Favorite RPG Universe: Lunar
Another new series of columns. JiH is really booming, huh?
Voice in the background: But you haven't updated in weeks!
...Gotta do something about the more noisy people in my room. Maybe rope and a ball gag....
Anyway! This is the start of yet another new series on JiH. Depending on when you actually ask me, I'm a pretty hardcore gamer, and my favorite genre has always been RPGs--particularly of the Japanese variety.
This is fairly logical, since: A.) Before I discovered RPGs (my first being Super Mario RPG, but we'll get into that a little later), I was at best a casual gamer, much preferring comics instead, and B.) Western RPGs tend to be a little too PWP (that's, Plot? What Plot?, for you people who've never read a fanfic, particularly of the pr0n variety) on consoles, and considering I'm primarily a console gamer, well...
So this new series will be devoted to my favorite RPGs, and split into two versions: Favorite RPG Universes, and Favorite RPGs I wish *had* Universes.
The first one of these just has to be Lunar, which is a large part of the reason why I love J-RPGs so intently. (And why I mostly don't game these days. Well. That and the overflow of FPSs.) However, due to the nature of Lunar, it sorta-kinda straddles the line between it being one of my favorite universes and being one of my favorite RPGs I wish had a universe.
For those who've never played Lunar...first of all, go play it. You're missing out. But the original Lunar is about a young boy named Alex, who wishes to become a Dragonmaster, the hero of Lunar and chosen warrior of Athena, the goddess of Lunar. (Which is hinted to be our moon that was terraformed into a livable planet by her powers.) To do this, he must travel the world in search of Four Dragons, in order to pass their trials and receive the pieces of the legendary Dragonmaster armor they possess. And of course you get to meet a number of new characters who join you in your quest along the way, and there are your expected twists and turns in the plotline. And, of course, you get to save the world.
Y'know, on its own, this could have been sorta weak. "Smalltown boy goes on quest, saves world"--THAT was ancient when this first came out for the Sega CD over a decade ago. But no good RPG relies solely on its plot, and Lunar doesn't either. Instead, it makes use of its other elements to suck you in.
Like, its characters. In a world where nearly every original idea has been used, reused, deconstructred and then reassembled, you'd be hard pressed to find someone who wouldn't tell you that the characters of a story are just as, if not much more important than the plot. And Lunar's characters are, to me, awesome. From the playboy thief Kyle and his fiery priest on-again, off-again girlfriend Jessica to the arrogant Nash and even the quiet main character, Alex and his beautiful childhood friend/girlfriend Luna, they're all fleshed out, three-dimensional characters who all have their own parts to play. The party is (I'm guessing, intentionally) kept small, so that you can actually grow attached to everyone over the course of this 35-40 hour adventure. Granted, Alex is one of those characters that almost never speaks, but they give him just enough scenes with dialogue and interaction with the team that the game actually manages to pull off that "see the world through his eyes" thing while making him more than a one-dimensional shell.
The game also relies on its unique world, another thing any great RPG absolutely must have. Sure, Burg is your typical "small town from whence comes the world's hero", but they manage to make it feel like a real place--it almost has a personality of its own, unlike many RPGs where the initial town is boring and...downright empty. The same can be said for every other city of the game, from the floating magic city of Vane (coolest floating city ever!) to the bustling seapot of Meribia.
To me, the absolute pinnacle of praise I can give *any* game (or universe) in terms of world building, is that it makes me wish I could live there. And while I played the game, for years after I finished it, and even now just thinking about it, the Lunar universe is a place I really would not mind living in.
Of course, part of this just might be the gorgeous graphics. This game has had two major releases during two different eras of gaming--the 16-bit and the 32-bit--and during both, it managed to stand out due to its lovingly crafted game world (again, from the overworld to the cities to its dungeons, each place feels diiferent and customized) and its stunning anime art for both the characters and its numerous movie scenes.
Granted, anime J-RPGs are nothing new today, but most of them seem to be lacking. Like, rather than have anime cutscenes there to enhance an already good game, these days it seems more like they throw it in to distract you from the fact that you're playing a mediocre one.
Lastly, though certainly not least, there's the music.
...Y'know what? Lunar--BOTH Lunars--are the BEST soundtracks in gaming. Hands down, point blank period. You can keep the Chrono Trigger soundtrack and all those Uematsu Final Fantasy OSTs most RPG fanboys and fangirls cream over. They're alright, but its an effort to actually LISTEN to most of them.
With Lunar, there's no effort. Its like, most soundtracks, they "feel" like soundtracks, if that makes any sense. Like, its good music, but its not really something you want to hear when you're not playing the game. With Lunar's soundtracks, I'm known to sit down and just listen to them like I would a CD. Plus (and I realize I'm going to sound crazy saying this), a lot of game soundtracks...I don't know, they just work a little too hard for me. I know that may not make sense, but to me it just feels like, rather than add to the story beats, they're so complex that often they can become distracting.
