Ogre Battle 64 - Nintendo 64 Review - Ultra HDMI - HD

ouka battle 64 person of lordly caliber is something of an anomaly on the Nintendo 64 ever since Final Fantasy 7 was switched to the Sony Playstation funds were constantly yearning for role-playing games to land on their n64 with the Super Nintendo being a treasure trove for RPG fans the n64 was anything but and along with the fighting game genre they became two of the consoles library holes which ultimately hurt the console in the longer term but that's not to say that the n64 didn't get any RPGs quest 64 left fans wanting more Paper Mario was a great example and aydin's Chronicles was well that's Aiden chronicles super nintendo fans may recall the ogre battle series which blended RPG elements with tactical battle strategy elements it was a winning formula but 1 which would always have a niche audience in fact for many gamers the most interesting thing about agha battle is that the series name of ogre battle comes from the band Queens album - the two super nintendo titles were march of the black queen and let us cling together both also named after other Queen songs thankfully though the games developer quest decided to end that tradition when they developed person of lordly caliber an original title this time published by Atlas in the year 2000 this was a Japanese and North American only game not being released in PAL regions and my local game store never being able to get an import copy the midnight didn't actually get to play the game until around the year 2002 I do however we remember seeing the game frequently in n64 Magazine and being disappointed when they confirm that the PAL release was cancelled featuring a huge single-player campaign beautiful sprite graphics the unrendered backgrounds and more depth than backstory than probably half the n64 library combined ogre battle 64 person of lordly caliber is not for the faint of heart starting with a game story this is set as the sixth chapter in the overall ogre battle saga but you don't really need to play the previous games to jump into the series if this is your first game the story follows Magnus gallant after joining the army in the game's intro sequence he jumped forward to seven years later where he graduates from the military academy and you'll take over control the world in which the game takes place is in turmoil and the choices you make in the game will affect not only how your character plays but also the game's ending of which there are six different endings to see evil backstory - the game is extremely in-depth it involves morality classism politics religion in fact I feel the game goes much more in depth with the law of the world that could turn some gamers off with an overload of information even before you take control saying that though I expect that this game will have always appealed to long term RPG funds and so I know from my own personal experience I kind of lap up that type of story and I personally like having more depth to help to become more engrossed in the story in addition to that as previously mentioned the story will test your views on certain events in the game and so the story will evolve as a game progresses and for the record when I say the game has six different endings they are all completely different ends to the story this isn't a game where you make a decision which will have a minor change to it now I've tried to be as limited with story details here because I appreciate that many people will have either overlooked this title in the past or never played it before and I want you to go into it with as little knowledge as possible because I found the story to be engrossing engaging and as the game is rated team it contained mature language which I think helped make the characters more believable in my own mind now if you thought that the story was deep then the game plays on a whole nother level if anyone is brand new to the series it is essential and I mean essential that you play the games tutorial the tutorial will take a long time to complete probably over an hour or so but because of the mechanics of the game is so complex you'll stand no chance in the main story campaign mode without doing this tutorial also anyone who's a fan of these super nintendo games all over at first glance the game plane may appear to be similar to the snez titles there are some gameplay Changez so you'll also want to brush up in the tutorial now with that out of the way let's talk about the gameplay in a simple terms as possible the main campaign is broken down into smaller chapters and each chapter in the story has smaller sub missions which you'll need to complete naturally each mission typically involves you overtaking a specific target stronghold in order to complete it and you'll also fail the mission if your own stronghold is overrun or your character is killed at the start of the campaign you're given an overview of the intended objectives for the storyline purposes but it's always ultimately up to you whether you want to listen to the advice that you're given or come up with your own plan to meet the objective yourself part of the tactical elements of over battle 64 are your unit building skills each unit in your army has room for potentially 5 warriors who are your place on a 3x3 grid each unit must also have a leader included within those 5 characters and some of the larger character such as beasts can take up two of the five places in each unit you do need to think tactically for example if you place your warriors like swordsmen at the front of the grid then they'll get extra attacks in the battle but if you're attacked from behind they'll be weaker and easier for your enemies to take out likewise if you have your archers or magicians you'll likely places at the back of your unit for ranged attacks but the downside is they'll have less moves meaning less of a chance to do damage part of the fun of ogre battle 64 is this unit building and allocating heroes to your teams and getting them the right equipment you'll be able to buy and upgrade them as you progress by earning gold from winning battles and completing campaigns and so like any good RPG they'll gain experience from battles with your enemies which it will in turn upgrade their stats and also allow them to evolve into different evolutions through a skill tree with your units created you're set for campaigning and this takes place on an overworld map you'll see your stronghold which acts as your base and the local area will be scattered with other towns and villages which could either be liberated already meaning that they will welcome you into them or you could have neutral towns which you can choose the liberate and strongholds which may have already been captured by the enemy which you'll want to overthrow and take control of each town has a different population and morale and so sometimes you'll need to gather intel on the stronghold before deciding to take over as in some cases they may strongly resist your attempt to take it over likewise if you do liberate a stronghold then the army will be thrown from it but they won't leave it alone for long they may regroup or instantly come back at you to battle again and so part of the game is a constant battle between progressing towards your target stronghold whilst also defending the strongholds that you have taken I mention the games battles a moment ago and for me this was perhaps the more unique element of the game now if you're a long-term fan of turn-based RPGs then this game maybe isn't for you as ogre battle 64 you don't actually have much control over the battles and instead you take on more of a general overseeing the unit now when you're in the overall map