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Post by Sonnington on Jun 13, 2016 0:39:44 GMT
so what is the morale in eating meat? does it boost our health, happiness and general advancement in life? Yes in all three categories. Let me ask you, if eating meat is immoral do you think lions, tigers, and sharks are immoral beings? What do you think should be done with these immoral murder machines?
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Post by Sonnington on Jun 12, 2016 20:57:47 GMT
Perhaps I need to get a copy of this, if this is the kind of discussion it inspires. It MUST be a heck of a game. It's one of the best RPGs I've ever played. The dialogue and story points have a lot of substance without getting long winded. The graphics are absolutely spectacular on Saturn; it's truly second to none on the system. Even the turnbased combat, something I typically loath, is engaging and typically demands more from you than most other turn-based games. It's also short, only 10-15 hours long. Onto this moral relativism. On the strictest, most impractical of levels mortality is subjective. On the practical side it's absolutely objective. Morality and moral laws come from the overall desire for good health, happiness, and advancement for the most amount of people. So when I hear people say something like morallity is subjective, I find it to be a pointless statement. For the vast majority of laws and moral principles it's so crystal clear and agreed upon there's no leeway that can be to entertain the idea of a subjective morality.
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Post by Sonnington on Jun 12, 2016 5:45:31 GMT
Believe me, give it some practice, and time will seem like it actually slows down when you play the more intense stages. This carries over from shmup to shmup. Just gotta train dat brain and dem eyes. The game is possible even with the speed. When I started bullet hells nearly 10 years ago I had the same problems, where as soon as too many things get on screen and start moving quickly and in different directions, your mind gets overloaded and your eyes lose track of everything and the screen turns into a panicky mess of ooze. That DOES go away, and it doesn't take that long to either. Give it a month or two. One word of advice: try to break the habit of staring directly at your ship. If you can focus your eyes near the top and guesstimate where your ship is, and get a feel for exactly where you'll be on a direction press and how much force you need to apply to stay clear of any oncoming shots without slamming into another or losing yourself, you'll be able to see the patterns start which will give you that split second extra to dodge. You should also use where your guns are firing as a guide to where you are on the X-Axis. It's only necessary to focus on your ship when it starts to get crowded with bullets, but be sure to glance back upwards frequently if it gets to that. It's kinda like driving and continuously checking all your mirrors. <3 Your first point is 100% accurate and really cool. When we move our eyes around, our brain perceives time going more slowly. www.nature.com/nature/journal/v414/n6861/full/414302a0.html I can totally see why a bullet hell would make it feel like time slows down.
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Post by Sonnington on May 27, 2016 23:12:00 GMT
Interesting interpretation of Azel. I'm pretty sure I saw the word 'program' in there somewhere, but I may be mistaken.
You said his choice was between good and evil. What I'm saying was he didn't know which choice was good and evil.
OK, I take it you now agree with my interpretation now, but you feel the developers could've done a better job? I'm confused because originally you said this:
The part at the end where the Ultimate Power tells the Divine Visitor (player character) to destroy him by pressing the button...
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Post by Sonnington on May 24, 2016 5:10:29 GMT
It's not exactly clear, she was either directly programmed by Craymen or programmed to follow the commands of whoever awoken her. There was no time allotted in the story for Craymen to take on a surrogate father position.
I'm not saying they were good or bad. I'm saying Edge didn't know to either follow Craymen or follow Gash. He didn't know what the right thing to do was.
Let me put it more simply, there may have been better ways the designers could have conveyed the message through gameplay elements, but that doesn't mean the message wasn't there. Considering the context of the story, I find it absurd to suggest the button segment had the intent to show anti-determinism.
I did a pretty thorough job explaining how the ultimate power was God in my last post.
