Let's Play A Super Robot Wars Game

[Bodkins Odds]

Good evening. I'm sure all of you are aware of Super Robot Wars by now, so my description will be brief. Super Robot Wars is a turn based strategy RPG ala Fire Emblem, Shining Force, and Final Fantasy Tactics... but with giant robots. Most of the games are crossovers between big names of giant robot anime from Mobile Suit Gundam to Mazinger Z with some original units thrown in for good measure.

To start with I'd like to offer you the choice of which game we'll be playing. I've got a few choices for you (spoilered for big pictures):

Spoiler

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Dai-3-Ji Super Robot Taisen for the SNES, which has been translated into English, has no battle animation, no pilot upgrades, no voice overs, and you don't get to pick a main character.


Super Robot Wars Alpha for the Playstation, which was the first with real battle animation, includes voice overs, let's you pick AND customize your main character, still no pilot upgrades, and is currently Japanese only.


Super Robot Wars Alpha Gaiden for the Playstation, which is a non-canon sequel to Alpha, includes even better animations, still has voice overs, has no main character, annoyingly places all but one super robot on a separate story path from your real robots, still no pilot upgrades, but is translated into English.


Super Robot Taisen Original Generation for the GBA, which does have battle animations, and let's you pick a main character, does not have voice overs, only has original characters, but is the first with pilot upgrades.


Super Robot Wars J for the GBA, which has battle animations, let's you pick & name your main character, pick and name your main character's robot, name your main character's robot's attacks, useful battleships (Nadeshico FTW!), no less than five character's voiced by Seki Tomokazu (but no voice acting ), a couple of animated toku characters, G Gundam, and is, as far as I know, the only SRW game were the most broken robot is not an original unit.


Super Robot Wars GC for the GameCube, which has battle animations, voice acting (I presume), let's you pick a main character, and would be partially translated assuming I can get the patch working. I've never played this one before so it would be a completely blind run.

Before you cast your votes, assuming anyone even bothers with this, I'd like to note that I don't read moonspeak so playing Alpha (and maybe GC) would be interesting.

[Hunter Noventa]

SRW3 Is one of the most painful games to play I've ever seen.

I think we had an OG2 LP on the forum before, but OG1 is so laughably inferior it can be painful.

Go for Alpha Gaiden, Alpha has too many obtuse secrets and such to play without a translation.

Though, my personal suggestion would be SRW J, since it's been translated and is pretty good. I'd do it myself if I had more free time.

[Bodkins Odds]

Well, I don't mind playing J. I just thought there had already been a J Let's Play here. Looking at it again, I realize that it was still in Japanese at the time. Adding it to the list.

It's just a shame that no one will vote for Calvina + Coustwell. :(

I really like Puzzle Robo better than the skill point system, I wonder what it'd be like in a game with actual difficulty...

[fizzmaister]

Could I at all convince you to add SRW:GC to that list? You would most certainly be the first one to do a proper LP for it if you decide to do it.

[Bodkins Odds]

Let's see, I've never emulated a Gamecube game before. Let me try and get it running, and if it works I'll put it on the list.

EDIT: Dang it, I can't get the translation patch to work... does anyone know the right way to install it? Added it to the list anyway since it does run, it's just in moonspeak.

[Sir_Mopalot]

Oooh, ooh, SRW:J! I've tried it before, but I suck pretty badly, and maybe by reading an LP I could suck a little less.

[Tengu_temp]

I'd say GC or @1, because I know OG2 too well already, 3 is too old, primitive and painful to play, and I didn't like @G or J and will always claim they're so popular only because they got fan translations.

[smuchmuch]

I think I vaguely recall was a LP of the OG2 on these forums a long time ago ?
I'd like to see OG1 if it's possible. Just to know what half the stuff in the second hat was all about. (Is the plot for these games strikes me as alway so confused, fragemented and all over the place as a rule ?)
Also original characters sounds good to me since I'm unlikely to know even a tenth of the series these games are build around, otherwise.

