As we posted yesterday, Peter Molyneux’s followup to Curiosity, Godus (Free) is now available on the App Store worldwide. Originally fueled by a £526,563 (Roughly $900,000) Kickstarter, Godus was sold to backers as the god game to end all god games. Peter Molyneux created Populous, so he had clout to spare when it came to boasting about wanting to make the most amazing god game ever.
Unsurprisingly, like most early Kickstarters with a big name behind them, it quickly exceeded its goal and backers eagerly anticipated what many assumed would be the next huge leap in Populous-style games. Check out how epic the original pitch video was:
Hype for the game hit critical levels as Minecraft ($6.99) creator Notch chimed in with “Money spending mode: ENGAGED." Here’s how 22Cans pitched it:
Half a living sandbox world, and half a strategy game, players can choose to explore the power of the almighty however they wish. Whether it’s granting the power of life and blossoming the world around your believers, or using godly powers to wreak havoc via natural disasters to defeat the armies of other gods, prepare for the Ultimate God Game: Single Player, Multiplayer, Cross-Platform gameplay, sandbox worlds, strategic battles, living populations, and the power to create, change, and destroy the very structure of the world.
…And what was eventually delivered basically amounts to a free to play farming game published by notorious monetizers Mobage. Kickstarter comments have been on fire ever since the game went live, as free to play timer games are basically the exact opposite of what core gamers who front money to back Kickstarters enjoy at all. Other corners of the internet, like reddit and even our own forums are filled with similar disgust.
The cruel irony of it all is that not long ago, Peter Molyneux himself called the EA’s similar timer and currency packed reboot of Dungeon Keeper (Free) “ridiculous" in an interview with the BBC:
“I felt myself turning round saying, ‘What? This is ridiculous. I just want to make a dungeon. I don’t want to schedule it on my alarm clock for six days to come back for a block to be chipped,'" he told the BBC.
Considering you need to use the “Belief" energy system in Godus to flatten land, one of the most basic tasks in a god game… These comments are pretty incredible. Similar to how Molyneux just wanted to make a dungeon, I think gamers (and particularly Kickstarter backers) just wanted to play a god game. Now, it’s entirely possible that everyone is currently in the timer-laden “tutorial" phase of the game and Godus eventually opens up in to the wildly deep game that was originally pitched, but, that’s sort of hard to believe with “Mobage" on the front of the box, isn’t it?
Holy crap, I'm glad I purchased this and held off on actually playing to far in because it's gonna be way better going through it after this update!
Same here 👍
Same here. Can't wait for controller.
Ya I don't believe this shit. Thy said they would update it like a year ago.
You're telling me. I'm amazed that this project never fell into Development Hell considering the amount of time and effort an update like this requires.
Yep, they're lying about the update and fabricated those screen shots just to trick you. Makes sense.
Lunar 2 please. There are so many Silver Star ports. When does Eternal Blue get it's love.
Square-Penix (tempted to replace x with s), take note of this, learn and educate yourself on how to improve and update your apps/games on mobile, this is how you make your fans happy.
SE had one decent port, though. It was FFT: WotL. They even overhauled the character’s portraits and they did it very good. The changes were subtle but noticeable.
But they had very decent in-game interface since PSX version to begin with which cannot be redone into an ugly one, like they did with FF games.
My point it that Lunar port is better than SE’s ports, but still is not the treatment that classic games should get, sadly.
I am more particularly concerned with stability, bugs and flawless gameplay, FFT iOS suffers from crashing issues even on the latest iPhone/iPod/etc, people will argue:
"Oh, mine hasn't crashed!"
"There's an auto-save feature and you can even save mid battle, what's your problem?"
Yes, Square's solution to the crashing is to implement an "auto-save" feature and the ability to save your game mid battle.
My problem is if I dished out $20 (I'm Asian not from the US so price differs) on a game it better be flawless in terms of stability and be bug free!
Graphics overhaul and improvements are appreciated but unnecessary because I hate playing a game with the constant fear of crashing. And Square are pretty lazy with updates, bug fixes and improvements although they seems to be stepping up.
Also TA, why does our comment in the app doesn't display line break properly? I had paragraphs but it ended up being a wall of text.
I used to play FFT when it come out on iOS a lot (42 hours) while commuting two years ago and I never had any issues with it. My device was either iPhone 4S or 4 (which is more likely).
It might become unstable with iOS updates, but I don’t know about that.