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Post by Sonnington on May 15, 2016 18:07:03 GMT
First off, spoilers obviously. Secondly, it took me about 8 months to finish this game so it's very possible I'm misremembering the story in places. Thirdly, I tried searching for the thread where the ending was being discussed to no avail, so here I am making a new topic. I absolutely loved this game. Despite it taking me so long I think this game is awesome and holds up very well to modern games. The only issues I had was with disc 4. It became rather tedious. Everything up until that point had extremely good pacing and I think with updated graphics you could easily release this game in full today. My only disappointment was with most of disc 4. It had you flying around on top of a forest and through dungeon corridors wondering where you were supposed to go and what you were supposed to be doing. In terms of gameplay the ending lost steam and felt a bit rushed. Besides that, the end of the story was very well crafted and thought provoking. Here's my interpretation, let me know if I'm all wet here. The overall theme to story is fairly anti-deterministic and anti-dogmatic/theologic in tone. Some of the events and elements throughout the game that show this would include the dragon and Edge being prophesied to protect the town of Zoah and ultimately failing. Then you have Azel eventually developing freewill despite heavy programming. You also have Paet who ostensibly burnt a Bible outside the mayor's house in Zoah. Then you have the emperor and Craymen locked in a battle to control the power of the towers through Azel. Both ultimately failing. Craymen convinces Edge that the monsters and power from the towers are essential to life on the planet and they must be controlled by someone honourable and the emperor cant do it because he's evil. Then you have Gash who wants to destroy that power and free the world from the monsters. Edge doesn't know who to believe after Gash tells him this, but goes along with him anyway because he's weak in character and Craymen is dead. The very end of the story has Edge meet an ultimate power or a god. Edge thinks it's the divine visitor, but what this ultimate organism is, is unclear. What is made clear is that the divine visitor is the player himself and is ultimately the god of the story. Which is a bit of a dues ex machina, 4th wall breaking, bizarre plot twist, but it works for the impact of the message the story wants to convey. So essentially the player destroys the existing oppressive power structure and ultimately god of the Panzer Dragoon world. While this has clear implications of antireligious sentiment and anti-tradition/anti-dogma. It's really an advocation of free will and free thought. The idea that you shouldn't follow simply because someone told you to, but because it's the right thing to do and what you want. That you are an empowered and powerful force that can move worlds. After you kill God you see Gash at the end say, apprehensively, something to the effect of, 'We'll have to travel without a destination.' Which is an allusion to not blindly following dogma and making your own path. After that Azel rides her definitely-not-chocobo into electrical storms to look for Edge, which symbolizes the danger of charting uncertain waters, which is what a rejection of blindly following dogma entails. While I don't like the idea of discarding all of the traditional values simply because they're dogmatic. I do like the promotion of free-thought, choice, and questioning of tradition. Or maybe I'm completely off and misinterpret the ending. In any event, it's a hell of a deep story and powerful ending if I am right. Also, is it supposed to be a cliffhanger with Azel running off looking for Edge like that? It's certainly an opening for a sequel. in general I advice every person who finished the game this website: panzerdragoonlegacy.com/ it's full of theories and other interesting things explaining the world, characters and storylines. it also has a good forum. did you play the other panzer dragoon games before saga? I strongly advice to do so. especially zwei about your point. I think mainly the panzer dragoon saga storyline advocated the destructive power and will of human in general. yet still always maintains hope through love. even an android can feel attached to a human, as is seen by azel falling in love with edge (body) I'll be sure to check that site out, thanks. While I've played the earlier titles, they've never held my attention.
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Post by Sonnington on May 15, 2016 17:53:18 GMT
There's some interesting points to martiniii's post, thanks for responding!
First off, I want to make clear I see no value in moral relativism. What I meant to get across is that understanding the intent for a law, a tradition, or a value is just as important as being taught what they are to begin with. Having the knowledge of intent allows you to reevaluate if the virtue is still valid or not. I don't want to go into a political rant, but there are quite a few laws that are being perverted or should change simply because the intent of those laws have been forgotten, were corrupt to begin with, or are simply invalid now. With that said, following your own best interests will almost always lead you to a virtuous life... as long as you're on the higher end of the bell curve.
Secondly, you're going to have to explain that one to me. She was a robot programmed to do what her master(Craymen) wanted her to do. He died and she was still bound to obey his wishes. Craymen believed the towers and monsters were vital to human existence and didn't want them destroyed. Despite that Azel made a decision to destroy them. How is disobeying her programming not acting on her own volition? Are you saying Azel stayed in the crumbling towers because it was her programming to? What gives you that impression? I thought she stayed because she had to.
