Legend of WuKong

[Jared Patton]

I wanted to post some impressions about this in the other thread but it was locked for some reason. Anyways I got this yesterday and played some this morning, so keep in mind I've only experienced a small portion of the game.

Pros:
- Generally the game has a simple charm to it, much like Lunar, DQ & Albert Odyssey. It's very easy to pick up and play without investing time into crazy customization. You gain magic automaticlly by leveling, and you have your basic Armor & Weapons to equip. Nothing fancy, but I like that.
- Money, Experience, Items & difficulty are well distributed. You have to do a little grinding at the begining but besides that it's not too difficult or too easy.
- Battles are quick. This helps if you need money for a certian item, or need to do a little leveling.
- The Music is good. It's catchy and it never gets annoying.

Cons:
- The random encounter rate is a little too high. But I've played worse (Persona & Vay come to mind) On average it's about 4-5 seconds between fights. Not really a huge deal. But I'd like a little longer to walk around before being forced to fight.
- Running away doesn't work. A few fights I've gone in over my head so I tried running, but I've yet to successfully run away which ultimately lead to my death.
- The NPC sprites look awkward. I think they could've been cleaned up a little better.
- The death animation of enimes (if you can even call it that) is odd. It looks like they flash then glitch off the screen.
- Red font is used for the amount of HP that's being delt. Makes it hard to read.
- The menu cursor SFX is a little annoying
- I'm not sure if it's because I'm early in the game but my character whiffs his attacks like 25% of the time. Often he'll miss 3 times in a row. This is important early on because with just one character every hit counts.

Overall the think the pros outweigh the cons. Most of my cons are very nit-picky, and some might not even mind.

[Brian Moy]

I'm the one who locked it.   

I wanted each game discussed to have its own individual topic, but I didn't yet get around to starting either.  So I'm glad you did for Legend of Wukong. 

[Brian Moy]

I actually had a much longer reply to this - but after posting it I got errored out.      Which unfortunately happens every so often.  (and it didn't save my entry either)

First it is very nice to hear you put up the pros and cons so quickly.  Thanks!

I wanted to do the first quick reply to make sure I didn't get the error again, but I did have a lot to say on Legend of Wukong.

Basically, I am a big active supporter of Super Fighter Team.  To give you some perspective that I am NOT just your average classic video game forum chin wagger that's all opinion and does nothing (and there's so many of those):  I bought 3 copies new of Beggar Prince - 1st print, 2nd print, 3rd print.  I sold one of the copies of the first two prints when I found out there was no physical or packaging difference between the two.  I had Brandon Cobb, founder of Super Fighter Team sign the first copy of the game for me.  I stayed in touch with him and set up the interview with him on than I had John do. 

The one thing I keep in mind is that the game is a early release Genesis game originally.  And if you recall, most early release Genesis games back then had quirks and bugs - so that's how it was.

I have the perspective that Brandon and Super Fighter Team is doing something almost no one else is doing - that is putting out games for game systems that are for the most part, obsolete - except to classic collectors and people who grew up and still play the stuff like myself.  Seriously - most younger game players and people just into the mainstream stuff just don't get it.  I've talked with Brandon a bunch and he lives this stuff and knows what's going on.  You don't go thru the trouble of programming games for obsolete systems, creating new original artwork, getting new factory produced parts - to get rich.  And its completely unfair to compare what they do with what many other retro publishers do - release old games on remanufactured cartridges or on playable CD-R with store bought game cases and home printed covers.  A lot of the homebrew and translated rom or beta releases are still very valuable to collectors - I'm just saying that's different.

Also, you have to keep in mind that although classic game collectors are few, they tend to be very opinionated.  Beggar Prince got a lot of criticism from the community, which is why they reprogramed the game for an updated release to fix bugs that were there, limitations in the code of the original game, not the fault of Super Fighter Team.  When you consider that really no one else is putting out new retail product for out of print systems, I really have a lot of respect for that and really I'm not so sure you'd find too many other people willing to commit enough to put out a product as good - and then have much of your audience bitch at you for what it is not, rather than for what it is.

[Jared Patton]

Thanks for your insight. I hope my negative comments didn't paint an ignorant picture about myself, but maybe I am when it comes to homebrew stuff. Since this is my first one I really don't know what goes into putting together something like this. And until a few months ago I didn't know stuff like this was going on. I instantly wanted to throw in my support.

As the years go on and the more old-school games I beat there's also less & less. I like the fact of playing something new and fresh but at the same time old. Guess that's kinda confusing. I felt the same way with Mega Man 9. So this is the perfect way to keep the sub-culture alive. But that doesn't mean I'll just buy any & everything. Even for my old-school games I must hold them up to some kind of caliber.

With that said I'm excited to play more of Legend of Wukong. I have the next 2 days off so I plan on getting in some quility gaming time.

[Brian Moy]

I hope my negative comments didn't paint an ignorant picture about myself, but maybe I am when it comes to homebrew stuff.

I didn't mean to imply that YOU were one of the bitches.      I was just saying its important to put things into perspective, and I will admit I'm probably am bias from meeting Brandon.

I realize that in general, most people aren't aware of homebrew and independent stuff - so that's really why I have as much interest as I do in talking about that. 

And I don't mean to be pissy about semantics here, but Legend of Wukong is not a homebrew, its independent.  Legend of Wukong was originally a commercial release in Taiwan that Super Fighter Team localised and reprogrammed.  And as far as the localization, it wasn't just another hobbyist rom hack on a cart job.  I guess my point was that I was trying to differentiate Legend of Wukong from a homebrew - not that homebrews are good or bad, but Legend of Wukong is different.  To me, the word "homebrew" implies a more amateur job or associated with hacks or emulation, where this is a complete reprogramming of the code by a team, 100% newly manufactured and professionally produced product.  Homebrew releases are typically on recycled cartridges and chips, or on recordable media. 

