Games

by **icycalm** » 26 Sep 2007 23:04

Hayama Akito of Gamercafe reports that the sequel to Yuki's excellent loli fighter will be unveiled in the next issue of Arcadia.

http://www.arcadiamagazine.com/

If you look at the contents of the next issue, he says you will see the katakana characters for Arcana Heart, followed by a '2'. Unfortunately I can't confirm this -- all I see is "??????? 2" because this fucking computer doesn't have Japanese fonts and I don't have the Windows CD to install them.

This is my number 2 most wanted arcade game, right behind Deathsmiles. Really, really awesome news, though I think they should have waited at least a couple more months to show it off. The port of the first game is coming out in like ten days for fuck's sake.

edit: Ok, yeah, I am on my roommate's laptop again and this news is for real.

by **icycalm** » 28 Sep 2007 04:46

Seems that the existence of the game was confirmed months ago, though I somehow missed that memo. Apparently in the Arcana Heart Mook interview they mentioned that they were definitely making a sequel.

So, scans:

One new character (a Swedish Gunslinger Girl -- time to tick off another lolicon checkbox!), and perhaps more, and at least some redrawn sprites. Looks awesome, though it doesn't seem like they added any life to the backgrounds, which was one of my minor gripes about the first game.

Also, Unicorn Arcana and +1 button.

by **Dale** » 04 Oct 2007 02:39

I'm going to be getting the PS2 port of the first Arcana Heart game at the end of us this month and I was curious as to what the game plays like. Many people I know who have yet to play it have been comparing the game to Melty Blood based on the videos they've seen. What would you compare the game to?

by **icycalm** » 06 Oct 2007 17:14

Check my review here:

http://insomnia.ac/reviews/custom/arcanaheart/

Also, you know, there is already an Arcana Heart AC/PS2 thread in this forum (see here). So let's leave this thread for news and comments on the sequel. Which brings me to:

Source: http://www.kobayan.jp/

by **AlphaONE** » 14 Oct 2007 07:33

I WANT TO PLAY IT NOW!!!!!!

by **icycalm** » 19 Oct 2007 19:34

More absolutely gorgeous screens in this Dengeki Online preview:

http://www.dengekionline.com/data/news/ ... 51739.html

New sprites look crisp as fuck and they are even redoing all the HUD elements. Better still, it seems like there will be at least one additional character/arcana apart from Petra. Go go Yuki! Erm... I mean Examu :(

by **CosMind** » 20 Oct 2007 02:41

Where I come from, they call that "hot eye sex".

Very nice, indeed.

Man, you cats here are tipping me to drop the bones on an import of the PS2 original. Too many good words about all elements -- it's controls, systems, balance, audio/visual presentation. And this follow-up seems to be ready to ace it, even.

by **icycalm** » 03 Nov 2007 02:04

New Arcadia scans reveal another new character, Catherine Kyohbashi, who controls a weird retro-styled mecha twice as big as Kira's slime/jelly thingy.

Haven't had time to check the SRK thread for more info yet, but will do soon. In the meantime, here it is for those who want to get their info first-hand:

http://forums.shoryuken.com/showthread.php?t=139627

by **icycalm** » 28 Nov 2007 17:46

There was a new ad in Amusement Journal earlier this month which I forgot to post:

Source: http://www.kobayan.jp/

And a new Arcadia preview reveals a third new character called Zenia Valov (Zangief's girlfriend?), who sports a mechanical arm with a rod-like extension. Cool shit. And her related arcana looks like a penguin! There's also an explanation of the new button settup:

Source: Game Nyarth

The new characters look a step above most of the old ones in terms of design, and now that we know there are at least three of them this is shaping up to be a great update. Not to mention the flashier hit effects and nicely redrawn sprites. Yuki FTW!

PS. There also seems to be some tweaking to how the gauges work -- see scan7. I'll look into that later...

by **AlphaONE** » 28 Nov 2007 21:46

Cool news :)

Can't wait.

Back in Japan for all of March next year!!!!! ^_^

by **icycalm** » 16 Feb 2008 14:37

http://insomnia.ac/news/all-hail-the-ex-board/

Gotta get me one of those!

by **AlphaONE** » 20 Feb 2008 23:41

Awesome, pretty sure it will cost A LOT! :(

by **CosMind** » 23 Feb 2008 03:43

Wow, very interesting indeed. Let's just hope it takes off enough to convince other devs to build their future games on carts for it :)

by **Nookel** » 20 Jan 2009 12:56

Japanese PS2 version:

http://www.aqi.co.jp/product/sugokana2/

Available for preorder from Play-Asia: April 06, 2009.

http://www.play-asia.com/paOS-13-71-40- ... -36hh.html

by **icycalm** » 21 Jan 2009 04:31

Movelists for Suggoi! (in Japanese, but with pics):

http://arcanaheart.sakura.ne.jp/0314arukana2/top.html

And the new URL of the old SRK thread:

http://forums.shoryuken.com/showthread.php?t=148299

by **Recap** » 30 Jan 2009 15:51

Suggoi! screenshots and artwork, including full backgrounds pictures (I wish I could find that for the GGX series...):

http://japan.gamespot.com/ps2/screensho ... 38p,00.htm

It's getting a minor revision soon much like AH got, as AM-Net reports. I'd make a brand-new thread for Suggoi!, quite frankly. The list of additions from AH2 is big enough to consider it as a separate game.

by **icycalm** » 30 Jan 2009 20:03

Recap wrote:It's getting a minor revision soon much like AH got, as AM-Net reports.

