I had to make my own suikoden icon :(
Aug. 11th, 2023 11:33 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ichthyocentaursI wish there was like, a repository for old style LJ avatars, because there was such a specific artistry to them in their day that's hard to replicate, and even if you can find them now a ton are claimed by the curse of the photobucket watermark. :( such a bummer.
I eneded up making my own by iffily coloring in a panel from the Suikoden 5 gag comic, which is SO good. Eventually I want to make one for Suiko 3, but same problem finding any as above, so I’ll be coloring the manga again I suppose. Also I don't have room (I wish we got a few more freebie slots but it's ok.....)
I wanted to write my thoughts after finishing Suikoden 5 but it’s taken… forever. I have this problem where I get too editorial, then I can tell that I am and it annoys me so I’m trapped in a loop. I WANT to talk about ships and stuff but the story is also important to me so it's hard. After so much time picking and pecking this became something of a frankenstein post and stupidly long so I’m going to put a lot of it behind a cut after all.
First off obligatory: 5 is a HUGE improvement from 4. To avoid being too negative I won't get into it, but that game truly was missing the Suikoden Spark. They knew they messed up and 5 obviously tried to recreate what worked from the other games to mostly good results. The hours of setup make the story weighty and the huge betrayal is devastating no matter how much you expect it. It’s the first time the main character is dashed from such a lofty position to having 3 people on your side, and anyone not trying to kill you is trying to exploit you. (I almost wish there was more of that but the game is long enough, I did 100 hours easily.) The build to your full army is nicely paced and there’s a good amount of twists in there. It’s not that most subtle story but I think it’s totally fine to not get too complicated. Keep it simple and do it well and other aspects like characters and gameplay will prop up anything else.
Anyway that’s boring I wanna talk about all the characters I like, with 108 there’s a lot of choices.
Maybe top tier, both in personality and usefulness in game: Zerase!! Viki and Jeane are alright but have never my favorites no matter how recurring they are, so adding a few more mysterious lady mages in was a great idea, and Zerase is an easy fav. She's a touch tsundere, a little bit gothy and not thrilled to be there, contrasting well with sexy lady and cute girl. (Eresh showed up too but...... frankly she's just the secretly 100 year old loli option and seems boring and I'd rather have a more fulfilling story by picking Euram to join over her. I did her dungeon just to prove I could and she didn't do anything for me personally.)
It’s too bad we didn’t get a Suiko 6, because I think Bernadette would have shown up at some point. I love that she is yet another aunt of MC but doesn't know it, and I wish it was explored but at the same time that’s a good space for fandom to fill. I think she could have redeemed the Island Nations in a way, since Lino in 4 was dumb as hell and so is her dad, whereas she's really serious and I’d like to see their country be actually cool. Her and Nelis's fish hats are super cute too. Unfortunately Yahr is SO close to being cute but isn't; I wish better for Island Nationers. They should be cool!
I wish we got a little more of Craig... hot green haired middle aged guy who kind of cowards out and then resigns... if I had a Suiko oc making partner I feel like a ship would have been made for him. Too bad. :'( Orok is also a green haired cute guy but kind of a little bitch (affectionate), more green haired boys for me to put in my secret collection I guess.
Nifsara is one of the best characters ever. If people knew about her they’d probably be mad LOL thanks Suikoden 5 for not being very popular and being old but this hot lady who loves pretty boys… a lot… so much that she works for someone because he is pretty, wants to join the mc because HE is pretty, starts a group of pretty boy lovers, and ranks the prettiest boys in your army. I’ve seen characters who were obviously meant to be like, yaoi shipper girls being poked fun of, but I’ve never seen something that hits this particular type of person, and I love her for it. Actually I really like all the Harmonians that join you and used her and Sharmista even though they come in late and I had to train them up. Sharmista is just really cute and basically replaces a certain someone who I missed. And Shula IS a pretty boy, plus I’m weak for the middle eastern-ish flair they have. (It is a little… eh… that Harmonia is like, an aggressive militaristic theocracy and they’re Middle Eastern themed but that just seems to be a favorite choice of many authors even though there’s alternatives that very much fit that mold… I will not get political but you know what I’m thinkin here hahahaha.)
