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PSA for anyone who wants an old but solid JRPG to play - "Dark Cloud" is on sale for $5 on the PSN store for a couple more days.

Multievolution

Multievolution

Member
Jun 5, 2018
3,218
It's not a Zelda clone/killer despite what people from back then would have you believe, fan service is minimal at best and it's up res'd I believe so it's perfectly playable on modern tv's,
For those who don't know, it's setting is non-modern, featuring both 3rd person RPG combat dungeon exploring (which are procedurally generated, know that's a deal breaker for some) and also contains a element of rebuilding villages and the like, almost reminiscent of sims if not more basic, it still makes for a fun addition though and adds to the experience at least in my opinion.

Most of your levels are related to the weapons which you must maintain and upgrade along with new ones you find, eventually you can combine their stats to help with this and it's a refreshing experience, I would say for those who don't try to speed run it you'll easily get 30+ hours from the game, and maybe more if you try to do everything, lastly, while the visuals are of course 20 years old the soundtrack is still a personal favourite to this day, easily one of the best I've heard.

 
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SunBroDave

SunBroDave

Member
Oct 25, 2017
13,154
Dark Cloud 1 is really dated. Skip it and just play Dark Cloud 2 (completely unrelated story)
 
BriGuy

BriGuy

Banned
Oct 27, 2017
4,275
It's kind of like Actraiser in a way; each dungeon is tied to a village, you find items to build the village in the dungeons. You pick up, rotate, and place pieces of the village in accordance with what the villagers want. One guy wants to live by the river, another wants their house facing East so they can wake up with the sun, these two don't get along so you need to keep them separated, so on and so forth. The better you build an ideal village, the better you're rewarded.
 
Clive

Clive

Member
Oct 25, 2017
5,095
Feels like a better way to describe this in 2021 is a roguelite with town building elements. That's why I think Dark Cloud 3 would work on a modern market. JRPGs are dead but rogulites are the new hotness.

I liked aspects of the game when I tried it out last year but the dungeon crawling just got too repetitive after a while so I dropped it. The gameplay has some neat ideas but it feels very stiff.
 

Bundy

Banned
Oct 27, 2017
20,931
Dark Cloud 1 is more of an action adventure imho. Dark Cloud 2 (Dark Chronicle) is the JRPG one.
I like Dark Cloud 1 more tho.
 
Dakkon

Dakkon

Member
Oct 27, 2017
4,191
RatskyWatsky said:
What's the "restore the world sim like gameplay"?
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Basically the loop is this:

There's a dungeon next to the village that's mostly empty -> Go into dungeon, find parts for the village -> using villager clues, build village to make everyone happy -> go to next act with a dungeon next to the village that's mostly empty.
 
OP
OP
Multievolution

Multievolution

Member
Jun 5, 2018
3,218
SunBroDave said:
Dark Cloud 1 is really dated. Skip it and just play Dark Cloud 2 (completely unrelated story)
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I appreciate that a sequel exists but I feel the old one still does some things better, and while some people might find it's age a barrier to get into it I still say it's perfectly playable.


Clive said:
Feels like a better way to describe this in 2021 is a roguelite with town building elements. That's why I think Dark Cloud 3 would work on a modern market. JRPGs are dead but rogulites are the new hotness.

I liked aspects of the game when I tried it out last year but the dungeon crawling just got too repetitive after a while so I dropped it. The gameplay has some neat ideas but it feels very stiff.
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That's fair enough, can't expect everyone to like it, I've been playing the game for near enough 20 years (not continuously) so for me it doesn't bother me that much, I have to say though that the game only gets better as you play on, more depth and difficultly along with more cool stuff.
 
mojo

mojo

Member
Oct 25, 2017
1,972
Randomly got this and platinumed it last year. I think the game holds up pretty well and being able to platinum a game from my childhood just felt cool I guess.
 
AIan

AIan

Member
Oct 20, 2019
4,859
Decent game! My favorite element, by far, was the town-sim gameplay. Maxing the requests made you think about placing objects and houses, and it was satisfying getting to 100%. I liked the dialogue the townpeople had and their neat little subplots. The dungeon system was cool but I agree it did feel a bit repetitive at times, and I disliked how Dran's Feather was a temporary item (don't know if that changed in this version). Dark Cloud 2 handled things better overall but I admit I liked the town-sim in Dark Cloud 1 more.
 
My Blue Heaven

My Blue Heaven

Banned
May 19, 2020
4,828
dark cloud 1 has aged like milk while dark cloud 2 is evergreen. you've been warned, the ok town building in DC1 is put up against some of the dullest dungeon crawling imaginable.
 
