more rpgs should include a segment where you become best buddies with a famous historical figure Patreon - / punchystream Stream Archive Channel - / @punchystream Twitch - / punchy Twitter - / succinct_punchy
I actually really adore the main villainess of FtNW simply because she's not actually a villain, rather a vessel of a destructive force. If you (over)analyse the plot of the game and pay close attention to the cutscenes Lady is in you'll notice none of her action show any kind of premeditation (aside from the very end) and what she does do often has to do with reaction or flow of energy (giving them Kiss of Malice to replenish their life energy). Killer follows Lady cause she saved him from certain death and he wants to help her become more human. He was given the kiss of Malice but unlike other characters who also received it, he never loses control cause the underlying intention of all his actions is to ensure Lady's safety and not haltered or revenge. Gilbert is a fanboi of hers obsessed with becoming a Cthulhu overlord or some shit but ultimately completely irrelevant which I found rather fitting and funny. The main cast if you think about it is sort of portrait as villains from Killer's perspective and the fact the main cast is flawed is explored in the super dungeon where each one gets assigned to a deadly sin boss that fits their disfunction is very fitting. And the final boss against Lady is honestly to me one of the most sad bitter moments I've experienced in a game.
This was my first introduction to Shadow Hearts. The person playing this also introduced me to Stretch Panic, Magic Pengel, and Okagē Shadow King. They were basically my own personal "obscure Japanese PS2 game youtuber" but back in the college dorm in 2008
That photogenic cat uses selective meows, what is she planning?! Cats aside, it is a shame Koudelka/Shadow Hearts didn't get a modern re-release so far :c
@@RTheStoryteller7 Sure, Punchy mentions that. It's just a shame that these original titles are currently locked to PS1 and PS2 respectively. Though I'm certainly curious about Penny Blood and hope it turns out well
@@noahhobson4521 I mean, if we're discounting Koudelka? Not really. Core rights on Shadow Hearts 1-3 are all with Aruze, which is what I'd say the actual problem is: NO. ONE. WANTS. TO. WORK. WITH. ARUZE.
I played this game Way too young and it really became formative media. When im standing around in real life my go to music is the garland office / harlem theme from the start. I still have my copy too!! Gotta replay it soon
One sad thing about Shadow Hearts is that not only did From The New World sell so poorly it killed the series, the IP ended up changing hands so many times that it eventually wound up with a hotel chain. Apparently various companies have approached them about licensing the IP for some sort of HD collection and been completely stonewalled.
a friend of mine actually emailed the company and got a reply about how they had no plan to use the Shadow Hearts IP for anything as recently as like a couple weeks ago as of the video's publish date. it's very funny that they will reply to just random people to crush their hopes about ever getting a re-release of these games lol
Finally, a From the New World review that isn't just completely shitting on the overly goofy tone and horrible pacing! It's got an absolutely banger soundtrack, beautiful zones to explore, and some of the best JRPG combat ever made. There is so much charm to it. It's one of my absolute favorite guilty pleasure games.
Last time I listened to Lady Tears II was over a decade ago in a SupraDarky video and I never even played or knew what SH was. Still remembered the melody the instant the violin kicked in, talk about a beast of a composition.
Glad someone reviewed this game without comparing it to other SH games! This is my first SH game, and I really likes the battle mechanic! It's not too hard, but punish and rewards evenly with how well doing judgment ring! Too bad the franchise got shafted since the developer got bankrupt :( I really hope the Spiritual Successor can bring the same feeling as SH games like once before...