Norma and Ernst are so great, I love their dynamic. Of course I am very weak for dude-that-is-animal but god they're so charming as a couple. I especially like that it's pretty confirmed They Be Fuckin and I'm kinda bummed no one wrote a fic about their night together (ok to be fair I didn't look at more contemporary sites I'm not going onto ff dot net anymore). Norma making sweets for him because he loves them in human form is so cute, but her determination to have him cured while respecting him as a person is like, ugh. I wish we got more of Ernst in human form but it is what it is. They're fun in the gag comic, I’m glad the artist thought to frog prince the situation. (Aside about actually playing the game but while Ernst's rune is kind of annoying to use since you have to waste a turn, I did totally cheese one of the final dungeon bosses by having him put it into dizzy status every round LOL. That team was a little weaker than intended so like. :) yeah it's called being a pro gamer~~)
I did enjoy that there is like a confirmed real lesbian couple in Lucretia and Lelei (and that they fucking break up later LMAO) but Lelei is kinda boring... someone did write a really good fic about them though which I'm just adopting as canon. They even fit in Sialeeds and Lucretia having a bad relationship, really digging into the hatefuck zone that those two really hovered in. I’m glad I wasn’t alone in seeing that. You’re obsessed with hating a lady to your dying breath… sounds like yuri to me.
Most of all I can't believe there aren't more Roog/Rahal fics... like "weirdly attractive" when Rahal crossdresses. Roog oblivious when Logg is mad that Lun visits the dragons. Their dragons fuck and have an egg together. The investigation where Rahal says the only difference between Roog and his dragon is that he eats anything. I know I am putting on my yaoi girl goggles but they really tick my boxes for that era and if I'd played it back then they'd be deeply imprinted on my soul forever OTP kind of shit. If I could turn back time...
Quickies: I don't like ship it but I love how old and divorced Galleon and Silva are. They are totally actually divorced but still care about each other. It's great. More people like this in jrpgs or just games in general I don't care.
The person who wrote Lorelai/Killey/Zweig fucking in a ruin with light bondage is so fucking big brained. I wish there was someone who wrote Wasil/Volga/Orok like that.
I don’t know if I like Lun/Subala or not… it’s really funny that Lun just straight up calls her ugly and I can see it as a maybe… but they’re kinda fun as just rival/friends. I wanna be convinced.
(To fit in one small ship complaint there’s like, not a ton of canon ones, but I kinda hate that the good end pretty strongly implies that the main character and Lyon will get together. I don’t dislike Lyon but I also don’t really like her that much and it’s the kind of ship I find really boring where it’s like well ~naturally~ they’d end up together. Also since the mc already has a really strong siscon thing going on, usually you’d contrast that with his ship as opposed to like, him ending up with his sisterly-bodyguard instead. But whatever it doesn’t show them getting married I can pretend mc grows into looking like Ferid and kisses Kyle or whatever I want hehe.)
My favorite couple is definitely Arshtat and Ferid... again if I had someone to discuss this all with I'd get obsessed with them I think. This tragic romance of these hot adults is so, italian pinching fingers. Ferid is just like, the coolest dude who is a good dad and husband and friend, and Arshtat is sometimes possessed by a nuke. <3 So relationshipcore. <3 We don't even get to see that much of them but they make a strong impression and the mystery of how they die carried a lot of intrigue, and when you get the reveal--ouch. But in the best way! Even though I thought I’d do spoilers I still want to shy away from this one, because it's such a good moment. Especially because the whole game I harbored the sure feeling that they were not really dead--that there would be a reveal where Lym would try to use the sun rune and it wouldn't work because the true queen was still out there somehow, and then she and Ferid would appear as last minute roster additions--but no. And thinking that there was a possibility made it hurt even better! So good.
Ok, now we are in the complaint department. It got way longer than intended these are honestly pretty minor, I just talk too much.