[Hunter Noventa]

(Is the plot for these games strikes me as alway so confused, fragemented and all over the place as a rule ?)

Well in the regular series games, you have the plots of at least a dozen mecha anime crashing into each other and making things even worse. On top of that you have the 'original' plot, involving original characters and villains.

With the OG games, you have several of the 'original' plots and characters coming together in one game the same way you do with the regular series games, AND new original stuff unique to said game.

So yeah, it gets pretty crazy.

[Nerd-o-rama]

Well, I don't mind playing J. I just thought there had already been a J Let's Play here. Looking at it again, I realize that it was still in Japanese at the time. Adding it to the list.

It's just a shame that no one will vote for Calvina + Coustwell. :(

I really like Puzzle Robo better than the skill point system, I wonder what it'd be like in a game with actual difficulty...

I've learned to love Coustwell a bit more since way back then.

Also Christ people still remember that LP? It was terrible.

Anyway, putting in a vote for Alpha if you want to try your hand at a guessing-and-joking translation or Alpha Gaiden if you want to show off AGTP's excellent localization work.

I'd say GC or @1, because I know OG2 too well already, 3 is too old, primitive and painful to play, and I didn't like @G or J and will always claim they're so popular only because they got fan translations.

Believe it or not, I liked J better when I didn't know what was going on. The plot is really pretty uninspired. Alpha Gaiden shows its age really badly, but it's also one of the few SRWs with a comprehensible difficulty curve (Ghosts aside). Z does most of what it does much better, though, I'll give you that.

[Tengu_temp]

Apart from the plot, my problem with J is how monotonous it is. "Here, have 20 enemies to fight, all exactly identical!" is something I can stand only so many times. Especially if they're freakin' Brainpower'd enemies with their freakin' shields that make them way too tough for what they should be.

@G had several problems:
1. Horrible pacing. You start with a large cast of varied mecha... and then it's all yanked away from you and you have to do a dozen maps with Voltes and Great Mazinger.
2. Way too many units in comparison to how many you can deploy, and most of them suck. If you don't deploy your strongest units every mission, but try to rotate and use everyone, the battles will be frustratingly slow.
3. The plot focuses on Turn A Gundam, Gundam X and Xabungle, but only the last of those is given any justice. The Gundams are completely butchered.

[Bodkins Odds]

SRW J: 2
SRW GC: 1 (2 with secondary votes)
SRW @1: 2
SRW OG: 1
SRW @G: 0 (2 with secondary votes)
Dai-3-Ji: Dead in the water (as expected)

Hm... I was hoping those secondary votes could be used to break ties, but instead they've turned a two-way tie into a three-way. Everything ends up with two votes except for OG. Oh, and Dai-3-Ji, but I didn't really expect any votes for that anyway.

Someone new is going to have to vote or else I'll have to draw up a random game encounter table and roll the dice.

[Nerd-o-rama]

I'd rescind one of my votes, but really, I'll leave them both so you can decide whether you want a harder game or a harder job writing the LP.

[Fri]

I vote for OG.

[Gai Daigoji]

I'm going to put a vote in for GC on the basis that:

• The cast list is good. I'm a sucker for Mazinkaiser, Shin vs. Neo Getter, and Dragonar.
• The Soul Gunner is a cool robot.
• The gameplay mechanics are interesting. You can choose to blow limbs and other parts off of enemy robots to disable them instead of outright destroying them.
• It has the best music in the entire series.

[Bodkins Odds]

And it looks like GC breaks the tie. Give me a few minutes to see if I can get the translation patch working, and if I can't I'll go ahead with it in Japanese.

>_> Layzner is in this one, lovely. He'd better not be as effing useless as he was in J.

[fizzmaister]

If you have trouble getting the patch working, just ask me for help.

[tensai_oni]

And it looks like GC breaks the tie. Give me a few minutes to see if I can get the translation patch working, and if I can't I'll go ahead with it in Japanese.

The translation patch is a work in progress. It's an /m/ project so expect it to be finished... well. Never.

>_> Layzner is in this one, lovely. He'd better not be as effing useless as he was in J.

