Japanese Niche Games Deals & Discussion Thread 4.0

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shivan128

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Welcome to the Japanese niche games deals and discussion thread!  Feel free to talk about local and import Japanese games here.  Our goal is to maintain a thread dedicated to active deals on niche games including RPGs, Visual Novels (VN), Shoot'em ups (Shmups), Musou, etc.  Also maintained are pre-orders for standard, limited and collector's edition games with key release dates provided.

I've wikified the thread to make it more friendly and open to others that can actively update with important information. You can find the wiki post directly below this one.

NOTE:  Please, leave the censorship discussion away from this thread.  It's common for japanese games to have questionable content outside of the country.  We want to keep discussions to the game itself and not about cultural/societal tolerance.

A message from Thorbahn:

Our CAG Japanese Niche Games Thread also has a community on PS4, where you can interact and game with other members of the thread.

Our moderators are: Draekon, Las_Hole, and Waffleswanton

You can basically friend any of our members, or any moderator, and you will be able to request to join the community under "Communities friends are in" tab, and a mod will approve your request.

You can also leave your PSN ID in the thread, saying you want to join, and we can invite you directly as well.

As always, have fun and enjoy your stay!

 
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addicted2games said:
Must have been a reprint of DR4. That seller sold out on his amazon listing and his first listing on ebay. Now he has a second listing with more than 10 available.
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Ugh, sucks one of the few hard to find games I actually have gets reprinted but... whatever. There are so many games going for insane prices physically- I hope more get reprinted (come on Cold Steel and Ys games).

 
I bought the switch version of DR4 because I played the demo and enjoyed it and didn't find anything objectionable about how it ran.  I ended up pre-ordering it though because I figured it would be low print (it is a japanese niche game) and scalpers would make it hard to get it for a reasonable price later.   So, I've adapted to the market and which games I'll risk waiting on.  If I wasn't interested in playing DR4, I would have made the decision at launch to never bother buying it.   As for it being considered a bad game... nah... it was a pretty fun experience.  Sure it's PS2/3 level of gaming... but I don't consider PS2/3 adventure games like this bad.  It is what it is and if you like the series/genre.. then it's worth playing.  But surely a lot of people fear they missed out on something and are snapping up copies as they appear because it got valuable... but really... are you going to play it or is the value on the secondary market a big part of the appeal all of a sudden?

 
shadowysea07 said:
I remember someone mentioning either here or in another topic that lost sphear was cheaper if you import it and is in english for the asian release. Anyone have a link to the page on amazon specifically as I can't seem to find it myself. I think amazon jp was mentioned but I am not sure.
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The Japanese and the recent Asian release are both in English. This is according to Japanese ebay seller. The Asian version actually has a new trophy list.

 
Pikagreg said:
Wasn't the actual PSP store closed down in like 2016 or something?
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I'm a little confused by what they mean too.

I believe their PC software Media Go, while updates were discontinued, still functions. It's somewhat unknown but I would've adored to have had this same function for Vita. You can download your games and media from PSN directly to your PC, keep them there as a backup, and then transfer to your PSP later. When the PSP store on the system was closed I remember this being mentioned as "this will still work", so I wonder if they're finally going to kill it off.

I suppose the second possibility is the removal of PSP content from the PS3/Vita stores?

 
I was asking around about this yesterday and from what I learned apparently you're still able to buy stuff on the PSP. Sony did close the store for browsing but apparently you're able to search for games by name and buy them. Can't confirm that myself since my PSP battery exploded and I don't care to buy a new one since I just play on my Vita anyway, but, multiple people were explaining how it worked so I assume it's accurate. People seem to think that is what Sony means by turning off "PSP commerce." 

Regardless, the blog post doesn't really do a good job explaining it. Would be nice if they'd confirm PSP games will still be on the Vita store.

 
So Great Ace Attorney Chronicles release has been confirmed for July 21st.

Kinda pissed at Capcom last gen, actually, what do they have against western 3DS owners? No Monster Hunter XX, no Great Ace Attorney games, no Gaist Crusher, RER2 developed for nearly every platform other than the one RER originally came on, pffft.
 
elessar123 said:
I'm still confused if there's a native PS5 version or not, since I only see the PS4 (PS5 compatible) versions available.
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there will be a PS5 disc version

z_607fef806fdf8.jpg


 
shadowysea07 said:
Tales of arise(ia) got a release date. 9\9\21. I'm surprised that they are not delaying it to next year.
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It's called, "We need revenues, dude!" With so many releases likely getting pushed back to 2022, I'm sure publishers are scrambling to decide which games that have been around just need to go out to bring in dollars.
 
Started feeling like it's time to replay P3 again. Decided to play Persona Q instead since I hadn't touched the premium edition after purchasing 5 years ago. Good news is that my cartridge seems to work fine. Bad news is that.. unless im missing something.. I apparently have to manually draw every wall in every dungeon for the entire game?
 