1. I am really not one to complain about graphics but this game looks SO cheap. The bird’s eye isometric view (I know you can zoom in but then you're just staring at the ass textures closer) is probably meant to emulate the 2D of 1/2 and be more budget-friendly but even 4 managed to be over the shoulder. Suiko 3 in comparison looks incredible, they should’ve stuck with the ps1-ish texture and stylization. Hindsight is 20/20 on how much better that looks than attempts at realism.
2. Why do the Island Nation's men have a traditional soul patch. This is not a real complaint but like one surfer king (who was lame) had one 100 years ago and it’s maintained. It's kinda hilarious but Ferid would just be hotter without it I'm sorry this is personal to me!!!
3. I wish a few of the strategies felt a little riskier, or maybe you had to do some kind of bad things to get your way instead of pretty much being fully supported the whole time (I get that a lot of the game is how you were fucked and people know it, but it all feels so easy). Lucretia sometimes is too good a strategist; the point where you forfeit all your collected land just for a simple trap works out a little too perfectly... though I appreciate that you are allowed to mess up her strategy, and pay for it.
4. Not enough cute boys. Every girl's design is like a work of art but a bunch of the dudes look dumb. In general the design of the characters themselves is pretty decent but...
5. God the costume design is highly hit-or-miss in this. I don't mind some overdesigned jrpg outfits (because mostly this is me as a person who does fanart wanting to complain about how it's hard to draw) but a lot of them are SO ugly. Arshtat is beautiful but is wearing 20 layers of drapes and stiff shoulderpads that somehow go under her boobs. Haswar's vestment over tunic looks like the lead apron you wear during x-rays. Lucretia has at least 5 layers of robes of basically the same length. Every Queen's Knight not only wears their uniforms styled differently (acceptable), they also clearly have totally different variations (so, not uniforms). Wtf is the material the Island Nations girls are wearing, rubber?? And Sialeeds is a MESS. I reflexively worry about these thoughts because I'm like ugh, am I just being a tumblrina wanting to redesign this garbage with my purity complex, but I don’t want to decrease the sexiness at all. Sialeeds’s outfit is clearly bodycon inspired but they had to throw this awful jacket over her. And she's just wearing a separated collar?? I think it's also partially because clothes construction has become more interesting to me over time, so seeing things that aren't just poorly designed, but on top of that don't make any sense it's like, come on.
6. The ending is a bit... odd. We go through the entire game with straightforward, extremely evil and treacherous villains. Then suddenly, they start monologuing about how well, they're just doing what they think is best for the country! And when we kick their asses and fucking murder them!! we see a vision of their ghosts like they were meant to be respected for that. Like... no this dude is a racist traitor who married my 10 year old sister with the intent of turning her into a living nuclear deterrent. I don't respect him! I respect fangirls who woobify him because he looks like that blond guy from FE 3 Houses but I don't need Konami to do that for anyone.
I have no particular conclusion to this. Suikoden 5 was refreshing and just what I needed to play this year. I love jrpgs and want to play them forever. :)
I eneded up making my own by iffily coloring in a panel from the Suikoden 5 gag comic, which is SO good. Eventually I want to make one for Suiko 3, but same problem finding any as above, so I’ll be coloring the manga again I suppose. Also I don't have room (I wish we got a few more freebie slots but it's ok.....)
I wanted to write my thoughts after finishing Suikoden 5 but it’s taken… forever. I have this problem where I get too editorial, then I can tell that I am and it annoys me so I’m trapped in a loop. I WANT to talk about ships and stuff but the story is also important to me so it's hard. After so much time picking and pecking this became something of a frankenstein post and stupidly long so I’m going to put a lot of it behind a cut after all.
