Review: Patapon 2
- Thread starter tendo82
- Start date
I'm a big fan of the Patapon series. And I never really thought the songs fell short. Each minigame has it's own distinctive style, and now that you can do different difficulties on each game you get a little variety when grinding.
There is also a different theme to each level that I always thought was very entertaining, from the peppy beach tune to the yodeling mountain march.
It's a PSP must have.
There is also a different theme to each level that I always thought was very entertaining, from the peppy beach tune to the yodeling mountain march.
It's a PSP must have.
You didn't really talk about what's changed since the first Patapon, which is what I wanted to know. I see Patapons on flying birds... how'd that work out? Any new 'command' songs (i.e. beyond the retreat, attack, advance beats from Patapon 1)? How's the evolution stuff; is it sorta like leveling up in a traditional RPG?
He mentions near the start of the review that he never had a chance to play the original.Clemenstation said:
So?Lvl 64 Klutz said:
I still wanna know.
It's like reading a Gears of War 2 review and learning all about the innovative cover system and chainsaw gun.
I seriously love the game. Everything is fantastic, the mix of the genres, the music (I think it's fun, especially when you really get into the rhythm), the clever battling, the neat looking characters and monsters, everything is unique and well done. OK, the first game anyway, I haven't played the second yet. However, I can't bring myself to pick it up that often. Why you ask? 2 reasons:
1: Level grinding. I despise it. Nothing makes me want to put a game down more than playing the same level 5 times in a row, and unfortunately for me that's exactly what I'll have to do. Too many times I've found that I couldn't finish a level with my current characters, but it wasn't a matter of strategy, it was a matter of not enough firepower. While the game does have some good strategy, it is very simplified and generally once you have all the songs you can play one level and if you don't figure it out then, you'll know what strategy to employ next time. However, the problem of enough firepower also ties in with my second problem:
2: Character Deletion. Unless I missed something entirely, there is no way short of waiting until the hat disappears to completely eliminate a character from play. Unfortunately, once your party is full up, you can't add more. Therefore, you have to get lucky and have the monster kill the right guy, otherwise you better pick up his hat before you lose your best character. I wish I could just send a guy away from my army. Now, this might very well solve this problem and to some extent the first because it will require less grinding, but to me, without being able to just drop someone completely, I don't want to play that much at all.
Did I miss something from the first? please tell me I did, or that they fixed it in the second.
1: Level grinding. I despise it. Nothing makes me want to put a game down more than playing the same level 5 times in a row, and unfortunately for me that's exactly what I'll have to do. Too many times I've found that I couldn't finish a level with my current characters, but it wasn't a matter of strategy, it was a matter of not enough firepower. While the game does have some good strategy, it is very simplified and generally once you have all the songs you can play one level and if you don't figure it out then, you'll know what strategy to employ next time. However, the problem of enough firepower also ties in with my second problem:
2: Character Deletion. Unless I missed something entirely, there is no way short of waiting until the hat disappears to completely eliminate a character from play. Unfortunately, once your party is full up, you can't add more. Therefore, you have to get lucky and have the monster kill the right guy, otherwise you better pick up his hat before you lose your best character. I wish I could just send a guy away from my army. Now, this might very well solve this problem and to some extent the first because it will require less grinding, but to me, without being able to just drop someone completely, I don't want to play that much at all.
Did I miss something from the first? please tell me I did, or that they fixed it in the second.
I admire the creative lengths you went to to kill off unwanted members of your eyeball army. However, you can totally delete unwanted units. It's a button-press option on the screen where you can outfit/equip guys for battle in the Patapon village... units menu.coldfrog said:
Um in the first one if you went to the outfitting screen, selected the faction/group of fighters and then hovered over the guy you wanted to get rid of and pressed either x or the select button you could delete them.(it's been awhile since I played the first one but I do remember that it was possible to do something to that extent)coldfrog said:
EDIT AGAIN:
it seems I was ninja'd
My god, it took me another ten minutes with this verified information to actually figure out what to do. The button is select, which in the options is called "Quit". I sat there looking at this, thinking it just meant quit back to the village, but NOOOOooooOOOo, you're supposed to somehow understand it means "Retire this unit"... I... I... HAAHHHHHGHGHGHGHGHGHG!!!!Clemenstation said:
Ahem.
Anyway, thanks a ton, this makes the game significantly better to me.
EDIT: thinking about it, it's still a bit of a poor design decision, as you have to kill him off in the prepare for battle screen, then go back to the village, but I'm honestly willing to live with that because now I can delete all my wimpy 'Pons for MEATY special ones! wahoo!
It's definitely not just you. I had pretty much the same reaction of 'Jesus, that's unintuitive.' Had to go to Gamefaqs to find out how to get rid of guys, which I felt pretty sad about. Any time players need a third-party FAQ to access / learn about a fundamental game function, you know you've gone wrong somewhere.coldfrog said:
I guess they did so much right they just had to drop the ball somewhere. To be fair, if more games had a problem like this as opposed to, say, boring unoriginal gameplay, I would be just fine with it. I wonder if it was just a translation error that slipped through the cracks somehow... Eh, I dunno. No use worrying about it now.Clemenstation said:
Needless to say, I most certainly will be getting the second one now.
