Etrian Odyssey II: Heroes of Lagaard
 

In case you weren't following the original Etrian Odyssey thread, this game plays much like the first, only it's much more polished and balanced. I played through the first two strata of the it in Japanese, but now that I know that it's coming stateside I'll hold off until then to finish it up.

I never thought it'd be published outside of Japan, so this news was certainly a nice tidbit to wake up to.

Edit: oh hay finally put that box art from later in the thread up

Also the street date has been broken. As of June 13th you can find the game on shelves, in what few quantities Atlus has produced.

F O E! F O E! F O E! F O E! \D:/

There's no doubt in my mind that this'll be awesome--totally looking forward to it. I do still have to finish the first game, so now I have a good impetus to do so. I hope the sequel is as unforgiving and cruel as the first, cause that's the way it should be.

Definitely excited for this game. Loved the first (still have to finish it) but, as surasshu said, that's probably a motivating factor!

http://www.rpgland.com/content/media/2008/03/eto5.jpg
http://www.rpgland.com/content/media/2008/03/eoii4.jpg http://www.rpgland.com/content/media/2008/03/eoii8.jpg
http://www.rpgland.com/content/media/2008/03/eoii3.jpg http://www.rpgland.com/content/media/2008/03/eoii9.jpg
http://www.rpgland.com/content/media/2008/03/eoii2.jpg http://www.rpgland.com/content/media/2008/03/eoii1.jpg
http://www.rpgland.com/content/media/2008/03/eoii10.jpg http://www.rpgland.com/content/media/2008/03/eoii7.jpg

Can't wait for this game. Apparently it's quite popular in Japan, but it is indeed quite niche here.

Looks like there's more icons you can put on your map too. Maybe I won't have to use as many memos to tag everything.

But yeah, this is going to be awesome. Quite the surprise. I wonder if the skill descriptions say a bit more this time around or if they're still as vague as ever. I still have no idea what H. Touch does for the Medic in the first one.

GFF introduced me to the first one so I'll be picking this up too =D
Still haven't quite beaten the game yet though ._.

Also: too bad the little brown shop girl is gone, but hurray for Gunner class!

A "small weak forest denizen", eh? I bet it'll kick my ass. :(

Those screenshots look promising, I love that guy's art. The game interface turned a lot greener since the first game... But that's cool, I like green.

Definitely going to be getting this one. EO1 is easily my favorite DS RPG to date. And this looks similar but with lots of polish issues fixed (which was the biggest problem with EO1).

I guess I should get back to working on those maps then...

So many FOEs.

I was interested in the first game but never bought it for some bizarre reason, and it's probably a good thing I didn't since the sequel is supposed to be more polished. One question though. I've been reading some stuff on the official website and there's info about the Beast. Is the Beast an actual character class, or something else? I want to get a wolf 'cause I love wolves.

I've never played any Wizardry game so how do you guys think I'll like this? I already know about the punishing difficulty this series has.

Can someone recommend a good beginner party for me?

Well you can go with something along these lines:
Protector(Defense)
Medic(Healer)
Landsknecht(Warrior type class)

And then usually you'll have the other 2 classes with support if you want:
Alchemist(Mage)
Hexer(Status)
Dark Hunter(Binding abilities-Preventing enemies to use certain moves)
Gunner(Ranged support)
Pet(Battle Support)
Ronin(Melee support or main melee)
Troubadour(Bard like class, high on party support abilities)
War Magus(War cleric?)
Survivalist(Battle and Map support)

It depends on your play style.

But regardless, my staples are usually a Protector on the front and a Medic in the back. Everything else is free to switch in and out.

As for beasts, they are a class, but I'm not sure that they're controllable. It's a really unique class that I can't wait to see how they play out.

Well the thing about the Beast class is

So you guys are saying there isn't a set group of classes that totally sucks when you take them to a dungeon? There's no consequences for mix and matching classes?

Really? Awww :(
I read up on Beasts and they do have some unique abilities. Would be fun to try them. I checked the wallpapers and didn't see one for them so I thought they were allies ie: they don't take up space in your party, but help out on the sidelines.

Hmmm that's a lot of classes I can fiddle around with. I'm able to keep characters in reserve to use whenever I want, right? How many can I have in total?

BTW, what is 'map support?' That really doesn't make much sense.

I've heard War Magus is pretty useless, and I can see why. Specialization is almost always better than "Jack-of-all-trades" types.

I'm a little skeptical of the whole map thing, but I'll probably pick this up on Wednesday. Seems fun and appropriately brutal in difficulty.

Heh, one reason why I hated 1st person dungeon crawlers back in the day was because you were forced to make a map on separate paper and I was too damn lazy to bother writing crap. Therefore, the ability to map as you go right on the DS screen appeals greatly to me :3

Can't pick it up til end of next week though as I can't get to the mall during the weekdays. Gonna get the Spore Creature Editor too while I'm at it :D

Map support is like :

Knowing where FOEs are
Being able to freeze them for a short time
Being able to lower encounter rate
etc and so on. :)

As far as characters on reserve, from the first one you had quite a few slots to use, but I dunno about the 2nd one.

I'm hoping for more storyline sequences. The first two floors in #1 made me go "OMFG IT'S LIKE WIZARDRY"

Then *NOTHING*. Storylines broke down to maybe once or twice in a strata. Period. Game felt too lifeless and I dropped it :( Still fun but, well, I need SOME sort of ongoing story.

It's more of a overall goal storyline.
In the first one when you took missions from the guild, it went from "We need to know what the hell is down in the labyrinth" to "OMFG There are bad things down there, and it has been killing other people like you! Go kill it!", etc. Though it did stretch in the stratas.

Still, it felt horribly empty ;( I enjoyed seeing storyline sequences or random character-encounters at random points on floors.

I actually memorized layouts rather than making paper maps. Shining in the Darkness may have taken me 4 years to beat, but I could probably still find my way through it today.

Anyway, I have EO2 paid in full and am looking forward to the release. They usually don't do it with DS games, but does anyone know if there are any goodies for preorders on this one?

Not that one knows of for this game. :(

Only other thing I could think of with anything for the DS recently was with Ninja Gaiden Dragon Sword, where you got the sword stylus.

Ugh. Ninja GIMMICK :V

Honestly, I'm a huge fan of the "less is more" storytelling. At the absolute very least, it contributes to an artsy-fartsy feel. At best, it contributes to immersion by letting you interpret events.

I didn't know the game was 30 bucks, either. Everyone usually charges 35 or 40, so that slightly smaller pricetag is very encouraging.

What? Do you have photographic memory or something? I'd never be able to do that :D

Ah, so that's what map support is like. That actually sounds interesting, although it also sounds like Survivalists are crappy fighters despite their class title :D

I don't actually mind less storytelling in dungeon crawlers. To me they sound more like an exploration type game than one with a set goal like, say, save the world.

Glad to see the game's nice and cheap. It's $26.99 at Amazon CA, so I assume it's the same price in stores.