First off obligatory: 5 is a HUGE improvement from 4. To avoid being too negative I won't get into it, but that game truly was missing the Suikoden Spark. They knew they messed up and 5 obviously tried to recreate what worked from the other games to mostly good results. The hours of setup make the story weighty and the huge betrayal is devastating no matter how much you expect it. It’s the first time the main character is dashed from such a lofty position to having 3 people on your side, and anyone not trying to kill you is trying to exploit you. (I almost wish there was more of that but the game is long enough, I did 100 hours easily.) The build to your full army is nicely paced and there’s a good amount of twists in there. It’s not that most subtle story but I think it’s totally fine to not get too complicated. Keep it simple and do it well and other aspects like characters and gameplay will prop up anything else.
Anyway that’s boring I wanna talk about all the characters I like, with 108 there’s a lot of choices.
Maybe top tier, both in personality and usefulness in game: Zerase!! Viki and Jeane are alright but have never my favorites no matter how recurring they are, so adding a few more mysterious lady mages in was a great idea, and Zerase is an easy fav. She's a touch tsundere, a little bit gothy and not thrilled to be there, contrasting well with sexy lady and cute girl. (Eresh showed up too but...... frankly she's just the secretly 100 year old loli option and seems boring and I'd rather have a more fulfilling story by picking Euram to join over her. I did her dungeon just to prove I could and she didn't do anything for me personally.)
It’s too bad we didn’t get a Suiko 6, because I think Bernadette would have shown up at some point. I love that she is yet another aunt of MC but doesn't know it, and I wish it was explored but at the same time that’s a good space for fandom to fill. I think she could have redeemed the Island Nations in a way, since Lino in 4 was dumb as hell and so is her dad, whereas she's really serious and I’d like to see their country be actually cool. Her and Nelis's fish hats are super cute too. Unfortunately Yahr is SO close to being cute but isn't; I wish better for Island Nationers. They should be cool!
I wish we got a little more of Craig... hot green haired middle aged guy who kind of cowards out and then resigns... if I had a Suiko oc making partner I feel like a ship would have been made for him. Too bad. :'( Orok is also a green haired cute guy but kind of a little bitch (affectionate), more green haired boys for me to put in my secret collection I guess.
Nifsara is one of the best characters ever. If people knew about her they’d probably be mad LOL thanks Suikoden 5 for not being very popular and being old but this hot lady who loves pretty boys… a lot… so much that she works for someone because he is pretty, wants to join the mc because HE is pretty, starts a group of pretty boy lovers, and ranks the prettiest boys in your army. I’ve seen characters who were obviously meant to be like, yaoi shipper girls being poked fun of, but I’ve never seen something that hits this particular type of person, and I love her for it. Actually I really like all the Harmonians that join you and used her and Sharmista even though they come in late and I had to train them up. Sharmista is just really cute and basically replaces a certain someone who I missed. And Shula IS a pretty boy, plus I’m weak for the middle eastern-ish flair they have. (It is a little… eh… that Harmonia is like, an aggressive militaristic theocracy and they’re Middle Eastern themed but that just seems to be a favorite choice of many authors even though there’s alternatives that very much fit that mold… I will not get political but you know what I’m thinkin here hahahaha.)
Norma and Ernst are so great, I love their dynamic. Of course I am very weak for dude-that-is-animal but god they're so charming as a couple. I especially like that it's pretty confirmed They Be Fuckin and I'm kinda bummed no one wrote a fic about their night together (ok to be fair I didn't look at more contemporary sites I'm not going onto ff dot net anymore). Norma making sweets for him because he loves them in human form is so cute, but her determination to have him cured while respecting him as a person is like, ugh. I wish we got more of Ernst in human form but it is what it is. They're fun in the gag comic, I’m glad the artist thought to frog prince the situation. (Aside about actually playing the game but while Ernst's rune is kind of annoying to use since you have to waste a turn, I did totally cheese one of the final dungeon bosses by having him put it into dizzy status every round LOL. That team was a little weaker than intended so like. :) yeah it's called being a pro gamer~~)
I did enjoy that there is like a confirmed real lesbian couple in Lucretia and Lelei (and that they fucking break up later LMAO) but Lelei is kinda boring... someone did write a really good fic about them though which I'm just adopting as canon. They even fit in Sialeeds and Lucretia having a bad relationship, really digging into the hatefuck zone that those two really hovered in. I’m glad I wasn’t alone in seeing that. You’re obsessed with hating a lady to your dying breath… sounds like yuri to me.
