless...which makes me a sad panda.
Now, let's glaze over "The Bad":
The japanese release had a difficulty balance similar to Exile and Vic rightfully so deemed it to be "too easy". Unfortunatly, Vic himself had no concept of game balance to begin with but decided to screw around with it anyway to make it insanely hard. Enemies now did ~3x more damage and had ~3x more health, which was offset by weapons, armor, and tonics costing a fraction of the price they used to. Of course, none of this mattered because even with the most powerful equipment available you were going to have a hell of a time getting through the next action segment, even if you level grinded. If you ever wanted to play a game where you could increase levels and still feel like you weren't making any progress, Exile 2 is the game to play.
Beyond those balance problems, the game reeks of lazy design. There's numerous bugs, in particular with the hit detection. Your hitbox extends a good bit above your actual sprite, even when you're ducking, so don't expect to evade ANYTHING by ducking. Most of the time you won't be able to evade it by jumping either...you'll just have to swallow some tonics and soldier on. Also, your ranged character's knife attacks only hit about 33%-50% of the time, which is quite a pain in the ass.
http://img157.imageshack.us/img157/231/mednafen20060415190850121hf.th.png (http://img157.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415190850121hf.png)
The town graphics also took a big hit. While Assassi looks reasonably good when you first start up the game, you soon notice that all of the cities pretty much look alike. Nt only that, but you won't find yourself exploring lots of nice overhead areas, just towns divided by action segments. The vast variety of locations of the first game is sadly missing.
So in short, the first game is a great (but easy) game and the second is a bunch of piss with some nice ideas, great music and a horribly botched execution. But none of that matters because both games feature 8-bit boobies.
http://img479.imageshack.us/img479/5792/mednafen20060417025037999em.th.png (http://img479.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060417025037999em.png)http://img479.imageshack.us/img479/2616/mednafen20060417002502456yd.th.png (http://img479.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060417002502456yd.png)http://img479.imageshack.us/img479/7397/mednafen20060415162225543pw.th.png (http://img479.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415162225543pw.png)http://img479.imageshack.us/img479/6475/mednafen20060415162536425bh.th.png (http://img479.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415162536425bh.png)http://img479.imageshack.us/img479/1854/mednafen20060415164456319rg.th.png (http://img479.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415164456319rg.png)
http://img119.imageshack.us/img119/1597/mednafen20060415165847562ft.th.png (http://img119.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415165847562ft.png)
http://img119.imageshack.us/img119/4554/mednafen20060415061118069lh.th.png (http://img119.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415061118069lh.png)
For those that haven't experienced them, they're a bit like Zelda 2 in that you move around a map in an overhead view and then enter action stages where you hack and slash stuff via a side view. Of course, coming out a few years after Zelda 2 means that you get better control, better graphics, better music, the whole 9 yards. It was developed from the same people that brought us Valis, so if that means something to you then good....but if not, that's ok too.
The first game was released on Genesis, but it had quite a few things cut out. The music wasn't as good, it was missing one of the towns and some quests, and the translation was your typical early-90s engrish-a-thon.
Enter Vic Ireland and crew.
After Cosmic Fantasy 2, Vic decided to localize Exile. Overall the localization went pretty well, but it did suffer from some trademarked Working Designs translation "quirks" (inconsistant writing for the main character, attempts to interject humor, making pop culture references, etc) but for the most part it was subtantionally better than the genesis' translation. Hell, even the voice acting wasn't that bad; compared to a majority of what was being done in the realm of voice acting back then, it was some seriously top teir stuff.
http://img215.imageshack.us/img215/8703/mednafen20060415151622626sy.th.png (http://img215.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415151622626sy.png)http://img119.imageshack.us/img119/5810/mednafen20060415075123577bp.th.png (http://img119.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415075123577bp.png)http://img119.imageshack.us/img119/1688/mednafen20060415080227350xy.th.png (http://img119.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415080227350xy.png)http://img119.imageshack.us/img119/470/mednafen20060415080836547uc.th.png (http://img119.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415080836547uc.png)http://img119.imageshack.us/img119/2057/mednafen20060415164550042re.th.png (http://img119.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415164550042re.png)
The one downfall of the game, however, was that it was just too damn easy. You don't even need to really abuse the respawning enemies to breeze through the game, but if you DO decide to abuse them then you're assured a smooth ride. Some people may have been miffed over being able to plow through the game in 4 hours, but it was still a damn good 4 hour game.
