Ni no Kuni

Having played most of the Dragon Quest series and the demo for this, I can say that's not the case. Dragon Quest is an extremely traditional series, up until X of course. Ni No Kuni just looks kind of like Dragon Quest 8 from the cel shading and the same company developing it. It plays differently, there's a bunch of new mechanics and so on, and Level5 is actually pretty good at differentiating the gameplay of their different series.

To be fair, it's a somewhat apt comparison for the DS game. Outside of sketching spells, Ghibli instead of Toriyama art, and a different party structure, it plays very much like a Hybrid of Dragon Quest 9 with one of the older games where you can recruit monsters into your party (5, SNES!6, and if my memory serves me right - 7).

Not that we'll ever be getting that version in English.

EDIT: Oh right, there's also simplified tactics with how you position your party members on the field.

edited 19th Jan '13 11:38:32 AM by TracerBullet

Do you guys think this game will be hard to find after a while? I really want to play it, but I'm playing FFX-2 right now, and Fire Emblem: Awakening is coming out soon. Not to mention that I have classes starting at the end of the month, so with all that together, I'll want to wait a little while before I get it.

If it's one of those things that's going to become rare really quickly, though, then I'd want to buy it sooner rather than later.

edited 19th Jan '13 11:56:49 AM by SapphireBlue

It's hard to guess. It depends on how much Namco Bandai wants to push it. And they're pushing it a surprisingly large amount. I would say get it soon if you can, but it most likely won't break the bank if you wait a bit.

Okay, that means it doesn't matter as long as you have room on your PS 3.

edited 20th Jan '13 9:27:46 AM by Zendervai

Digital release at launch, too.

Destructoid's Review by... Jim Sterling, awww cra-... wait. ... wha...

....O_O

edited 21st Jan '13 2:16:09 PM by LE0Night

He was one of the big voices pushing Operation Rainfall.

It is kind of funny how he goes on about how grindy it is when apparently, it's not. Granted, he also played The Last Story wrong and complained about gameplay that he just needed to look in the menu to change.

edited 21st Jan '13 2:10:38 PM by Zendervai

*begins saving money*

Pre-ordered!!! Time to give my black PS 3 some love. Now, which games to add to the trade-in pile after Battlefield 3 on the Xbox 360? Decisions, decisions...

On that review. Well, taking the piss out of its alleged grindy nature and then giving it 9.0 out of 10.0 is a bit odd, is it not?

edited 21st Jan '13 6:34:07 PM by TamH70

What with the whole Pokemon aspect there's probably just as much grinding as you want there to be. More than one has commented on a Surprise Difficulty so perhaps it's necessary.

Surprise difficulty?

Apparently it has the tendency to go, "Look at this new area, isn't it pretty? Now hold still while I kick your ass."

Its on the Playstation Store. There are literally infinite (assuming infinite appropriate storage space for the obtained games) copies available.

edited 22nd Jan '13 4:51:09 AM by Seventythree

Whelp, put some money on as a deposit on the game. Just over twenty five pounds still to pay on it and the game is mine. Mine, I tell you. Mine!!!!! mwahahahah.

Oops, sorry. /blush.

I'm planning on getting this game, but how much does the difficulty spike? Also is it one of those games that kick you back to the title screen whenever you get a game over?

edited 22nd Jan '13 5:33:59 AM by FFmax

So I got my copy, but a friend of mine demanded that I wait until she visits to play it. Welp, back into the drawer with you.

(I did start it up to make sure it worked and install it and install the DLC character I got for preordering it [Flutterby] and it is very, very pretty).

I'll give my impressions when I can. In a week and a half.

Well, after playing for six hours tonight I think I have diabetes. This is a good thing.

*worried noises*

And.. um.. this is a thing.

Oh that is so cute. Odd as fuck, obviously, but cute as well. Just like the rest of the game from what I have been able to see so far.

On the subject of a delay to my preorder, well, I am not really fussed. So long as I get the game I am happy.

edited 24th Jan '13 11:11:31 PM by TamH70

Double post, sorry. Metacritic score is out:

http://www.metacritic.com/game/playstation-3/ni-no-kuni-wrath-of-the-white-witch/critic-reviews

Looks like bonuses/sequels may be coming.

I think it only worked like that for Bethesda's deal with Obsidian over New Vegas.

Oh okay. I thought it was standard practice given the attention paid to Metacritic scores nowadays.

I mean, that could be true. I dunno. I did think it was a specific deal though.

Does the game have a Japanese audio/English subtitles option or is it stuck with just the English language dub?

It has both Japanese & English Audio. And for subtitles it has English,French,Spanish,German,& Italian.