Most of all I can't believe there aren't more Roog/Rahal fics... like "weirdly attractive" when Rahal crossdresses. Roog oblivious when Logg is mad that Lun visits the dragons. Their dragons fuck and have an egg together. The investigation where Rahal says the only difference between Roog and his dragon is that he eats anything. I know I am putting on my yaoi girl goggles but they really tick my boxes for that era and if I'd played it back then they'd be deeply imprinted on my soul forever OTP kind of shit. If I could turn back time...
Quickies: I don't like ship it but I love how old and divorced Galleon and Silva are. They are totally actually divorced but still care about each other. It's great. More people like this in jrpgs or just games in general I don't care.
The person who wrote Lorelai/Killey/Zweig fucking in a ruin with light bondage is so fucking big brained. I wish there was someone who wrote Wasil/Volga/Orok like that.
I don’t know if I like Lun/Subala or not… it’s really funny that Lun just straight up calls her ugly and I can see it as a maybe… but they’re kinda fun as just rival/friends. I wanna be convinced.
(To fit in one small ship complaint there’s like, not a ton of canon ones, but I kinda hate that the good end pretty strongly implies that the main character and Lyon will get together. I don’t dislike Lyon but I also don’t really like her that much and it’s the kind of ship I find really boring where it’s like well ~naturally~ they’d end up together. Also since the mc already has a really strong siscon thing going on, usually you’d contrast that with his ship as opposed to like, him ending up with his sisterly-bodyguard instead. But whatever it doesn’t show them getting married I can pretend mc grows into looking like Ferid and kisses Kyle or whatever I want hehe.)
My favorite couple is definitely Arshtat and Ferid... again if I had someone to discuss this all with I'd get obsessed with them I think. This tragic romance of these hot adults is so, italian pinching fingers. Ferid is just like, the coolest dude who is a good dad and husband and friend, and Arshtat is sometimes possessed by a nuke. <3 So relationshipcore. <3 We don't even get to see that much of them but they make a strong impression and the mystery of how they die carried a lot of intrigue, and when you get the reveal--ouch. But in the best way! Even though I thought I’d do spoilers I still want to shy away from this one, because it's such a good moment. Especially because the whole game I harbored the sure feeling that they were not really dead--that there would be a reveal where Lym would try to use the sun rune and it wouldn't work because the true queen was still out there somehow, and then she and Ferid would appear as last minute roster additions--but no. And thinking that there was a possibility made it hurt even better! So good.
Ok, now we are in the complaint department. It got way longer than intended these are honestly pretty minor, I just talk too much.
1. I am really not one to complain about graphics but this game looks SO cheap. The bird’s eye isometric view (I know you can zoom in but then you're just staring at the ass textures closer) is probably meant to emulate the 2D of 1/2 and be more budget-friendly but even 4 managed to be over the shoulder. Suiko 3 in comparison looks incredible, they should’ve stuck with the ps1-ish texture and stylization. Hindsight is 20/20 on how much better that looks than attempts at realism.
2. Why do the Island Nation's men have a traditional soul patch. This is not a real complaint but like one surfer king (who was lame) had one 100 years ago and it’s maintained. It's kinda hilarious but Ferid would just be hotter without it I'm sorry this is personal to me!!!
3. I wish a few of the strategies felt a little riskier, or maybe you had to do some kind of bad things to get your way instead of pretty much being fully supported the whole time (I get that a lot of the game is how you were fucked and people know it, but it all feels so easy). Lucretia sometimes is too good a strategist; the point where you forfeit all your collected land just for a simple trap works out a little too perfectly... though I appreciate that you are allowed to mess up her strategy, and pay for it.
4. Not enough cute boys. Every girl's design is like a work of art but a bunch of the dudes look dumb. In general the design of the characters themselves is pretty decent but...
