Season 44 rankings: Preliminary stage

[Cmdr_King]

I see nothing to support P3>P2 (NR-numbers-wise.  Yes, P3 may well have growth potential, it seems to have jumped 5% between NR9 and NR10 against Disgaea 2 at least.)

Interest?  *shrug* This topic exists to guage exactly that.  I'm merely picking something that looks viable that I have an interest in and would hope that others are doing the same.  Although given some reactions on that front I'm not so sure that's what other people think this topic is for.

[Jo'ou Ranbu]

The thing is, the interest really isn't there. P2 isn't even among the ideas that got less than three nods. If the game didn't even get nodded this time around outside of your out-of-the-left-field suggestion, then why bother? And I think that P2, after years of NR, still managing to get outpaced by a 45% draw that was released in less than a year is more than enough evidence to show the P3>P2 thing. I know it's NR and the numbers should be taken with a grain of salt, but nothing outside of P2 suddenly turning into FF7 for draw would justify its reranking. It got nothing other than a couple writers, and it hasn't had any sort of push from the outside public to get back for a while. I'm not sure what kind of evidence you're even expecting, although I'm not sure you're even talking seriously about the reranking anyway. Which makes this all moot.

[Dark Holy Elf]

I dunno, there are still constant examples reminding me why P2 isn't ranked. I recall the latest Twink League where Baofu just couldn't get votes, for instance. Yeah, DL is not the tournament board, but I do think, without heavilly researching the numbers, that you are overrating its draw. Its upwards potential is also very poor, compared to the other main candidates on the block right now. D2 and FE9 will probably shake a few people into playing them once they are on the roster, I don't see that with P2.

[Luther Lansfeld]

I know it's NR and the numbers should be taken with a grain of salt, but nothing outside of P2 suddenly turning into FF7 for draw would justify its reranking.

That seems a little extreme. <_< I'd definitely like to see P2's numbers higher than what they are in order to justify a reranking.

Also, Baofu drew 46% against Splitpath SaGa Frontier Boss, 37% against FFTA, 51% against Harley (which is intraseries drawing). Also, it drew in the DL proper 52% against a combined XG/CC combo.

To grab the worst numbers from the pile feels like plain misrepresentation, which is something I feel needs to be dispelled in these topics. Not supporting P2, of course, I do not feel that these numbers justify ranking it over games which are more upward bound, but the numbers aren't as bad as you are making them seem either.

[Jo'ou Ranbu]

Well, I guess so. But I am one of the people who would just shoot everything suggested in this period down if urged to vote. I'm generally abstaining for a reason. Although it just kinda irks me the idea of bringing up a dead dog for reranking when it... really didn't impress in any way since the booting.

[Cmdr_King]

Unfortunately a lot of the stuff P2 faced was pure NR, so getting something definitive like "lowered RBY by 10%" doesn't happen, so I'm kinda trying to divine it from comparisons that I'm not even sure what they were now.  The one interesting bit to me was only lowering DDS by 2%, which can be explained by same fanbase obviously but is still a facinating statistic.  Comparing it to stuff like FFIII isn't very effective because they also aren't good and it's that sort of suck meets blow cross-breeding that makes NR numbers unreliable as all get out.

The tournament board stuff is some of why I don't entirely give up on P2.  That usually means bad internal, and bad internal dragging a game down is theoretically fixable and also means there's a chance the external is tolerable if the internal is patched up.  Though obviously in this day and age making DLers actually play something never ever happens.

[Jo'ou Ranbu]

It's a self-defeating argument, yeah. In theory, you could even fix the bad internal enough with a drive! Just... uh, P2, even the internal doesn't care. The argument is kinda cute, if in the same sense an agonizing puppy with a broken leg is, though.

[superaielman]

Unfortunately a lot of the stuff P2 faced was pure NR, so getting something definitive like "lowered RBY by 10%" doesn't happen, so I'm kinda trying to divine it from comparisons that I'm not even sure what they were now.  The one interesting bit to me was only lowering DDS by 2%, which can be explained by same fanbase obviously but is still a facinating statistic.  Comparing it to stuff like FFIII isn't very effective because they also aren't good and it's that sort of suck meets blow cross-breeding that makes NR numbers unreliable as all get out.