Mattiful-Joe said:
It's called, "We need revenues, dude!" With so many releases likely getting pushed back to 2022, I'm sure publishers are scrambling to decide which games that have been around just need to go out to bring in dollars.
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I get that but there wasn't much about the game out thus far till now so usually that means its in early development. It was supposed to release last year but then they said that there was an issue encountered and had to delay the release to na. Now all the sudden it has a solid release date and its less than 6 months out. Typically something like that would have been announced at tales of festival (granted they had to do it online only after cancelling the one planned from last year) a month back or so. So to me it sounds like they didn't know it was gonna release until after that or they were cautiously waiting to see if they'd announce it or not.

Either way with that solid release date barring delays they have 4 months to announce the remaining party members, dlc, antagonists, important npcs and voice actors, and whatever the opening is going to be. And possibly put out a demo since a couple tales of titles for the last few years have had demos available prior to release (zestiria vesperia berseria).

 
gospelman said:
Started feeling like it's time to replay P3 again. Decided to play Persona Q instead since I hadn't touched the premium edition after purchasing 5 years ago. Good news is that my cartridge seems to work fine. Bad news is that.. unless im missing something.. I apparently have to manually draw every wall in every dungeon for the entire game?
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I don't recall reading that the cart issues applied to anything other than the launch copies so you might be safe. But cart errors can appear at any time while playing it. While getting the game to read and load is a big deal in and of itself it doesn't mean that the copy will work the whole way through. At least going by all the topics I read on reddit, gfaqs, neogaf and such which is why I purchased it digitally instead of physically.

 
shadowysea07 said:
Now all the sudden it has a solid release date and its less than 6 months out. Typically something like that would have been announced at tales of festival (granted they had to do it online only after cancelling the one planned from last year) a month back or so.
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I think we should be applauding companies for announcing release dates in a timely manner, when they have a date they feel they can stick with, and not something far off where they'll continue to delay again and again.

And they did give news at the Tales of Festival. They gave a new trailer, and announced they would give a new development update for Tales of Arise in Spring 2021. Which is now.

 
artego said:
I think we should be applauding companies for announcing release dates in a timely manner, when they have a date they feel they can stick with, and not something far off where they'll continue to delay again and again.

And they did give news at the Tales of Festival. They gave a new trailer, and announced they would give a new development update for Tales of Arise in Spring 2021. Which is now.
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It wasn't a new trailer.

It's pretty normal for bamco to announce the games they are releasing in a timely fashion since they want to build up on release info and occasionally do teasers and countdown sites prior to release. They don't delay games either under normal circumstances.

 
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Pikagreg said:
Not sure anyone cares but VideoGames 911 on Amazon has the ESRB PS4 version of Disaster Report 4 for $58+$5 shipping which is near msrp. The game has been hovering the $95-$130 area for awile and PS5 does fix the performance issues from the PS4/Switch versions. I was a bit skeptical at first but I got my copy in on Friday and it was legit. I was also pretty happy to find out I claimed the Epilogue DLC back when it was free on release.

https://www.amazon.com/Disaster-Report-Summer-Memories-PlayStation-4/dp/B07TQ9V2KV
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Down to $51.75 plus shipping. Just placed an order!
 
Haven't seen this posted on CAG, but The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles for switch is up for physical preorder at Gamestop.  I'm waiting for BB or Amazon to get it... though I hope Walmart gets it so it'll have that walmart in store discount.  Still $40 MSRP is pretty sweet for the combo.   I was hoping the physical would be like the content mentioned at the end of the video and have the TGAA Chronicles and Phoenix Wright Trilogy bundle that was mentioned, but it's just Chronicles.

https://www.gamestop.com/video-games/nintendo-switch/games/products/the-great-ace-attorney/11138922.html

Box art is sweet... not a jpg...so probably wont load but he link should work:
https://media.gamestop.com/i/gamestop/11138922/The-Great-Ace-Attorney?$pdp$


There is also a JP physical bundle of Chronicles and the Trilogy.

https://nintendoeverything.com/wp-content/uploads/ace-attorney-turnabout-collection-1-656x394.jpg

Play asia already sold out of their initial allotment of the switch version:
https://www.play-asia.com/the-great-ace-attorney-chronicles-turnabout-collection-limited-e/13/70eedb?tagid=1248773

But the ps4 version is still available:
https://www.play-asia.com/the-great-ace-attorney-chronicles-turnabout-collection-limited-e/13/70eedf

 
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nightc1 said:
Haven't seen this posted on CAG, but The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles for switch is up for physical preorder at Gamestop. I'm waiting for BB or Amazon to get it... though I hope Walmart gets it so it'll have that walmart in store discount. Still $40 MSRP is pretty sweet for the combo. I was hoping the physical would be like the content mentioned at the end of the video and have the TGAA Chronicles and Phoenix Wright Trilogy bundle that was mentioned, but it's just Chronicles.

