Super Robot Wars

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Video Games > Super Robot Wars

Samurai Sanders: Nov 4, 2003; Pillbug

What is Super Robot Wars?
It's a long running tactical RPG series starring anime robots. It's made by Banpresto, a division of Bandai-Namco that does pretty much just this. It's like your thirteen year old self's crazy ramblings about how Mazinger Z and Voltron would totally be awesome fighting evil alongside Gundams and Evangelions and Macross units and stuff, except it's real and just as awesome as you think.

What does it play like?
A lot like Fire Emblem (the first in both series appeared right around the same time), but more forgiving in general, with no permanent unit death or anything. The most important difference though is that each unit is a pilot and a robot, and both contribute different stats to movement and combat. Other common features are:

- A system of mental abilities that consume a very difficult to replenish resource and give characters things like 100% chance to hit for the next turn, reduced damage for the next incoming attack, circumventing enemies' defensive abilities, getting double xp on the next combat action, and so on.

- A system where units build morale over the course of a battle, and you need above a certain amount to use certain attacks. This is designed to emulate the "you can't use your most powerful attack until the end of the episode" shtick in robot anime.

- Multiple main characters, multiple paths and multiple endings, and tons of secrets to either get through luck or careful examination of FAQs to trigger hidden flags in the game.

- Optional objectives in each stage which adjust the difficulty level dynamically (get more of them and future stages start becoming more difficult)

- All kinds of ways to modify robots and give pilots new abilities, and to some extent switch pilots around between robots.

- Features unique to each source anime, such as power cable connecting/disconnecting from Evangelion, OPEN GET, Trans-Am from Gundam 00, and so on.

What does it look like?

There are six basic parts to the game.

talking about stuff:

pre-battle unit setup:

a character sheet:

the map and command list:

getting ready to attack:

ORAAAA!!

post-kill awesome pose

Combat animations are the only thing that really goes into trailers for this game so just watch these:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Fi26MKyl7Y
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OGLv6yM6O9U

Why won't this ever become a thing outside of Japan?
Because the foreign licences for these animes are ancient, unknown, unreachable, and otherwise cost prohibitive for the developer to get at. That, plus all the other reasons why really, really Japanese games often don't leave Japan. Leave your just world hypothesis at the door when you start talking about games like this.

Why should I care about this if I don't speak Japanese?
Because dedicated individuals (including people inside this thread) have compiled a BIG rear end WIKI dedicated to explaining the ins and outs of the series to English speakers. This page is more complete than most Japanese fan pages about SRW, seriously. And, same as Final Fantasy or whatever, once you learn the menu layout and terminology for one game, you've pretty much learned them all. There are also some fan translation projects, but I'll leave it to them to explain the status of them.

If I were to buy a game in this series, where should I start?
You should probably start with Super Robot Wars Z3: Jigoku-hen, which comes out on April 10th for the PS3 and PS Vita. There is both a disc and same-day download version of both. It is the third game in the Z series, but also the first on the PS3, and thas bunch of animes with high recognition in the West such as Evangelion (the new movie version), Gundam Wing Endless Waltz, and Gunbuster (which has high recognition inside my mind if not in the real world). Most of the screenshots above are from that game.

What is the history of this series?
SRW started as a humble Gameboy game in 1991 (which is interestingly being remade and thrown in as a freebie with the newest game, developed by another company called Winkysoft. They developed the original series of SRW1 (GB)
through SRW4 (SNES), and then SRW4 was upgraded/ported to the PS1 and Saturn as SRW Final. Then, Winkysoft left the series and Banpresto took over, and gave us SRW Alpha, the first of the modern age of SRW games. The universe of Alpha is somewhat a continuation of that of the original series, but also covered a lot of the same things story-wise.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JAFtu4Vmk04

The Alpha series proceeded onto the PS2 and finished with Alpha 3, the current grand champion of the series as far as massive scope and happy saving-the-galaxy feelings.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8SgjrqWwFGI

The Alpha series closed, Banpresto started the Z series, which is an entirely new world with no connection to the old continuity (that we have seen so far). The first game was on the PS2, and was pretty rad.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FR_lVjlNb_I

But then moved to the PSP, and people like me expected a drop in quality at this point, but there was not one in particular.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wQqRA1R68V0

One thing that did change though is that the second game was broken up into two halves, but each one was a full-length game. That appears to be what will happen with Z3 as well. They are usually referred to as Z2-1 and Z2-2, and Z3-1 and eventually Z3-2. So basically the Z series will have five games in it, and the fourth is about to be released.