The tournament board stuff is some of why I don't entirely give up on P2.  That usually means bad internal, and bad internal dragging a game down is theoretically fixable and also means there's a chance the external is tolerable if the internal is patched up.  Though obviously in this day and age making DLers actually play something never ever happens.

P2's writers are like at 14-15/21 or so, have to doublecheck some things. It's not weak internally. I hate to keep driving this point home, but unless the game takes a huge upturn with Maya or NR it's about as weak as you can get as an overall game package. It'd have to have the external vote pull it up, and that is not going to happen. It is a debate topic, but I really don't see what P2 has going for it besides having fans.

Snow: Not really a fair argument. P2 has it's share of fans. It it could have drawn I have no doubt that it'd have people clamoring for it. But.. see above.

[Meeplelard]

P2 got booted for a reason.  Since its booting, I haven't really seen anyone playing it.  Well, yes, I did eventually play it, but that's one person in how many years?

It'd be one thing if P2 was like FF6 where one person playing the game for the first time is odd cause everyone has already played it; to avoid naming people specifically, I specified FF6 cause it was one of these games that there was like one person internally who DIDN'T play it and they finally did.  Persona 2 doesn't have that situation; plenty of people have yet to play it, and no one is.  One person picking up and playing the game in several years does actually say something as a result.

What's the reason? There are several.  Two main ones are...

General lack of interest in the game.  Some people just don't really care enough to pick it up (I can name a few people offhand, but will refrain from it.)  And remember, not everyone plays a game just cause its ranked.

Another is availability; this is probably the biggest one.  Persona 2 is near impossible to find now.  I was lucky enough to be in a gamestore right after they discovered they had 10k packaged copies or something and picked it up then!  But I'm not the norm.
As Snow noted, Persona 2 is notorious in being bad to emulate, so  resorting to that doesn't work so well.

As such, Persona 2 has done poorly, and I can't see its potential getting much higher than it is at this moment.  Its kind of like FFMQ, except FFMQ is much easier to emulate and on a more emulatable and stable system, *AND* is a much shorter game.

Trying to push for P2 is...really beating a dead horse...again, its an FFMQ parallel!  The game had its chance, it failed (FFMQ got to the second stage I believe, but got rejected; that counts as "getting its chance"), has yet to give a good reason to be reranked since.  

P3 actually has a chance of growing in potential meanwhile.  People are picking the game up and playing it, people did request it on site, and the interest to play it is there (admittedly, I'm not one of those interested! But I'm one person; I won't deny that there are people who intend to play it.)

Is it ready for this ranking session? Probably not.  Does it have a good chance of getting ranked in the future?  Possible, but only time will tell.

Persona 2 is past the point of "Time will tell."  Its an old game, with practically 0 interest, and horrible availability.  There have been games that were slow to pick up interest in the past and got ranked, sure; Grandia 3 is a fine example.  Game was out for some time, very few people actually flocked to play it...but over time, people did play it, and sure enough, it has gotten ranked and is still there, so clearly its become at least passable!  FE9 and Dis2 are probably not as good as G3 in this regard, but...the growth potential is still there for them.  I can't really see it for a game like Persona 2, meanwhile.

[Yakumo]

This is getting rather snarky for something that really doesn't matter in the scheme of things.  CK honestly thinks it's a good idea, let him say his piece, that's what this topic's for.  What's the point of an open forum if you're going to browbeat anything you don't agree with out of it?  Now, I'm not saying I think P2's a good idea or anything, but he's got a right to put it out there. (Besides, it's not like anyone listens to CK anyway. <_<)

[Dhyerwolf]

I dunno, there are still constant examples reminding me why P2 isn't ranked. I recall the latest Twink League where Baofu just couldn't get votes, for instance. Yeah, DL is not the tournament board, but I do think, without heavilly researching the numbers, that you are overrating its draw. Its upwards potential is also very poor, compared to the other main candidates on the block right now. D2 and FE9 will probably shake a few people into playing them once they are on the roster, I don't see that with P2.

