I personally love portrait mode for RPGs, but I'm playing them on my iPhone where portrait makes more sense. When it comes to iPad, you're right. It would be nice to have the option to punch in and only view part of the screen or have the layout change (especially menus and battles). I'll try downloading this to my iPad and sync my save to see what it's like. Having black bars on the sides is probably like me playing Chaos Rings 2 on my iPhone in landscape. Why do I have to have black bars there if the iPad doesn't? Well... screen aspect ratio as opposed to the aspect ratio of the original screen it was intended for. And unfortunately, I bet it's hard to program games to look different on different size screens but all that info is contained in the same one app download. And this is where our availability to choose different devices and sizes is problematic for game devs. Fragmentation is obviously leading to alienation. And SE must not want to deal with it like smaller devs have to.
Battleheart Legacy is realtime, but each dungeon can be cleared in short sessions. Infinity Blade Trilogy can each be played "one battle at a time," and the game automatically saves after each battle. Pen and Paper RPG is a very well done turn-based RPG, and can be played in very short bursts. Deep Dungeons of Doom is another turn-based RPG where short bursts are very possible. Dungelot 1 and 2 is a roguelike which resembles some puzzle-type games, but it is definitely a roguelike rpg. Slayin is an arcade-y type of action RPG, and can definitely be played in small bursts.
Yes, pisiform. I think DQ4 is a great short burst RPG. I fight a few battles while waiting for files to render or during commercial breaks. Then you can hit the top button to turn off the screen until you're ready to jump in again. And the Quicksave feature makes it easier than ever to digest these long RPGs in digestible bites. I also agree with Exact-Psience. These are some good RPGs. My favorite out of those is Knights of Pen and Paper... Which can be played in portrait and landscape. That should please most people!
While I am enjoying dragon quest 8, the port is terrible. I have been developing in unity for about four years and I can just see the visual amateurish mistakes in it. For example, even in portrait mode there are black bars on the side, this is a mistake from not preparing the screen size, scaling, properly. It's almost if they just tried to do a straight port with minimal effort and to hell with the bugs. It's not worth $20 in its current state. I am curious if iv has the same problem but it looks like it from the posts here. I loved this game series on NES, and I owned unopened boxes from the original 4 dragon warriors, but this is kind of disgraceful. I am sure they will work, but not well.
Anyone know how to view your mini-medals? It said that they would be listed in the Misc. Menu, but under Battle Records I don't see them. And I don't know where else they would be.
I would recommend Lunar Silver Star Story Touch ; it is straight-forward and simple story of good vs evil and it's one of rare RPGs in which grinding for higher levels isn't needed to defeat bosses.
Forgot about that one! And you can play in landscape or portrait! But portrait uses only half of the screen for gameplay. Has anyone played DQ4 on DS? Isn't the battle menu layout of two screens, one on top of the other, basically portrait mode just like this version? And aren't the town exploration parts all in portrait on the DS? The only parts in landscape on the DS version seem to be the world exploration, which is just half view and half map. See the screens here: m.ign.com/images/games/dragon-quest-iv-nds-953458 When translating these basic portrait view DS ports to iOS, it makes sense to keep them the same. And the iPhone is just like putting the 2 DS screens together. However, I agree it would be nice to have an optional landscape layout, but that would mean just cutting off the top half of the game for more than half of it!
Thank you very much! It's just Menu->Attributes->Party. I kept searching under the wagon Misc. and it wasn't under that!
Thanks for all those replies. Very kind and helpful of you. Ii think I've played nearly all of them and really enjoyed most of them. Lunar silver star story I gave up on very quickly as I found it near unplayable due to the controls but perhaps I need to try again. Exact-Psience - thats a great list of games. Battleheart legacy I couldn't put down but is it a RPG? Perhaps not in the way that I mean it. However its probably impossible to have that degree of playability with a deep story AND keep it playable in short bursts. I will get DQ4 though thanks to your input and will let you know.....
There's a magic about these Dungeon Quest games. I bought this the other day and I'm loving it. Better than Final Fantasy. That's something I never thought I'd be saying but it's just the characters have so much personality and the story is so well done.
Well, I haven't been able to find any more people interested in moving to the town. I think I talked to everyone in the towns, zoomable and otherwise. At the very least, I've talked to enough people to determine that it's not set up where there's a lot of people to get at any point. Whatever has changed from the DS version, it's a pretty small but critical change. I'm not asking someone to figure the whole thing out, but it would be useful if people could list their town acquisitions aside from the ones I already listed. EDIT: Found the missing piece in the first place I thought I'd already looked. It's basically the same as the DS version except for two NPCs. The hints in the game are accurate, I just dropped the ball on one of them.
I think DQ does a better job with atmosphere and subtlety in the narrative than FF usually does. I don't think Torneko says anything in his chapter, but he's still memorable.
A couple questions.... are all the battles random? I don´t mind the grinding part but I like my battles with some strategy there... are the battles challenging? thanksss...
The battles are random, and so long as you don't grind, you'll find plenty of challenging encounters where you'll have to use all of your tools strategically to win. Since the DQ series is meant to be enjoyed by everyone, you can grind the challenge out of the game if you want, but I don't recommend it.
I will take the challenging path then I like it more buying it now btw Shaun you should give 1/6 of the credit to me about your super post about FF vs DQ I was the first to ask you to compare something to DQ ... it was Chaos Ring but i think I started something Thanks for your answers!
So is this game available to play in landscape mode at all? Also, how hard is it? Much grinding required? And by the way one game I would really love to see a good iOS port of sometime, is the original Suikoden.
Duncanedi: You guys started more than you realize at the moment. Tune in next week for more! No, it's portrait-only and I imagine it will stay that way. It's as hard as you want to be, and has as much grinding as you want it to have. Those things are connected. If you grind a lot, it's easy. If you don't, it's more challenging but still surmountable if you use proper strategy. Boy, would I love to see the Suikoden games, too. Any and all of them.