Are there other SRW games besides these?
Oh my yes, there are at least fifty non main line, spin-off or otherwise affiliated games on basically every game platform there has ever been (with the exception of the PC). However, most of them are not very good and not worth mentioning. What IS worth mentioning though is the Original Generation (OG) series, which is the only one to have ever found its way outside of Japan, under the name Super Robot Taisen 1 and 2 on the GBA. This is possible because OG has only Banpresto-owned characters and robots, not anime. The most recent game is SRW Original Generations 2 on the PS3. It has some mechanical advantages over the other games, such as the ability to put almost any pilot in almost any robot, and switch weapon systems around between robots. If you were to start playing the series now, this would also be a likely choice.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RLO-Ox2Lrsw

Music?
MUSIC!!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r3HcfmPAxCY

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FPsSYxDXHsE

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UN00p8MNajg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mtwgm_IQ2s4

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BdD3K83IMN4
(This is JAM Project, the official band of SRW)

You must love the hell out of anime to enjoy this game
Ironically, I don't even really watch anime anymore; I haven't for several years now. This series delivers me everything I like about anime but in a much more entertaining format. Also, this series usually takes the opportunity to fix glaring plot idiocy in the anime story, making it hard to go back to a reality where Shinji Ikari didn't have Ryoma Nagarae to teach him how to man up.

I want to talk about other Japanese robot games in this thread!
Ok.

Hit the gong, everyone! It's time to save the galaxy!

Samurai Sanders fucked around with this message at 02:00 on Apr 19, 2014

# ¿ Apr 2, 2014 09:09

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# ¿ Apr 26, 2024 08:28

Samurai Sanders: Nov 4, 2003; Pillbug

Broken Loose posted:

If you want a starting point for the series and don't care about language, get SRW Z1 (PS2 Classic for PS3) off the PSN store. It's only 1500 yen and it's one of the best SRWs ever made.

Yeah, I'm playing it again right now and indeed it is. The emulation isn't perfect though, some animations are slightly out of sync with music and sound effects. When Sandman says "Grand Knights, gasshin seyo!" his bizarre arm gesture is at the wrong time. This is serious business.

Broken Loose posted:

Man, that is a really boring thread title.

All I got was stupid suggestions for a comedy thread title.

# ¿ Apr 2, 2014 17:34

Samurai Sanders: Nov 4, 2003; Pillbug

Rascyc posted:

It's always fun learning a new SRW game. My Japanese fluent friend is baffled I've played so many SRW titles and I still don't know how to read the menus. Apparently everyone picks this up pretty quickly but all this time I've just become accustomed to where all the menu items are from game to game. They rarely change.

Of course there's that awkward hour where I trial/error how to form squads in every squad based game, heh.

A friend of mine learned how to play the first Disgaea game in Japanese, just as it came out, when literally no one on earth knew what the gently caress to make of it. He learned how to play it way faster than me, given that unlike him, I could actually read it. Now THAT'S dedication.

Samurai Sanders fucked around with this message at 05:28 on Apr 3, 2014

# ¿ Apr 3, 2014 05:24

Samurai Sanders: Nov 4, 2003; Pillbug

Race Realists posted:

15 years old and you sound like a loving 30 year old

I believe Heero's actually a ~~500 year old vampire~~ 30-something veteran who just looks fifteen because of the art style.

# ¿ Apr 3, 2014 06:21

Samurai Sanders: Nov 4, 2003; Pillbug

Spiritus Nox posted:

Well, these games have at least made me somewhat familiar with...Katakana, I think? The characters they use to spell out engrishy poo poo like Gundam or non-Japanese names? I can sort of...pronounce those. Kind of.

Technically, being able to pronounce them isn't a requirement, as long as you can visually distinguish names and terminology from each other. That's how the friend I mentioned before played Disgaea without reading Japanese.

# ¿ Apr 3, 2014 07:14

Samurai Sanders: Nov 4, 2003; Pillbug

Huh, were the previous worlds ever called UCW and ADW before? I don't remember them having names, so they were just "the world ZEUTH is from" and "the world ZEXIS is from" to me.

And of course, both of them are crazy patchwork worlds themselves as well.

edit: the prologue seems to suggest that the story starts in UCW (the world of Z1), but I can't really tell.

Samurai Sanders fucked around with this message at 08:02 on Apr 3, 2014

# ¿ Apr 3, 2014 07:57

Samurai Sanders: Nov 4, 2003; Pillbug

Wow, so the worlds are merging back together again? It's gonna be even harder for me to remember who and who are original world buddies, or maybe it doesn't matter anymore. Also, I guess that's an opportunity to do what I said before and get rid of that extra Japan, which has outlived its usefulness and is only a source of confusion.

