Etrian Odyssey takes to the seas -- with inscrutable map icons!
Etrian Odyssey 3
This post tackles the game’s second set of map icons – the Etrian Odyssey 3 ocean icons. These are the icons that you use while exploring the ocean in your ship. Hard as it is to believe, these are even more confusing than the dungeon symbols! Seriously, I feel like I just failed some kind of IQ test. Here’s my best shot.
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Etrian Odyssey 3 -- Look at these heroes, ready and eager to map!
One of the standout features of the Etrian Odyssey series is its map-making system. In the olden days, RPG gamers used pencils and graph paper to painstakingly map their way through grid-based dungeon crawler RPGs. The Etrian Odyssey games give the player the freedom to experience this style of gameplay in the modern world by mapping dungeons on the DS’s lower screen using the stylus.
Problem is, as far as I can tell, unlike the first two games, Etrian Odyssey 3
In the spirit of helping intrepid adventurers everywhere (as well as bloggers like me), I have decided to post a guide to the Etrian Odyssey 3 map icons. But I am going to need your help figuring some of these out!
Update: The Final Dungeon’s Key to Etrian Odyssey 3’s Ocean Map Icons is now up as well!
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Wizardry -- Hope you brought your imagination!
With Etrian Odyssey 3
What is a Grid-Based Dungeon Crawler RPG?
Before Ultima Underworld introduced the ability to move freely through a 3D space, first-person role playing games were strictly grid-based. Each time you pressed the arrow key left or right, you would turn a full 90 degrees in that direction. Each time you pressed the up arrow key, you advanced one square forward on an invisible grid. While this made mapping easy (graph paper was ideal) it also imposed artificial restraints on the dungeon designs. (These evil mages must have hired only the best dungeon contractors to get all of those 90 degree angles and perfectly level floors just right!)
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Usually, the only Dark Project that would get me excited is Warren Spector’s masterpiece Thief. However, I may have to make an exception in this case, given that this Project Dark is the follow-up to From Software’s brutal 2009 RPG Demon’s Souls
Whether Project Dark is a role playing game is unclear at this point, but From Software’s history strongly suggests that it will be. This is the Japanese studio responsible for Demon’s Souls and the King’s Field series. My guess is that Project Dark will be an RPG. And if it’s a successor to Demon’s Souls, it won’t be an easy one.
Originally announced for the Playstation 3 during Sony’s presentation at the Tokyo Game Show on September 15, 2010, it now appears that Project Dark will be available on both PS3 and XBox 360 in 2011.
Source: 1Up
Recettear: A Surprisingly Fresh and Enjoyable Indie JRPG
Recettear: An Item Shop’s Tale is a Japanese indie RPG developed by EasyGameStation for Windows in 2007 and localized into English by Carpe Fulgur LLC in 2010. The game is an anime-style JRPG with a twist – instead of playing the role of the hero, you play the role of the proprietor of the ubiquitous “item shop” that appears in 99% of RPGs (western and Japanese). While this may sound tedious, it is actually a lot of fun.
Recettear is reminiscent of Torneko’s quest line in Dragon Quest 4, in that you are a merchant who can enter dungeons to find rare items to sell in your store. However, unlike in Dragon Quest 4, in which Torneko himself entered the dungeons, in Recettear you hire a variety of adventurers to do the dirty dungeon crawling work for you (although as the player, you control the adventurer – see more details after the jump). As the game progresses, your adventurers-for-hire level up.
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Lair of the Shadow Broker brings Liara back to the fight -- temporarily, at least
I remember the days of expansion packs with pleasant nostalgia, so the concept of a self-contained mini-adventure downloaded straight into my game appeals to me – the chance to take my party out on one more quest from which I can triumphantly emerge with experience points and loot (and, on the Xbox 360, achievement points). This ideal DLC isn’t exactly what Bioware delivers in Lair of the Shadow Broker. For one thing, there’s minimal loot and only one level’s worth of XP. But what the episode does deliver is pretty damn good.
For those who have no idea what I’m talking about, Lair of the Shadow Broker is the latest downloadable content pack for Mass Effect 2
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Fable 3 sure looks awesome....
Fable 3
They say that those who don’t learn from history are bound to repeat it. Not me. I’ve been burned before. Twice.
So before we start storming Gamestop to place our pre-orders, let’s review five reasons not to get our hopes up for Fable 3.
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Dragon Age: Origins -- an old school RPG with (mostly) modern graphics
I started this blog because if there’s one thing the Internet needs, it’s more video game websites.
Just kidding.
But I do think that I can add something meaningful — or at least entertaining — to the conversation.
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