Hey, Layzner is badass! It's not the robot's fault SRW J didn't do it justice.

[Bodkins Odds]

Okay, it looks like I got the patch working. As evidenced by the fact that I can read this start menu.


And now for yet another choice, which character are we? I don't know anything about Male Main or Female Main, but I think we can name them and pick whether they get a super or a real. I might be wrong on that though.

I think the GC pictures are small enough not to need spoilers, but If I'm wrong I'll gladly wrap this up in a spoiler tag.

[fizzmaister]

Two stages and a substage have been translated for the male, eleven for the female and four substages. The female route is being actively translated, the male route isn't. I don't think there's much of a choice, same thing with the robot selection, it has to be the Soul Gunner because the other robot hasn't been translated as far. Lastly, you have to keep her default name, otherwise the hashing fails and any line that involves her talking or someone talking to or about her end up not translated.

[Bodkins Odds]

Well that sucks. Honestly, while I would certainly prefer having the story bits translated I can stand playing with just the menus in English, so I'll let you guys decide how much we care about having the game translated vs picking our character.

[Gai Daigoji]

I suppose I'll vote for the translated option.

I prefer the female main and the Soul Gunner anyway.

[Bodkins Odds]

Is it okay for me to say that I think they're both rather ugly?

[Nerd-o-rama]

And it looks like GC breaks the tie. Give me a few minutes to see if I can get the translation patch working, and if I can't I'll go ahead with it in Japanese.

>_> Layzner is in this one, lovely. He'd better not be as effing useless as he was in J.

Somebody didn't get the Layzner Mk. II...

Is it okay for me to say that I think they're both rather ugly?

Non-SD Banpresto Originals always look weird.

Normally when possible I'd say put the female lead in the super robot because there aren't enough of that combination in anime, but Soul Gunner is a lot less stupid-looking so I vote for that.

[Bodkins Odds]

Somebody didn't get the Layzner Mk. II...

Non-SD Banpresto Originals always look weird.

Honestly, I just ignored him after he repeatedly refused to survive his opening mission. Braybull and Bulby were useful though.

While I will agree that non-SD pictures of Bandpresto Originals do tend to look a little off, I think this is made worse by the generic looking 3D models. I can't help but feel that Soul Gunner would look better if I popped Last Raven into my PS2 and made it in that...

You have no idea how hard it is for me to resist the urge to redo Soul Gunner in Armored Core: Last Raven.

[Tengu_temp]

Soul Saber looks like someone put Raideen's head on Gespenst's body, added drills and painted it all in random colors. Soul Gunner is slightly less ugly.

I vote for the female main character because there aren't enough of those in SRW. Also she's pretty cute.

Honestly, I just ignored him after he repeatedly refused to survive his opening mission. Braybull and Bulby were useful though.

But... They're worse in pretty much everything than Layzner!

[tensai_oni]

I vote for the super robot and female Akimi Akatsuki. That's the MC's default name - regardless of gender.

Sure, let's use the partial translation. It will be fun to start making up plot when we reach the untranslated part.

[fizzmaister]

It shall be a race. The /m/ translation team has an eleven stage and four sub-stage head start. Let's how long it takes for this LP to catch up.

[Bodkins Odds]

I took 223 screenshots (including some that I threw away). Never again! Next time I'm just going to summarize the talky bits...

Spoiler

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Confirming character selection...


Now, on to the story:


Wait... our star system, Sol, is at the edge of the Galaxy, could they be a bit more specific?



Well, it could be worse, at least there isn't an incredibly lame acronym involve-



I'm sorry. I'm so, so sorry.



Wait, now I'm confused. Earlier you sounded like you thought this was a bad thing...



A wild Molly Ringwald appears!



Well, that sounds easy enough. I mean, who's gonna say no to Molly Ringwald?

[Star Wars Theme Plays]




Oh good, it's still 0079, I was worried Char's Counterattack would be in this. The worst part about Dynasty Warriors Gundam 2 was that they forced you to play CCA to unlock Char... and Amuro, but who the hell cares about Amuro?






