Japanese Niche Games Deals & Discussion Thread 4.0

shivan128

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Welcome to the Japanese niche games deals and discussion thread!  Feel free to talk about local and import Japanese games here.  Our goal is to maintain a thread dedicated to active deals on niche games including RPGs, Visual Novels (VN), Shoot'em ups (Shmups), Musou, etc.  Also maintained are pre-orders for standard, limited and collector's edition games with key release dates provided.

I've wikified the thread to make it more friendly and open to others that can actively update with important information. You can find the wiki post directly below this one.

NOTE:  Please, leave the censorship discussion away from this thread.  It's common for japanese games to have questionable content outside of the country.  We want to keep discussions to the game itself and not about cultural/societal tolerance.

A message from Thorbahn:

Our CAG Japanese Niche Games Thread also has a community on PS4, where you can interact and game with other members of the thread.

Our moderators are: Draekon, Las_Hole, and Waffleswanton

You can basically friend any of our members, or any moderator, and you will be able to request to join the community under "Communities friends are in" tab, and a mod will approve your request.

You can also leave your PSN ID in the thread, saying you want to join, and we can invite you directly as well.

As always, have fun and enjoy your stay!

 
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Inescapable is one of those games I need to play only touching it a bit on release (did beat the demo which lead me to buying it). Should have waited to buy, but it was pretty aight for what I played.
 
Yeah, $20 is my buy price for most physical games I am remotely interested in. For example, didn't touch Inescapable at $24.99 but gladly picked it up when it fell to $20. Now I just need some more stuff to drop to tempt me.
 
Just beat Rebirth. 112 hours. I kinda get what they did with the ending but definitely had to have a few things pointed out by IGN's summary that makes things are lot clearer. I'm definitely amped to see what they do in Part 3. The first 3/4s of the game are a sold 9.5, the final quarter is 8-ish. Overall I'd say it's a 9.

My final thoughts on the game are:
1. Cait Sith sucks donkey ass to use. They just need to scrap him and focus on making Cid and Vincent actually worth using.
2. The third game will be called Reunite.
 
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Just beat Rebirth. 112 hours. I kinda get what they did with the ending but definitely had to have a few things pointed out by IGN's summary that makes things are lot clearer. I'm definitely amped to see what they do in Part 3. The first 3/4s of the game are a sold 9.5, the final quarter is 8-ish. Overall I'd say it's a 9.

My final thoughts on the game are:
1. Cait Sith sucks donkey ass to use. They just need to scrap him and focus on making Cid and Vincent actually worth using.
2. The third game will be called Reunite.
I’m almost certain the third game will be called Return because (1) “return to the planet” is a recurring phrase in FF7 and (2) it falls into the dumb-subtitle category that SE loves.
 
I picked up Sword Art Online (PS5) Dying Light 2 (PS5) and few more games. Damaged $170 after taxes. The Legend of Heroes is good deal but the framerates is suck. Need new patches
 
I’m almost certain the third game will be called Return because (1) “return to the planet” is a recurring phrase in FF7 and (2) it falls into the dumb-subtitle category that SE loves.

I thought Return too for a while but in the ending where
Zack is sitting at the church, he says something along the lines of worlds uniting, which makes me think all the various timelines or whatever are gonna be one again, or reunite to what it should be. And hopefully he reunites with Aerith, Zack deserves a W.
 
Thats a good price for Spirit Hunter: Death Mark II after only a few months. Do I buy it now or risk it going even lower?
 
I don’t see the traditional Seiken Densetsu artstyle on either, so neither.
I thought this was going to be the cover, so I'm a little disappointed:
960x0.jpg
 
If you've been waiting for a drop on any of the woot titles, they have 10% off at checkout using their app. Today only I believe.

I'm sill eyeing P3R and Unicorn Overlord CEs. But I think I'll end up waiting for further drops.
 
It's weird to me how SquareEnix reprinted the crap out of Crisis Core PS5. But refuse to reprint any additional copies of PS5 Remake or PS4/NSW I-VI Pixel Remaster for NA.

They reprinted Crisis Core Reunion? Odd, I don't recall it ever being that expensive...

