Recettear: My god, it's full of Tallychus.
The game is stupid, easy and completely and totally full of shit (The only way I have seen that you can lose is for the game to make everything cheap all week, like I had! Should have save scummed that shit just to piss it off.)
Pretty much Tal imagine Atelier Iris with shop keeper chick as the main character. Now take away all the plot stuff that I found interesting there and replace it with lolis and faeries. Pile on 6 times as many anime tropes as any given Gust game. That is Recettear.
Suffice to say, I think that Dangerous High School Girls in Trouble is a far greater investment of your money and Recettear is making money hand over fist because fuck you internet.
Edit - DQ9 - Why did they have plot scenes? Finished the game. Plot scenes are frustratingly long in the ending. zzzzzz if I wanted to watch movies on the bus I would be using my PSP or my phone. I want to press A a lot and watch things die. Final boss fight was pretty solid, ate a Magic Burst once and almost earned my first game over (didn't hand out Yggdrasil leaves like I should have, Paladin with Zing Stick Dance died along with my priest), gibbed my Paladin and the overflow offed my priest. Fun game and well worth the time. Not worth the insanity that is Japan or the depressingly embarassing advertising campaign (Which is awkward and pervasive enough that when my brothers asked me what I was playing and I said I was almost finished it they asked if I had got The Gigaslash).
Problems with the game boat boat boat boat boat boat boat boat. Alchemy reciped are to sparse and reliant on trawling for shit again, but probably better paced out and less broken than in DQ8. Not sure if it is more or less annoying though. Getting your stuff straight away is good. Having to go to Stornway to do it is a drag even with Zoom sometimes, but most definitely is before then, good thing there is like a whole dungeon between getting the pot and Zoom.
Party was like this.
Jim - Minstrel until unlocked Armamentalist. Stuck there for the rest of the game. Maxed out Shields, the started on Swords up until Falcon slash and then started past the first skill in Fource (got Fire Fource early for free awesome pimp armour). Probably the character I screwed up the most. Shields are a massive disappointment in the main game, I can see them as being a great choice for a third skill to go after and brilliant for aftergame. During the main game though? 4 or 6% extra evasion as you work your way up does not hold a candle to the attack power choosing a weapon to level would have. Even still, 58 points in Swords and Armamentalist made him my primary attacker in the final boss and I was never unhappy with my choices.
Jim - Thief with 32 points in Acquisitiveness and unlock +20 health, some points in Knives to unlock Ranger (which I never used) then some points in Sword to unlock Gladiator. Then became a Gladiator with 55 points in Guts to get Str boost. Spent some time in warrior also to unlock Paladin. Then became a Paladin when I hit Gleeba and dumped 100 points into Virtue. Was stocking points as a Paladin to dump into Axe, would have ended up with 30something in that. All up my most indecisive character but easilly my most useful. Forebearance and a stupid amount of Resilience and HP, awesome totally the reason I beat the final boss without to much effort or forethought. Time as a Gladiator gave a good start into Forebearance and generally being wishy washy with him gave him the most skill points overall without being overly abusive.
Jim - Cleric. Got like level 15 Mage as well to get skill points to put into stuff, ended up sinking it all into Faith which was pretty much worth it just for the Magical Mending boosts and Care Prayer lets you do stupidly efficient healing. Rest spent in Spears. Not much to say, did the job, average at taking damage, average at doing it, incredibly important job done very well with healing. Boring, but a corner stone.
Jim - Mage. Got up to about level 15 Cleric for same reasons as above. 100 points in Wand. Rest in Spellcraft. Wands and I had a love/hate relationship. Early on they are useless, then you get free GT damage out of them and they are awesome. You can't attack to get MP back, but you do decent damage for free if you aren't keeping that mana pool up. Didn't really regret it until I hit Gleeba and you are stuck with Water Maul staff if you don't improve it with Alchemy. That thing blows hard. Even before then between Port Laffan and Bloomingdale you are stuck between having a good on use or being able to break defense and get mana back. It just makes you swap items around constantly and it is annoying as all fuck. I was supremely disappointed with Wands then. They gave me a slightly bigger mana pool but that was about it. They were doing a horrible job of keeping it topped up while my spells just kept getting more expensive. Crackle is awesome at that point, but you just cannot cast it enough. Once you hit Batsureg though? Oh wow they are awesome. Not because they get good item casts, but because they make your mana pool enormous. Then you get MP Recover which also doesn't make you regen a ton of MP, but over time, especially with slowly increasing MP drain amounts (seriously by end game you get 3 or 4 MP for attacks most of the time at best. The MP% absorption for putting points into it are massively underwhelming, the value comes entirely from the MP pool boost and the recovery). At that point? Bang/Boom spam commences. Oh and you also not long after that get one that item casts Bang. Free MT is awesome, but at that point I was able to support spamming Boom instead, actually had my Cleric swap from his spear to it to use Bang more than the Mage cast it. Wands are good overall and I don't regret putting the points into them. They are great for a Mage, it lets you use their skillset. Cadeceus is got much later than it was on Jessica so it isn't as amazingly good when you get it, but it is MP efficient healing still and generally speaking absolutely fantastic, really rounds out your Mage. Spell Craft was alright dump spot for points. Mages are great, fast and with Wands always capable of doing something useful or being able to replenish and be able to do something useful. Zing Stick Dance is a pretty neat ultimate with my party reward (everyone can use Wands). Possibly MVP overall? Handled randoms brilliantly, Oomph lets you go on the offense earlier with your physical powerhouses not wasing a turn with Double Up. Frizzle seems a little underwhelming, but it is pretty solid damage for MP ratio even against resistant enemies if you have MP to burn against a single target. Sap has its ups and downs. Acceleratle shines when it is good and if nothing else lets you setup 2x damage basic attacks if you are against a laughable boss. Only problem with the mage is that they are definitely much weaker defensively than my other characters and he really felt it at the end of the game (final boss could burst him down in one turn if Paladin was slept, if I had a reset I would have made Paladin immune to sleep with accessory though). I maybe should have looked into making him some armour with Alchemy.
So overall my only things I can really suggest the game other than to stop being a Dragon Quest game with all your generic grindy complaints. Make MP Recovery about 60 points into the tree, swap its place with one of those worthless MP absorption talents or shit, maybe give Wands another useful skill. Stop the boat from being so boat. Don't have randoms from the second last overworld area commonly encountered in the ocean that is available half way through the game. Alternately GIVE SOME FUCKING DIRECTIONS WHEN YOU GET THE BOAT YOU STUPID THICK CUNTS.
Game is alright, if you found DQ8 was a game that came out at just the right time because it had been ages since an honest to gods old school grindyish naive RPG came out then this will be a good pick up if you haven't immersed yourself in the DS releases of earlier DQ games. Otherwise? Whatever, you can miss this. It ain't no Planescape: Torment, but much like DQ8 it is what I wanted when it came out, impeccable timing once again. It is very good at what it does, but what it does is be charmingly naive.