You would think that Bandpresto would eventually get tired of repeatedly recreating the backstory for Macross, but you'd be wrong.







I can't believe they just had that argument. Ignoring the moral and ethical concerns, surely a living extra-terrestrial is more valuable than a dead one.



Oh, we're doing this now?





Okay, let me give you aspiring writers a big ole hint, not everything needs to be explained. Even when something does need explaining that doesn't mean you need to shove that explanation down the audiences throat in the first five minutes. I can guarantee you that whatever the consequences of Fairey being an alien turn out to be, they'd be even more rewarding if they had merely hinted that she was an alien instead of both showing and explaining it at the beginning of the game.




Okay, this is my fault, I installed the male character patch as well under the mistaken idea that it would only override dialog if you used the male character.







I'm not really sure how to parse that last sentence.



Look, I took over two-hundred screenshots. I'm going to use as many of them as I can.





Silence fool! Giovanni knows what he's doing! Now go capture a Pikachu or something.



And my goof with the translation patch has just made it a plot point that Giovanni can't get over the fact that he has a daughter instead of a son.



...Enabler! He has a daughter, he needs to accept it!





Fairey! STOP. ENABLING. HIM. Akimi is not a boy.




Given my experience with SRW games, I'd say that this conspiracy will be poorly explained two-thirds into the game.



You know what? I hope eleven-year old kids foil your plans for Pokemon world domination, repeatedly. Jerk.



Oh, come on! Now your doing it too?





Damn it, Giovanni! You see what horrible things you've done to her? She wants to be normal! And it's all your fault!



See! See!



Because it's in the script.



Hey look, it's the grandson of that grey haired alien from the prologue. I'd recognize those sideburns anywhere!





I can't decide whether he looks more like Liono or Ryo-Ohki (in human form).






Wow, he couldn't figure that out on his own? Baka.

Okay, this is going to take forever. Let me explain, no there is too much. Let me sum up.

Akimi takes Liono to a shelter, and then Fairey decides she'll have to fly spirit gunner by herself:



Apparently, that's a bad idea so it's a good thing that Akimi shows up to fly the thing.



Wait, now we get a chapter screen? Good grief, this is worse than Kingdom Hearts 2. At least they let you play that before the chapter screen hit.



After the title screen we get introduced to a junior high student and his girlfriend. The school is predictably, and almost immediately, attacked by giant robots.



I'm guessing the kid is a super robot pilot.



Yep, not only is he a super robot pilot, his robot is the centerpiece for his school's playground. Why couldn't I have gone to that school?




Okay, so we have the Trider G7. Any other giant robots piloted by little kids?



As a matter of fact, yes. This time it's kindergartners.




Yeah, apparently there a bit too young to comprehend the awesomeness that is Super Robot Kombat!

But they combine anyway.



Okay, take note Bandpresto. This is what a Super Robot looks like. And if you could please stick to the drawn art like this in the future that would be lovely, thanks.

So, the situation here is that Akimi and the Trider guy both work for seperate companies that fight invading giant robots for pay. They don't seem to get along that well.

The Earth Defense Class kids defend the Earth from invaders, as school work. Because they have a flipping Super Robot...

Lucky bastards.

So, our current situation is that we're under attack by three different factions of invading giant robots. Here are our units stats:

Trider G7:





Raijin Oh:







And, last but not least, our own Soul Gunner:






Anoyingly, I can't read the seishin list, and the costs seem off for Focus and company...




Here's were everyone is. As you can see, we're all tucked into the southeast corner and the enemies are all in the other corners. So, how should we deal with these guys?

[Nerd-o-rama]

All I can say about the writing and number of screencaps here is this:

WELCOME TO SUPER ROBOT WARS! I hope you enjoy giant walls of mostly superfluous text.

(I know you know this already, but doing an LP makes it a lot more obnoxious, doesn't it?)

EDIT: Ha, that post is so long with the spoiler expanded the site's sidebar ends halfway through it.

EDIT EDIT: Well it did before I refreshed.