I'll definitely be getting a 5000 yen card from Play Asia here pretty soon, since I have about 4000 yen left over from some previous purchases.

edit: is the ocean red in this new world? Or just some of the ocean?

edit: I guess GX and Turn-A are both out, so there's no need for confusion regarding the moon either...except maybe between Gurren Lagann and Aquarion EVOL?

Samurai Sanders fucked around with this message at 17:53 on Apr 3, 2014

# ¿ Apr 3, 2014 17:48

Samurai Sanders: Nov 4, 2003; Pillbug

And everyone on every Earth is completely used to it by now. People wake up and look out the window and see a new extra moon in the sky and unknown giant robots stomping and say eh, and go back to sleep.

edit: It's funny to try to think of the government implications for a world like that. I wonder if there are rednecks waving around signs saying "dimensional immigrants took my job!" and politicians have to appease them by promising to secure the world's dimension borders.

Samurai Sanders fucked around with this message at 18:29 on Apr 3, 2014

# ¿ Apr 3, 2014 18:07

Samurai Sanders: Nov 4, 2003; Pillbug

Caphi posted:

"As Hibiki works to master the Genion's new power, Suzune has a fit of irrational hysteria towards him and takes the Genion out herself."

For gently caress's sake, Z3, you're not helping me have any hope about Suzune whatsoever.

(I know it's actually going to be something that's supposed to make sense in the context of the Gemini's feedback, but that doesn't make it sound or feel any better, especially when they actually use the word "hysteria.")

It wouldn't surprise me at all if it was still common belief in Japan that hysteria only affected women.

But just to check, what's the pre-translation source for that?

# ¿ Apr 4, 2014 17:38

Samurai Sanders: Nov 4, 2003; Pillbug

Caphi posted:

Oh, sorry. It's at the bottom of the new page detailing DLC chapters.

ジェニオンの新たな力を使いこなそうとするヒビキに対して、スズネは理不尽なヒステリーをぶつけ、自らジェニオンに乗り込む。

Yep, definitely using the same word, and checking the j/j dictionary it says "usually said to affect women but can be seen in men as well".

# ¿ Apr 4, 2014 17:46

Samurai Sanders: Nov 4, 2003; Pillbug

ImpAtom posted:

I can not roll my eyes enough. I don't have a lot of confidence in these originals.

Yeah, they are the only part of the game I have no interest in at all. And I loved Esther, she was my favorite original in a long time. But then they had to go all, well, I wanna say Frank Miller, but there's probably a better example somewhere, on her.

# ¿ Apr 4, 2014 18:10

Samurai Sanders: Nov 4, 2003; Pillbug

ImpAtom posted:

Yeah, I'm in the same boat. Esther was fun right up until the point they went Fridgey with her. I kind of hope she gets to show up in Z3 and do something awesome.

Oh god I hope so. Please Esther, save us from boring and inept original characters! Charge straight into both work and love! (or however it's commonly translated)

I don't care whether Crowe shows up again or not.

# ¿ Apr 4, 2014 18:15

Samurai Sanders: Nov 4, 2003; Pillbug

They really need to improve their batting average for original characters recently, especially if they aren't going to give us a choice any more.

# ¿ Apr 4, 2014 19:10

Samurai Sanders: Nov 4, 2003; Pillbug

Luceid posted:

I liked Esther, at least, but this new crew don't look interesting at all. How many stages do we have to wait to get the real heroes, the Buster Machine Corps?

As soon as Noriko shows up, everyone else goes on the back shelf. She is the real star of SRW. All of it. Even the games she isn't in.

edit: surely Z3-1 is not going to skip a whole bunch of her early story like Alpha 1 did?

Samurai Sanders fucked around with this message at 01:55 on Apr 5, 2014

# ¿ Apr 5, 2014 01:48

Samurai Sanders: Nov 4, 2003; Pillbug

TARDISman posted:

I guess someone at Banpresto thought Brasta looked REALLY nice but had no loving clue how to make it move.

They were wrong, since it looks like a mass-produced variant of a hero robot in any robot anime.

# ¿ Apr 5, 2014 02:51

Samurai Sanders: Nov 4, 2003; Pillbug

It just occurs to me that we're gonna run up against Edel's prediction of Hathaway's death. I wonder if they're gonna make a thing of that, and then I wonder if saving him will activate the secret path, a la Shirley in Z2-2?