EDIT* And if they're gonna reprint anything, about about reprinting the PS4 FF Pixel Remaster.
 
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I don’t think they have otherwise done a FF collection since PS1. Waiting till PS9 for the next at that rate. Physical will be long dead by then, or an exclusive limited release price gouged to absurd levels we can’t even imagine.
 
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I feel like it was super expensive and their store only. Might have only been 1-9.

Hmm seems like I may have been thinking of something similar to the anniversary collection. but that was digital only from what i read. while I believe the one I was thinking of was at least huge looking like one of those encyclopedia sets but for games.

Ah I may have been the ultimate box collection for the 25th anniversary? It came with physical copies but they were all for each individual platform from ps1-ps3.
 
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Hold gif from that car trade commercial
God I hate that commercial. I'll dive across a room to get to the remote and mute that shit.
I don’t think they have otherwise done a FF collection since PS1. Waiting till PS9 for the next at that rate. Physical will be long dead by then, or an exclusive limited release price gouged to absurd levels we can’t even imagine.
They'll be beaming the games directly into our brains by then. Or, better yet, we'll experience them in holosuites.
8Bu3SI.gif
 
Finally took time this weekend to go through my more recent purchases of switch games released within the last year to redeem all the gold coins. Ended up with just under $6 in gold coins. Then took advantage of the last full day of the eshop sale to get the Xenoblade Chronicles 3 Expansion Pass which ended up $17.21 (after tax). Not a bad way to burn gold coins.

Also started playing Mario Vs Donkey Kong on the switch. I played the original 20 years ago when it came out as at the time GBA was my main platform... but I haven't played it since. I still own the original but was looking forward to the two new worlds and potentially trying the 2-player mode. The new worlds are good, but overall I haven't found the base game mode that challenging. Hopefully plus mode and expert levels gives my brain a little workout. This might end up something I finish and like the original, like seeing on the shelf but just don't replay. Which if that's the case, I'll probably move it to my sell pile after giving other family members a chance to play it.

Side note, forgive my over sharing, but my youngest son moved out over the past week. He's sharing an apartment near college for his last two years. This opens his room up for the most part to be my new room for storing all media, sorting through stuff, and having a small game setup (still keeping a bed for him if he needs to spend the night). So all of my media shelves, I'm about to take apart and rebuild for a single wall in the room. I'm kind of amped about having the space to get better organized and seeing everything out will maybe help me decide on where to start with downsizing the collection.
 
Finally beat Valkyria Chronicles on Sunday after 15 years. Put 20 hrs into the PS3 version back in 2008 and my OG PS3 died & I never started over. Then got the Remaster on PS4 day one and got back to mission 6 before the game eventually got buried in the backlog. Booted it up last week and pushed through the rest. Such a great strategy RPG with characters you get attached to. I still loved that the 3 main characters from Skies of Arcadia are squad members. Glad I finally finished. Playing Tunic until the Elden Ring expansion drops this later week.
 
Personally I disliked vc1. almost all the maps were capture the flag, which while not exactly terrible it penalized you for doing anything than finishing the map as quickly as possible :(, unit balance was wonky since scouts are broken, snipers and to a lesser degree shock troopers are good while lancers are super niche and mechanics only have use when ranks are deployed.
Also the bugs with the hit boxes and physics really ruined my playthrough. I threw a grenade for example and it somehow ricochet under a tank back to me. Sorry to be a bummer. I Really wanted to love the game as srpgs are my bread and butter.
 
While true, I want to make it clear that III comes this year and I&II will release next year. It's not the all in one package people were hoping for.
We can't have nice (affordable) things, I know. I have the Asian import three pack, which I just got recently for a fair price.

So you are all welcome for the inevitable I&II announcement.

Now if only the middle children could get ported to Switch, then I could have a system with all the Final Fantasy games and all the Dragon Quest games on it from the originals to PS2 era.
 
We can't have nice (affordable) things, I know. I have the Asian import three pack, which I just got recently for a fair price.