5. God the costume design is highly hit-or-miss in this. I don't mind some overdesigned jrpg outfits (because mostly this is me as a person who does fanart wanting to complain about how it's hard to draw) but a lot of them are SO ugly. Arshtat is beautiful but is wearing 20 layers of drapes and stiff shoulderpads that somehow go under her boobs. Haswar's vestment over tunic looks like the lead apron you wear during x-rays. Lucretia has at least 5 layers of robes of basically the same length. Every Queen's Knight not only wears their uniforms styled differently (acceptable), they also clearly have totally different variations (so, not uniforms). Wtf is the material the Island Nations girls are wearing, rubber?? And Sialeeds is a MESS. I reflexively worry about these thoughts because I'm like ugh, am I just being a tumblrina wanting to redesign this garbage with my purity complex, but I don’t want to decrease the sexiness at all. Sialeeds’s outfit is clearly bodycon inspired but they had to throw this awful jacket over her. And she's just wearing a separated collar?? I think it's also partially because clothes construction has become more interesting to me over time, so seeing things that aren't just poorly designed, but on top of that don't make any sense it's like, come on.
6. The ending is a bit... odd. We go through the entire game with straightforward, extremely evil and treacherous villains. Then suddenly, they start monologuing about how well, they're just doing what they think is best for the country! And when we kick their asses and fucking murder them!! we see a vision of their ghosts like they were meant to be respected for that. Like... no this dude is a racist traitor who married my 10 year old sister with the intent of turning her into a living nuclear deterrent. I don't respect him! I respect fangirls who woobify him because he looks like that blond guy from FE 3 Houses but I don't need Konami to do that for anyone.
I have no particular conclusion to this. Suikoden 5 was refreshing and just what I needed to play this year. I love jrpgs and want to play them forever. :)
no subject
Date: 2023-08-14 01:22 pm (UTC)suikoden is one of those game series where the idea of trying to get into playing is kinda overwhelming but i still love seeing ppl talk about it because there's always so much passion. craig sounds fun and so does the divorced couple, and the tragedy you hint at makes me want to read more about arshtat and ferid. (zoroastrian name... interesting)
i can't find it now but there was a website back in the early 2000s that did video game reviews in an intentionally obnoxious way (lots of boner/penis jokes, etc, lampooning the stereotype of horny teen boy gamer, no connection to game grumps) and i'm positive they did a review of suikoden v because the premise sounds familiar. if i manage to locate it i can send the link your way.
re costume analysis - weirdly-constructed outfits are a pain in the ass for fan authors too! i remember trying to figure out this one yugioh outfit then just giving up and kinda handwaving part of the process of getting it off lol. it looks like sialeeds at least has a secondary outfit that seems more logical? but i don't know much about the intricacies of clothes construction.
no subject
Date: 2023-08-15 06:48 am (UTC)This is just my propaganda wing but honestly Suikoden is not tough to get into! tbh this is kind of a prime time (well... in the near future hopefully) because whenever they actually release the HD collection, 1 and 2 are very playable and not that long. 1 is good and 2 is very highly regarded for good reason. They're not difficult jrpgs. I originally worried about character recruitment but suikosource has pages for every game that let you know how and when to get people in a pretty spoiler free way. And like, the game's not ruined if you don't. I would highly recommend them, they're a lot of fun! Anyway lol
I can spoil their tragedy for you! let me know if you want that, I kinda doubt anyone else will describe it with the same weird passion (at least, nowadays, but I doubt they were any kind of popular ship).
Oh wow, I would love to read that if you find it. Suikoden 5 definitely has some good material for fake horny teenage boy type reviews lmao.
Oh my god lol, yeah, when you're taking clothes off and it's like does this button or unstrap or... what exactly?? I know the original characters are mostly pretty straightforward, but when you get into like 5ds and uhhh I had to look it up zexal I can see it getting way more difficult.
And she does have another outfit but it's temporary, it's mostly the very bright pink one! My resolution was just to push it into full bodycon territory, if only for my personal satisfaction.