Sailor Moon One other Story (美少女戦士セーラームーン ANOTHER STORY), launched 9/22/1995, developed and printed by Angel

I used to be (am?) an enormous fan of Sailor Moon. It was the primary anime I actually bought into, again within the mid-90s when the dub was airing on American TV. I’m unsure why I appreciated it a lot; a part of it was the web group (in newsgroups and mailing lists) and a part of it me eager to see a cartoon with a creating storyline. I ultimately acquired the entire collection on VHS tapes (fansubs) and have watched all 200 episodes a number of instances. I not personal the VHS tapes although.

Which means that whereas I’ve performed many video games to this point primarily based on present anime, manga, and so on, that is the primary one that’s primarily based on a present I used to be actually into. In all probability the one earlier than this that I knew probably the most about was Ranma 1/2, and that was a reasonably crappy recreation general. This recreation, however, is fairly nicely completed when it comes to adapting the unique property and making one thing that may curiosity followers of the sport. It might have been simple to only cram a retelling of the present or lazy product, however the story goes above and past that. It includes fully new villains that don’t appear misplaced, and examines areas of the unique story that have been hardly touched on (significantly the longer term Silver Millennium and the previous Moon Kingdom).

The sport was developed whereas the manga was nonetheless working. When the event began, the third storyline (S) hadn’t began; when the sport was launched, the fourth storyline (SuperS) was presently working in each anime and manga kind. Due to this, the builders have been working off info from Naoko Takeuchi about how the story would develop. The story takes place after the third storyline (S), and largely appears to comply with the manga, though some anime-only issues are included (many of the random encounter monsters are from the anime), and there are even references to the R and S films. I believe in case you are a fan of Sailor Moon there’s a lot to love concerning the story. If you’re not, I believe the story could also be much less fascinating/efficient.

There’s a translation patch which was launched a very long time in the past, however somebody up to date it with some varied fixes and a “no-grind” patch that reduces the random encounter price and doubles the xp/gold from every encounter.

All ten of the Sailor Senshi launched to this point are within the recreation, together with all of the powers from each the anime and manga. Additionally they have voice clips for all of the assaults in addition to their transformation traces.

The graphics on the entire are fairly good. I respect the face photos within the dialogue (why don’t extra video games do that!) Since that they had a big assortment of enemies to attract on from the anime, there aren’t a bunch of palette swap monsters and the in-battle graphics are respectable as nicely.

One of many challenges usually confronted by builders of video games like that is being devoted to the unique concepts whereas nonetheless creating RPG-like gameplay. Within the manga and anime, they sometimes solely battle one monster at a time, and a single assault by Sailor Moon is the one factor that may kill it (normally one different senshi will use an assault to weaken or stun it). It is a related drawback that was confronted by the Fist of the North Star RPG creators — in that anime, the entire level is that individuals like Kenshiro can solely be pretty matched in opposition to a small variety of others who’re educated like them. Kenshiro can take out a traditional thug with out even breaking a sweat.

So that you mainly have three decisions, I believe, in adapting one thing like this:

• Attempt to create a very new battle system that permits for extra faithfulness to the supply. I believe Dragon Ball is the primary instance I can consider of a recreation that did this; it’s not a standard method in all probability as a result of it’s not simple to do and takes extra time.
• Put some clarification within the story for why the characters can’t battle in addition to they’ll within the authentic supply. Slayers did this by having the “reminiscence loss Lina” that couldn’t use most of her spells. This isn’t a gorgeous choice as a result of it could annoy gamers who need to play the unique characters as they have been within the supply.
• Simply use a traditional RPG system, and hope that the gamers shall be completely happy sufficient to play their favourite characters that they’ll overlook how nonsensical it’s (or they’ll perceive that there was no option to adapt the unique concepts right into a satisfying RPG).

The third choice is what many of the collection take, and it’s what Sailor Moon One other Story does as nicely. Right here, any transfer can beat the enemies, and Sailor Moon’s personal strikes are simply damage-dealing strikes like every other that she might need to make use of 2 or 3 instances and never even kill the enemy. I believe it really works, although. An fascinating selection they made was to utterly restore EP after each battle to be able to make heavy use of the particular strikes moderately than simply primary assaults.

The opposite points to the battle system are Hyperlink Techs, the place two (or three) senshi mix their powers, and Formation Techs (which I by no means used). There are 4 formations that enhance or lower the assault/protection of senshi particularly spots — as an example, the “Cluster” formation quadruples the assault of the middle senshi however lowers the protection/assault fairly a little bit of everybody else.

Due to the setting, there aren’t any weapons and armor to equip, simply equipment (that are largely rings, earrings, bracelets, and so on).

The sport is split into 4 chapters. The story beings within the Silver Millennium sooner or later, the place a comet is coming and there’s a unusual epidemic. Again within the current, outdated enemies are showing once more in Tokyo.

Fan favourite Hotaru adjustments from a child again into Sailor Saturn once more. She actually shouldn’t have a transfer that simply damages random enemies since she’s imagined to destroy planets, however we’ll enable it.