Ive been trying to think of the name of this game for months 😂 Back in the day I use to buy PlayStation monthly game informer magazines with the multi game demo discs inside the magazine $10 (deal of the century when you can’t afford games lol). This game was in one, issue102. I definitely want to check out the rest of the series this game’s demo left a impression on me for all these years later got me thinking about finally getting it & i didn’t even play the game fully
I've known about Shadow Hearts since the Armed Fantasia Penny Blood kickstarter and theyve all looked real interesting. This one looks especially interesting as a weird humorous spinoff type deal. ill have to check em out, maybe after i finish the wild arms series, my old semi-obscure jrpg series i go feral for (I wanna say breath of fire, but im mostly feral for 2 despite the others also being good)
I also go feral over Shadow Hearts after playing Koudelka & SH1/2 over the last few years, haven't played 3 yet but it looks like more of the same combat in a goofier setting so I'll have to check it out
I really liked how if you've played through the stories of the previous 3 games, that From the New World's plot essentially acts like the foil or inversion to the plots of the previous 3 games. Not gonna spoil how but if you know you know
I've been looking for Shadow Hearts video so thank you for this video! This game sure is a weird one among the list of many jrpgs I played on ps2 back when I was a kid but it's very fun and the comedy horror is so good! (Maybe you can cover Rogue Galaxy next? No pressure though, love your video!)
Rogue Galaxy is interesting to me (but not at the top of my priority list rn) because it actually has a significantly better reputation in the west than it does in Japan, where it was largely considered a pile of shit, so that could make an interesting thing to cover.
I mean, Yuri and a couple other Shadow Hearts characters do show up in a tactics RPG. And uh... it's great. It's called Chaos Wars. And I recommend it. 🤣
For me this series has the best combat of any rpg in the PS2, yeah including FFX and XII. In fact the only one I like more is the combat system from baten kaitos
This is a great series. I love the judgment ring mechanic. It adds so much to the but can be tedious at times admittedly. I like the way Frank gets new weapons. I am not a fan of the whole do these extra obscure things to get the "good" ending trope in games but that is a minor gripe. Also some of the humor did not age well. Lookin at you gay stereotypes that run the motorcycle shop.😅
Loved the game. honestly my favourite out of the three. Fun combat and entertaining characters (even Nathan). wouldn't call it a horror though since I've probably had more laughs playing this than any other JRPGs (teen me loved the crap out of Frank's and Mao's side missions). If there's anything that I find lacking it's Grace's involvement (or lack thereof) in the overall plot.
I showuld mention that the version of the game in this video appears to be the broken PAL release. In the US or Japanese version the animations and models aren't broken like they are in the EU version (you can see it whenever Johnny's elbow snaps into place when taking a photo here). It's all thanks to ghostlight, one of the goddamn worst EU publishers in history
@@PunchyYT Thank you for the review BTW. I'm glad to see more people love this over hated game. I played the game in both versions, first US and then I loaded up my PAL copy (I also live in PAL region) and I just couldn't stop noticing how broken the EU release was, it's really sad that this is the version we got. Normally if a 50/60hz selector is available you don't really need to worry about the quality of the conversion cause 60hz will generally run correctly but with FtNW, you just get 2 flavors of awful. The only other PAL game I played that was this poorly adapted is Galerians Ash. Regardless of the number of hz selected the cutscenes would switch to 50 hz (which messes with most TV's) and they would play with a jittery back and forth movement indicative of messed up field order. That is is they played at all cause I wasn't able to play very far in due to the game freezing up during FMV's. US version is thankfully perfectly fine. PAL conversions sadly mostly come in varying degrees of bad with some being passable and very few 50 hz examples being exactly as good as the 60 hz variants.
@@Megamatszero Exactly, for context this is a glitch in all versions of the game but in the EU version it happens most frequently. Each time Natan does 1 damage there's a chance the game will freeze and considering his moves are all about hitcount and not power, it's not out of realm of possibility especially if an enemy guards. Best solution is to boot him out of the party at the earliest opportunity and only use him for UMA hunts. PAL version also can just freeze up at random when starting a battle but that seems to be 50 hz mode exclusive, like in Wild Arms 4.
