I'm thinking that too. Might skip on this. Add portrait mode with no voice acting = non purchase. I guess they just wanted to rush it out to cash in and never really cared about doing it right. Playing portrait for over a 100 hours on an iPad is not my idea of fun.
The problem with A5 device support at this point is how much iOS 7 is using of the devices specs. If we do take GTA San Andreas as an example, I played through that game without any problems excluding a few rare crashes whilst I was running iOS 6, whilst people playing that game whilst running iOS 7 were getting a lot more crashes and bugs I haven't bought Dragon Quest VIII yet (hooray for no disposable income) so I can't really describe for you any performance problems, but judging from the App Description, I could see a situation like that, but that might be more of a worst case scenario. It's been out in Japan since the end of last year, so they could have acknowledged complaints there and fixed it for the international release. I hope that the problems explained in the App Store description are just related to A5 devices running iOS 7, but either way, I would find it hard to believe that an iPad 2 running iOS 6 would not be able to handle pretty much any games released on the App Store, as it may be old hardware, but it is still efficient hardware right now
People are saying this game was rushed, etc. It's been out in Japan since December so presumably all they needed to do in the last 5-6 months was localize it. I skimmed through that older thread for impressions from there: http://forums.toucharcade.com/showthread.php?t=230640
Localising doesn't just mean language but also habits and preferences. If they took out the voice acting then that was supposedly localisation but done ignorantly and without prior consultation as a lot of folks here love voice acting even in Japanese! Then there's portrait vs landscape. Did they do a survey of local preferences? I doubt it. That's why I called it rushed because they just wanted to get the game out but didn't do any real tweaks to adapt the game to the international market. Did they properly adapt the game for comfortable ergonomic ipad gameplay? With a 100+ hour game a comfort option needs to be offered.
It seems like portrait mode was a decision that is becoming pretty common in Japan regarding mobile games. The ability to play games in portrait mode with one hand is a big deal, especially since it allows for easy playing standing on a crowded train. I would have to imagine that reworking the game to play in landscape mode for western markets would be a massive task (not far off from essentially porting the game again). Graphics and controls would have to be totally reworked and that doesn't included all the English text that has to be inserted. So really, it sucks, but I also am not surprised we are getting the game in portrait mode.
Some of the comments there was that there was no voice acting in the Japanese version. Their focus was on the portability of it and making it a one handed on the go game. I just think it wasn't important to them.
The portrait mode is the single biggest thing I'm looking forward to. I'm not big on landscape gaming with two hands. My favorite games all can be played with one hand as I'm walking to work or traveling somewhere. I hope more games do this!
They've not taken the voice acting out per se. The original Japanese version of the PS2 game never had voice acting and never had an orchestrated soundtrack. Those features were exclusive to the western PS2 version. This iOS version is a port of the Japanese PS2 version so...no voice-acting.
I'm really hoping for some impressions tonight once it's out in most region. I'm really of two minds about this game. On one hand, it looks like a rushed port Then again, some of the issues that we seem to have with it (portrait, no VA, no orchestral soundtrack) are fully intentional (ability to play one handed and a straight port of the Japanese version which didn't have VA/orchestra). My biggest concern is performance. Hopefully bugs have been ironed out and it performs well on the 5s. I'm also wondering if I can really tolerate a 100+ hour RPG fully in portrait mode on the tiny iPhone screen. On the other hand, even if I don't play it, part of me wants to buy it anyways to at least let SE know that the West does care about DQ. Maybe it will play a small role in finally getting VII 3DS or the eventual XI over here. This is the first DQ release we've had in years so I'm worried that poor sales of this release will lead SE to drop future DQ localizations.
Many thanks to whichever moderator merged the old and new Dragon Quest VIII threads! That was bugging me.
I've put about 30hrs into the Japanese version on a first gen iPad Mini and not run into that many problems apart from a little lag occasionally and about 2 crashes in total. Definitely not the optimum device to play on, but playable non the less. I've even put about 5hrs into it on an iPhone 4 which is an unsupported device. Although on that the lag was way more frequent and I wouldn't really recommend it About the portrait only thing.. It's actually not that bad. Takes a little getting used to for sure, but once you do, it works quite well. Definitely not a rushed port like some people are speculating. DQIV is also portrait only too btw
Its great for a phone Ive got no problems with that but an ipad in one hand using the other hand is awkward. They need to think about these things if they want to port it to tablets after all its amongst the highest priced games on the App Store. $24.99 for a portrait port for Tablets is a bit rough. My next phone will be an iPhone I'll be happy playing it on that when I get it.
Can this be clarified please. Another post says there's no voice acting. So are we or aren't we getting everything, some, oart or all of a Dragon Quest? What are we really getting?
It's not been "taken out". This is a port of the Japanese version of the game which never had VO to begin with.