As far as Paet and the burnt Bible goes, you can find the Bible outside the mayor's house next to where the child goes to play hide and seek. Edge narrates to himself, "Paet must've done this."
That's a fair point about Edge, he's just an ignorant young man that doesn't know who to believe or what to do. I suppose lacking character isn't the right way to put it. Lets say he lacks conviction. Your framing of it as uncertain good vs certain evil is a bit overblown though. Edge just doesn't know what to do and is easily convinced. For most of the ending Edge wasn't at all convinced he should destroy the towers, but he went along with it anyway.
I actually wasn't at all clear that he was the dragon. I was too busy reading the subtitles. It could get more explicit than 'That voice...... the dragon?!.' Thanks for bringing that up though! I didn't notice Edge wasn't riding the dragon either. Clearly the dragon is a part of the ultimate power or metamorphasized into it. Now that I've had some time to rewatch the ending and think about it. I wouldn't call the dragon an ultimate power the same thing. The dragon either evolves into that power or reverts back to it.
That ultimate power seems pretty god-like to me. At the beginning of the game it was able to bring Edge back to life and give you control over Edge. It's also omniscient. I'd also say that the ultimate power is a representation of the developers. It says that he's been guiding the Divine Visitor. That's not really the case for the dragon though. The dragon has no character motivation at all and adds nothing to the direction of the story save for being a vehicle. Who has been guiding you are the developers and their intent.
I find it rather strange that you're trying so hard to prove my interpretation as invalid with nit picks when the ultimate power says, "I exist to lead the Divine Visitor, to break the spell of the Ancient Age, and to give humans control of their own destiny."
What I said was having the player become the Divine Visitor and take the roll he did worked for the story. Not that pressing the button was proof of anti-determinism. At the end of the day we're talking about a late 90's JRPG which are built linear by design. Does the game need to be Minecraft in order to truly have an anti-deterministic message? Lets unpack this. This is an interesting design choice. Why even have the Divine Visitor be the player character? Why give that decision point to press the button at all? Which is less deterministic, giving the player a decision point, as faux as it might be, or giving no decision point at all? Perhaps the game is signalling the positive nature of power: getting people to do things without coercion. Which is in stark contrast to what Craymen and the Emperor wanted with the power of the towers and monsters. They wanted to rule with force. At the end, the player wants to continue the story and the ultimate power wants to be destroyed. So the ultimate power gives the player a method to make both things possible and commands the player to do it. Stopping the cutscene to press the button wasn't required. Edge or the Divine Visitor could've done that without the pause, but the pause was there to give the player an opportunity to decide. The decision is an easy one, but it didn't have to take place and it didn't involve coercion. As simple and as obvious as the decision was to make, it was done by the player's free will.
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Post by Sonnington on May 14, 2016 17:12:24 GMT
Scorcher is absolutely awesome. The art style and gameplay are top notch. It's like a racer-platformer with the amount of jumping in it.
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Post by Sonnington on May 12, 2016 1:04:26 GMT
Oh cool, I'm not so far off then. One thing I'm not entirely sure I'm correct about is the prophecy that the dragon would save the town. I'm pretty sure, when you reach the citizen's area, you talk to a guy in a store room who talks about how the food from the forest gods and the gods prophecized the dragon would save the town and keep the town safe. Am I right about that or am I misremembering?
Also, I remember reading from time to time that people didn't like the ending, but I always avoided reading why that was and I can't find those posts anymore. I'm wondering why that is. Is there something I'm missing?
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Post by Sonnington on May 9, 2016 20:03:53 GMT
First off, spoilers obviously. Secondly, it took me about 8 months to finish this game so it's very possible I'm misremembering the story in places. Thirdly, I tried searching for the thread where the ending was being discussed to no avail, so here I am making a new topic.
I absolutely loved this game. Despite it taking me so long I think this game is awesome and holds up very well to modern games. The only issues I had was with disc 4. It became rather tedious. Everything up until that point had extremely good pacing and I think with updated graphics you could easily release this game in full today.