Btw Rodimus, I sent you a private email today so I hope you got it.

[Brian Moy]

that doesn't mean I'll just buy any & everything. Even for my old-school games I must hold them up to some kind of caliber.

Oh I hear you!  That's why I very much appreciate your comments on the game as I haven't bought my copy yet.  (but I will, when I can spare the money or get some PayPal funds)

I am NOT a classic game whore.  Although what I like is actually very specific, and that kind of stuff I will put 100+ hours of playtime on, beating over and over consecutively.  I tend to be attracted to games that I completely admit are monotonous and so very slow paced they do put me to sleep while I'm playing.

I do completely understand that today is a very different era than ten years ago, as there is an overwhelming number of choices compared to then.  And with that, the level of expectation that game players have of their games is much different too with all the choices.

...

"And if you call in the next ten minutes, because we can't do this all day, we'll give you a second set absolutely free"


I'm sorry... I think I left my body for a minute there...

[Jared Patton]

Again my ignorance shows it's self again. I guess I just don't know the true definition of homebrew & independent.

I played some more last night and got to the first boss, the Demon Black Bear. Although he looks kinda cute for a Demon Bear. Anyways he mopped the floor with me. I held in there for awhile but I just ran out of items & MP. I was surprised cause I got through the dungeon just fine. I'm actually glad to see the game wont baby me.

Well, back to Wukong. Guess I gotta level some more.

[dante]

Again my ignorance shows it's self again. I guess I just don't know the true definition of homebrew & independent.

I played some more last night and got to the first boss, the Demon Black Bear. Although he looks kinda cute for a Demon Bear. Anyways he mopped the floor with me. I held in there for awhile but I just ran out of items & MP. I was surprised cause I got through the dungeon just fine. I'm actually glad to see the game wont baby me.

Well, back to Wukong. Guess I gotta level some more.

No worries, pal. A lot of the homebrew concepts and terminology often go right over my head.

[Jared Patton]

Thanks,  I don't feel so stupid now.

Finally got all three main characters in my party. I always feel more comfortable with an RPG once I get all the characters. Only then can I go all out level grinding.

[Brian Moy]

Its not too hard to understand.

Homebrew basically has the meaning of amateur games made by fans for fans.  The opposite of homebrew is commercial implying professional production with intentions of profit.  Independent means not associated with or authorized by the original hardware.  The specific definition of those terms do have some overlap, and they are even more grey as the subjects the labels go to are often based on opinion or interpretation of the level and scope of work put in. 

The reason Legend of Wukong isn't a homebrew is because it was originally a commercial release in Taiwan.  Companies like  and Atlus localise games they didn't themselves originally develop, but they reprogram them for new audiences that don't speak the original language, they have the permission of the original publishers of the title in the original language, and they have copies of the original code that they work on and reprogram - as opposed to someone who hacks into the rom code of a game and changes it without permission.

That's sort of the thing that Super Fighter Team is fighting - the perception of themselves in the homebrew/emulation scene.  Since no Genesis games have been at retail stores for about 10 years or so, its easy to make the association that the game is a homebrew, since no one else is releasing product for Genesis, and its easy to presume that although there's fans still putting releasing games at collector shows for obsolete systems such as 2600, , etc., that hardly any of them are going to go thru the trouble of hiring contract programmers, contract artists and a factory to produce a game as the intended audience for these games is a very small and specific crowd - so financially, it doesn't make sense for most people and companies to put out these games beyond the fan and volunteer level.

Hopefully I haven't made you feel too bad about that, as I DO respect you as an informed collector Rodimus.  I know Shirley that you would know more about the culture and history of Japanese games than I do - and I'll bet you could teach me things about J culture that I thought it was and am mistaken.  More than anything, I'm trying to stand up for Super Fighter Team against the perception of them as an amateur/volunteer development.

This is , so I want to talk about games that only a very specific audience tends to really know deeply about - so that a broader audience can be informed to understand and appreciate it too.  That is the reason I created so we all can learn about things we don't know! 

[Jared Patton]

Got to Chapter 4 last night. Not sure how far in I am. Wish I knew how many chapters there were.

Once you get all three characters the game becomes much easier. But I did do a lot of grinding so I'm sure that helps.

From what I understand your magic power doesn't level up. You're given a lot of new spells as a kinda upgrade to your old ones. For example in the beginning you're given a spell that does 27 HP worth of damage. The problem is it hits for 27 points the entire game. It doesn't get any stronger. Not really a big deal, but the new spells are very costly on MP. The good spells cost well above 50 MP when your character only has a total of 180 MPs.

[Jared Patton]

Took me a while but I finally beat it. I just created a review. Feel free to read and leave comments. Thanks.

[Brian Moy]

Took me a while but I finally beat it. I just created a review. Feel free to read and leave comments. Thanks.

Looks good.  I posted it to the FaceBook page.  I'll tell Brandon Cobb about it and he'd likely be pleased. 

[Jared Patton]

Cool, thanks. I still need to clean up some grammer & typos, but for some reason the editing tool isn't working correctly. After doing some edits I'll go to save but it ends up not saving. Not sure what to do.

[Brian Moy]

Cool, thanks. I still need to clean up some grammer & typos, but for some reason the editing tool isn't working correctly. After doing some edits I'll go to save but it ends up not saving. Not sure what to do.

The activity logs are empty so I can't exactly see what the issue is.  Try it again sometime, just do a quick change and save to test before you commit too much time into it.  If its still not working, email me directly specifically what you are doing and the errors.