Couldn't make it very far, and I really liked Covenant. No character clicked for me, Nathan has less personality than Lucia, Frank is unfunny, and the villains are incredibly dull
This was the only one I played in the entire series, so finding out the franchise started with a horror game tripped me bad. Shania occupied my dreams for a _while._
I basically hadn't heard about the Shadow Hearts series before you streamed them except for the most vaguely remembered article in a Gameinformer magazine. This series rocks so much. I'm very ride or die for it. The combat is slick, the story writing for the first two games is really good, and From the New World is a bewilderingly fun game, especially when you have zero context for anything that's happening, which is constantly. Also, Covenant and FTNW have great soundtracks. Covenant's OST fucks super hard.
i really wish I'd made space in the script to talk about the music because it's exceptional and unlike a lot of RPG soundtracks but the script got longer than I intended already so I settled for just using it instead
1920's NYC -This 12,000AD NYC(?) -Nier Automata New Los Angeles colony crashed on an alien planet -Xenoblade X Hawaii -Yakuza Infinite Wealth JRPGs have gone places.
5:56 I dunno but I think we need more games like it, maybe have everyone thinking the goal is one thing but it's unique to every villain? Oh well, I just want more games where the villains are just as lost as the player.
As fun as it is, the only bad thing about this game is that it very clearly feels like an extended inconsequential sidequest. Machida even said outright that it's not a true sequel, and that a proper SH3 (never ever ;_;) would've continued Yuri's story.
I'M SCREAMIN' RN LIKE SPONGEBOB BOUTTA BE MADE MANAGER OF THE KRUSTY KRAB A SHADOW HEARTS VIDEO!? YEEEEEEEEEEEEEESSSSSSSSSS HERE'S TO THE FUTURE, HERE'S TO PENNY BLOOD!
2:55 It's usually called RPF and is certainly hosted alongside fanfiction. I think the distinction between it and historical fiction is usually whether or not the people you're talking about are alive and able to consent to being in an officially marketed work though so I guess Al Capone hangouts are just self-indulgent historical fiction lol
The whole "set one foot in the final dungeon then a bunch of sidequests open up" is a staple in just about every JRPG I've ever played to be fair haha, from the ps1 to ps2 era Idk why they do it, but it's basically a genre staple, either when the final dungeon opens, or after walking in and having to walk back out. Is funny
I still fondly remember this game, even though kid me did get stuck in the Roswell dungeon for an embarrassingly long time. Out of the whole cast of weirdos, my favourite will always be Frank the American ninja; you nearly never had to buy a weapon for him, he'd just stick a hilt on random objects you'd come across, like a cactus, or a stop sign, or a huge sword that already had a hilt on it...
I wonder if the Penny Blood game will lead to a rediscovery of the whole series. Shadow Hearts and Koudelka have been obscure for so long. Shin Megami tensei used to be too, but with the continuous release of new games, I feel they've become less niche than they once used to be.
I akwats feel guilty that I enjoyed this game more than all the others. I get why rationally they SHOULD be better exoeriences, they have a much deeper story and genuine emotion. But idk, i just enjoy a completely silly no depth comedy game with an excellent battle system better. Its just an entirely different genre, and that's fine. I honestly think it wouldnt have been as hated as it is if they simply named it it's own thing instead of tenuously linking it to the Shadow Hearts series. Of course people were gonna be pissed off if they expected darkness and got the most sun ever crammed into a game, lol I cant help but be overjoyed every second Frank is onscreen, he's just a slice of serotonin through and through!
Oh man, I have terrible news regarding Penny Blood. The project isn't dead, but the devs are struggling to find investors and it seems they are pretty much out of money at this point.
I think the problem was Shadow Hearts and Shadow Hearts 2 were just super dark and yeah it had a lot of funny stuff. But he stories were ultimately dramatic and pretty awesome. But then FTNW came out, and all of us who'd played the other games in the series were hyped, only to be confronted by talking kung fu, mobster cat, and bleach blonde native American princess. Its was just a touch to weird, and out of touch with the series mood and feel as a whole. I hate that it killed the series, because it its such a great group of games. I really wish they could get a reboot or an additional chance to release a game on a modern console.
You should try out Fear & Hunger. Its a jrpg style survival horror game series made mostly by a Finnish solo dev. Both games in the series are really good, but they can come off as a bit hard because of the learning curve and "trial by fire" way of learning the game.