My only disappointment was with most of disc 4. It had you flying around on top of a forest and through dungeon corridors wondering where you were supposed to go and what you were supposed to be doing. In terms of gameplay the ending lost steam and felt a bit rushed. Besides that, the end of the story was very well crafted and thought provoking. Here's my interpretation, let me know if I'm all wet here. The overall theme to story is fairly anti-deterministic and anti-dogmatic/theologic in tone.
Some of the events and elements throughout the game that show this would include the dragon and Edge being prophesied to protect the town of Zoah and ultimately failing. Then you have Azel eventually developing freewill despite heavy programming. You also have Paet who ostensibly burnt a Bible outside the mayor's house in Zoah. Then you have the emperor and Craymen locked in a battle to control the power of the towers through Azel. Both ultimately failing.
Craymen convinces Edge that the monsters and power from the towers are essential to life on the planet and they must be controlled by someone honourable and the emperor cant do it because he's evil. Then you have Gash who wants to destroy that power and free the world from the monsters. Edge doesn't know who to believe after Gash tells him this, but goes along with him anyway because he's weak in character and Craymen is dead.
The very end of the story has Edge meet an ultimate power or a god. Edge thinks it's the divine visitor, but what this ultimate organism is, is unclear. What is made clear is that the divine visitor is the player himself and is ultimately the god of the story. Which is a bit of a dues ex machina, 4th wall breaking, bizarre plot twist, but it works for the impact of the message the story wants to convey. So essentially the player destroys the existing oppressive power structure and ultimately god of the Panzer Dragoon world. While this has clear implications of antireligious sentiment and anti-tradition/anti-dogma. It's really an advocation of free will and free thought. The idea that you shouldn't follow simply because someone told you to, but because it's the right thing to do and what you want. That you are an empowered and powerful force that can move worlds.
After you kill God you see Gash at the end say, apprehensively, something to the effect of, 'We'll have to travel without a destination.' Which is an allusion to not blindly following dogma and making your own path. After that Azel rides her definitely-not-chocobo into electrical storms to look for Edge, which symbolizes the danger of charting uncertain waters, which is what a rejection of blindly following dogma entails.
While I don't like the idea of discarding all of the traditional values simply because they're dogmatic. I do like the promotion of free-thought, choice, and questioning of tradition. Or maybe I'm completely off and misinterpret the ending. In any event, it's a hell of a deep story and powerful ending if I am right. Also, is it supposed to be a cliffhanger with Azel running off looking for Edge like that? It's certainly an opening for a sequel.
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Post by Sonnington on Apr 28, 2016 8:20:46 GMT
That's interesting. I have a tangential question. Is the analogue stick supposed to twist? Like, when you take it by your index finger and thumb you can twist it like a clock slightly. Also, have you ever been using it and then it just randomly crunches for some reason or another?
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Post by Sonnington on Apr 25, 2016 23:29:30 GMT
I thought it was an above average platformer. The graphics are good and the mechanics are unique.
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Post by Sonnington on Jan 24, 2016 16:50:19 GMT
I have to finish PDS. I'm not sure why I haven't. It's one of the best RPGs I've ever played and one of the prettiest Saturn games ever. Probably the best looking. I guess I just know once it's over it's over. Once it's completed I won't have anything to look forward to. The game has been hyped forever for me and it's absolutely lived up to that hype. I even played an hour or two of it on a Saturn emulator 4-5 years ago before shutting it off, because I wanted to play it on Saturn.
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Post by Sonnington on Jan 24, 2016 15:55:18 GMT
if you like rts I take it you've played Z on the saturn, right? Nope, never heard of it. I usually stay away from single player or console RTS. I actually didn't know this game existed, thanks for the heads up.
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Post by Sonnington on Jan 20, 2016 20:51:37 GMT
I'll add another one: DRAGON FORCE I just don't get it. It's basically just a complex game of rock, paper scissors. It's something like Archers>Soldiers>Something Else>Archers, it's been a few years since I played it. Then you add in formation moving which changes the dynamic where Soldiers can start beating Archers with the proper formation. Once you figure out the proper formations it becomes a boring grind fest. Until that point it's a pretty fun game.
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