you'll see enemy units and if you come into contact them a battle will be triggered now it's also worth noting at this point that as the overworld map has a real-time clock the time of day will also have an impact on your characters and the enemies for example some battle will better at nighttime and others will be weaker if you try and battle them in the daytime and also vice versa also attacking your enemy head-on will lead to a balanced battle if you attack an enemy from behind you'll have the upper hand as their characters in the unit will be reversed which will greatly impact on their ability to attack you but be warned though the same applies if you are flanked yourself in battle your characters will automatically attack the enemy and use certain spells when attacking them and magic to upgrade health and boost and so on each character will have a set amount of attacks that they will make depending on their stats and positioning in the unit of the battle and the battle will come to an end when every character on the battlefield as either have their set amount of turns or they've died but note that battles do not continue until all characters are dead after each character has taken their turns the damage is totalled up and winner will be the team that inflicted the most damage if enemy characters do survive they will be moved a short distance away from you when you return to the overworld map and you can choose then to either finish your job by taking them on again or you can continue on your path but know full well that they may regroup and actually come back to attack you when you're in the battles you do have a limited amount of control you can give instructions such as attacking the leader of the enemies group attacking the weakest character the strongest character and so on and you also have the ability to call for larger magical attacks which should you feel the need to you may sound a little complicated and to be fair it is but it's a kind of game which after a few levels you'll get to grips with fairly easily and you can start to find your feet in it later on in the game you'll have multiple army units traveling across the map to various locations and so it's not uncommon to be going from one battle to the next when things get intense seeing your units level up and become stronger it's one of the most enjoyable parts of the game but it does have its flaws it's not impossible to reach around the midpoint of the game and have at least a few units in your army which are massively overpowered the result of this is winning battles fairly easily and so the game's difficulty curve gets blurred some point around the middle of the game for seasoned players your first time through the game however will be challenging and there's a huge campaign story some of the levels in the campaign are stronger than others but with a fantastic storyline in the mix you'll want to complete levels to see what happens next and what decisions the game will ask you to make to evolve your character it's a game where the mechanic will definitely not be for everyone but if you give it a good few hours and I can't see how he wouldn't be sucked right into the game like I was for me the most refreshing thing about the game though were the graphics which I personally loved seeing a studio throughout sprites on the console in the year 2000 so it's just how little they cared about appealing to the masses in fact in one interview the game's producer specifically said he felt that as long as the story was good it didn't matter that the game had what would be considered as retro visuals for that time what we get here in a way is a throwback to the graphical style of older consoles it's a love letter to the RPG genres of history whilst also incorporating some limited 3d work to bring it into the modern era the sprite animations are gorgeous and the characters enemies scenery they're all superb you'll also notice subtle details like character's body language physical actions like drawing out swords and cut scenes and even candles flickering on tables the effects and battle are just as well done and a lot seeing the brawls take place near magical effects which were also amazingly well done is rare for me to say this but I wouldn't have changed a single thing with the visuals in the game I feel that they are already that good equally is mesmerizing is the game soundtrack the music in the game is breathtaking from the cutscenes to the overworld to the battles the music in the game is high-quality and the composition perfectly fit the game when story elements progress the music has a calm and tranquil tone to it when you're in the overworld map or on the campaign then it turns into what you would have thought is a more epic in heroic piece of music and then when you've got tough decisions to make it draws you in for music which has slightly calming but at the same time sinister tones to it just listen to the game's full soundtrack on YouTube and I doubt you'll find any pieces of music which you don't think sound great nothing sounds generic bland or boring is the soundtrack that you can listen to in isolation but when combined with the gameplay and storyline it takes on a whole nother level I'm sure by now that you can tell that overall I feel is this is an incredible game and one which I would like to think that many of you watching will also agree with or for those who haven't played the game that you're now eager to go out and try it the game received generally positive reviews and it's launched and it was well received as a whole the downside is that outlets work cautious when publishing and so the print run was very low the result of that now is that the game is becoming increasingly expensive to pick up a physical copy of what alternative though is downloading the Virtual Console version and it's funny now because some of the Virtual Console review were actually higher than the n64 release at the time as those reviewers stated just how well the games aged and in fact is refreshing to play it in the modern era no matter how you play the game just play it even at the higher price point the game packs a huge amount of content and depth for anyone to really get stuck into if you feel that there's a lack of depth in many n64 games and you've already mastered Starcraft 64 in command & Conquer then this may be the game to get your strategy RPG fix on and so for today's topic of conversation I'd love to know your thoughts on the game like me do you love it what do you actually disagree and think that the game is a convoluted mess of fiddly menus boring combat and overly compact storyline modes which had a Civil War element thrown into it I'd also love to hear from anyone who picked this up on launch and what you made of it and also how easy was it for you to get hold of this game when it was launched I remember being on a waiting list for months when I knew that the games released in the US and being so frustrated about not being able to play it at the time as always though let me know your thoughts and feelings in the comments section down below and until next time

Channel: N64 Glenn Plant

Views: 80,056

Keywords: ogre battle 64, person of lordly caliber, queen, live, march of the black queen, n64, nintendo 64, rpg, role playing game, music, soundtrack, ost, theme, song, snes, guitar, lesson, tutorial, revolt, ending, best ending, battle theme, lets play, walkthrough, trailer, drunk, tactical, starcraft 64, command conquor, shrek, rom, ps1, playstation, psp, portable, tactics ogre, gba, gameboy advance, let us cling together, knights of lodis, top 5, top 10, best, worst

Id: 6DwySiBWv6w

Length: 14min 31sec (871 seconds)

Published: Fri Nov 30 2018