Recent subscriber and enjoying binging most of your content. I will say, I wish you would spend the time to fully outline the plot as it's half the reason most of us watch these videos. We want to fully explore the game with you, instead of being recommended to go out and invest time in playing it. I can get a recommendation from google, but I can only get you from these videos, if that makes sense? If you're truly worried about spoilers, maybe a single timestamp to skip it for the limited people that are actually going to go out and play it. Best of both worlds!
it's not that I'm worried about spoilers its that I don't think that highly of From The New World's plot and therefore didn't care to outline it. this video is not intended as a comprehensive overview of the game, I just wanted to talk about the bits I liked.
I still have the PS2 version but the last few times I booted it up, it was getting worryingly longer and longer to read the disc, so I ended up having to drop my replay 40% of the way through. This game would be at the tippy-top of my list to emulate... if PCSX2 didn't have that atrocious input latency that would destroy any semblance of playing the Judgement Ring well.
I actually really adore the main villainess of FtNW simply because she's not actually a villain, rather a vessel of a destructive force. If you (over)analyse the plot of the game and pay close attention to the cutscenes Lady is in you'll notice none of her action show any kind of premeditation (aside from the very end) and what she does do often has to do with reaction or flow of energy (giving them Kiss of Malice to replenish their life energy).
Killer follows Lady cause she saved him from certain death and he wants to help her become more human. He was given the kiss of Malice but unlike other characters who also received it, he never loses control cause the underlying intention of all his actions is to ensure Lady's safety and not haltered or revenge.
Gilbert is a fanboi of hers obsessed with becoming a Cthulhu overlord or some shit but ultimately completely irrelevant which I found rather fitting and funny.
The main cast if you think about it is sort of portrait as villains from Killer's perspective and the fact the main cast is flawed is explored in the super dungeon where each one gets assigned to a deadly sin boss that fits their disfunction is very fitting.
And the final boss against Lady is honestly to me one of the most sad bitter moments I've experienced in a game.
Damn Punchy, you really read Yuri for filth
This was my first introduction to Shadow Hearts.
The person playing this also introduced me to Stretch Panic, Magic Pengel, and Okagē Shadow King.
They were basically my own personal "obscure Japanese PS2 game youtuber" but back in the college dorm in 2008
Literally!
Meet famed real historical figures, like Al Capone, and his most trusted giant drunken kung fu cat.
That photogenic cat uses selective meows, what is she planning?!
Cats aside, it is a shame Koudelka/Shadow Hearts didn't get a modern re-release so far :c
there is a spiritual successor in the works called "Penny Blood" with the original SH's director Matsuzo Machida on the lead
@@RTheStoryteller7 Sure, Punchy mentions that. It's just a shame that these original titles are currently locked to PS1 and PS2 respectively. Though I'm certainly curious about Penny Blood and hope it turns out well
The reason why there isn't a rerelease is because the ownership rights of the series is a convoluted mess.
@@noahhobson4521 I mean, if we're discounting Koudelka? Not really. Core rights on Shadow Hearts 1-3 are all with Aruze, which is what I'd say the actual problem is: NO. ONE. WANTS. TO. WORK. WITH. ARUZE.
@@Volvagia1927Aruze is more concerned with "how can we make a pachislot out of this? And then how do we get gamers to use pachislot?"
4:38 The "Fuck it, we ball!" Attitude is nice to see a lot of the time.
