Ni no kuni: Wrath of the white witch PS3 / Ni no kuni: The jet black mage DS

[Atticus]

Nope. Very mild spoiler: [HIDE]those are just to access your excess familiars (up to 400 of them).[/HIDE]

Ahh. Heh, guess I've been playing too much zombiu

[Sketcz]

I don't know whether I'm just brilliant, or if the game is telegraphing things too much, but I think I've worked out the ending - or at least who the main baddie really is.

I don't want to say what though, because if anyone confirms that I guessed right, I would have spoiled it for myself.

Did anyone else guess and find they were correct?


Disappointed someone mentioned trophies. I'd only discovered two, for completing chapters, and assumed they would all be story mileage trophies, so as not to spoil the fun. Then last night I finished another side-quest and got a boyscout trophy. I refuse to look at the trophy list though! I don't want to know what they are, for fear they alter how I play/enjoy the game. So far I've been tackling this like I'm back in the 16/32/64 bit era. There's a purity to not thinking about external and superfluous medals.

[Sketcz]

WARNING

When you reach the seaside town, and you carry the pot back to the merchant, SAVE before opening the pot. The game gives you no warning that there's an extremely difficult boss battle inside. Since I was in a town, I thought I was safe, and intended to run some errands before saving (checking out Swift Solutions, following the pot thief, etc). So I fought the battle with zero magic, weak familiars, and no items.

I died and lost about an hour's worth of previous work. Had to redo everything, because I wasn't about to lose 3000 guilders by clicking "continue".

Don't let this happen to you.

I'll be honest, I was super pissed off with that. Surprise boss battles are not a clever game design mechanic. Also, I read up on the teleport spells. 20 hours in?! Xenoblade let you warp from the game's start. I was surprised that most places were giving this 8/10, sometimes less, but I can see why. It really is 100% traditional, and not only does it not try to innovate, it stoically ignores all of the progress which other better RPGs have implemented recently. Such as Xenoblade. Frankly, I'm surprised it even lets you see enemies on the playfield, such is its love for archaic mechanics.

The more I play this, the more I wish I was playing an RPG from my list of favourites. It really makes me want to replay other better RPGs I've completed.

Where's the score poll for this? Currently I'm leaning towards a 6 or 7. I highly doubt this could ever reach the perfect 10 I would give Xenoblade. Man... I wish I was replaying Xenoblade.

[SuperBeatBoy]

I would have continued. 3000 guilders is naff all. Can earn that back in no time. You are never in a serious need of money. I think at that point of the game i had like 40,000.

[importaku]

Lol the game gives you warning of what's inside if you look at the page concerning the pot, never found that battle too hard. If you struggled at the pot lord help you later on thats all i can say.

[Sketcz]

I am struggling. Playing on normal. Am surprised, since I'm an RPG veteran.

I would have continued. 3000 guilders is naff all. Can earn that back in no time. You are never in a serious need of money. I think at that point of the game i had like 40,000.

Bloody hell! I have to keep spending all my money on coffee and sandwiches to use in battle. Magic runs out SUPER fast, and I repeatedly need to heal myself. 200 a coffee is insane, since it only restores 10mp.

Any advice, guys?

I haven't played an RPG this tough since Saga Frontier and the rest of the crap by Akitoshi Kawazu. Fights give too little gold (50 a time!) and after 2-3 fights my magic hits ZERO. Enemies do too much damage and familiars don't do enough. I've had game over about 10 times now.

Basically, I earn about 200 gold from 3-4 fights, but I lose 80+ MP, and at 200 gold for a coffee restore, I'm forced to use the inn. All the enemies also keep running away from me, so clearly I'm over levelled.

[SuperBeatBoy]

Doing all the errands and bounties really helps. Recruiting some new mobs and evolving them can really help too, the ones you start off with really suck including the mite, his damage and defence towards the end of the game is terrible that's in his final form.

You will eventually get to a point where you don't have to keep replenishing mp. I bought like 20 cappuccinos about 3/4 of the way through thinking i might get into a spot of bother and i never ended up using them.

[Sketcz]

I do every mission as I find it. Perhaps I'm not grinding against the enemies enough?

[Brad]

When you run out of magic just get ready to defend and just run around the enemies. When they attack you defend against the attack and lose a tiny bit of health but then Drippy will drop mana for you. Now you can use magic again. Repeat until you win.

[Golgo]

^ ****, is that really as dull as it sounds?! (Been on fence about this since demo, which was artistically great but not that enthralling gameplay-wise).

[Sketcz]

You mean defend actually serves a purpose in this game? I have never, ever used Defend in an RPG, because if I'm going to take damage, then I'm going to be giving damage while taking it, not sitting idly by. Afterwards, usually, a quick potion restores the HP so no fuss. I'll give your suggestion a go - even if it does goes against every cell in my body.

Regardless, I am increasingly disliking this game and the back tracking in it.

It's just made me traipse across the desert AGAIN, for what must be the 14th time including side-quests. I can't stand all this traipsing without a warp spell. Even if you're forced to trek out somewhere, at least give me the option of skipping the walk back! Even Suikoden quite early on gave you the "warp home" mirror.

Having hated Rogue Galaxy, I should have expected this. Level 5 don't know how to make a good RPG. Too much fat, too much padding, and absolutely none of the intelligence which other RPG makers have learned over the past decade. I'm a traditionalist, but this grinding and backtracking is just ****.

['Press Start']

HMmmm, not sure I like the amount of familiars, collecting them, feeding them, making them love me and all that. I hate Pokemon and all that nonsense.

Feel like I am coming to the brick wall of the game. If I can break through it I will complete it, if I can't I will sell it. Despite my early impressions once the graphics and wonder ware off there is some serious trekking around to do. As I said I explore every nook and cranny but this is some cheap padding.

The curse of playing too many 16/32 bit RPGs I think.

[Brad]

You mean defend actually serves a purpose in this game? I have never, ever used Defend in an RPG, because if I'm going to take damage, then I'm going to be giving damage while taking it, not sitting idly by. Afterwards, usually, a quick potion restores the HP so no fuss. I'll give your suggestion a go - even if it does goes against every cell in my body.

When a boss does a big telegraphed attack you can either let him take 3/4 of your health and then have to use all your sandwiches to get it back or you can quickly switch to defend and take 5 or 6hp damage and go and pick up a HP and or MP drop afterwards. I did the first 3 or 4 bosses without using familiars i.e. just magic attacks. Ok, yes, I was playing the game wrong but defending against big attacks is what you're supposed to do!

[Sketcz]

There's no such thing as playing it wrong if you're doing well.

Clearly I was the one playing it wrong!

['Press Start']

The genie battle is not hard. I had 2 strong familiars and 3 leveling up from being morphed and one super magic familiar just gathering EXP for use later on

->Open Spoiler<-

(magic familiar chosen from the great sage)

. You cashing in your merit stamp awards? Don't mean to patronize but your not rocking 3 types of the same familiar on one character or anything like that?