Squallege posted:

This right here is the truest of truths. Gunbuster for life!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sdhSVlhxzrs&t=44s
Only she gets to yell the game's title.

Samurai Sanders fucked around with this message at 06:31 on Apr 5, 2014

# ¿ Apr 5, 2014 06:28

Samurai Sanders: Nov 4, 2003; Pillbug

I also didn't see it, but according to the official website, that is indeed when it came out as its own thing, the price should be 3000 yen. I don't think I'll partake of it though, Neo Granzon is cool and it would be nice to see Selena I guess, but I'm not interested in anything that happens in La Geas.

# ¿ Apr 6, 2014 21:04

Samurai Sanders: Nov 4, 2003; Pillbug

Yeah I can't find it either, I searched for everything with "スーパーロボット大戦" in its title, found all the SRW games I know about on the PSN (including Infinite Battle), but not that.

edit: Famitsu still lists it as "spring 2014" and that's it.

Samurai Sanders fucked around with this message at 22:00 on Apr 6, 2014

# ¿ Apr 6, 2014 21:52

Samurai Sanders: Nov 4, 2003; Pillbug

Wait wait, hold on. I totally misread the official page. It says this:

quote:

3,000円（税込）※2014年3月31日迄の価格で表示しております。
発売日：
好評発売中(2013年11月28日発売)
単体でのダウンロード販売は2014年春を予定

All it's saying is that as of 3/31, it is showing the tax included price, and that the bundle with Infinite Battle was released on 11/28, and it will be available individually in spring 2014.

# ¿ Apr 6, 2014 22:04

Samurai Sanders: Nov 4, 2003; Pillbug

This is embarrassing but I just found out Chobham armor is an actual thing and not some anime thing that always happens to be the lowest level of optional armor in SRW games.

# ¿ Apr 6, 2014 22:36

Samurai Sanders: Nov 4, 2003; Pillbug

ImpAtom posted:

Is there an exact price for the download version, by the way? I'm seeing pretty conflicting reports.

What does "very conflicting" mean?

It should be 8715 yen (8070 + 8% sales tax).

# ¿ Apr 7, 2014 01:57

Samurai Sanders: Nov 4, 2003; Pillbug

TheManSeries posted:

Is the sales tax for foreigners too or just locals?

How were you planning to avoid it as a foreigner? Email Sony and ask for it to be refunded to you?

edit: or do you mean a physical copy? In which case, I have no idea. Japan's consumption tax law just changed literally five days ago and I dunno the details other than going from 5% to 8%.

# ¿ Apr 7, 2014 02:12

Samurai Sanders: Nov 4, 2003; Pillbug

I'm getting more and more interested to see what the remake of SRW1 is like. Will it have modern features like animation skipping and stuff? Will it be...playable?

# ¿ Apr 7, 2014 08:22

Samurai Sanders: Nov 4, 2003; Pillbug

Nephrite posted:

When do things usually go up on the Japanese PSN? Will it be around 12pm on the 10th (Japan time), or does it tend to vary?

I forget, it's midday sometime.

edit: I still can't understand why these things can't just start automatically at midnight. Do they really need a human to flip the switch that makes the game downloadable?

Samurai Sanders fucked around with this message at 18:39 on Apr 7, 2014

# ¿ Apr 7, 2014 17:55

Samurai Sanders: Nov 4, 2003; Pillbug

Okay, my JP PSN account is all "charged" (still dunno why they use that word for when you put money INTO it) and if its like previous times I have done this, it will show up sometime after work tomorrow, but NOT early enough that it will finish downloading/installing before I have to go to sleep. Oh well.

# ¿ Apr 9, 2014 09:50

Samurai Sanders: Nov 4, 2003; Pillbug

Kanos posted:

Should we expect it at 12-1 AM EST?

Whatever 1-2pm or so Japan time is in EST.

edit: it would finish in time if PS3 downloading was as fast as Steam, but alas, it's like a cocktail straw in comparison. And then installing takes another million years too.

Samurai Sanders fucked around with this message at 10:11 on Apr 9, 2014

# ¿ Apr 9, 2014 09:56

Samurai Sanders: Nov 4, 2003; Pillbug

Eternal Volfogg posted:

[spoiler]

Thats all i've got of it, if someone can read moonspeak, maybe they can translate whats happening.

"It seems I don't suit this robot very well, so I'll leave the rest to you"

# ¿ Apr 9, 2014 17:34

Samurai Sanders: Nov 4, 2003; Pillbug

Looking at it again, I just saw where her seat belt is. That's gotta chafe like crazy.

edit: wait poo poo, I'm supposed to be objectifying her and not thinking of how I would feel in her place.