https://www.gamestop.com/video-games/nintendo-switch/games/products/the-great-ace-attorney/11138922.html

Box art is sweet... not a jpg...so probably wont load but he link should work:
https://media.gamestop.com/i/gamestop/11138922/The-Great-Ace-Attorney?$pdp$


There is also a JP physical bundle of Chronicles and the Trilogy.

https://nintendoeverything.com/wp-content/uploads/ace-attorney-turnabout-collection-1-656x394.jpg

Play asia already sold out of their initial allotment of the switch version:
https://www.play-asia.com/the-great-ace-attorney-chronicles-turnabout-collection-limited-e/13/70eedb?tagid=1248773

But the ps4 version is still available:
https://www.play-asia.com/the-great-ace-attorney-chronicles-turnabout-collection-limited-e/13/70eedf
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I believe if a game is $40 MSRP, Walmart won't sell it cheaper than that right? Hades was $35 MSRP and Walmart sold it for $29.88 though, but it's OOS everywhere near me. Good Amazon sells it for the same price now.

 
ayuchan said:
I believe if a game is $40 MSRP, Walmart won't sell it cheaper than that right? Hades was $35 MSRP and Walmart sold it for $29.88 though, but it's OOS everywhere near me. Good Amazon sells it for the same price now.
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If Walmart carries it in store, it would be $33.88 or something around that. I think every retail $40 switch game I've bought there in the last couple years has been that way.

 
nightc1 said:
If Walmart carries it in store, it would be $33.88 or something around that. I think every retail $40 switch game I've bought there in the last couple years has been that way.
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Oh I had no idea, good to know, I'll check brickseek once it's close to the release date, thanks for the heads up!

 
I have most, if not all, of the modern Tales CEs as well, but I don't really have the room for another CE figure and it's a bit pricey too. If it left out the figure and was around $100 I'd probably pick it up.

Speaking of too pricey CEs, my Nier Replicant CE should be arriving today :)

Edit: EU also has an exclusive alternate Tales CE (https://twitter.com/BandaiNamcoEU/status/1385248050042621956) and unless it just isn't listed, their CE of the version NA gets also includes a bunch of extra DLC :/

 
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nightc1 said:
There is also a JP physical bundle of Chronicles and the Trilogy.

https://nintendoeverything.com/wp-content/uploads/ace-attorney-turnabout-collection-1-656x394.jpg

Play asia already sold out of their initial allotment of the switch version:
https://www.play-asia.com/the-great-ace-attorney-chronicles-turnabout-collection-limited-e/13/70eedb?tagid=1248773

But the ps4 version is still available:
https://www.play-asia.com/the-great-ace-attorney-chronicles-turnabout-collection-limited-e/13/70eedf
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Thanks for this--I knew it was coming and planned on getting a PS4 version, but I didn't know Play-Asia already had listings up.

 
I have 9 switch preorders/orders up. Most of which are japanese

 

 
Clockwork Aquario

Wonder Boy: Asha in Monster World

No more heroes 1

No more heroes 2

Bloodstained Curse of the moon 2

Vaporum (not japanese)

Legend of Mana Remasteres

Saga Frontier Remastered

Crawlco Block Knockers (not japanese)

The switch is great for small asian english releases, indies, and limited type releases. The 3rd party output for the switch is way better than the first party output.

 
Glad we're getting a physical release of those Ace games. I own the original trilogy already for the Switch (JPN version). Also thinking of Legend of Mana and Saga Frontier Remastered although I was not a fan of either original game. Legend of Mana was gorgeous but buggy (2 player I'm sure will be fixed), and the placement system and quest system were strange. I also hated the magic system with it's ultra complicated refinement system. Saga Frontier had some weird story system and was hard to follow. Some characters had just about no story. I believe this especially for Lute. I believe the game had some expanded stories and also has a story progression thing now so you can not get lost and all, like I did searching for the robots computers or whatever it was. Very likely to get them discounted digitally someday, but not sure about the Asian English versions.

 
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nitrosmob said:
Some characters had just about no story. I believe this especially for Lute. I believe the game had some expanded stories and also has a story progression thing now so you can not get lost and all, like I did searching for the robots computers or whatever it was.
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Said it before, but yeah, SaGa games aren't about the story, they're very gameplay driven experiences. Lute doesn't have much of a story because he is basically the character that gives you the full open ended experience. He can recruit the widest variety of party members and go to almost every location in the game. Funny enough though with the NG+ additions in the remaster you can play through his whole story in like 20 minutes if you really want.