In all fairness, as someone who can vote on P2...voting on it in the twink league was damn hard. Using something w/ absolutely no stat topic documentation+making it difficult for someone to easily figure out what setups were allowed on top of it makes voting very difficult.

[Clear Tranquil]

I don't think Meeple's being snarky, I just think he's being Meeple >.> As in being some kind of "Exposition!" guru

My choices -

1) Persona 3 - Played it. Can write for it. Interesting, good discussion fodder, discussion about the game seems to motivate more people into playing it and it's become quite well known. More people equals more writers, the more writers the better.

2) D2 My heart says WA5, logic says D2. Haven't played it but I vaguely remember the series being released over here. On the other hand WA5 appears not to exist in haggis land~ As OK pointed out it seems that might as well be the case elsewhere as well. Just doesn't seem to be thriving. Which is sad but ah well >.>

[Jo'ou Ranbu]

Nah, I'm being the snarky one. It's just kind of what I do.

[Luther Lansfeld]

Exposition guru. That is... the nicest way I've heard it said!

[alanna82]

I know someone in real life who played Persona 3 because I suggested it to them, and they went and bought all the other Shin Megami games (well, that they could find), and even mentioned borrowing Persona 2 sometime. So oddly enought Persona 3 could make Persona 2 draw better.

Persona 2 DID do a bit better after its re release ( I picked up a copy then, so Meeple isnt the only one that gained voting on it). I think Ulala was drawing around 50% when she was in not ranked (oddly, shes not listed in the NR topic). And if people play Persona 3 and like it, they might go hunting down Persona 2 or DDS or games like that. However, I would like to see Maya get in again, she didnt do too awful last time she was in.

Also, I am of the opinion that vote draw doesnt really matter that much, as long as the character wins fair and square. Persona 2 characters DO seem to get the wins that they deserve in NR, and Maya even champed. If the vote draw is so poor they dont win, then they get booted. Persona 2 isnt really at that point.

[Orson]

I know someone in real life who played Persona 3 because I suggested it to them, and they went and bought all the other Shin Megami games (well, that they could find), and even mentioned borrowing Persona 2 sometime. So oddly enought Persona 3 could make Persona 2 draw better.

Persona 2 DID do a bit better after its re release ( I picked up a copy then, so Meeple isnt the only one that gained voting on it). I think Ulala was drawing around 50% when she was in not ranked (oddly, shes not listed in the NR topic). And if people play Persona 3 and like it, they might go hunting down Persona 2 or DDS or games like that. However, I would like to see Maya get in again, she didnt do too awful last time she was in.

Also, I am of the opinion that vote draw doesnt really matter that much, as long as the character wins fair and square. Persona 2 characters DO seem to get the wins that they deserve in NR, and Maya even champed. If the vote draw is so poor they dont win, then they get booted. Persona 2 isnt really at that point.

That is a good scenario for a game to be (re)ranked. However, even that has its limits. Other games that may piggyback into the league through other games are Fire Emblems 6 and 10 (thanks to 7 and 9, though 9 could piggyback thanks to SSBB), Mother 1 (EarthBound), Kingdom Hearts (plausibly on the FF games), and Star Ocean 1 (SO2 and 3, though the PSP game could conceivably help if given a US release). However, the main problem is that in order to piggyback, the rerelease (or other game) has to be more successful than the previous game. And since we can't keep giving rereleases (I'm looking at you Pokemon RBG), this only happens rarely. However, even with that, the problem still remains for P2: low amount of game copies, rare, and it's a PS1 game in the era of the PS3. Only through the release of the game through PSP/PS3 store (which has...say...a 5,000,000 to 1 chance of occuring) can more versions of the game be picked up. As it stands now, P2 is a VERY, VERY tenuous rank...er...rerank for this season. Maybe in a later round, but not now.