YES!!!!!! THE CATS!!!!!!!! So happy to see them being shown to the wider audience
Seeing Shadow Hearts being mentioned anywhere is wild, I managed to grab this game for a good 20 bucks and got to play it on a working ps2, it was fun
I for one would love a 4 part series of Punchy explaining the plot of weird niche JRPGs for over half an hour each
I played this game Way too young and it really became formative media. When im standing around in real life my go to music is the garland office / harlem theme from the start. I still have my copy too!! Gotta replay it soon
One sad thing about Shadow Hearts is that not only did From The New World sell so poorly it killed the series, the IP ended up changing hands so many times that it eventually wound up with a hotel chain. Apparently various companies have approached them about licensing the IP for some sort of HD collection and been completely stonewalled.
a friend of mine actually emailed the company and got a reply about how they had no plan to use the Shadow Hearts IP for anything as recently as like a couple weeks ago as of the video's publish date. it's very funny that they will reply to just random people to crush their hopes about ever getting a re-release of these games lol
Months old but like… HOW… why even hold on to the IP just let someone buy it off you.
I genuinely don’t understand
I randomly came across this game at Blockbuster as a kid, never played a shadow hearts game before, and ended up loving it! ❤❤
Another great video Punchy, great job
Finally, a From the New World review that isn't just completely shitting on the overly goofy tone and horrible pacing! It's got an absolutely banger soundtrack, beautiful zones to explore, and some of the best JRPG combat ever made. There is so much charm to it. It's one of my absolute favorite guilty pleasure games.
It's probably just a me thing but I've been seeing a lot of Shadow Hearts coverage lately.
A very pleasant watch :) It looks like a real fun game!
Last time I listened to Lady Tears II was over a decade ago in a SupraDarky video and I never even played or knew what SH was. Still remembered the melody the instant the violin kicked in, talk about a beast of a composition.
JRPG Enjoyers eating good tonight
HELL YEAH THANK YOU FOR MAKING A VIDEO ABOUT THIS GAME I NEVER HIT THE SUB BUTTON SO HARD BEFORE BRO
I really love these videos where you talk about various video games (Mostly horror games). I do hope you do them more!
Glad someone reviewed this game without comparing it to other SH games! This is my first SH game, and I really likes the battle mechanic! It's not too hard, but punish and rewards evenly with how well doing judgment ring!
Too bad the franchise got shafted since the developer got bankrupt :( I really hope the Spiritual Successor can bring the same feeling as SH games like once before...
Big Up for Phoebe & Zelda for the cuteness value added to this already geat video ♥
The combat system sounds almost like a prototype of designs we saw in games like Octopath Traveler, in a lot of ways. Man, what a weird game.
Ive been trying to think of the name of this game for months 😂 Back in the day I use to buy PlayStation monthly game informer magazines with the multi game demo discs inside the magazine $10 (deal of the century when you can’t afford games lol). This game was in one, issue102. I definitely want to check out the rest of the series this game’s demo left a impression on me for all these years later got me thinking about finally getting it & i didn’t even play the game fully
I've known about Shadow Hearts since the Armed Fantasia Penny Blood kickstarter and theyve all looked real interesting. This one looks especially interesting as a weird humorous spinoff type deal. ill have to check em out, maybe after i finish the wild arms series, my old semi-obscure jrpg series i go feral for (I wanna say breath of fire, but im mostly feral for 2 despite the others also being good)
I also go feral over Shadow Hearts after playing Koudelka & SH1/2 over the last few years, haven't played 3 yet but it looks like more of the same combat in a goofier setting so I'll have to check it out
I see a new upload from you, and I have to watch it!
I really liked how if you've played through the stories of the previous 3 games, that From the New World's plot essentially acts like the foil or inversion to the plots of the previous 3 games. Not gonna spoil how but if you know you know
Regarding Yuri and his cool quips:
The game makes much more sense when you read Yuri as a surfer dude.
If this and Rising Zan: Samurai Gunman taught me anything, it's that games where the protagonist is called Johnny are almost always peak
Shadow hearts Covenant and shadow hearts 1 are absolute gems.
If only my 3 PS2s hadn't all broken.
shoutout my girl slim hilda
When I first saw Slim Hilda back in the day, I just went got DAMN.
I've been looking for Shadow Hearts video so thank you for this video! This game sure is a weird one among the list of many jrpgs I played on ps2 back when I was a kid but it's very fun and the comedy horror is so good! (Maybe you can cover Rogue Galaxy next? No pressure though, love your video!)