Perhaps the key lies in simplicity, as Lunar's 24 song soundtrack clocks in at a short 55 minutes, each song short and to the point, evoking the exact emotion they should for their given purpose. Listening to "Determination", there's no way you can tell me you don't feel both depressed (since its the "...We didn't even stand a chance..." song indiginous to most J-RPGs) and steeled all at once.
Of course...I guess it all could just be me and maybe nobody sees where I'm coming from on Lunar's music. But y'know what? Man, I don't give a shit. /Jamie Foxx
And all this stuff about Lunar goes for its sequel as well. Yeah, I realize I didn't talk so much about it, but that's because its nowhere near as fun to me. Granted, Lunar is near-perfect in my eyes, so its not really an insult, as I'd take L2 over nearly any other game aside from L1.
My biggest problem with Lunar 2 is that...Lunar 2 is to Lord of the Rings as Lunar 1 is to The Simarllion. To expound, basically Lunar 1 is like this big, First Age-ish epic where the world is absolutely *covered* in magic and alternate races, and your characters are sort of archetypes because that's what "larger than life" characters tend to be, and everything almost has this mythic feel to it, and you just know what you're doing now will be spoken of in legends decades, even centuries later in that game. (Even the end of Lunar 1 is a lot like the end of the Silmarillion, where a lot of the powers and beings that existed at the start are either wiped out or have just plain gone away by the end due to the machinations of the villains.)
But with Lunar 2...you get this feeling that magic is slowly dying out, and that maybe less than a few hundred years from the present in that game, that world will basically be like ours. Being a guy that likes the lofty, crazy powerful crap, its only natural Lunar 1 would appeal to me more. But I've seen people say they prefer L2's world and plot more, so I guess its a toss up.
Anyway, the reason why this game sort of straddles the line between being a universe and being a game I wish had a universe, is because its existed since the mid-90's and there are only three games, with only one being up to the quality of the original. This is despite the fact that there are so many possible stories one could tell with this universe, you could easily get games out of it for the next decade, carrying it up to at least Lunar 8. (I have concrete ideas for L3 and L4 already.) Nevermind the various gaiden stories one could tell on the portable systems.
Game Arts/Kadokawa Shoten/Studio Alex appears to prefer instead releasing endless remakes of the original, all of which continue to make money (or they wouldn't keep doing them), just to prove that Lunar 1 is STILL one of the most bad-ass games ever.
But hey...uhm. Guys? You know what ELSE could be REALLY bad-ass? L3. Seriously. Just...y'know...think about it. Please?
Voice in the background: But you haven't updated in weeks!
...Gotta do something about the more noisy people in my room. Maybe rope and a ball gag....
Anyway! This is the start of yet another new series on JiH. Depending on when you actually ask me, I'm a pretty hardcore gamer, and my favorite genre has always been RPGs--particularly of the Japanese variety.
This is fairly logical, since: A.) Before I discovered RPGs (my first being Super Mario RPG, but we'll get into that a little later), I was at best a casual gamer, much preferring comics instead, and B.) Western RPGs tend to be a little too PWP (that's, Plot? What Plot?, for you people who've never read a fanfic, particularly of the pr0n variety) on consoles, and considering I'm primarily a console gamer, well...
So this new series will be devoted to my favorite RPGs, and split into two versions: Favorite RPG Universes, and Favorite RPGs I wish *had* Universes.
The first one of these just has to be Lunar, which is a large part of the reason why I love J-RPGs so intently. (And why I mostly don't game these days. Well. That and the overflow of FPSs.) However, due to the nature of Lunar, it sorta-kinda straddles the line between it being one of my favorite universes and being one of my favorite RPGs I wish had a universe.
For those who've never played Lunar...first of all, go play it. You're missing out. But the original Lunar is about a young boy named Alex, who wishes to become a Dragonmaster, the hero of Lunar and chosen warrior of Athena, the goddess of Lunar. (Which is hinted to be our moon that was terraformed into a livable planet by her powers.) To do this, he must travel the world in search of Four Dragons, in order to pass their trials and receive the pieces of the legendary Dragonmaster armor they possess. And of course you get to meet a number of new characters who join you in your quest along the way, and there are your expected twists and turns in the plotline. And, of course, you get to save the world.
Y'know, on its own, this could have been sorta weak. "Smalltown boy goes on quest, saves world"--THAT was ancient when this first came out for the Sega CD over a decade ago. But no good RPG relies solely on its plot, and Lunar doesn't either. Instead, it makes use of its other elements to suck you in.
Like, its characters. In a world where nearly every original idea has been used, reused, deconstructred and then reassembled, you'd be hard pressed to find someone who wouldn't tell you that the characters of a story are just as, if not much more important than the plot. And Lunar's characters are, to me, awesome. From the playboy thief Kyle and his fiery priest on-again, off-again girlfriend Jessica to the arrogant Nash and even the quiet main character, Alex and his beautiful childhood friend/girlfriend Luna, they're all fleshed out, three-dimensional characters who all have their own parts to play. The party is (I'm guessing, intentionally) kept small, so that you can actually grow attached to everyone over the course of this 35-40 hour adventure. Granted, Alex is one of those characters that almost never speaks, but they give him just enough scenes with dialogue and interaction with the team that the game actually manages to pull off that "see the world through his eyes" thing while making him more than a one-dimensional shell.