But if anything, you can take solace in that as bad as the P2 votedraw is, it can't hold a candle to the vote draw of Thousand Arms in the Ranked League...ok, now I'm interested. Was P2 one of the worst Ranked games (top 5 maybe)? And also, how have its number improved since then?

[Meeplelard]

ITs worth noting that Kingdom Hearts isn't ranked not cause of its draw, but cause of its general interpretation issues.  The fact that the game doesn't show damage values means that without a stat topic, you have to eyeball everything, combined with how all nonSora PCs are AI controlled.

Then there's the fact that some people just don't like the game as a DL idea, be it Disney, not fitting the RPG setting, etc.

So yeah, I wouldn't put it with the "Piggy Backing" crowd, since it...doesn't need that.  What it does need, however, is people to have general agreement on the darn game.

Pokemon in the past has gone through similar problems, just the difference is, its hard to argue that it isn't an RPG, and the main issue was "argh generics!" more so than anything else (its this issue that will likely keep DP out for a long while unless its player ship picks up dramatically, to be on par with the earlier Gens.  That, and I for one, while would support the idea, don't wanna go through another Pokemon argument.)

NOTE: Just using Pokemon as a parallel here, since its the first thing that came to mind that had problems getting ranked for reasons other than playership.  Yes, it did eventually get ranked, but that's mainly cause its issues weren't as big as KHs and the push for it was considerably higher.

I agree, though, that if Persona 3 does help Persona 2...I doubt its going to be a particularly large amount.  Its more likely that a few of the games you mentioned (FE9 helping FE10 is the big one, for example.)  Again, keep in mind that Persona 3's availability is way higher than Persona 2, and wouldn't be shocked if people didn't even know Persona 2 came stateside.  It sounds like it works in theory but...well...

To put things into perspective, look at AtL4.  We ranked the game in full at first, and kept it in for a while thinking its ties with AtL1/2 (middling games for votes, wanna say lower end? They're not bottom of the barrel, is the point) would help the game, AND when it was ranked, finding AtL4 wasn't hard (it...probably still isn't at this point.)
However, this proved fruitless, as AtL4 just never really improved.  Eventually, we booted everyone but a specific few from the game (as a side note, fuck you Bebedora for staying when you had no reason to *shakes fist*), and even then, you could argue the game should be kicked out in entirety.

Some games, despite being linked to other decent games, just can't live off the series fame alone.  Tales of Eternia is another example.  It draws horribly in the DL, yet, Tales of Symphonia, Tales of Phantasia and Tales of the Abyss draw well enough, and are of the same series.  I can't help but think that availability plays at least some role in it.  Finding ToS until recently (if at all) was never really hard, and TotA still has copies around too.  ToP still has the GBA copies lying around, and of course, the SNES version exists on emulators, requiring a mere translation patch.  ToE? Good luck finding one, even used.  Now yes, you can emulate, but not everyone does, and PSX emulation isn't the most stable of things for some people.
ToD I wanna say is like ToE, except its problems aren't as extreme, namely its draw isn't quite as bad, hence why it doesn't get brought up often, but you could say the same thing about it. 

So, yeah, while it is a nice way to look at things, generally, games need more than ties to strong series to get good playership.  Wild ARMs 5 is proving that nicely right now, in that its draw has been quite sub par, despite being out for nearly a year already, yet all other WA games do well enough in the DL.

...yeah, I rambled on, but the point is, Piggybacking (if you wanna call it that) tends to be a bad way to look at things.  Ties to a strong series only help a game so much, let alone ties to a game that isn't really that strong yet (there's no telling whether Persona 3 has, in fact, hit the peak of its drawing power, or if its gradual improvement will continue for some time.  Given its a newish game, it has a reasonable enough chance to increase, as we've been saying.)

[OblivionKnight]

It has come to my attention that people are disappointed I am taking this so seriously.  So...