Rogue Galaxy is interesting to me (but not at the top of my priority list rn) because it actually has a significantly better reputation in the west than it does in Japan, where it was largely considered a pile of shit, so that could make an interesting thing to cover.
I mean, Yuri and a couple other Shadow Hearts characters do show up in a tactics RPG. And uh... it's great. It's called Chaos Wars. And I recommend it.
🤣
Played it, loved it, played it multiple times, loved it even more
The adventures of JOHNNY ME BOI ME BOI
Huh, as a kid I totally disregarded this because I thought it was a Kingom Hearts spinoff lmao
Life was hard and I had to sell my games as a teen, but this one I loved It so much I bought it again as an adult, along with a few others. 🤟🏼
Shadow Hearts 2: Covenant is probably the best JRPG ever made
For me this series has the best combat of any rpg in the PS2, yeah including FFX and XII. In fact the only one I like more is the combat system from baten kaitos
Covenant is the best game in the series, but From the New World is silly fun that I still enjoy playing regularly.
Koudelka is alive and well
This is a great series. I love the judgment ring mechanic. It adds so much to the but can be tedious at times admittedly. I like the way Frank gets new weapons. I am not a fan of the whole do these extra obscure things to get the "good" ending trope in games but that is a minor gripe. Also some of the humor did not age well. Lookin at you gay stereotypes that run the motorcycle shop.😅
Loved the game. honestly my favourite out of the three. Fun combat and entertaining characters (even Nathan). wouldn't call it a horror though since I've probably had more laughs playing this than any other JRPGs (teen me loved the crap out of Frank's and Mao's side missions).
If there's anything that I find lacking it's Grace's involvement (or lack thereof) in the overall plot.
WOOOHO NEW VIDEO
where's the cup noodle
Wait, this isn't Majuular
I love Shadow Hearts 2 Covenant
Can you join the Discord without being a Patron or is it Patrons only?
What is the song at 8:10? With the high pitched flute type thing?
"Mauve", the second main battle theme of the game.
My fav SH game. 💕
Good video 😃
gamefaqs is gamer's friend.
Okay but Johnny and Shania look a lot like Shulk and Sharla from Xenoblade 1.
Neat!
A jrpg set in America.
I don't think it's a mystery why people hate or ignored it.
A very strange game.
I showuld mention that the version of the game in this video appears to be the broken PAL release. In the US or Japanese version the animations and models aren't broken like they are in the EU version (you can see it whenever Johnny's elbow snaps into place when taking a photo here). It's all thanks to ghostlight, one of the goddamn worst EU publishers in history
yeah I'm european but I wasn't really sure if it was the PAL version specifically that does that and after a while I kind of just stopped noticing
@@PunchyYT Thank you for the review BTW. I'm glad to see more people love this over hated game.
I played the game in both versions, first US and then I loaded up my PAL copy (I also live in PAL region) and I just couldn't stop noticing how broken the EU release was, it's really sad that this is the version we got.
Normally if a 50/60hz selector is available you don't really need to worry about the quality of the conversion cause 60hz will generally run correctly but with FtNW, you just get 2 flavors of awful.
The only other PAL game I played that was this poorly adapted is Galerians Ash. Regardless of the number of hz selected the cutscenes would switch to 50 hz (which messes with most TV's) and they would play with a jittery back and forth movement indicative of messed up field order. That is is they played at all cause I wasn't able to play very far in due to the game freezing up during FMV's. US version is thankfully perfectly fine.
PAL conversions sadly mostly come in varying degrees of bad with some being passable and very few 50 hz examples being exactly as good as the 60 hz variants.
There's also the fact that Natan's regular attack can straight up freeze the game. Scared the shit outta me when it happened back in the day.
@@Megamatszero Exactly, for context this is a glitch in all versions of the game but in the EU version it happens most frequently.
Each time Natan does 1 damage there's a chance the game will freeze and considering his moves are all about hitcount and not power, it's not out of realm of possibility especially if an enemy guards.