Don't you mean to say "much like AH Full" got? Did AH Full really get a revision? I don't remember hearing about this.

Recap wrote:I'd make a brand-new thread for Suggoi!, quite frankly. The list of additions from AH2 is big enough to consider it as a separate game.

Strictly speaking, I don't even consider AH2 a separate game from AH...

by **Recap** » 30 Jan 2009 23:24

icycalm wrote:Don't you mean to say "much like AH Full" got? Did AH Full really get a revision? I don't remember hearing about this.

No, I meant to say indeed that this forthcoming revision will do to Suggoi! what Full! did to AH -- balance tweaks and a training mode.

Strictly speaking, I don't even consider AH2 a separate game from AH...

Which validates my point. They both have independent threads at Insomnia.

by **icycalm** » 30 Jan 2009 23:33

Yes, but I have to draw the line somewhere, otherwise I could very well have had a single thread on all 2D fighting games. So I decided to draw the line at Arcana Heart 1 and 2. Everything below that, all modifications to those two -- let us call them 'games' -- has to be lumped in their respective threads.

It's an interesting issue, because had this forum existed at the time of SFII's release, I would have ended up lumping all the SFII games in a single thread, which obviously wouldn't have worked very well. But I think that for this particular case my solution is good. I doubt there will be more versions of AH2 after this. If there are, I could always split this thread into two or three threads, as needed.

by **Recap** » 30 Jan 2009 23:50

My point is that Suggoi! is not a mere revision to AH2, like Dash and Dash Turbo were to SFII. Would you make a single thread for SFII and Super SFII? And one for SFIII - 2nd Impact - 3rd Strike?

Think about it -- Suggoi! has at least 4 new characters, balance reworking, even the whole artwork is by a new artist.

by **icycalm** » 31 Jan 2009 00:07

Recap wrote:My point is that Suggoi! is not a mere revision to AH2, like Dash and Dash Turbo were to SFII. Would you make a single thread for SFII and Super SFII? And one for SFIII - 2nd Impact - 3rd Strike?

Ultimately, even Super SFII and 2nd Impact and 3rd Strike are revisions to SFII and SFIII respectively, because it is impossible to draw a definitive line between "minor update", "major update" and "new game". Because what makes the difference between minor and major updates? How many balance tweaks, how many new characters, how much new artwork is required for us to pronounce a game a major update, as opposed to a minor one? Are three balance tweaks enough? Perhaps four? Perhaps twenty-five? Is one new character enough? Or a newly unlockable boss? Or three?

You will never get anywhere if you go down this route. The only thing to do is to take it on a per-game basis and use your judgement. Clearly, this judgement will not be quantitative, because there is no rule that we can follow, so every person will come up with his own. So it doesn't matter how many characters Suggoi has or whatever; all that matters is that, to me, it feels -- in a vague, unjustifiable manner -- like a minor update to Arcana Heart 2. A major update would probably (according to Examu's naming habits) be called Arcana Heart 3, would bring many more changes to the franchise than either Suggoi or its update, and would therefore, in my estimation, deserve a brand-new thread.

In the end, once enough time has gone by, there will be a single post on SRK listing all the changes between AH2 and Suggoi, and another one between Suggoi and its update (whatever it's going to be called). I can then copy-paste these two posts in here, with links to their respective flyers, screens, etc. and that's it. If players knowledgeable enough show up in this forum one day, and begin discussing the differences between the various AH2 incarnations in great detail, for pages and pages, I will have a reason to break up this thread into three, so as to facilitate easier discussion. But for the time being I see no such need.

by **Archonus** » 01 Mar 2009 03:01

Catherine's mech looks like Dr. Eggman...

by **icycalm** » 01 Apr 2009 23:46

Lolmitsu: 6, 7, 6, 5

by **El Chaos** » 29 Jul 2009 23:14

http://hatimaki.blog110.fc2.com/blog-entry-983.html

I noticed how horribly jaggy/ jittery the PS2 port was in the menus and HUD, plus some slowdown and lag, but never thought it could be as bad as this.

by **Tain** » 30 Jul 2009 05:29

Yeah, I was shocked when I first played it. Some characters even have idle animations that switch sprite resolutions depending on the frame, I think.

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