Baten Kaitos 2
The advantage of Baten Kaitos 2 is many-fold.  First, it breathes life into a nearly dead system with some other games left on it.  Particularly, since it is the sequel to a best-selling Gamecube game (reference: the game box), there should surely be a large number of people, fans, that would flock to see the game do well.  In addition, we know that the system isn't tough to work with - Goku in NR, from a card game with far, far more problems translating, did well enough to win Godlike with not total fail vote draw (and this was a long time ago).  There's also lots of interest - the characters and storyline draw a lot of people in, and each character is pretty unique in what they do.  There's a large amount of write-up bait, and several solid bosses to rank, as well as the main PCs.  It's even a small rank, so if characters should prove to be poor on vote draw or prone to "robbing" people (unlikely, but it could happen), then there at least isn't a large amount of characters to compete and continue pressing those issues.  It's also very cheap and not exceptionally long, so people can easily pick it up and play it. 

Rhapsody
Yes, it's old.  But it's also one of the most unique games we can rank, and it has plenty of connections to other games in the multiverse, in addition to being very popular with the fans, having suggestions in the past.  Characters are generally pretty easy to rank as well, and there's a significant connection to the DL's sister site, RPGDuels.  Why not foster some love with others?  The game is a bit expensive, I'll admit, but it's ungodly short and easy, so people can blow through it fast.  Strikes me as a good niche game to rank to draw more people in - hype for Marjoly in Godlike and massive pancakes crushing Middle is exceptional write-up bait, which we cannot ignore if we want the DL to survive.


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Ahem.  Good thing I stopped there - I probably could have gone on way longer.  Anyway, my real suggestions...

Persona 3 - It's...well, I think the fact that it has more interest lets it beat FE9 to me.  More uniqueness in fighters, and generally growing...it's like SH:C.  Granted, I know there is some grey area in regards to that (too early is bad, etc.), but I feel like this would be a better choice than FE9 at the moment.  Both games would be good, and either in the next stage could pass well enough overall comparatively.  I just feel that the overall benefits of P3 are better than FE9 right now - the only weakness I can see is lower vote draw, which isn't horribly lower, and will surely grow.

Disgaea 2 - As I mentioned earlier, the most balanced of the big 3.  Definitely is the best choice overall, and the best candidate to go past stage 2 to actual ranking.     

Current Tallies as of muakaka's post below:

P3 - iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii (20)
D2 - iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii (26)
FE9  iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii (21)

And since I do this everytime in this session just to get people thinking...

All the people I could think of that would be potentially ranked from each of the top 3 games!

***SPOILERS MAY BE PRESENT BELOW - READ AT YOUR OWN RISK***

P3: Minato, Yukari, Junpei, Akihiko, Mitsuru, Aigis, Koromaru, Ken, Shinjiro, Chidori, Jin, Takaya, Ryoji/Nyx/Pharos (Metis in Fes, even though that isn't considered for ranking at the moment...don't think anyone else really fits from the game besides her) - total 13

Disgaea 2: Adell, Rozalin, Tink, Hanako, Taro, Yukimaru, Axel, Fubuki, Shura, Serion, 'Zenon' - total 11

FE9: Ike, Titania, Oscar, Boyd, Soren, Mist, Volke, Ranulf, Elincia, Ena, Petrine, Oliver, Tibarn, Naesala, Rhys, Shinon, Gatrie, Rolf, Mia, Marcia, Lethe, Mordecai, Nephenee, Kieran, Brom, Jill, Astrid, Tanith, Janaff, Ulki, Haar, Bastian, Lucia, Geoffrey, Ashnard, Illyana, Zihark, Sothe, Makalov, Tormod, Muarim, Stefan, Devdan, Resyon, Callil, Tauroneo, Largo, Nasir, Giffca, Black Knight, Bertram - total 51 (too damn many - hope I didn't miss any)

FE9 Minimized (based on what I think are the general thoughts of the group): Ike, Titania, Oscar, Boyd, Soren, Mist, Volk, Ranulf, Elinica, Ena, Tibarn, Naesala, Rhys, Shinon, Gatrie, Rolf, Mia, Nephenee, Jill, Ashnard(?) - total 20 (21)

[SageAcrin]

Persona 3 and Disgaea 2.