Samurai Sanders fucked around with this message at 19:06 on Apr 9, 2014

# ¿ Apr 9, 2014 18:35

Samurai Sanders: Nov 4, 2003; Pillbug

I expect the PS3 version to appear on the PS store in an hour or two...and then take loving five hours to download and another hour to install. Still, it's marginally faster than having it mailed to me.

Samurai Sanders fucked around with this message at 04:16 on Apr 10, 2014

# ¿ Apr 10, 2014 04:13

Samurai Sanders: Nov 4, 2003; Pillbug

Does the website reflect the same content as the store on the PS3 itself? Should I just be F5ing the website periodically or do I need to do it on the PS3 also?

# ¿ Apr 10, 2014 05:14

Samurai Sanders: Nov 4, 2003; Pillbug

Hm, it's about an hour overdue compared to what I expected. At this point I'm hoping it at least shows up before I go to bed.

# ¿ Apr 10, 2014 07:02

Samurai Sanders: Nov 4, 2003; Pillbug

To people saying that its on the Vita store, and saying the web store updates at a different time than on the PS3...why the hell don't they all update at the same time? They're all just different expressions of the same underlying content, right? What kind of mickey mouse operation are they running over there?

edit: I give up; I'll have to check again tomorrow morning. Stupid Japanese internet incompetence.

Samurai Sanders fucked around with this message at 09:51 on Apr 10, 2014

# ¿ Apr 10, 2014 08:42

Samurai Sanders: Nov 4, 2003; Pillbug

I had just time this morning to play two missions. ECS on the FMP units is not what I expected, it's a one time seishin buff at the beginning of the stage. Also there are still two Japans.

# ¿ Apr 10, 2014 18:40

Samurai Sanders: Nov 4, 2003; Pillbug

BlitzBlast posted:

It's Zetas all the way down in Z3. And hopefully that goes double for Z3.2.

And no Roux to pilot at least one of them...

# ¿ Apr 11, 2014 04:17

Samurai Sanders: Nov 4, 2003; Pillbug

Man, Kaname and Sousuke have some GREAT portraits. I'd be disappointed if it was any less.

I can't wait to see Melissa Mao and Misato meet up, they have so much in common. Speaking of her...

Lostconfused posted:

You missed the best one.

"Cool as hell!"

His gimmick is that he is a dumb kid.

It's better than Denzel and Setsuko's "have a go!" from Z1. Speaking of Denzel, he struck me immediately as pretty much a dead ringer for Melissa, but I guess they won't ever meet...

# ¿ Apr 11, 2014 05:29

Samurai Sanders: Nov 4, 2003; Pillbug

I played some of SRW1HD, did anyone else? I didn't realize that there were no pilots in that game, it's just robots. Also when your robots get blown up they're gone forever. I guess it has no story to speak of either. I guess it's good as a curiosity, at least.

# ¿ Apr 11, 2014 06:51

Samurai Sanders: Nov 4, 2003; Pillbug

Kaname Chidori always was the most easily bored anime schoolgirl ever. Three months after the entire world was altered, yet again, by dimension quakes, she is like "I'm so boooored why isn't anything happening?" She reminds me of the description of Animal Mother in Full Metal Jacket.

She's never going to actually be a pilot, is she...

# ¿ Apr 11, 2014 17:45

Samurai Sanders: Nov 4, 2003; Pillbug

Daler Mehndi posted:

She could probably take out a few terrorists with a paper fan.

I was thinking more along the lines of that one episode in season 2 where she becomes extremely self-motivated in Sousuke's absence.

That show definitely had its moments.

# ¿ Apr 11, 2014 18:06

Samurai Sanders: Nov 4, 2003; Pillbug

The man called M posted:

That man gives no fucks.

There are no fucks to give when you're driving around in a tin can while everyone else has some kind of magic nuclear plasma robot.

# ¿ Apr 11, 2014 18:19

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# ¿ Apr 26, 2024 08:28

Samurai Sanders: Nov 4, 2003; Pillbug

BlitzBlast posted:

The Delta Plus' heritage is a long and twisted one,

but as you can see it's both a Zeta and a Hyaku Shiki ripoff.

A Zeta Plus model was one of the only Gundam models I ever made, that thing is badass.

edit: has it ever shown up in SRW? Not that I'm requesting another Zeta variant or anything.

Samurai Sanders fucked around with this message at 03:16 on Apr 12, 2014

# ¿ Apr 12, 2014 03:11

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Video Games > Super Robot Wars

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