The game also relies on its unique world, another thing any great RPG absolutely must have. Sure, Burg is your typical "small town from whence comes the world's hero", but they manage to make it feel like a real place--it almost has a personality of its own, unlike many RPGs where the initial town is boring and...downright empty. The same can be said for every other city of the game, from the floating magic city of Vane (coolest floating city ever!) to the bustling seapot of Meribia.
To me, the absolute pinnacle of praise I can give *any* game (or universe) in terms of world building, is that it makes me wish I could live there. And while I played the game, for years after I finished it, and even now just thinking about it, the Lunar universe is a place I really would not mind living in.
Of course, part of this just might be the gorgeous graphics. This game has had two major releases during two different eras of gaming--the 16-bit and the 32-bit--and during both, it managed to stand out due to its lovingly crafted game world (again, from the overworld to the cities to its dungeons, each place feels diiferent and customized) and its stunning anime art for both the characters and its numerous movie scenes.
Granted, anime J-RPGs are nothing new today, but most of them seem to be lacking. Like, rather than have anime cutscenes there to enhance an already good game, these days it seems more like they throw it in to distract you from the fact that you're playing a mediocre one.
Lastly, though certainly not least, there's the music.
...Y'know what? Lunar--BOTH Lunars--are the BEST soundtracks in gaming. Hands down, point blank period. You can keep the Chrono Trigger soundtrack and all those Uematsu Final Fantasy OSTs most RPG fanboys and fangirls cream over. They're alright, but its an effort to actually LISTEN to most of them.
With Lunar, there's no effort. Its like, most soundtracks, they "feel" like soundtracks, if that makes any sense. Like, its good music, but its not really something you want to hear when you're not playing the game. With Lunar's soundtracks, I'm known to sit down and just listen to them like I would a CD. Plus (and I realize I'm going to sound crazy saying this), a lot of game soundtracks...I don't know, they just work a little too hard for me. I know that may not make sense, but to me it just feels like, rather than add to the story beats, they're so complex that often they can become distracting.
Perhaps the key lies in simplicity, as Lunar's 24 song soundtrack clocks in at a short 55 minutes, each song short and to the point, evoking the exact emotion they should for their given purpose. Listening to "Determination", there's no way you can tell me you don't feel both depressed (since its the "...We didn't even stand a chance..." song indiginous to most J-RPGs) and steeled all at once.
Of course...I guess it all could just be me and maybe nobody sees where I'm coming from on Lunar's music. But y'know what? Man, I don't give a shit. /Jamie Foxx
And all this stuff about Lunar goes for its sequel as well. Yeah, I realize I didn't talk so much about it, but that's because its nowhere near as fun to me. Granted, Lunar is near-perfect in my eyes, so its not really an insult, as I'd take L2 over nearly any other game aside from L1.
My biggest problem with Lunar 2 is that...Lunar 2 is to Lord of the Rings as Lunar 1 is to The Simarllion. To expound, basically Lunar 1 is like this big, First Age-ish epic where the world is absolutely *covered* in magic and alternate races, and your characters are sort of archetypes because that's what "larger than life" characters tend to be, and everything almost has this mythic feel to it, and you just know what you're doing now will be spoken of in legends decades, even centuries later in that game. (Even the end of Lunar 1 is a lot like the end of the Silmarillion, where a lot of the powers and beings that existed at the start are either wiped out or have just plain gone away by the end due to the machinations of the villains.)
But with Lunar 2...you get this feeling that magic is slowly dying out, and that maybe less than a few hundred years from the present in that game, that world will basically be like ours. Being a guy that likes the lofty, crazy powerful crap, its only natural Lunar 1 would appeal to me more. But I've seen people say they prefer L2's world and plot more, so I guess its a toss up.
Anyway, the reason why this game sort of straddles the line between being a universe and being a game I wish had a universe, is because its existed since the mid-90's and there are only three games, with only one being up to the quality of the original. This is despite the fact that there are so many possible stories one could tell with this universe, you could easily get games out of it for the next decade, carrying it up to at least Lunar 8. (I have concrete ideas for L3 and L4 already.) Nevermind the various gaiden stories one could tell on the portable systems.
Game Arts/Kadokawa Shoten/Studio Alex appears to prefer instead releasing endless remakes of the original, all of which continue to make money (or they wouldn't keep doing them), just to prove that Lunar 1 is STILL one of the most bad-ass games ever.
But hey...uhm. Guys? You know what ELSE could be REALLY bad-ass? L3. Seriously. Just...y'know...think about it. Please?
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