FE9's in a weird-ass transitional phase where FE10 is too minor to be ranked but too major for it to not impact close matches(Ranking a game by name has never been 100% for this ever, people vote how they want, etc.), and frankly I'd like something decent to rank next time. FE9 has a decent shot at being, not borderline, but actually good if left to wait.

Also I don't want to play it because it's a pain in the ass for me to hook up my GC/borrow or buy a copy. I'm not too proud to admit this influences which games I'd want ranked! Mostly because not playing it makes me suffer for results, and the writers are still not precisely good here(Although at least Meeple's played it, so I know I'll be able to get something. That part's good.). <_<

But no, that's not my only reasoning; FE9 just feels like something that should be left on the back burner due to the nature of the Wii(And how DLers are gradually getting them, and hence access to GC games retroactively and access to FE10 as well.) and such.

It's not that it'd be harmful to rank, it's that it's the only candidate here that I have high surety in it being a long-term good ranking idea, but, being as it's FE, it's probably better to wait off a bit to avoid people complaining about ranking a potentially sub-50% FE game.

WA5 vs Dis 2 is a crapshoot and I'm just going with the at-a-glance more popular one.

Dis 2 and P3 are both borderliners that I hope will end up harmless if they get ranked. No, I'm not happy with this being a ranking criteria, but whatever.

[Tide]

P3 and MK were my two choices.

P3 because I genuinely believe that its a game that has potential for it. Its not picking up at the quickest pace but most people who've picked it up did enjoy it to a certain point, which helps attract attention. The duellers are also easy to interpret (with Minato being the only exception) and each cast member does its own stuff. I find that they are also easy to write for, for what its worth.

MK...I was originally deciding this and WA5 but MK won out in the end due to interesting duellers and ease of interpretation. Art should be farily easy to find too. The concern of course is that the internal isn't ready and the growth potential is largely undetermined or way the hell too iffy. It's not my best idea! But yeah, I needed something else, and of the things I could give a voice to, it was the only one I felt was better than the other choices.

WA5...has various interp issues (see IQA and VOLSUNG) and the playership just hasn't rose much at all. The game's almost a year old now and the draw via NR is well...poor to describe it in the best of light. Not to mention half the PC cast are about interesting as rocks, which makes it really hard to even root for them getting in.

FE9, see Sage. I do feel its ready, but its in the weird phase of sort of kind of not there with FE10. I ready just wait for FE10 to grow out and rank both at once to get more solid ranks.

Can't really comment on anything else. Wait...there's XF but that's a definite no right now.

[Dark Holy Elf]

FE10's probably a year away? It makes no sense to wait on FE9 just for that. (It might make some sense to wait on anyone who significantly improves, but not the game as a whole.) FE9 is... very clearly one of the next three games that should be ranked, while FE10 has what, five writers?

Sage, I'd argue that P3 is the game that stands to improve most for next time. It's the youngest of the trio, and it currently has the least number of writers/voters. These are both good arguments for passing on it this time, and waiting to see good things from it next.

[Pyro]

Throwing in a vote for...

Fire Emblem 9: Eh. Its harmless enough, probably the FE I've enjoyed most, and one of the better objective choices for ranking. Ike is cool as a rank at the very least.

Persona 3: Interesting cast of characters, and a push isn't a bad thing. I will probably vote against this in later rounds, ironically.

Some other thoughts:

Mana Khemia: I would love to see this ranked. Its a fun game with interesting duelers and a colorful cast. Easily the best of the Atelier series for gameplay, to the point where I feel almost the entire DL could potentially enjoy it. Reminds me of WA4 in that respect. Its not ready, but I'm willing to push for it on the internal so it will be.

Disgaea 2: I'm not interested in this. What do you want me to say? Its just... kind of bland. Outside of Etna and the two mains, the characters are even boring (Well, maybe Tink hype but not from me). Duelers are one-dimensional at best. I don't feel like this has enough to add for me to throw it a vote.

Wild Arms XF: A fun game with a healthy offering of unique PCs and possibly an interesting boss or two to offer the DL. Its too early, but I would push for this if I can get more folks to pick up PSPs.