Best solution is to boot him out of the party at the earliest opportunity and only use him for UMA hunts.
PAL version also can just freeze up at random when starting a battle but that seems to be 50 hz mode exclusive, like in Wild Arms 4.
I was like nr 70 so i ruined something nice
Honestly hate how this game is always compared to the other 2 and described as bad. There’s nothing remotely BAD about this game.
Fa
Couldn't make it very far, and I really liked Covenant. No character clicked for me, Nathan has less personality than Lucia, Frank is unfunny, and the villains are incredibly dull
Casually recommends game series from PS2 era, does not recommend how one might obtain said series consider how many generations back it goes. :(
i mean it's a ps2 game, you play it on a ps2. dunno what you want me to recommend, really. they cost like sixty bucks.
Emulators are your friend.
This seems like a shin megami tensei wannabe
As a SMT fan and a Shadow Hearts fan, these series are NOTHING alike. They're both great series though.
This game has absolutely IMMACULATE music.
Yoshitaka Hirota is the GOAT. Based Mitsuda wouldn't have picked some hack as his protege.
Really. The first random battle theme, "Dead Fingers Talk" is incredible.
All Shadow Herts have neat music
This was the only one I played in the entire series, so finding out the franchise started with a horror game tripped me bad. Shania occupied my dreams for a _while._
I basically hadn't heard about the Shadow Hearts series before you streamed them except for the most vaguely remembered article in a Gameinformer magazine. This series rocks so much. I'm very ride or die for it. The combat is slick, the story writing for the first two games is really good, and From the New World is a bewilderingly fun game, especially when you have zero context for anything that's happening, which is constantly.
Also, Covenant and FTNW have great soundtracks. Covenant's OST fucks super hard.
i really wish I'd made space in the script to talk about the music because it's exceptional and unlike a lot of RPG soundtracks but the script got longer than I intended already so I settled for just using it instead
Honestly you actually sold me on trying to check out this game/series, I'll definitely keep an eye out for it at a decent price.
Same. I specifically want to check out Koudelka
"talks like somebody who definitely has a something awful account" ouch, punchy, ouch
Oh reading your comments in other videos you type like a goon, so I am going to assume you also are one. Which would make sense, then!
1920's NYC -This
12,000AD NYC(?) -Nier Automata
New Los Angeles colony crashed on an alien planet -Xenoblade X
Hawaii -Yakuza Infinite Wealth
JRPGs have gone places.
I saw bits and pieces of your playthrough of this game, it looked really fun!
Also 7th Dragon is my semi-niche JRPG series that I go feral over.
This game kinda looks like Yiik… but good. I don’t remember Ackk studios ever mentioning this game but I wonder if this is what they were going for
5:56 I dunno but I think we need more games like it, maybe have everyone thinking the goal is one thing but it's unique to every villain? Oh well, I just want more games where the villains are just as lost as the player.
video games
As fun as it is, the only bad thing about this game is that it very clearly feels like an extended inconsequential sidequest. Machida even said outright that it's not a true sequel, and that a proper SH3 (never ever ;_;) would've continued Yuri's story.
i heard SH3 was supposed to be a prequel. the story of Yuri's dad.
I'M SCREAMIN' RN LIKE SPONGEBOB BOUTTA BE MADE MANAGER OF THE KRUSTY KRAB
A SHADOW HEARTS VIDEO!? YEEEEEEEEEEEEEESSSSSSSSSS
HERE'S TO THE FUTURE, HERE'S TO PENNY BLOOD!
I will give this video the highest honor I can *adds to his video essay playlist*
2:55 It's usually called RPF and is certainly hosted alongside fanfiction. I think the distinction between it and historical fiction is usually whether or not the people you're talking about are alive and able to consent to being in an officially marketed work though so I guess Al Capone hangouts are just self-indulgent historical fiction lol
The whole "set one foot in the final dungeon then a bunch of sidequests open up" is a staple in just about every JRPG I've ever played to be fair haha, from the ps1 to ps2 era
Idk why they do it, but it's basically a genre staple, either when the final dungeon opens, or after walking in and having to walk back out.