The primary chapter simply hints at what’s occurring, with a brand new enemy revealing herself as “Sin”, and varied goals and prophecies. The interior senshi are all captured by Sin, and throughout the rescue you get varied glimpses of their dream “good lives” that they’ve deserted to be warriors (this was within the R Film additionally I believe). Sin additionally has 5 underlings headed by Apsu. Their purpose is to get the Ginzuishou (silver crystal) from Sailor Moon. The senshi achieve combating them off however Mamoru (Tuxedo Kamen) is injured, a standard scenario for him.

In Chapter 2, the Internal senshi should go round to totally different locations by themselves to get better 4 gems primarily based on the 4 generals of the primary collection. The sport attracts from the manga in making the 4 generals servants of Endymion (Mamoru’s previous life); this was by no means acknowledged within the anime. Every of the 4 tales includes one of many enemy underlings, and develops their backstories and why they joined Sin. They have been all dissatisfied with life within the Silver Millennium indirectly.

One huge criticism concerning the recreation that I believe is correct is that there’s an excessive amount of grinding; everytime you attain a brand new space the enemies outclass you by fairly a bit and you need to do some levelling. It doesn’t take that lengthy however it’s a bit annoying. The boss of Mercury’s section right here is especially troublesome (the no-grind patch hacked one thing right here to make it a bit simpler).

Now that we’ve the 4 gems, we nonetheless want the Rose Crystal, which is chapter 3 — the Outer senshi and Moon are going after the Rose Crystal whereas the Inners are gone. Saturn’s Loss of life Reborn Revolution is actually good so I normally put her in the midst of the Cluster formation.

This chapter additionally begins the connection between Chibi-Usa and an enemy Anshar, a child with a pet. This appears a minimum of a bit much like the Chibi-Usa/Helios story from the 4th season, making me marvel in the event that they primarily based this on future concepts for the story.

This chapter has you combating all of the Loss of life Busters, Mistress 9, and Professor Tomoe once more from S, adopted by Queen Beryl from the unique season. I’ve blended emotions concerning the reappearance of all of the outdated enemies from the earlier seasons — I really feel like they did it simply to attraction to followers moderately than as a result of it match organically into the story. They by no means actually absolutely clarify why a number of the individuals got here again. I suppose it’s a small criticism however it could reduce the attraction of the sport to people who find themselves not followers of Sailor Moon. In any case we fail to achieve the Rose Crystal from Anshar, ending chapter 3.

In chapter 4 we discover out the enemies are messing round prior to now, threatening to alter the timeline. So we use the Time Hall (getting Sailor Pluto on the workforce) to return. It is a good likelihood to see Beryl and the Generals earlier than they turned to the evil facet, and likewise see authentic Queen Serenity. We additionally should battle the villains from the second season (R) once more.

We lastly see right here extra motivation of the enemies — Sin, the chief, goes to die quickly. Apsu, the sister of Anshar, was pissed off when the Darkish Moon killed her mother and father, and questioned why the sailor senshi have been simply defending Neo Queen Serenity moderately than serving to her mother and father.

Nevertheless, we do handle to get better the Rose Crystal and heal Mamoru. Now it’s time for the ultimate chapter.

At this level you have the funds for to have 99 colognes (full MP restore for everybody). With this, you’ll be able to have Pluto use Time Cease each spherical, which even freezes bosses (together with the ultimate boss). So all you need to do is have three characters use sturdy assaults (I did a triple tech with Mars-Jupiter-Uranus), then a 4th character use a cologne, and Pluto Time cease each spherical. In the event you do that, so long as you’re at a excessive sufficient stage to do affordable injury and you can also make it by means of the primary spherical of fight with out anybody getting confused/entranced/and so on, you win each boss battle.

Right here we do the ultimate battles in opposition to the assorted underlings who then see the error of their methods. However Sin and Apsu nonetheless stay — first we’ve to defeat Apsu, after which a mixture of Apsu and Sin. I assumed the ultimate part was a bit much less satisfying than the others when it comes to the motivation and background of the enemies, however it’s nonetheless a good conclusion to the storyline.

Total I did take pleasure in this recreation fairly a bit regardless of the issues within the system. Actually an excellent a part of this was my like for Sailor Moon normally, however I believe it exhibits that this was an excellent adaptation of the supply materials, and it offers you a pleasant likelihood to see issues that have been by no means actually touched on a lot within the authentic collection. It additionally creates some fascinating villains that would slot in the supply manga/anime in addition to fleshing out the primary characters a bit.

I do marvel how individuals unfamiliar with Sailor Moon would love this recreation — I’ve a sense not all that a lot for the reason that recreation system shouldn’t be essentially the most effective on the planet, and there’s fairly a little bit of grinding concerned. It does make me marvel if I’d have had a greater opinion of a number of the different IP-based video games I’ve performed prior to now if I had performed these collection.

Really the following recreation can also be a shojo manga (Magic Knight Rayearth). However first there shall be two posts about SRPGs I solely performed the primary few phases of.