Persona 2: I tried emulating it once. Said attempt failed. Not eager to try again based on what I did see.

FE10: I can see where this would cause headaches for some characters who would be ranked now (Elincia 2-3 division split? Yeahhhhh). I don't feel that this should stop us from ranking FE9, however. I intend to play this myself at some point, but won't push for it to be ranked heavily (like I even need to).

[DjinnAndTonic]

Throwing my support to FE9 - it's Fire Emblem, which is generally pretty fun even if over-represented in the DL, and it's got some improvements to its duelers that the other FEs were lacking. Namely, all of the cast is slightly less one-dimensional. I'd be in favor of a tight ranking here, still. Especially with FE10 looming on the horizon.

My other stab in the dark was for Prier (LPT) as a Forgotten Warrior. She's got really good numbers in NR, but I'm still not sure about the internal. LPT is still pretty easy to find in game stores, though you won't be finding it in Wal-Mart anytime soon. Ranking all of LPT seems extraneous, Prier's not exactly a multi-faceted dueler, but she makes for great writeup fodder. As usual, the Nippon-Ichi fans would all jump for joy.

On the note of Mana Khemia (this really needs a better acronym than MK, I keep seeing Makai Kingdom and Mortal Kombat... >.>;; ) - I'd be in favor of this game once it gets its internal up, and maybe picks up enough sales. Gust games tend to always give us one or two cool duelers in each of their games (Alchemists from AI, Reyvateils from AT, Pamela), and it would be nice to see these games get some representation in the DL. Since Mana Khemia is the superior game, and stands alone nicely, it seems like the logical choice.

P3, Dis2, WA5, and WAXF seem like they will all get ranked eventually and generally have my support.

I'd be in favor of KH, FF12 and RadiataStories (to a lesser extent) if I thought they would actually bring in more voters. Is there any kind of precedent for this kind of 'high profile, low compatibility with DL system' ranking that shows an increase in votes?

PSP has so many RPGs now... it needs to get a foothold in the DL. Crisis Core, WAXF, JDA, FFT:LW... It's not ready yet, but hopefully soon.

I saw some TWEWY ranking hype... I wish its proponent good luck. They'll need it.

-Djinn

[Lady Ashe]

Mm, only really the three options in my eyes right now. (An FW maybe, but I think it's better to look at whole games right now to increase interest/awareness)

Disgaea 2 is fairly obvious, so it's down to FE9 vs. P3. FE is better in terms of numbers, but P3 characters are a lot more interesting. I would probably say to just stick to D2, but I think that P3 has outside drawing potential. Board 8 has a fairly large number of vocal P3 fans, so it's possible that seeing Aigis, Mitsuru or Akihiko in the title of the RPGDL topic there might help grab a few voters who would otherwise just pass the topic by. Maybe not, but it's something to consider so I'll give Persona 3 the nod at least for this stage.

Other stuff... MK would be nice, but huge playership issues. Same applies to the other Gust games. I don't really like the idea of FE6 at all, because it isn't really interesting enough to justify the ranking of a game never released in NA. On a somewhat related note, how bad is Mother 1 playership? I assume the characters are unique enough for it to be a decent idea, and with the Mother 3 translation project being so huge, getting Mother 1 and then eventually 3 might draw some interest from a few people over at Starmen. Or I could be silly and have no clue what I'm talking about, but it doesn't hurt to get thoughts out there. <<

[muakaka]

Here goes my definite votes......

Disgaea 2 is kinda obvious here. It's arguably the most stable out of all the choices and has had quite a few experiences in NR. (Besides Taro headaches)

And, as usual, I'm in the run for Ash as a FW. I think I'll get around to do that stat topic I promised a long time ago when I get the time.........

Other games?
MK is probably my favorite GUST game in terms of gameplay, but it's way too young. No matches in NR yet to see drawing.

P3's fanbase is quite big, and would attract some fans, but I think.... it's not ready yet. Feels very next-season ranking to me.

WA5 had quite a boring cast. I'd vote MK over this, any day.