I grabbed the switch import for 1/2/3 from PA back in 2019. Paid $44.89 for it (I might have used a coupon and preordered). I'm pretty happy with just playing those versions, XI on switch, and then leaning on my New 3DS XL and the DS/3DS versions of the other games. More switch ports of 4->9, I'd like to see X-Offline at least get an english release. I played some of the online version since US IP address are able to play the free content with a JP account... but no way was I going to try and and dig into it with the language barrier let alone throw money at a digital only game. Still, I'll likely buy all the 2D-HD ports because it's DQ even if I don't need them, it's a franchise I like to collect for. It would be cool to have everything mainline on the Switch... but I feel like those games are only a part of what I love about DQ. The spinoffs are pretty exceptional with Monsters Joker & Rocket Slime being among my favorite. So at minimum I'll Iikely always need my New 3DS XL anyway. Same for keeping a GBA SP+ for GBC DQ3. Also even though I got the PS4 versions of Heroes 1 & 2, I still grabbed the swith version as those games are pretty fun and the language barrier isn't as big a deal.
 
For me the most surprising announcement at the Nintendo direct was the Marvel vs. Capcom Fighting Collection: Arcade Classics. No one thought these games would ever get released for consoles again because of licensing. I think the last time a Marvel Capcom game came out for consoles was 22 years ago with the release of mvc2 PS2.

I have a mvc2 Dreamcast story from back in the day to share. Mvc2 Dreamcast was hard to find and in demand even over 20 years ago. They sold for about $50 each on ebay at the time. In my area it seemed to be common, or nobody wanted it. I would pick them up on clearance for around $10 each at the stores. They would open a KB Toys Express around the holidays in the malls, I went in one and found 30 copies of mvc2 Dreamcast for $3 each, they couldn't give these things away, of course I bought them all. I think I moved about 50 copies of it on ebay. I put together quite a large Neo Geo AES collection from the money I made from those. Now I see they sell for $150+ used.
 
I just beat Dragon Quest III on the Switch 3-pack last year and hardly remember a single thing about it.

It was good tho!

For me the most surprising announcement at the Nintendo direct was the Marvel vs. Capcom Fighting Collection: Arcade Classics. No one thought these games would ever get released for consoles again because of licensing. I think the last time a Marvel Capcom game came out for consoles was 22 years ago with the release of mvc2 PS2.
MVC3 / Ultimate and MVC Infinite don't exist?!
 
For me the most surprising announcement at the Nintendo direct was the Marvel vs. Capcom Fighting Collection: Arcade Classics. No one thought these games would ever get released for consoles again because of licensing. I think the last time a Marvel Capcom game came out for consoles was 22 years ago with the release of mvc2 PS2.
Marvel vs Capcom Origins and Marvel vs Capcom 2 were released on PS3 and XBox 360. Digital only
 
Mario & Luigi Brotherhood honestly looked like the best game but that combat looks like battles will be super long and slow, unless all of those were special moves.

Fantasian is another one that's interesting, I had no idea it even existed. I don't think having a legendary name tied to the game means much since most of them haven't done anything legendary since the 90s or 00s, but this looks a pretty cool game.

I initially loved the idea of playing as Zelda but Echoes of Wisdom just looks so fucking boring. I'm not against a less combat/more puzzle heavy game but conjuring up tables just seems like it's something that'll stop being fun after you do it twice. Regardless, they should have called it Legend of Link: Echoes of Wisdom.

DK Returns HD is cool but Luigi's Mansion 2 HD..? The Luigi's Mansion games were kinda meh. I honestly figured we'd finally see Xeno X HD by now.

Prime 4 looks... fine.

With all that said, my ramblings are meaningless and Nintendo is going to print money freely with their line-up. And in all honestly, I could see myself getting at least 4-5 of these games over the next year whereas with Sony... dunno, after finishing Rebirth I can't say there's anything else in 2024 or 2025 I want outside of Wolverine.
 
Marvel vs Capcom Origins and Marvel vs Capcom 2 were released on PS3 and XBox 360. Digital only
I didn't know those existed. I don't really pay attention to most digital only releases. I just looked those up and origins came out in 2012 and was delisted in 2014, that didn't last long!
 
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