Just stepping in to mention that FFT WOTL ios started as a mediocre port of one of the best and worst ports I've seen. The slowdown desync problems in the psp version really destroyed all of the beautiful work they did in adding cutscenes, extra chars, and even multiplayer. After a year of barely supporting the app, Squeenix all of a sudden fixed like almost everything. Now the ios version is the best version short of using a live patch on the psp that requires custom firmware.
I know of that PSP patch you're talking, it fixes the slowdown right? I enjoy the iOS version but crashing still happen albeit rarely. Might give it another go one of these days.
It doesn’t look very nice.
Old one is still good without the filter which makes all the pixels blurry.
This graphical overhaul looks half-assed, to be honest.
Check the background. Reminds me of something like hq2x filter (check rounded corners (which were straight) on the pillar).
Character sprites, too. I think they applied some filter and then just finished the sprites with a file.
Check Jessica’s hair. It’s missing the tiara.
UI is horrible in this port too.
im not certain if you are serious or just trolling. from what i can tell, your only valid point is about the missing tiara. i've com close to getting this several times now, and every time i tell myself to wait for the supposed update. ironically, i never thought this would actually happen. looks like im happily spending seven bucks fairly soon now.
That's no tiara. It's her hairline. I'm a longtime LUNAR-Net member who owns every US-released LUNAR game (even the crappy ones).
Screenshot: http://www.lunar-net.com/ss...
That makes your point moot.
Automatic purchase for me once they update it. I haven't played Lunar since the saga cd version so this should be a real treat.
This was originally a Sega CD game, not Saturn:
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/w...
I can put this back on my device once it's updated. Hopefully they make the file size smaller too. That would be cool.
Lol I emailed them the other day asking if the update is still a thing and that we at TA were still waiting for news. :D And they replied up front! Nice!
Just wanted to personally thank SoMoGa for bringing this release to iOS and for working hard to continue to support the title. I would have never thought that the game that (along with Nintendo titles) got me into video gaming and pretty much shaped me as a kid would be on my friggin phone. Will support you guys day 1 with whatever, hoping to see Eternal Blue eventually released, really appreciate your guys' efforts.
I can't believe they did it! Square Enix has just stretched their original artwork to fit new screens. And probably for good reason: It takes a LONG time and a lot of effort to redraw or design backgrounds for a large RPG like this. So, my hat off to you, SoMoGa. You've done an awesome job! Thank you for your support of this one. This isn't something that can be done in a few months. So, thanks for doing it right.
I was kinda hoping the update they were talking about would be the PSP remake. Even a full separate version would be sweet. New screens look nice though.
I bought this a while back and even by the generally low standards of RPG ports on iOS, this was astonishingly awful. The frame rate was in single figures and the virtual D-Pad control the worst I have ever seen by a gigantic margin. Plus the horrific dubbing was still in place with no way to strip the dub out and revert entirely to the original VO.
Lunar is a solid RPG, but on iOS, one of the worst apps I have ever seen.
By original VO, do you mean the Japanese VO or the old English cast? I wish we could have had the old English cast, especially John Truitt's Ghaleon, but my understanding is that it's a legal nightmare.
Speaking of the voice acting, who owns the the rights to the original localization? Victor Ireland? Game Arts?
Also, just so I understand it correctly, this version used the art assets from the PSX version (SSS: Complete) but the voice work and music from the PSP remake (SS Harmony). Is that correct?
That's correct, yes. This is Silver Star Story Complete with Silver Star Harmony's voice work and songs with vocals. The localization on the older games is owned by Game Arts/Gungho, but reusing the voice work in a new release would require new contracts, and all but one of the old VAs opted not to be part of SSH when Vic Ireland ended up not being involved.
I mean the Japanese VO. I always avoid dubbing whatever possible.
Ah, well, I agree it would be nice if the option were there, maybe as a paid IAP to cover licensing/contract costs. I wonder which voice cast the JP version of the App uses? I think it got recast with every release in Japan.
This looks almost as bad as FF6 on iOS. Seriously, click on the pic to enlarge.
I, for one, am thrilled at this unexpected news. I can't understand all the haters. I think Lunar: SSST is a fantastic port that, despite some slightly finicky controls that I quickly adjusted to, brought a JRPG classic to our pockets.
I stopped a playthrough of Lunar over a year ago when they announced the art update was "imminent", waiting patiently for it to drop and checking the TA Lunar thread every few weeks. Like most posters on the thread I had basically given up and figures SoMoGa had died and moved on.
Welcome back SoMoGa. You have been missed.
I hope they release something new also..a new Rpg or maybe a sequel
I just want SE to port Super Mario RPG...that would be a glorious day lol. Even though that would never happen in a million years 😞😞