Also yeah, the remaster has a nice story log that gives you an idea of where you should go to progress the story. There is a lot of amazing additions in this remaster but that one is especially nice for new players who have never touched the game before. I think it makes this remaster the best one to start with for anyone trying to get into the series.

 
I always hear that the SaGa games have punishment for people that like to grind and overlevel, which has mostly kept me from checking them out. I'm sure some people like that at the same that means you shouldn't have to grind though, but it's a pretty hard out for me.

 
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With Monster Hunter Stories 2 just around the corner, figured I’d at least mention that the original is on sale for $4.99 right now on iOS and Android. I know mobile isn’t anybody’s first choice in this thread, but it’s the best-playing version of the game (notably for the substantially higher frame rate, resolution, antialiasing, and draw distance), considering that precise controls are by and large unnecessary.
 
BoxPizzaBox said:
I always hear that the SaGa games have punishment for people that like to grind and overlevel, which has mostly kept me from checking them out. I'm sure some people like that at the same that means you shouldn't have to grind though, but it's a pretty hard out for me.
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Nah, that is legit the biggest misunderstanding about the series. Especially the overleveling part. So like, the way the games work is that enemy scaling and player stats aren't tied together. If you think about most games with level scaling it's just a simple linear progression, you level up, enemies level up. SaGa games don't do that. Instead the series has a mechanic called Battle Rank where the more fights you do the more a number increases. As that number goes up harder enemies start appearing.

The whole punishment misunderstanding comes from the fact that it's technically possible to just keep grinding enemies that don't give very good stat gains while also increasing your BR to the point where enemies you can't handle start appearing. But in practice - it's just never going to happen. To put it in more normal RPG terms think of it like this, you'd have to willingly spend dozens of hours grinding enemies that give you no EXP. Would you ever actually do that in a normal RPG? Because that is how these games are, the only way the game would punish you is because you decided to just fight quite literally hundreds of enemies that weren't making your characters stronger.

It's actually very possible to overlevel if you want, same as any other RPG. They just don't have linear level scaling because it gives you the chance to exploit the game in fun ways you wouldn't be able to in a linear system. For example in SaGa Frontier one of the playable races is robots. Robots do not gain stats from fighting, just from the gear they equip. A chest piece that gives a human +30 defense would instead give a robot something like +30 def +100 HP +20 strength, etc. So with that knowledge you can start a brand new game: run around the world and buy or pick up good equipment, and then stack it on a robot to give them stats good enough for the final boss. All within like 20 minutes of a new game. The thing is, going in blind you wouldn't know that so technically I ruined some of the fun you'd get from going in and figuring that out for yourself. But, that is just one part of the game so I don't really mind, it gets my point across.

 
The Atelier Mysterious DX Trilogy appears to have downgraded graphics compared to the originals. It seems like they were making a Switch version of Sophie and Firis then decided to sell it again on PS4 and PC.

 
It's still not live online and I didn't see it mentioned here but the Monster Hunter Stories 2 CE is up for pre-order at physical stores. 

 
shadowysea07 said:
Anyone know where I can harvest pebbles in atelier Rorona plus? Need 5 more to craft gold.
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A lot of places - • Nearby Forest • Ortoga Ruins • National Mines • Traveler's Way • Catacombs. I'm pretty sure I remember that creatures can drop them too. But couldn't find any info on that.

 
Midori Monkey said:
A lot of places - • Nearby Forest • Ortoga Ruins • National Mines • Traveler's Way • Catacombs. I'm pretty sure I remember that creatures can drop them too. But couldn't find any info on that.
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Problem is they don't show up on the list for nearby forest when harvesting and I also went through and didn't get a single one. The wiki is basically useless for this particular item.

Guess my only shot is drops then so I'll just give up on that. Wish I had known a recipe would need 8 and to have kept some but its whatever.

 
Pikagreg said:
It's still not live online and I didn't see it mentioned here but the Monster Hunter Stories 2 CE is up for pre-order at physical stores.
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You might need to do it by SKU though (SKU: 284749) as I heard some stores don't have it in the system by name yet.

 
Mask of deception the first one is the expensive one. Truth had more copies for whatever reason so that's about what it normally goes for. Still a good price for anyone that missed the 15 buck ones from vgca.
 
I don't really know where else to ask this but are Asian PS4 game cases diff than NA ones somehow? I have two diff Super Robot games (Asian release, I think?) with loose discs and I cannot get them back in place. I tried the drop trick and the press trick- after a dozen times, neither work. They were part of a lot of a dozen PS4 games, and half arrived with loose discs- but only those two, I cannot get back in place.

toska said:
this game was mentioned as delisted digitally here Utawarerumono: Mask of Truth

https://www.ebay.com/itm/323165198523

seems like a good price for a new copy, few copies left.
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Seems like they're just showing a max 6 by default. A lot of their listings seem to do that.

 
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