Is funny
Well, you've now convinced me to give this series a try.
I still fondly remember this game, even though kid me did get stuck in the Roswell dungeon for an embarrassingly long time. Out of the whole cast of weirdos, my favourite will always be Frank the American ninja; you nearly never had to buy a weapon for him, he'd just stick a hilt on random objects you'd come across, like a cactus, or a stop sign, or a huge sword that already had a hilt on it...
I love Frank 🤣 I wonder if it inspired the real Filthy Frank 🤔
I remember playing this and a damn Ps2 jampck along with Steambot Chronicles . Crazy remembering what the hell I was playing from like 20 years ago
I wonder if the Penny Blood game will lead to a rediscovery of the whole series. Shadow Hearts and Koudelka have been obscure for so long. Shin Megami tensei used to be too, but with the continuous release of new games, I feel they've become less niche than they once used to be.
Love this game!
For covering goofy and wacky JRPGS may I recommend Operation Darkness on Xbox.
I akwats feel guilty that I enjoyed this game more than all the others. I get why rationally they SHOULD be better exoeriences, they have a much deeper story and genuine emotion. But idk, i just enjoy a completely silly no depth comedy game with an excellent battle system better. Its just an entirely different genre, and that's fine. I honestly think it wouldnt have been as hated as it is if they simply named it it's own thing instead of tenuously linking it to the Shadow Hearts series. Of course people were gonna be pissed off if they expected darkness and got the most sun ever crammed into a game, lol
I cant help but be overjoyed every second Frank is onscreen, he's just a slice of serotonin through and through!
Oh man, I have terrible news regarding Penny Blood. The project isn't dead, but the devs are struggling to find investors and it seems they are pretty much out of money at this point.
I remember rage quitting this game during a late game dungeon and dying to some bs status effect and losing a lot of progress
I think the problem was Shadow Hearts and Shadow Hearts 2 were just super dark and yeah it had a lot of funny stuff. But he stories were ultimately dramatic and pretty awesome. But then FTNW came out, and all of us who'd played the other games in the series were hyped, only to be confronted by talking kung fu, mobster cat, and bleach blonde native American princess. Its was just a touch to weird, and out of touch with the series mood and feel as a whole. I hate that it killed the series, because it its such a great group of games. I really wish they could get a reboot or an additional chance to release a game on a modern console.
You should try out Fear & Hunger. Its a jrpg style survival horror game series made mostly by a Finnish solo dev. Both games in the series are really good, but they can come off as a bit hard because of the learning curve and "trial by fire" way of learning the game.
5:11 Hang on, is that fucking massive Stargate in the background?
I played the entire series. Shadow Hearts II/Covenant is what got me to start learning Japanese. It will always be near and dear to my heart.
This is a rare positive review on this game. Its pretty damn descriptive too.
2:33 *Finger guns* Hey, you're pretty good.
Recent subscriber and enjoying binging most of your content.
I will say, I wish you would spend the time to fully outline the plot as it's half the reason most of us watch these videos. We want to fully explore the game with you, instead of being recommended to go out and invest time in playing it. I can get a recommendation from google, but I can only get you from these videos, if that makes sense? If you're truly worried about spoilers, maybe a single timestamp to skip it for the limited people that are actually going to go out and play it. Best of both worlds!
it's not that I'm worried about spoilers its that I don't think that highly of From The New World's plot and therefore didn't care to outline it. this video is not intended as a comprehensive overview of the game, I just wanted to talk about the bits I liked.
I still have the PS2 version but the last few times I booted it up, it was getting worryingly longer and longer to read the disc, so I ended up having to drop my replay 40% of the way through. This game would be at the tippy-top of my list to emulate... if PCSX2 didn't have that atrocious input latency that would destroy any semblance of playing the Judgement Ring well.
Hated this game as a teen
Shadow hearts covenant is my favorite out of the series, also i'm looking forward to penny blood whenever it comes out.