You all will be pleased to hear that Patapon 2 works very different there so that the need to retire units does not arise (and is not possible) anymore.Clemenstation said:
They worked it out that each single one has his own evolution tree with levels per "flavour".
You can always change within the tree and keep previous advancements for later.
The birds are one of the new classes (with magicians, robo-pons and others).Clemenstation said:
New command songs have also been added (jump, cure status), as well as new minigames.
I totally forgot that this game would be released so late as we have it for quite some time in Europe. My personal opinion? This game would even be worth 40$.
Rundown of changes in Patapon 2
1. Bosses no longer have attacks that permanently kill units. So you will never again lose an expensive unit to a boss fight.
2. The Hero Pon, he functions as fourth squad and can be changed to any type of Pon you have. Every time you get a perfect sequence he powers up his special ability, ranging from a single powerful explosion attack with the Yaripon form to the rolling rampage of destruction with the Robopon form.
3. You evolve through the evolution tree for each individual pon and can evolve back to any form you want. You can also level up each form which increases stats depending on form. You can even level up your basic Pon form if you don't have expensive materials.
4. You gain most of your new Pons through evolution. Go through the right part of the tree and each form gives you a new one.
5. Each minigame has different difficulty levels. Depending on the difficulty and how well you do you get different materials as rewards. Unfortunately playing the minigames costs Ka-ching now instead of materials. Each difficulty costs more than the previous but you get better rewards.
Those are the ones I can remember off the top of my head. It's really fantastic and you should check it out.
1. Bosses no longer have attacks that permanently kill units. So you will never again lose an expensive unit to a boss fight.
2. The Hero Pon, he functions as fourth squad and can be changed to any type of Pon you have. Every time you get a perfect sequence he powers up his special ability, ranging from a single powerful explosion attack with the Yaripon form to the rolling rampage of destruction with the Robopon form.
3. You evolve through the evolution tree for each individual pon and can evolve back to any form you want. You can also level up each form which increases stats depending on form. You can even level up your basic Pon form if you don't have expensive materials.
4. You gain most of your new Pons through evolution. Go through the right part of the tree and each form gives you a new one.
5. Each minigame has different difficulty levels. Depending on the difficulty and how well you do you get different materials as rewards. Unfortunately playing the minigames costs Ka-ching now instead of materials. Each difficulty costs more than the previous but you get better rewards.
Those are the ones I can remember off the top of my head. It's really fantastic and you should check it out.
Something no one else mentioned was if you have a Patapon 1 save file on your memory card you can transfer all the materials and kaching you had into your new game.
Of course materials in the first game consisted of 4 quality levels of:
Wood
Ore/Stone
Alloy
Meat
Vegetables (Basically meat but cheaper)
Now, not only do you need much more than you did in Patapon 1, there are 5 quality levels of:
Wood
Ore/Stone
Alloy
Meat
Vegetables (Now completely different from meat)
Fangs
Bones
Skin
Seeds
Juice
Also for some odd reason some of the new materials have only been partially translated eg. Mudada Bone instead of Useless bone.
Aside from that, something I thought that was missing from Patapon 1 were replayable vs. army mission instead of just bosses. Patapon 2 delivers on that and also gives us training missions like a distance challenge and survival game.
Since I loved Patapon 1 so much I don't know if I'm a good judge of whether or not others should get it but if you liked the original at all, get the sequal.
What, are you still here? Get it! NOW! Make it sell well enough so they make another one!
Of course materials in the first game consisted of 4 quality levels of:
Wood
Ore/Stone
Alloy
Meat
Vegetables (Basically meat but cheaper)
Now, not only do you need much more than you did in Patapon 1, there are 5 quality levels of:
Wood
Ore/Stone
Alloy
Meat
Vegetables (Now completely different from meat)
Fangs
Bones
Skin
Seeds
Juice
Also for some odd reason some of the new materials have only been partially translated eg. Mudada Bone instead of Useless bone.
Aside from that, something I thought that was missing from Patapon 1 were replayable vs. army mission instead of just bosses. Patapon 2 delivers on that and also gives us training missions like a distance challenge and survival game.
Since I loved Patapon 1 so much I don't know if I'm a good judge of whether or not others should get it but if you liked the original at all, get the sequal.
What, are you still here? Get it! NOW! Make it sell well enough so they make another one!
Well. It's 45 euro's here in Belgium.dnadns said:
FORTY. FIVE. EURO'S.
Convert it to $, and agree with me that I should move to another country.
But...but that's enough for a console game in the states...Saphatorael said:
*Spends the rest of the night clinging to America*
Oh, yeah. 65 euro's for a 360 or PS3 game. 'sup.SilentFish said:
Anyhoo, to be on-topic for a change: Patapon 2 does indeed have vast improvements over the first game, but altogether, it's just more of the same. And I've kind of gotten tired of it. (The beginning is nigh identical, save for the heropon)
You should look up which country I am from ;-)Saphatorael said:
But you should not forget that prices are not that easily comparable.
Afaik the game can only be bought over the PSN in the US while it is also released on UMD and PSN in all other regions.
The UMD sold for 45? here, too, but I bought it via the PSN which was a bit cheaper.