http://img119.imageshack.us/img119/6969/mednafen20060415061144501bj.th.png (http://img119.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415061144501bj.png)http://img119.imageshack.us/img119/7535/mednafen20060415061824895km.th.png (http://img119.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415061824895km.png)http://img119.imageshack.us/img119/4164/mednafen20060415061956348qn.th.png (http://img119.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415061956348qn.png)http://img119.imageshack.us/img119/6435/mednafen20060415062618531kg.th.png (http://img119.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415062618531kg.png)http://img119.imageshack.us/img119/7057/mednafen20060415064340213fn.th.png (http://img119.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415064340213fn.png)
http://img119.imageshack.us/img119/7172/mednafen20060415064900320ha.th.png (http://img119.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415064900320ha.png)http://img119.imageshack.us/img119/5233/mednafen20060415065244281hc.th.png (http://img119.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415065244281hc.png)http://img119.imageshack.us/img119/7727/mednafen20060415071122377gx.th.png (http://img119.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415071122377gx.png)http://img119.imageshack.us/img119/2598/mednafen20060415072034685qq.th.png (http://img119.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415072034685qq.png)http://img119.imageshack.us/img119/9168/mednafen20060415074619547yh.th.png (http://img119.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415074619547yh.png)
Then came Exile 2, which was released as Exile - Wicked Phenomenon but should have been released as "Exile - What The Fuck?".
http://img157.imageshack.us/img157/4585/mednafen20060415183658745xw.th.png (http://img157.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415183658745xw.png)
First, let's cover the good:
In the first Exile you had a border around the play field similar to Ys. In Exile 2, the border is gone and now the entire screen is the play area, which is actually quite a nice change of pace. Your character sprite feels a bit smaller as a result, but it's nice to have all of that extra screen realestate.
http://img157.imageshack.us/img157/5858/mednafen20060415183934233gq.th.png (http://img157.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415183934233gq.png)http://img157.imageshack.us/img157/634/mednafen20060415184038517hm.th.png (http://img157.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415184038517hm.png)http://img157.imageshack.us/img157/9517/mednafen20060415185757481qn.th.png (http://img157.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415185757481qn.png)
http://img157.imageshack.us/img157/1820/mednafen20060415190201783ce.th.png (http://img157.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415190201783ce.png)http://img157.imageshack.us/img157/7172/mednafen20060416093716209er.th.png (http://img157.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060416093716209er.png)http://img157.imageshack.us/img157/2550/mednafen20060416102712820xk.th.png (http://img157.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060416102712820xk.png)
The music also took a jump up in quality in the second game. While the first game had "damn good" music, the second one has "damned awesome" music.
The biggest change from the structure of the first game is that you can now control one of up to five people during the action segments, with each one having their own strengths and weaknesses. One character can jump really high and has ranged attacks, one is stupidly strong but can't jump to save his life, etc. Some of the bosses have attacks structured around you being able to effectively employ the unique abilities of your party, but from what I've seen ...the magic user is completely worthless...which makes me a sad panda.
Now, let's glaze over "The Bad":
The japanese release had a difficulty balance similar to Exile and Vic rightfully so deemed it to be "too easy". Unfortunatly, Vic himself had no concept of game balance to begin with but decided to screw around with it anyway to make it insanely hard. Enemies now did ~3x more damage and had ~3x more health, which was offset by weapons, armor, and tonics costing a fraction of the price they used to. Of course, none of this mattered because even with the most powerful equipment available you were going to have a hell of a time getting through the next action segment, even if you level grinded. If you ever wanted to play a game where you could increase levels and still feel like you weren't making any progress, Exile 2 is the game to play.
Beyond those balance problems, the game reeks of lazy design. There's numerous bugs, in particular with the hit detection. Your hitbox extends a good bit above your actual sprite, even when you're ducking, so don't expect to evade ANYTHING by ducking. Most of the time you won't be able to evade it by jumping either...you'll just have to swallow some tonics and soldier on. Also, your ranged character's knife attacks only hit about 33%-50% of the time, which is quite a pain in the ass.
http://img157.imageshack.us/img157/231/mednafen20060415190850121hf.th.png (http://img157.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415190850121hf.png)
The town graphics also took a big hit. While Assassi looks reasonably good when you first start up the game, you soon notice that all of the cities pretty much look alike. Nt only that, but you won't find yourself exploring lots of nice overhead areas, just towns divided by action segments. The vast variety of locations of the first game is sadly missing.
So in short, the first game is a great (but easy) game and the second is a bunch of piss with some nice ideas, great music and a horribly botched execution. But none of that matters because both games feature 8-bit boobies.
http://img479.imageshack.us/img479/5792/mednafen20060417025037999em.th.png (http://img479.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060417025037999em.png)http://img479.imageshack.us/img479/2616/mednafen20060417002502456yd.th.png (http://img479.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060417002502456yd.png)http://img479.imageshack.us/img479/7397/mednafen20060415162225543pw.th.png (http://img479.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415162225543pw.png)http://img479.imageshack.us/img479/6475/mednafen20060415162536425bh.th.png (http://img479.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415162536425bh.png)http://img479.imageshack.us/img479/1854/mednafen20060415164456319rg.th.png (http://img479.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415164456319rg.png)
http://img119.imageshack.us/img119/1597/mednafen20060415165847562ft.th.png (http://img119.imageshack.us/my.php?image=mednafen20060415165847562ft.png)