OP
OP
Multievolution

Multievolution

Member
Jun 5, 2018
3,218
night814 said:
Dont PS2 classics on PS4 have some graphical errors on PS5 or is that only some titles?
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as far as I can tell it's not a problem with dark cloud, I don't have a ps5 to test it but someone who seemingly streamed it on twitch with a 5 had no issues, the problem as I understand it has to do with the power of the system, it loads quicker than the loading screens with some old ps2 games causing it to mess up, but as I say dark cloud 1 seems fine

My Blue Heaven said:
dark cloud 1 has aged like milk while dark cloud 2 is evergreen. you've been warned, the ok town building in DC1 is put up against some of the dullest dungeon crawling imaginable.
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I think you'll find while 2 is more cleaner and time friendly the what you call "dull dungeon crawling" is an opinion not a fact :)
 
My Blue Heaven

My Blue Heaven

Banned
May 19, 2020
4,828
Multievolution said:
I think you'll find while 2 is more cleaner and time friendly the what you call "dull dungeon crawling" is an opinion not a fact :)
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it certainly is an opinion but a fact is that i literally fell asleep playing dark cloud 1 during the dungeon where you get the axe boy or whatever lol. like many people i revisited a game from my youth that was actually kind of a stinker
 
Richietto

Richietto

One Winged Slayer
Member
Oct 25, 2017
22,981
North Carolina
Honestly I say spend a few bucks extra for Dark Cloud 2. Its a much better game and the first was already pretty good. If you really want to play the first one just prepare for some pretty dated stuff.
 
Pau

Pau

Self-Appointed Godmother of Bruce Wayne's Children
Member
Oct 25, 2017
5,846
Didn't realize this was available on PSN. Always been interested in playing. Thanks for the heads up!
 
Captain of Outer Space

Captain of Outer Space

Come Sale Away With Me
Member
Oct 28, 2017
11,336
I got it a few years ago and have enjoyed it a good bit after bouncing off of the game early on when it came out for the PS2. It still holds up pretty well, especially the combat stuff for such an early game in the PS2's life when those sorts of early PS2 action RPGs typically don't. It also wasn't as hard as I was expecting it to be either. Fun game still.

Never really got into Dark Cloud 2 at all. Had more fun when I got the new release on PS4 googling to find out why the main character sounded so familiar, which is because he's voiced by the actor behind Kevin French.
 
RatskyWatsky

RatskyWatsky

Are we human or are we dancer?
Member
Oct 25, 2017
14,931
Dakkon said:
Basically the loop is this:

There's a dungeon next to the village that's mostly empty -> Go into dungeon, find parts for the village -> using villager clues, build village to make everyone happy -> go to next act with a dungeon next to the village that's mostly empty.
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is it like the villa in Assassin's Creed 2
 
OmegaDL50

OmegaDL50

One Winged Slayer
Member
Oct 25, 2017
9,682
Philadelphia, PA
night814 said:
Dont PS2 classics on PS4 have some graphical errors on PS5 or is that only some titles?
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Some. I know Star Ocean 3 for example can cause the text the main menu and dialog boxes to have issues but that only happened once in the 7 hours I've played it so far, other than that it's pretty much better than as if was on the PS2. Loading and getting into the game is definitely much more smoother in my experience.
 
night814

night814

One Winged Slayer
Member
Oct 29, 2017
15,040
Pennsylvania
OmegaDL50 said:
Some. I know Star Ocean 3 for example can cause the text the main menu and dialog boxes to have issues but that only happened once in the 7 hours I've played it so far, other than that it's pretty much better than as if was on the PS2. Loading and getting into the game is definitely much more smoother in my experience.
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Multievolution said:
as far as I can tell it's not a problem with dark cloud, I don't have a ps5 to test it but someone who seemingly streamed it on twitch with a 5 had no issues, the problem as I understand it has to do with the power of the system, it loads quicker than the loading screens with some old ps2 games causing it to mess up, but as I say dark cloud 1 seems fine
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Cool that's good, I'll definitely get it and check it out eventually
 
Strat

Strat

Member
Apr 8, 2018
13,330
Dark Cloud feels barely like an RPG to me. It's a dungeon crawling hack and slash (with bad combat) and very light "design" elements. Building the villages is like placing furniture in an Animal Crossing house.
 
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Multievolution

Multievolution

Member
Jun 5, 2018
3,218
My Blue Heaven said:
it certainly is an opinion but a fact is that i literally fell asleep playing dark cloud 1 during the dungeon where you get the axe boy or whatever lol. like many people i revisited a game from my youth that was actually kind of a stinker
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As I say, that's fine, I personally think the one your referring to is my favourite dungeon in the game and could happily play through it all day, neither opinion is invalid I'd just rather avoid people thinking it's bad based on how strongly you worded yours and therefor skip it, I say watch some gameplay and make your own choices, or if you feel like going in blind go for it.



Strat said:
Dark Cloud feels barely like an RPG to me. It's a dungeon crawling hack and slash (with bad combat) and very light "design" elements. Building the villages is like placing furniture in an Animal Crossing house.
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It depends how you define an RPG, it has a levelling system applied to the weapons which while unique is still fairly advanced, it's combat is weak but then it's 20 years old, short of turn based combat not many games could boast amazing combat back then, and yes it's a basic town building system but it isn't overly convoluted whereas in the sequel I had no idea what I was doing with it.
 
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