Even in my journal, FOE
Mar. 12th, 2013 12:26 am![[personal profile]](http://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kasuminFor many years, a good friend of mine has been going on and on and on about the old school dungeon crawler series Etrian Odyssey, which originally came out for the DS in 2007. I've always liked the cutesy art of the series, but old school dungeon crawlers (and, well, dungeon crawlers in general) aren't really my thing. So I'd listen to his harrowing tales of crazy dungeon adventures and fighting horrific monsters (like the dreaded FOEs) and it always piqued my interest.
Cut to 2012 when Etrian Odyssey 4 comes out for the 3DS in Japan. This time, however, they announce a "casual" mode for beginners. So I finally say, "Okay, I can do this!" And I get the demo early last month. I played on casual mode until I realized it made the game too easy and then switched to Normal (unlike Fire Emblem: Awakening, you can switch the difficulty when you're in town, which is very nice).
From what I've read, EO4 streamlines a lot of mechanics from the earlier 3 Etrian Odyssey games. Some people complain it's too easy (some series veterans), but I don't mind that at all. For an old school dungeon crawler, the game is very fair about stuff. It'll present challenges to you while giving you clues as to how to deal with the challenge. And the ten different classes available in the game are so well-balanced that it's hard to make a team that doesn't work well together.
Also, you can generate cool stuff for street pass like Guild cards!
It'll probably take me awhile to beat the game (I just got to the 3rd major labyrinth dungeon), but I'm happy with taking it slow. I'm pretty sure I'll have to make some major tweaks to my party soon as I'm having some trouble in the latest dungeon. But once again, it's a lot easier to do that in EO4 than it was in earlier games in the series.
And once again, I loooove the character designs:
Cut to 2012 when Etrian Odyssey 4 comes out for the 3DS in Japan. This time, however, they announce a "casual" mode for beginners. So I finally say, "Okay, I can do this!" And I get the demo early last month. I played on casual mode until I realized it made the game too easy and then switched to Normal (unlike Fire Emblem: Awakening, you can switch the difficulty when you're in town, which is very nice).
From what I've read, EO4 streamlines a lot of mechanics from the earlier 3 Etrian Odyssey games. Some people complain it's too easy (some series veterans), but I don't mind that at all. For an old school dungeon crawler, the game is very fair about stuff. It'll present challenges to you while giving you clues as to how to deal with the challenge. And the ten different classes available in the game are so well-balanced that it's hard to make a team that doesn't work well together.
Also, you can generate cool stuff for street pass like Guild cards!
It'll probably take me awhile to beat the game (I just got to the 3rd major labyrinth dungeon), but I'm happy with taking it slow. I'm pretty sure I'll have to make some major tweaks to my party soon as I'm having some trouble in the latest dungeon. But once again, it's a lot easier to do that in EO4 than it was in earlier games in the series.
And once again, I loooove the character designs: