Best Plot/Story Rpgs of recent time

Suikoden V...Internal political battles explode into an all-out, no-holds-barred civil war and you get to see everything unfold from your group's perspective (and in time, the enemy's). Helps that the main characters tend to break stereotype (everytime I thought I had one figured out, they did something to make me take notice) and seem quite...alive for RPG characters. That, and you get to see so many different perspectives from the various allies you meet up with. Anyone who's whining about bad storylines recently and hasn't played this...You have no argument (though I hear it hasn't been released yet in Europe). The gameplay is pretty spiffy as well...That is, if you guys care about that stuff.

My problem with FFVII's story is, was and always will be the ending (though I was never crazy about how misleading some parts were). I was with the storyline right up until the lifestream comes and surrounds the meteor and...That's it? That, and the way Shinra is basically written out of things when there was so much more potential than the lousy retread into Midgar. That was enough to alter my opinion on the entire thing from "Wow, I can't wait to see what happens next" to "Eh, maybe these guys were just randomly coming up with stuff and didn't really think things through." The recent influx of FFVII games/stuff (almost a decade later) has done nothing to change that opinion.

Jam it back in, in the dark.

Originally Posted by Miles

If anyone plays this game I urge them to at least aim for the true ending on their second playthrough.

Seconded. In fact, I would say don't even play the game without planning on getting the best ending, because it explains so much that goes on during the game. The 'average' ending here is one of the most unrewarding feelings in gaming (but only because the rest of the game is a blast...The 'true' ending is the only one that does it justice).

There's nowhere I can't reach.

I wouldn't call the time spent after Stormfist filler...It sets up an important meeting with several of the characters you're going to spend the rest of the game with. Plus, both Stormfist and the events right after that are intended to offer recruitment hints for various characters later on. But yeah, they could be trimmed down considerably. After that though...(good stuff happens)

Suikoden manages to do something a ton of RPG's fail at and that is to have good character interaction and really get a feel for the various perspectives about the events that are going on, which tends to make the overall story more realistic to me. IV utterly failed at this and that's why I could care less about it (and I have yet to play 3). 1,2 and 5 all stand out for that reason though...If I go back and flip through a guide, I can recall what events each character was involved in and what side they were on. And it's been over 5 years since I finished S2.

Megavolt: Are you going for the full 108? It can seem pretty daunting, but I thought the ranks filled out pretty fast everything considered. It's slower than S2 (and I don't know how I got 108 on S1 in 20-21 hours), but that's probably because there's more dialogue overall. Once I knew what I was doing, it didn't add too much to my playtime. Key thing is to keep checking the inns, which I rarely do in RPG's...Especially Raftfleet's (9-10 characters come from Raftfleet's inn, plus Gavaya and Subala right outside) Worst thing is waiting for the castle to get to the second level, since a lot of characters are inaccessible until then.

Most amazing jew boots

Oh christ, Genoh was a pain the in the ass to get. I had to pull out the classic, "kill 4 characters so the two remaining ones get more experience" bit. Good thing is once you get him, you can get the lake monster and Richard (if you have Mueller and Wilhelm) real easily afterwards.

It's possible you may be in the middle of an event that's about to happen...This hinders your ability to recruit. You have to talk to the guard at the bridge and he'll tell you about the bridge and Dr. Babbage. Then the whole Sorensen thing plays out. It worked for me...I forget if I had to talk to an NPC to trigger that conversation with the guard.

But yeah...Suikoden has that whole paranoia thing going for it. That's why I always play through twice: once to see how many characters I can get on my own (I managed 57 on my own), the second time is all guide/FAQ. First time is actually more fun for me, since the recruiting becomes like a giant minigame.

/End thread derailment. Gomen ne!

I am a dolphin, do you want me on your body?